To Encourage You

2 Corinthians 7:10 “For godly grief produces a repentance that leads to salvation without regret, whereas worldly grief produces death.”

Some years ago, I had the opportunity to be involved in several short-term mission trips to Russia.  One of the things that I remember about the Russian Christians was the terms they used in talking about their salvation.  Rarely did they say that “they had become a Christian,” or that “they had been saved,” terms you hear in America so often when people talk about such things. No, the thing I remember that they so commonly said in Russia was that they had “repented.”  It’s how they spoke about their salvation.  So, what did they mean by this? Why did they put it this way? 

Well, the word “repentance” as it is used in the Scriptures means to have feelings of guilt that lead to a change of mind. It carries with it the idea of “turning around.”  It’s that idea that Paul was talking about in the verse above which referenced the effects of a letter he had written to the Corinthian church.  It was a letter that pointed out how they had been sinning against God.  The letter’s effect was to produce “godly grief” and that grief resulted in a change, a turning around in their minds and lives that was demonstrated by turning from their sin towards God. Such repentance is essential to salvation.  It’s something that we will never regret having done.  It’s a realization that our sins are a great offense against God which produces sorrow in our heart and a decision to turn away from the path we are on and never looking back.  It’s a determination to turn our back on the sinful, worldly course we’ve been on and follow hard after God. 

If such repentance does not describe us, it’s questionable if we are truly saved.  You see, there is another type of sorrow regarding sin that does not lead to salvation.  Paul calls it a grief that produces death. It’s the situation in which a person is sorry that they got caught up in a sinful lifestyle or sinful action because of the consequences. Perhaps it led to a broken relationship in their family, a divorce, disease, or who knows what else that was the result of reaping what they had sown.  But that grief doesn’t result in repentance. There’s no turning around. The “grief” over the sin, whether temporary or life-long, results in things like bitterness, regret, depression, or even suicide. Such was the nature of Judas’ grief over sin after he had betrayed the Lord.  His sorrow led to his own death.  On the other hand, Peter was also sorrowful when he denied the Lord three times. He wept bitterly because of it. Yet, he didn’t continue in that sin. He kept pursuing the Lord.  He was one of the first to visit the grave after Jesus rose from the dead.  He acknowledged his sin, had godly sorrow over it, and continued to follow hard after God.  His life had truly been transformed by Christ.  Despite his failings, he truly loved Jesus. At one time in His ministry, when many of Jesus supposed “disciples” turned away from Him, Jesus had asked the twelve apostles, “Do you want to go away as well?”   To this Peter answered “Lord, to whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life, and we have believed, and have come to know, that you are the Holy One of God” (John 6:66-69).  His mind was set on following Jesus no matter what. His was a life of repentance, of turning from sin and toward God. On the other hand, we are told that Judas was nothing more than a hypocrite. He “followed” Jesus, but all the while we are told that he was “a thief, and having charge of the moneybag he used to help himself to what was put into it” (John 12:6).  Sadly, he never changed. He sold out Jesus for 30 pieces of silver.  

So what about you?  Have you ever had a godly sorrow over your sin? Have you ever had a time when you consciously turned away from it in repentance, and turned toward Jesus?  Are you seeking your own pleasure or the glory of God with your life?  Are you content to live in your sin, or discontent with it all with a desire to turn from it to God?  You see, godly sorrow is a very good thing since it leads to repentance and eternal life.  But a life of sin, even if it includes sorrow because of that sin, leads only to death if there’s never a “turning around,” a “change of mind,” that is true of the repentance that always accompanies true salvation.