Chapter 9, Part 8

“Repent and turn away from all your transgressions, so
that iniquity will not be your ruin. Cast away from you
all the transgressions which you have committed, and
get yourselves a new heart and a new spirit.”
Ezekiel 18:30, 31

According to the scriptures in order for us to remain repentant we will need a new heart and a new spirit. Why is this necessary? Because our old hearts and spirits have been corrupted and perverted. Due to our worldliness, our love of this world’s pleasures, we are of no use to God. God cannot use us if we love the world or the things of the world.[1] Thank God that He loves us too much to leave us the way we are. One of the problems with the “easy gospel” is that the only thing we have to do to be reconciled with God is just to confess our sins, no change of heart is required. There is a difference between confession and repentance. Confession merely is an acknowledgment of what we have done, our sins. This is important but it is only half of the equation. One must go to the next step, which is repentance. We should go put away those transgressions, or sins. We can acknowledge we are fornicators all day long, but at some point we must begin to turn away from this behavior. Acknowledging our sin to God is like us acknowledging our image on a surveillance video. It is already known that this is us, we must take the next step and we can with the help of God. If the Spirit of the Living God is in you, you will change. We can delay it, but we cannot prevent it. God’s will; cannot be stopped. Our fighting against it only brings us more pain. God has a new life for us, as represented by the new heart and spirit, but for some unknown reason we want to continue living a powerless life.

“The Lord is not slack concerning His promise
as some count slackness, but is longsuffering
towards us, not willing that any should perish
but that all should come to repentance.”
2 Peter 3:9

Our God loves us so much He would let us die in our sins, He wants to allow us every opportunity to put them away and come to Him. We should thank Him, not only those of us who are saved but also those who are unsaved. He is being so very patient with this sinful people as we continue to parade our fornicating ways in front of His Holy presence. However, the time is drawing near when He is going to come for His people. At this very day He is calling us to be holy, because He is holy.[2] I pray that we repent while there is still time. No one knows the hour of His coming, but the good servant will be ready whenever that day is.[3] If we are busy doing His will then it will not matter when He comes. Beware of those who come prophesying the exact time of His arrival they are not of Him. If we are not caught up in our sinfulness it will not matter what day it is we will be ready.

“Then God saw there works, that they turned
from their evil way; and God relented from the
disaster that He said He would bring upon them,
and He did not do it.”
Jonah 3:10

The city of Nineveh was a very sinful and rebellious place, some would say comparable to our current society. But when confronted with their sinfulness they repented by the grace of God. God was so moved by their change of heart that He allowed Himself to be changed. He did not do what He had said He would. The lesson for us today is that if we forsake our evil ways, God will restore us to our place of fellowship with Him. If we stop laying with anybody and everybody, God will forgive and forget. However, unlike the city of Nineveh we hear the call of God, the pronouncement of His condemnation of our fornicating ways and ignore Him. I wish I could stress enough the thought that the sin for us, is that we refuse to let God do what we know He can do. We refuse to let God change us. We will not use the power that God has given us to change.

If we repent of this evil and live in the spirit with God the societal ills that we suffer from will be healed. Our children will stop killing each other, the drugs will be removed from our streets, and we will be respected as a people. This is only a small partial list of things God is waiting and willing to do for us. Some would say that I am being too naive and oversimplifying the problems. That our problems are much more complicated than that. I say thank God that He has used simple things to confound the wise of this world.[4] Do not be fooled by the enemy into thinking that we are going to solve this by intelligence and common sense. All sin can only be defeated by the Spirit of God which dwells within all those who are true believers and followers of God. God is the only one who can heal this people. The question then becomes, do we want to be healed?

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[1] 1 John 2:15

[2] Leviticus 11:44

[3] Matthew 24:36

[4] Matthew 11:25