AUGUST 8, 2021 SCRIPTURE AND SONG “REPENTANCE”

PSALM 40:5 Many, O Lord my God, are the wonderful works which You have done, and Your thoughts toward us; no one can compare with You! If I should declare and speak of them, they are too many to be numbered.

6. Sacrifice and offering You do not desire, nor have You delight in them; You have given me capacity to hear and obey (Your law, a more valuable service than) burnt and sin offerings which you do not require. Amp.

DEFINITIONS

Sacrifice – c) a slaughter, kill, slay.

Offering – c) donation, tribute.

Repent – d) to feel such regret over some past action, intention, etc., so as to change one’s mind.

The Lord is Love and full of loving kindness, mercy and compassion. If you think about all the animal sacrifices that Israel offered upon the altar of the temple, it is rather disturbing. Why did the Lord command them in the laws that He gave to Moses if He does not like them?

The offering was to awaken them to their sins and show them how vile they were. If you have light thoughts of sin, you will never turn away from them. Repentance means to confess your sins and turn away from them with a change of heart.

If you watched theses innocent animals being slaughtered for your sins without any regret or bad feeling, you were missing the point of it all. Psalm 97:10 says You who love the Lord, hate evil. We have a sin nature that causes sin to be normal and that is not right.

The sacrifices were preparing them for the true Lamb of God who would be slain for all sins of mankind. And we know the Father had no delight in the slaughter of His Son. But because of His great love for us He made a way for us to be forgiven. He made no way for the angels to be forgiven.

So now because of Jesus we have access to a new way of life. The people that lived before the cross could not come near the presence of God. Only the High Priest came and only once a year. He could not have any sin attached to him or he would be struck dead in the holy place and have to be pulled out by the cord that was attached to him. They could not even go into to get him.

We take all our great privileges for granted. For now we have been given access to the Father every moment of everyday. All we need is a contrite heart and to be truly sorry for our sins, enough to turn away from them. What is repentance?

I have heard the sounds of repentance in different churches that sounded good but were not true repentance. It was sin — confess, sin — confess, over and over because they keep repeating the same offenses, never coming to a deep sorrow for their sins.

Without godly sorrow, which is a very painful process, there is no forgiveness and no victory. When we hate anything that keeps us away from God and out of His will, we will pray earnestly for His help and not stop until help comes.

For the true Christian who loves the Lord and puts Him first in His life, Sin — Confess, Sin — Confess is just not good enough. He wants to be set free from the thing that God hates. He wants more than anything to be pleasing to the one he loves and will not stop until he is.

Psalm 51:17 My sacrifice (the sacrifice acceptable) to God is a broken spirit; a broken and a contrite heart (broken down with sorrow for sin and humbly and thoroughly penitent) such, O God, You will not despise. Amp.

SUBJECT — HEART RENDING — CH SPURGEON

Heart rending is divinely wrought and solemnly felt. It is a secret grief which is personally experienced not in mere form, but as a deep, soul-moving work of the Holy Spirit upon the inmost heart of each believer. It is not a matter to be merely talked of and believed in, but keenly sensitively felt in every living child of God.

It is powerfully humiliating and completely sin-purging; but then it is sweetly preparative for those gracious consolations which proud unhumbled spirits are unable to receive; and it is distinctly discriminating for it belongs to the elect of God and to them alone.

SONG — SOFTEN MY HEART — VINEYARD MUSIC