Why Do I Do What I Don't Want To Do?
Repentance #2
Note: Thanks for the excellent response to the first post. I think this is a vital subject and requires us to take a fresh look at a word we’ve heard often. I appreciate your interest. I’m not throwing down three points and a poem on this one. I’m reflecting and thinking out loud without an outlined approach. I hope you’ll think along with me.
I want to be a godly man. I want to live a life that lifts up the Savior who died, arose, and is coming back. I want to be a good husband, father, grandfather, friend. I want to be a shining light, an example of good, and a person who puts others before self. And when I say those things, I am sincere.
I know that to live that kind of life, I am going to have to abandon some things. I’m going to have to develop in some areas. I am going to have to grow more knowledgable and more connected to God.
If all of my good intentions were only strong enough to be a consistent reality!
The problem is that I am a human being living in a broken world and sometimes I find it easier to be broken along with everything else around me. Repentance is a part of my ongoing experience with God because I do what I do not want to do.
Bible readers are already thinking of Apostle Paul’s startling confession.
I do not understand what I do. For what I want to do I do not do, but what I hate I do….For I do not do the good I want to do, but the evil I do not want to do—this I keep on doing.—Romans 7:15, 19
It is not startling because I fail to understand it. It is startling because I thought that Apostle Paul would have had a better grip on the Christian life by this point. I think that way because I still think that the Christian life is something I am able to accomplish on my own power. Listen to how Delffs writes about what happens when we are focused on our own strength and ability:
And when self is the motivation at the center of our energy, then the cycle spirals in on itself, breeding anger (that we’re not changing), fear (that we’ll never change), and despair (that even God can’t change us). So we end up with secrets, addictions, manipulations of others to get what we think we need to make us feel better, dark thoughts that maybe we’re just not cut out to be a follower, a truster of Jesus. We become committed to relieving our pain through whatever sinful resources —an affair, overeating, alcoholism, selfishly withdrawing —seem to provide temporary comfort. Or … denying that we’re struggling with much of anything at all … merely disguised as the self-righteousness of our “spirituality.” - Dudley J. Delffs, A Repentant Heart: The Joy of Restoring Intimacy With God, p. 18, 19.
If repentance is merely trying to feel better about ourselves, we are missing the point. One of the reasons I do what I do not want to do is the failure to understand repentance as an ongoing relationship with God. Instead, I easily slide into the belief that repentance is finding the power to make personal choices to make me a better person.
I’m not just a pretty good guy trying real hard to be a better guy. That weak outlook leaves me powerless to overcome something powerful that is living within me, and that is sin. At some point I have to realize that I’m not the guy I tried to be and presented myself to others as being. I’m a sinner who can’t make myself a former sinner by just tweaking a few bad characteristics, making a few improvements. With Apostle Paul, I reach the following conclusion and question:
What a wretched man I am! Who will rescue me from this body that is subject to death?—Romans 7:24
Jesus didn’t die on the cross so I could be a better version of myself.
There’s more to consider, but maybe we rush through this self examination because it’s not enjoyable. Until we really admit to ourselves the hopeless situation we are in when we are living on our own power and trying to use God as a step-up to better living, we remain “a wretched man.”
God has much more to say about this in his Word. But let it settle in for a bit before rushing to redemption. Be patient. We are not in a hurry. There aren’t five easy steps here.
Another newsletter you may find interesting:
Thanks for the thoughts. I particularly resonate with comments about the importance of relationship with God and living that relationship is so synonymous with repentance.
I wonder how wrong we can go if we centered our lives on simply living every in presence of God. I think Brother Andrew was really a great model for us here.
Such a good word here! Reminds me about a book I purchased last year that I'm yet to get to; 'Repentance the First Word of the Gospel' by Richard Owen Roberts.