Of Grace and Debt 4 (Repentance versus Remorse)

God is interesting in the way He teaches us.

One small question can lead us into great truths.

I did not expect the simple topic of our archived sin files leading us this far.

But here we are, looking at repentance and its counterfeit, remorse. We are also looking at rebellion, the fruit of remorse.

To the casual observer, remorse is not much different from repentance since it mouths the same words in the same way.

What is the difference? I know someone is wondering.

Repentance is a turning around. It is a changing course. It is deserting the route.

Remorse is feeling sorry, many times for being caught.

You will see the term, ‘I have sinned’, enough times with the remorseful.

But that is as far as it goes.

Remember pharaoh?

How many times did he use that statement and how serious was he, gauging by the outcome once the plague necessitating that confession was removed?

Remember Balaam?

I did not know You felt this bad. I could turn back if it affects You this much.

That was his response when he realised that his ass had saved him from death

And we see the same with king Saul when he was confronted, both times. And we see him when again he has to deal with David sparing his life, twice.

Do you realise that the same happened with Judas?

Remorse seeks to soften the blow our sin has attracted.

Now look at repentance.

David has ordered a census, gotten convicted and been given options.

God goes ahead to carry out the judgment that is not restricted to the offender as sins and their judgment mostly are.

And David spake unto the LORD when he saw the angel that smote the people, and said, Lo, I have sinned, and I have done wickedly: but these sheep, what have they done? let thine hand, I pray thee, be against me, and against my father's house. (2Samuel 24:7)

Repentance takes responsibility, full responsibility.

When Judas took the blood money back to the temple, he was in effect transferring his guilt to the leaders instead of taking responsibility for his part in the same.

And it was the same with Saul.

You were late. The army forced me.

Transferring or sharing the responsibility in the sinning has no capacity of freeing the sinner.

Sin is personal before it becomes corporate.

I will nurture lust before looking for or being found by a partner.

I will nurture greed before I can join the corrupt.

I must therefore deal with my sin personally before I can help somebody else deal with theirs.

And I must face it directly before God for anything worthwhile to occur.

Against thee, thee only, have I sinned, and done this evil in thy sight: that thou mightest be justified when thou speakest, and be clear when thou judgest. (Psalm 51:4)

We must be ready to face God because He is the One most intimately connected to the state of our spirits. He therefore knows the sin we are confessing beyond those feeble words we speak.

Look at the prodigal son.

He deals with God before attempting to deal with his father because he knew that it is only by getting right with God that we can be able to right things with people.

But remorse thinks otherwise because it confesses to the offended people or partners in sin.

And I think it is because they can easily be able to explain their fallibility to other fallible people

I tried my best or I will from today try my best makes enough sense to fallible man and is able to buy some sort of pardon from the offended.

But is that enough with God? Is it acceptable to God?

Imagine Peter taking the remorse route?

He would turn to the crowd he had been warming himself with and say something like this.

Look what you have made me do? How can you make me deny my Lord?

That is essentially what Judas did.

Remorse seeks to share the guilt but repentance transfers the full weight of the sin on the offender like we see with David and Peter in this instance.

Repentance leaves me exposed for correction whereas remorse seeks to share the responsibility of the same.

God convicts individuals. Remorse seeks corporate ‘repentance’ so that I am not the only guilty character around.

In David’s adultery and murder, it would be impossible to absolve Bathsheba from guilt, especially knowing the scriptural instruction.

But David never in his repentance quoted her part in his sin, however prominent it may have been.

I hope we are getting somewhere so far.

Allow me to summarise what I have shared so far.

Remorse is related more to regret than it is to a change.

That is why there is always so much explaining and justifying and explaining away the fact of the offense.

It is what the Bible calls worldly sorrow that leads to death.

Remorse is actually short-circuited repentance because it refuses to go the full hog in its actions.

Remorse will be content if its offense is understood than it is to deal with sin.

Due to that, no real transactions are carried out in their heart and spirit. This means that sin is excused instead of excised, leaving the spirit more wounded than it was before facing the sin.

When I kept silence, my bones waxed old through my roaring all the day long. For day and night thy hand was heavy upon me: my moisture is turned into the drought of summer. (Psalm 32: 3, 4)

No wonder suicide or its associated actions are the result as we see with Ahithophel, Saul, Judas, Balaam, etc.

This because the guilt will continue eating up the person, simply because they are not ready to completely deal with their sin.

Remorse seeks to save face at all costs. It does not want the exposure required for change to occur.

But repentance bares all, first before God and then to people.

I think that was the purpose of sackcloth.

Remember what David did when he was offered the land, animals and materials to make the altar God had ordered.

I caused this. Allow me to deal with it myself, was his response.

It was my sin. I will not allow anybody else to rectify it.

He was not afraid of people knowing that he was the cause of the plague that killed seventy thousand of his people. And he was not afraid of taking responsibility for the same, publicly.

We also remember Paul calling himself the chief of sinners for the same reason.

Remorse, though in many ways it looks just like repentance, does not offer any restorative benefits.

It is a cosmetic front to avoid dealing with actual sin.