Seeking Him Week Four—Repentance: The Big Turnaround

Welcome to our Summer 2021 Book Club-Style Bible Study! We are using the book Seeking Him by Nancy DeMoss Wolgemuth and Tim Grissom.

How would you like to seek personal revival with us this summer and change your life forever! I have done this study twice now, and let me tell you, it is life changing!

​Join us for 12 weeks this summer on Tuesday mornings at 9:00 est beginning June 1 through August 17. If you can't come then, come when you can.

Whether you are a brand new lover of Jesus Christ, or you’ve been a Christian for years, this insightful study will impact your life in a transformative way. Seeking Him will reward you with a deeper walk with God and set your life on a path to be used greatly by our Savior. ​

​Repentance: The Big Turnaround

“…Repent and turn from all your transgressions, lest iniquity be your ruin. Cast away from you all the transgressions that you have committed, and make yourselves a new heart and a new spirit....” Ezekiel 18:30b,31

The phrase, “Seeking Him,” tells us that though revival begins with the Spirit’s call, it demands a response from the one being called.

As we are called, we are commanded to humble ourselves, we are compelled to get honest with God and others, and we are then convicted to repent of our sin against a Holy God.

Repentance is not just a simple, “I’m sorry,” or an emotional response filled with words of regret. I remember as a child being told I was going to be spanked, which then brought on the repeated cry, “I’m sorry! I’m sorry! I’m sorry!” I would do anything to avoid that spanking. But these were words with no thought or intention.

Hebrews 12 tells us that Esau, after selling his birthright and then being cheated, begs for the blessing. But he was denied, “For he found no chance to repent, though he sought it with tears.” (v17) Tears weren’t enough. Begging wasn’t enough.

What does it mean to repent?

Becoming a Christian involves repentance—turning away from sin, my old way of life, and turning to Christ for salvation. But as a child of God, we still have that sinful nature and therefore must repent as we are shown our sin.
  

• Repentance involves accepting full responsibility for our own sin.
  ​Psalm 51 is one of the best examples in the Bible of a child of God repenting. After living with his sin for a time, David is confronted by his friend, Nathan, who brings him to repentance. He accepts full responsibility.

“For I know my transgressions, and my sin is ever before me. Against You, You only, have I sinned and done what is evil in Your sight…” vs 3,4a

• Repentance is a change of one’s mind about sin that results in a change of behavior.
  ​It is a 180-degree turnaround. It is forsaking known sin and obeying God’s Word

​“Repent therefore, and turn back, that your sins may be blotted out.” Acts 3:19

“Remember therefore from where you have fallen; repent, and do the works you did at first….” Revelation 2:5

 “Bear fruit in keeping with repentance.” Matthew 3:8

• Repentance takes thought and is a decision.

“When I think on my ways, I turn my feet to Your testimonies.” Psalm 119:59

It is imperative that we do not put off repentance. Just as God says in II Corinthians 6:2, now is the day of salvation, so it is true that now is the moment of repentance for all who have sinned.

What happens if we fail to repent when convicted? The Bible warns us in Hebrews 12,

“See to it that no one fails to obtain the grace of God; that no ‘root of bitterness’ springs up and causes trouble, and by it many become defiled.” v15

Waiting causes a heart to become hard. Waiting may result in deeply rooted bitterness, and this affects others.

Now is the time to repent—to turn from our sin, face our gracious Savior, and walk in obedience to His Word.

“Turn us back to You, O LORD, and we will be restored; Renew our days as of old.” Lamentations 5:21

Repentance is not just a once and done kind of thing. It's not only at the point of salvation that we need to repent. Repentance is, at the lease, a daily activity in the life of a Christian. Sometimes, it may even be a moment-by-moment activity. How will you seek Him this week?

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​Full Assurance—Finding Settled Peace With God

​"In penning the pages of this book, I have but one outstanding object before me—to make as plain as possible just how any troubled soul may find settled peace with God. I am thinking particularly of those people who believe the Holy Scriptures to be divinely inspired and who recognize that salvation is only to be found in Christ, but someway have missed the peace of a perfect trust and though earnestly desiring to know the Lord, are floundering in perplexity of mind. Full Assurance!

What could be more precious?
​And it is for you if you want it; only you must receive it by faith. For observe carefully, it is not the full assurance of an emotional experience, nor the full assurance of a carefully reasoned-out system of philosophy. It is the full assurance of faith. The feeblest faith in Christ is saving faith.

The strongest faith in self, or in something other than Christ, is but a delusion and a snare, and will leave the soul at last unsaved and forever forlorn.

​Full Assurance forever! Is it not a wonderfully pleasing expression? Assurance not for a few days, or weeks, or months—nor yet for a few years, or even a lifetime—but forever! It is this blessed assurance that God delights to impart to all who come to Him as needy sinners seeking the way of life."—Harry Ironside

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