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Sunday 11 November 2001 - Godly sorrow

(Summary of sermon by Rev Erlo Stegen)

Luke 22:62

In this text we find Peter sorrowing and weeping because of his sin. He had blatantly turned his back on the Lord Jesus and denied him three times. However, he repented, confessed and forsook his sin, and found grace from the Lord. But, another disciple of the Lord, Judas, also sinned grieviously. He too betrayed his Lord, and when he saw what he had done, he also cried bitterly, but went and hanged himself. What was the difference? Why did the one find grace and the other not?

Here we find a great secret - the difference between true repentance and false repentance. What is most important is not how grieviously you have sinned, but what do you do after you have sinned. "What next?" is the question.

We read in 2 Corinthians 7:10 "For godly sorrow worketh repentance to salvation not to be repented of: but the sorrow of the world worketh death."

We find this right through the Bible. Look at David after he had sinned with Bathsheba. Next, he murdered Uriah with the sword of the Ammonites, but after God's prophet came to him, he had godly sorrow, repented and forsook his sin and he too found grace. Read Ps 51.

We find in Matt 21 the man who asked his two sons to work in his vineyard. The first plainly refused and said that he would not go, but afterwards he repented and went. The second agreed to go, but he did not go. Jesus asked who had done the will of their father. Obviously, the first one who had refused, repented and went.

Now you Pharisees who agree to all that God says through his servants. You are the second son. You profess to know God, but you do not do what he tells you to do. The drunkards and harlots refused to do God's will, sinned grieviously, but afterwards they repented from their sins and did what God told them to do. They are entering heaven, but you Pharisees will be cast out.

Again, we find in Luke 15 the two sons with a father. The younger rebelled against his father, and wasted all his father's goods with riotous living: that is by drinking and sleeping around with women and men. He went very low and eventually found himself with the pigs. This one finds if you look in the original Greek. He eventually became a homosexual. But he too had godly sorrow, repented and forsook his sins and found grace. His brother however, who seemed so pious, was a Pharisee in his heart and had no godly sorrow for the things he had done wrong in his life, although staying at home.

So too is the story of Naomi, Ruth and Orpah. After Naomi's husband and two sons died, Naomi told her daughters-in-law to go home to their people. Both of them cried bitterly, but the tears of Orpah were just crocodile tears. She went back to her people. But Ruth said, "Intreat me not to leave thee, or to return from following after thee: for whither thou goest, I will go; and where thou lodgest, I will lodge: thy people shall be my people, and thy God my God: Where thou diest, will I die, and there will I be buried: the LORD do so to me, and more also, if ought but death part thee and me."

And little did she know what a blessing her life would be to the world up to this day: how the Saviour of the world would be born from her descendents.

All these clear examples show the difference between true and false repentance. Whether you will have eternal life in heaven or eternal death in hell. Remember this after you've sinned - what you do now determines whether you will find grace or not.

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