Repentance Never Ends

 G-d says: "Keep my Law." Keep His law and you are square with Him.

And even if I could answer 100% that I do keep it (I do try,) I would not be done with repentance. Never in this life can I be. Because, you see, we have a tendency to live in illusions. We have a natural inclination to live by lies.

I go along thinking I am peachy keen and I am not. We go along thinking the world is fine and IT is not. Repent, repent, repent. We are never done with repentance in this life.

If by keeping the Law I satisfy G-d's requirements, and the Tanakh says so, what is this further repentance for? Well one thing it's for is to keep me from breaking the Law in the future. It is to keep me from slipping into sin. Sin is a slippery devil, it can snatch you when you are not looking. But also it is for me. When a child is covered in mud, you strip those clothes off and send him to the bathtub. Sin is ugly, sin is demeaning, sin is pitiful. How can I wish the best for myself if I let myself remain in ugliness and wretchedness rather than asking for help?

What is the greatest Commandment? Love G-d. How can I love G-d, who hates servitude and bondage and sin, and not also hate those things as much as it is humanly possible to do? So when I act the slave, when I put myself in bondage, I have to hate that too. In so far as it is humanly possible to do, I have to hate those things as much as G-d hates them.

As an aside, hate has a bad rap. Not all hate is bad. Hate what is evil, hate it with every fiber of your being.

Here is another thing I have to repent of: pride. I go along not doing well, feeling poorly, being afflicted of body, heart and mind, and I DO NOT ASK G-d to heal me. Why do I even go on being stubborn like that?

While the New Testament is not scripture for me, believing that G-d alone is G-d and there is no Trinity and He was never a man, I have to admit that I love me some James (brother of Jesus.) He said:

"You covet but you cannot get what you want, so you quarrel and fight. You do not have because you do not ask God. When you ask, you do not receive, because you ask with wrong motives, that you may spend what you get on your pleasures."

~James 4:2-3 (emphasis mine.)

In other words, either we don't ask because we are proud or stubborn and so don't understand the true nature of our dependence on G-d, or we ask wickedly or selfishly for things we don't need.

Knowing that there is an affliction on my body mind and heart and not asking for help is a symptom of either pride or doubt or both. You are prideful, you do not ask for help, or you doubt, you don't think you will be helped. Or you're just plain cussed. Either way you have wronged your Lord. You either think you are a big noise now and don't need Him, or you think He doesn't care.

Because my mind is not right (no one's is to my knowledge) and my heart is not right (no one's is to my knowledge,) I am never done with repenting.

OUR SOCIETY LOVES FOR PEOPLE TO REPENT OF THINGS THAT G-D NEVER COMMANDED US TO REPENT FOR. OUR SOCIETY LOVES FOR PEOPLE TO REPENT OF DOING WHAT IS RIGHT.

Repentance of sins that are not sins, our society loves to see people bend the knee for that. To bend the knee to the IMAGE OF MAN and human values.

Godly repentance on the other hand, that is anathema to this culture.

I tell you the truth, G-dly repentance will never hurt you and will only help you. You are wounded now, but IT IS FOR YOUR GOOD. You are humbled before that which you ought to be humbled before. I tell you the truth, the sins of the sinner hunt him, hunt his soul. The pride of the sinner, which we all are, hunt him. The doubt of the skeptic and the cynic, they hunt him. G-d is stronger than these hunters after your life, but you have to ask and you have to be willing to be corrected. You have to be willing to break your pride and have faith.

I do not tell you these things as one who has achieved, one who has run his race and is ready for the crown to be put on his head. I tell you this as your fellow sinner: for the love of you, for the love of me, for the love of all holiness, do not be ashamed to repent.

Repentance Never Ends.