Why We Must Weep

We often times seem to be okay with our sin.  We overlook the severity of it and continue on with our lives, hoping the feelings of shame and guilt will go away.  Sometimes, we even look at our next good deed as enough to cover for the sin we are living in as we shy away from true repentance.The Bible tells us that our sin is an offense to God, yet our response to our sin is often one of disregard or acceptance.  We casually go about our busy lives, too afraid and guilt-ridden to approach the God who has died for our forgiveness and the redemption of our soul and body.

Acknowledge Our Sin

Often times, we as Christians focus solely on the goodness of God. And while we should meditate on His goodness, it benefits us also to acknowledge our sin.The common trait we as humans share is our sinful nature. When we acknowledge that we are sinners, though, we can put sin in its rightful place at the foot of the cross. Hiding behind our shame and guilt no longer has to be a part of our identity. We can now live in freedom, admit our sin before God, and obtain His loving mercy.

Whoever conceals his transgressions will not prosper, but he who confesses and forsakes them will obtain mercy.  Proverbs 28:13

The world may consider the admission of shortcomings a weakness.  But God, through our faults, reveals His very strength. His forgiveness and justification of us as His children are magnified when we are at our lowest.

Weep Over Our Sin

After acknowledging our sin, godly sorrow leads us to stop and weep over our sin, knowing our actions have dishonored the Creator of our being. He is the Creator who knows the numbers of hairs on our head, the One who knows our thoughts before we know them ourselves. Our sinfulness grieves His heart.

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God cares deeply for us. As a result, He, like a good parent, must be just in His dealing with sin and wrongdoing in our lives. He knows the pain our sin will ultimately cause us and, instead, wants us to experience the joy and peace a life lived in His righteousness brings.God doesn't take sin lightly, and neither should we. He hates our sin because it is contrary to His holiness and, most of all, it separates us from Him.  For Him to overlook our sin would render Him to be unjust and unholy. He cannot act against His own nature. However, God loves His people and does not ever leave us where we are.

For you are not a God who delights in wickedness; evil may not dwell with you.  Psalm 5:4

The Hope

Thankfully, God has called us out of darkness into marvelous light through His Son. Our lives are no longer defined by darkness, but rather by walking in the light of Christ, which cleanses us of our sin. But we must receive this gift through repentance.

This is the message we have heard from him and proclaim to you, that God is light, and in him is no darkness at all. If we say we have fellowship with him while we walk in darkness, we lie and do not practice the truth. But if we walk in the light, as he is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus his Son cleanses us from all sin. If we say we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us.  1 John 1:5-8

We do not weep and grieve out of guilt; we do so because our sin separates us from God. He created us to be in union with Him, yet when we sin, we fracture this union.Some may see weeping and grieving over our sin as dwelling on what we hate and what is unrighteous. However, when we meditate on what God hates while focusing on the promise of His hope, weeping draws us closer to Him and further shapes us into His image.

Repent Of Our Sin

How we view God will determine how we see our sin. We miss the depth of who He is if we see Him only as a good, moral figure to follow. If we view Him, though, as the holy, just, and righteous Creator who commands glory and praise from His created, our sin will lead us to genuine repentance.If we see our sin how God views it, we have no choice but to hate it and turn from it. In our repentance, we receive salvation, and God bridges the divide between Him and us.Hope is lost in worldly grief. Hope is restored in godly sorrow.

For godly grief produces a repentance that leads to salvation without regret, whereas worldly grief produces death.  2 Corinthians 7:10

Our repentance leads to life as God intended it to be before the fall of humanity. It brings us back into unity with the Father.There is redemption and life if we acknowledge it with truth, weep over it with godly sorrow, and repent with hope.