Do not get in the way of your own repentance journey
Being closed minded to the ways of God is a major impediment to repentance and is something that causes God to not allow our eyes to see or our ears to hear. Many people do not know that we can prevent ourselves from repenting and being heard by God.
Proverbs 28:9 says, “If one turns away his ear from hearing the law [Torah], even his prayer is an abomination.”
A barrier to repentance is not setting your mind to know God’s ways, His statutes, or not committing to know His commandments. We are to choose life, and Jesus said that eternal life is to know God (John 17:3). Repentance is not an option; it is a command.
1 John 5:2 says, by this we know that we love the children of God, when we love God and obey his commandments.
It is a seed God places in you, and you are responsible to manage and grow it. It is a way of living, but your mind can become a barrier to cultivating the seed which can prevent repentance.
Repentance is the foundation of our faith. The seed of repentance has to be cultivated correctly and learning and applying God’s instructions is vital to the fruit it produces. A disciple of Jesus has to have a strong foundation of repentance, and every disciple must learn to master it. Jesus gave an example of what happens if you do not have a strong foundation in Matthew 7:24-27; winds and storms will come and try to destroy your seed many times throughout your life. You have to be aware it is not an easy path, and you must be intelligent with the seed that is growing in your life. If the Kingdom of God is not your primary focus in life, then you need to redirect your focus. Jesus said to seek the Kingdom and His righteousness first. That is the job of a disciple of Jesus.
The Battle For Your Position In the Kingdom of God
Jesus and other Rabbis have said repentance should be compared to going to war; a war is intelligently planned at many levels. In Luke 14:25-34 Jesus said, “to make sure to count the cost.” He also said, “What king would ever dream of going to war without first sitting down with his counselors and discussing whether his army of 10,000 is strong enough to defeat the 20,000 men who are marching against him?” You are partaking in a battle for your position in the Kingdom of God; you are going to war with your flesh. Battle plans of repentance should have knowledge of what it means to love God, understanding of what it means to serve the King out of love, and questions must be answered about what jurisdiction of keeping God’s commandments (mitzvoth) you fall into. It is not a one-time decision – it is a life changing decision. You can start with a little investment, but you need to at least make an investment. Your reward (fruit) is in proportion to your investment. Be open to investing time into studying, praying, and a solid decision to turn from sin with an action plan. Desire to know God more, and that this journey of repentance is intended to help you love and desire the things of God. Most of all, you need to be open-minded to making corrections in your life, for the rest of your life.
Repentance should be seen as a diamond – it has multiple angles, and each angle gives you a little different perspective. As you cultivate the seed of repentance in your life, sometimes you need to be willing to look at things from a different perspective.
Here are some different perspectives to think about:
- What would have happened if the children of Israel would have repented from the message of Isaiah or Jeremiah? Would the First Temple have been destroyed?
- What if Israel would have repented when Jesus came? Would Jesus have been crowned King and the 1000-year reign started? What would it look like now? Would we already be in eternity?
- Why is it that Jesus has to reign for 1000-years? Why not go straight to the ‘World to Come’ (the Redemption)?
- Why did the Apostles continue to live their life around the Temple, and keep doing sacrifices even after Jesus died?
- If we are the Temple of the Holy Spirit, why is the teaching on the Temple of God not a foundational teaching in Christianity? Would we want to know how we should live our life in comparison to the Temple of God?
- Why do we not read the bible from a Jewish perspective if Jesus, the disciples, the Apostles, all of the authors in the Bible were Jews, and the original church was a sect of Judaism?
- If Jesus, Paul, and the Apostles kept Sabbath, why is the Church not keeping the 4th Commandment as originally instructed “to rest on the 7th day vs. resting on the 1st?”
- If Jesus kept all the commandments, why is the Torah, or even learning what it means to ‘keep God’s commandments’ not a foundational teaching in the Church?
When you start making corrections in your life, it motivates you to ask questions, and sometimes it takes time to get the answers. We are not going to offer answers to the questions above, but we will offer resources on this website for you to search these answers out. You have to be prayerful in asking God to reveal His hidden secrets to you so you can continue to cultivate the seed of repentance in your life. You are responsible for the fruit from the seed of repentance (John 15:1-6).
God Withholds Repentance from Some
The Rabbis say there are situations where repentance is not an option, such as a person who confesses sin, but has not resolved in their heart to abandon the sin, that confession is meaningless. Proverbs 28:9 says, “If one turns away his ear from hearing the law [Torah], even his prayer is an abomination.” The first step in repentance is setting your mind to stop sinning and a commitment to obey God’s laws.
Repentance is a commandment that each one us must obey in order to even understand who God is, but God must first allow us the ability to approach Him.
Isaiah 44:18 says, “They know not, nor do they discern, for He has shut their eyes, so that they cannot see, and their hearts, so that they cannot understand.”
It also says in Isaiah 6:9-10, “…Go, and say to this people: Keep on hearing, but do not understand; keep on seeing, but do not perceive. Make the heart of this people dull, and their ears heavy, and blind their eyes; lest they see with their eyes, and hear with their ears, and understand with their hearts, and turn and be healed.”
Proverbs 9:10 says the beginning of even being able to know God has to start with the fear God. The fear of God is being afraid of being disconnected from the Creator of the Universe. God has created this world to be a corridor to the World to Come; we are preparing right now to serve Him for eternity. We should perceive this life as the tool we have in order to work on our ‘After Retirement’ plan while we live here. Jesus also said in Matthew 6:19-21 we should prepare by storing up treasures for life after here. Treasures come by us keeping His commandments. This is why the battle plan must have an understanding of which jurisdiction we are in, and which commandments we need to follow. Keeping a commandment is giving God an eternal gift, and one day you will be reading a book, where you can see each gift that you gave Him.
Being closed minded to the ways of God is a major impediment to repentance, and is something that causes God to not allow our eyes to see or our ears to hear. We are only allowed to repent because God opens our eyes and allows us to. He conceals truth to those who reject him.
In Deuteronomy 29:4 it says, “But to this day the Lord has not given you a heart to understand or eyes to see or ears to hear.”
Repentance is a seed, it is not a one-time decision, it takes continual effort from us, and we need to keep ourselves in a place where we see and hear.
Jesus said in Matthew 11:15, “He who has ears to hear, let him hear.”
According to Jewish sources, other things that impede repentance, and not being able to make rectification are:
- One who causes many to sin/prevents others from obedience
- One who instigates and puts someone on a wrong path
- One who sends a child in a wrong direction, and does not rebuke them (one that is under your authority)
- Someone who says I will sin and repent later
- One who separates from the community of believers
- One who quarrels with the wise
- One who ridicules the commandments of God
- One who hates rebuke
If you have stopped cultivating the seed of repentance in your life, humble yourself, ask for forgiveness, and make corrections today. Ask yourself, are there barriers in your repentance journey?
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