Resolution vs Repentance - Godly and Worldly Sorrow

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Alright, so today we are going to be discussing the concept of resolutions.
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And obviously this is a theme lesson because today is New Year's Eve and tomorrow is January 1st and on January 1st most people make New Year's resolutions.
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And I don't know if you guys have had other people talk about this or if anybody else has, thank you Bobby, if this has been the subject of anybody else's lesson I don't know so if I'm saying anything that's repetitive I apologize.
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But you'll notice on my shirt, I wore this shirt for you all, this was given to me a few years ago, I know my computer is kind of in the way so I'll bring it down a little.
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This is, it says Resolution 1, I will live for God.
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Resolution 2, if no one else will, I still will.
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And that is a quote from Jonathan Edwards.
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If you're unfamiliar with Jonathan Edwards, Jonathan Edwards was a minister in New England, he was a theologian and he was considered by many to be the greatest theologian to ever be born in the United States.
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In fact, that is how he is defined by the Encyclopedia Britannica, defines Jonathan Edwards as the greatest theologian that was ever born in the United States.
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Jonathan Edwards was a tremendous mind, he was a tremendous intellect, and when he was a young man, I believe 19 years old, he established a set of rules to live by and he wrote those rules out and over time he added to them and sort of modified them as time went by, but they all sort of stayed as the resolutions of his life.
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And there were several of those resolutions, I think there, I have it here, 76 resolutions I think was how many he came up with when it was all over.
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But here's what it says, here's what he wrote in the beginning of his resolutions.
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He says, being sensible that I am unable to do anything without God's help, I do humbly entreat him by his grace to enable me to keep these resolutions so far as they are agreeable to his will for Christ's sake.
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So what we notice in the opening of his resolutions was he understood that anything that he would be able to do would be by the grace of God and it was by that grace that he would be able to have any success in his seeking of his keeping of his resolutions and so he understood himself and Jonathan Edwards did understand himself to be a sinful man.
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He did not think he was perfect, but he understood that there were certain things in life that he wanted to accomplish and to accomplish those things it meant being faithful to God and to God's word.
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And so what I want to talk about today, essentially what created this lesson, and by the way, I know some of you may wonder, well why aren't we back at our theology course? Normally I teach a 12 week theology course, we're going to start that next week.
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Today is technically the last day of 2020 and so rather than starting another 12 weeks today, I'm going to start the 12 weeks on the first Thursday of next year.
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So this is my last lesson of this year and what really got me thinking about this lesson was I know that many people on January 1st, they make resolutions and often those resolutions are almost humorous because everybody knows angle stick, you know.
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How many times have I resolved to lose weight? You don't know, but it's a lot.
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How many times have you guys resolved to do something and it just didn't happen? And usually it may be by the, it don't even last the month.
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The day.
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Or some, yeah, I'd say or sometimes the week or the day or even the hour.
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Well, this year I'm not going to drink caffeine.
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Well, bottoms up, you know.
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And some of you guys, you know, y'all are here for various different reasons, but some of you guys in your life have dealt with saying you're going to do something, do better, only to find yourselves falling back into whatever it was that was before.
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So there's some very real considerations that we should think about when we think about the subject of resolutions.
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And I do want to today talk about the difference between resolutions and repentance.
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Because there is a difference between making a resolution and repenting.
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And so we're going to be talking about various things.
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I have an outline that's sort of loose to keep us going.
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Feel free to ask questions if you'd like.
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But we're going to start simply by reading 2 Corinthians chapter 7, verses 10 and 11.
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2 Corinthians chapter 7, verse 10.
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The Apostle Paul is writing and he says this, For godly grief produces a repentance that leads to salvation without regret.
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Whereas worldly grief produces death.
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For see what earnestness this godly grief has produced in you, but also what eagerness to clear yourselves, what indignation, what fear, what longing, what zeal, what punishment.
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At every point you have proved yourselves innocent or pure in the matter.
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Let me pray.
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Father, I pray now that as I seek to give an understanding not only of this text, but of the concept of repentance and the distinction between making a resolution and repenting toward God, I pray, Lord, that you would keep me from error.
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For God, I am a fallible man and I am capable of preaching error.
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And I don't want to for the sake of your name, for the sake of my conscience, and for the sake of these men.
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I pray also, Lord, that you'd keep me from cowardice.
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Give me boldness to preach your truth.
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Help what I say to be received well and help it all to glorify you.
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I pray all this in Jesus name and for his sake.
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Amen.
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When we talk about the subject of a resolution, a resolution means to resolve to do something.
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And typically, it's resolving to do something better than we've done before.
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I resolve to eat better.
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I resolve to exercise more.
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I resolve to not get so angry.
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I resolve...
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I'm not looking at you for any particular...
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I just happen to look at...
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Well, I can look at myself too.
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I can look at a mirror.
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You know, I, you know, resolve to spend more time with my kids.
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Resolve to, you know, treat my wife better.
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Whatever, you know.
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Generally, a resolution has to do with something to make ourselves better.
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It has to do with something that involves bettering ourselves.
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And yet, as we've already mentioned, resolutions tend to be easily broken.
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And we don't feel usually too bad about it.
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We have a resolution to do something.
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We say we're going to do it.
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As soon as the temptation to go the other way comes or some kind of frustration comes, whatever, we, as it were, fall off the wagon.
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Go right back to where we were.
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And, you know, we look...
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I look around and, as I said earlier, all you guys are here for different reasons, but I'm sure that many of you have been in situations where you have resolved to do better and it just didn't work out.
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And maybe that's why you're here.
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Maybe some of you are here on your second time.
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Or maybe a third time.
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Because you made a resolution and it just didn't work out.
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And that's why I want to discuss the difference between resolutions and repentance.
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Because resolving to do something good is a positive thing.
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As I said, I wore my Jonathan Edwards shirt because I do think resolving to do good is good.
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So I'm not here to speak ill of a resolution.
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If you want to resolve in the new year to do better at whatever, my encouragement is do that.
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But there is a difference between resolving and repenting.
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And what we're going to talk about...
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Basically, this lesson has two parts.
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What's the difference between resolution and repentance? That's part one.
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And part two is what does real repentance look like? And that's where we're going to go back to 2 Corinthians in just a moment.
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Because this 2 Corinthians actually tells us what real repentance looks like.
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There's nine things.
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Not all of it's drawn directly from the text, but there's nine inferences that we can draw from the text that are indicators that repentance is genuine.
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Do you know that there's such a thing as false repentance? That there are people who say, I've repented, but it's not true.
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Or some people that will say, I...
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You know, they may even believe they've repented, but it's not true.
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Well, that's what we're going to talk about.
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We're going to get there.
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The difference between true and false repentance.
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And I will say this, in 2 Corinthians 7, 10, it's the difference between godly sorrow and worldly sorrow.
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Because that's the two things, right? Notice it in the text.
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It says there is a godly sorrow that leads to repentance, and there is a worldly sorrow that leads to death.
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So that's the difference.
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And that's what we're going to talk about.
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There's nine things that distinguishes worldly sorrow from godly sorrow.
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But before we get there, let's look at part one.
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The difference between a resolution and repentance.
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So we'll write it up here.
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Now, in regard to resolution and repentance, one thing that we have to note is they both have a similar concept.
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So they're not completely divided as far as their meaning.
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Because both of them have within them the concept of wanting to do better, right? So when I say that there's a difference between resolution and repentance, I'm not saying it's so different that they could never have any commonalities.
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But there's enough of a difference that we need to understand the difference.
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To resolve to do something means to make up your mind or to decide that you're going to do something.
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And generally, it's to do better.
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Okay? So we're going to start with that concept.
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To do better.
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To resolve is the concept of the idea to do better.
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But repentance is different.
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Repentance means what? Anybody know? Let's start at the very beginning.
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What does the word repentance mean? I'm hearing a bunch.
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Huh? No, it doesn't mean forget.
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The word repent.
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And I don't mean to throw out Greek words just to sound fancy.
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But the Greek helps us on this.
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The Greek word is metanoia.
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And the word meta means to change.
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And noia means mind.
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All right.
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So the most basic definition of a of repentance means to change your mind.
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But it's not simply changing your mind in the sense that, well, I want to go to Burger King and I'm going to change my mind and I'm going to go to McDonald's.
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See, I got a problem with that whole eating thing.
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I just went from one bad place to another.
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But anyway, if I change my mind to go from McDonald's to Burger King, that's not repentance.
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That's not what the word repentance means.
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To change the mind in regard to how repentance is used biblically.
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Someone in here already said change of heart.
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And I think that's more that.
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Did you have something you want to add? That's how you point it.
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Huh? OK, so you have a change of mind.
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And I do think from a biblical perspective, a change of heart is.
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Is also appropriate to say, but it also is a change of behavior.
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You could say a change of purpose.
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I like that.
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Change of what? Yes, by changing the way you think you can put that under mine.
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OK, so a resolution.
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I'm going to do better.
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But repentance means my mind has changed towards this particular thing.
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Well, yes, but the point is, why do we eat bad? Because we like it.
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Why do we do the things that we do that we shouldn't do? Because we love it.
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That's right.
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The reason why we sin is because we love it.
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You say, but I hate myself when I'm done.
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Yeah, but you loved it while you were doing it.
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That's why you did it.
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That's why you sought it out.
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That's why you went after the thing.
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Or that's why you went after the woman.
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Or that's why you went after the needle.
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Or that's why you went after the bottle.
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Or that's why you went after the theft.
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Or that's why you went after the violence.
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Or that's why you went after the anger.
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Because at that moment, your flesh wanted it.
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You loved it, right? And I'm not pointing my finger at you.
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I'm pointing back at me, too.
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That's why I do these things, because I love it.
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And repentance means I don't love it no more.
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That's repentance.
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I change my mind, my heart toward that thing.
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But understand this.
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Repentance is a grace of God.
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That's the other difference.
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Resolution is my effort.
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Repentance is God's grace.
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And this is the biggest distinction.
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As long as you are relying on your resolutions, as long as you are relying on your resolve, you will never be successful.
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Because you are not enough.
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You know, all these books, I'll be right there with you, brother.
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I know you want to ask a question.
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Let me finish my thought.
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I know all these books are written to say you are enough, and you're good enough, and you're smart enough, and doggone it, people like you, and you're the best.
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But the reality is you're not enough, and you're not good enough, and I'm not good enough, and I am desperate for God's grace.
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That's why I read Jonathan Edwards this morning.
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What did he say? I can only do these things by the grace of God.
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I can only do these things if you enable me.
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I can only do these things by your strength.
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Now, go ahead, brother.
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You had a question.
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Yep, and that's part two.
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So part one, I'm just distinguishing between a resolution and repentance, and resolution is my effort.
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Repentance is God's grace.
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That's the big distinction, and that's the thing I wanted to point out, and repentance is a change of mind, change of heart, change of purpose.
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I like that.
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Who said purpose? Was it you who said? One of you guys said, I like that.
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Change of purpose.
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Also, change of behavior.
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From a biblical perspective, if somebody says, I repent, and they keep doing that thing, the repentance itself is a question mark.
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Now, I want to be clarified.
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There's no such thing as perfect repentance, and we all fail, but if I'm punching somebody in the face and saying, I repent, I repent, I repent, and it's just getting harder every time, there's going to be a question about the genuine nature of that repentance.
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Especially for the person that's getting walloped.
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They're going to be wondering, is it real? Now, Jesus did say this, and we have to take it into consideration.
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He said, if your brother sins against you seven times in a day, and he comes to you seven times and says, I repent, you should forgive him.
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But that doesn't mean that that repentance was genuine.
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What that means is that we ought to be good at forgiving.
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So that's not giving credence to the repentance.
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It's giving credence or giving encouragement to the forgiver, right? That's telling us that we ought to forgive people, even if we don't think they deserve it.
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Because God forgave us when we didn't deserve it.
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Isn't that right? God forgave me when I didn't deserve it, because I'm a sinner, and I'm a vicious sinner, and I'm a hurtful sinner, and God forgave me, and I didn't deserve it.
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Therefore, when a vicious person or a hurtful person accosts me in some way, then I ought to forgive them, even if they don't deserve it.
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So the difference between a resolution and repentance is a resolution is my effort, and repentance is a grace and gift of God.
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So one thing I would say right away, if you're struggling, go to God and ask for grace.
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Go to God and ask for mercy.
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Go to God and ask for His strength, not yours, because your strength will always be not enough.
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It will always be lacking.
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Remember what James says in the first chapter of James, if anyone lacks wisdom, let him ask God who gives generously, right? That wisdom there isn't just you wanting to know all the miracles of the universe, or all the mysteries, rather, of the universe.
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That's not what the wisdom there is.
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The wisdom there is the wisdom to live godly.
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If you read the context of that idea of wisdom in James, it's the idea of living a wise life.
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What is a wise life? A godly life.
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Yeah, what do we know? We know this, God invented living.
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I know that sounds like a simple thing, but think about this.
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God invented living, therefore, to live the way the one who invented living told us how to live is the best way to live.
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He invented it.
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He knows the best way to do it.
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And therefore, we ought to live the way He says, and what makes our lives bad when we don't live the way the one who invented living tells us how to live? Yeah? So that's number one.
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Number one is the difference between resolution and repentance.
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Now, we are going to look at nine differences between worldly repentance, which you asked, is there such a thing? Yes, I would say worldly sorrow, but same thing.
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Worldly repentance and godly repentance.
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And I'm not going to try to write them all on the board because they're a little long, but if you want to follow along and take notes, you can.
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I'll put little reminders up here.
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Yes, sir? Resolution.
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I think it's the other way around.
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I think repentance can lead to resolution.
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I'm just saying that because of my addiction and everything.
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Sure.
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I had to make an effort to get here.
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You know what I mean? Yep.
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And now that I'm here, I do have to change my mind a lot.
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Sure.
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Now, I would agree with that in the sense that that's what got you here.
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But I guess I would also go back and say, but God was being gracious to you all along, even to give you that desire.
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So I think if it's genuine repentance, we got to be thankful that it's a gracious thing.
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That's all.
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Even this is a grace if it leads to this.
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So yes, yes, absolutely.
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But I guess with the distinction I'm making is people who say, I'm going to do X.
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I'm going to lose weight or I'm going to quit being angry.
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I'm going to do whatever, right? It's it's they're they're trying to do it themselves.
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And a lot of programs, you know, and I've and I've not been to a lot, but I'm talking to different people.
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A lot of programs that try to help people with addictions and different things.
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They try to make it all about you and your efforts and 12 steps and these things.
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But it's God's grace.
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That's the that's the point is is is beginning with that.
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Yes, sir.
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Every morning we read the gospel.
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Say that again.
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Every morning we read the gospel.
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And it says that before we even ask for forgiveness, he's running towards this.
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And, you know, he's forgiven us before we can even get the words of confession out of our mouth.
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And I got a particular thing that I go back to.
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I feel a conscience about it or whatever.
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But right before I right before I do the sin, I'm already talking to talking to God about it.
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I tell God, I pray I need help with it.
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And as soon as I'm done with the sin, I don't want to ask for forgiveness for it right away because I feel like if I ask for forgiveness right away, like I'm playing with him, I just have a hard time believing that he's forgiven me for that sin because it's like I'm dealing with knowing I'm going to do it.
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And even after I repent and ask for forgiveness, deep down inside, I feel like I know I'm going to go back to it again.
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Well, I think your description is common in the sense that I think we can all think of things that we deal with with that that we struggle with.
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And I have to be careful with how I'm going to explain this, because I want to make sure I don't say the wrong thing.
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When we talk about the subject of what we call abiding sin, that's what you're talking about.
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The idea of abiding sin, sin that we are struggling with, and it continues to abide.
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Um, I mean, we all have those things that we deal with.
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We all have those things that we struggle with.
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Um, and I do think this is where the daily, daily repentance is necessary.
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In Jesus's prayer that he taught us to pray when his disciples asked us, teach us to pray.
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He said in that prayer, which is supposed to be a daily prayer, forgive us our trespasses, forgive us our sins.
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Right.
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In fact, in Luke's gospel, it uses specifically the word hamartia, which is the Greek word for sin.
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Forgive us our sins as we forgive those who are indebted to us, those who sin against us.
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Right.
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So I do think that because of the flesh that we live in, Galatians five very clearly says there's a there's a battle that happens between the flesh and the spirit.
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And I do think that there are that there are going to be failures.
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And but I don't want that to ever be an excuse.
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That's the thing.
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That's why I said I want to be careful what I don't want people to think.
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Well, Pastor Key said, you know, we're going to have failures.
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Therefore, let's let's fail it up.
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It's New Year's, right? You know, we'll resolve tomorrow.
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But today, you know, so let me finish my thought and I'll get back to you.
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So my answer to you is this.
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If you are if you are in Christ, you are not sinless.
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But if you are in Christ, there should be a desire for repentance that is in your heart and a struggle with sin that was not there before you were in Christ.
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I can tell you when I was 16 years old, I didn't struggle with sin.
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I struggle getting caught.
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And that's honestly what I'm about to give you the nine differences between godly sorrow and worldly sorrow.
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I had worldly sorrow when I was 14.
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I had worldly sorrow when I was 17.
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I had worldly sorrow when I was 19.
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But when I got saved, a different type of sorrow overcame me.
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And my response to sin was different.
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So hopefully this will help you with that.
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Brother, you had a question? No, I was going to say, deep inside, as you said, deep inside repentance, it was just saying, God, please forgive me.
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Like I was acknowledging God.
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It's been more of a conviction now.
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You know what I mean? Versus me just saying it and be going through the moment.
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It's like going to church because I have to go to church.
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I'm not going to church because I didn't get worldly sorrow.
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Yeah.
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Well, like I said, I think I think I think you're I think you're on to something there.
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And I think what what I think these things are going to be in agreement and when you hear what these nine things, because these things have helped me even just for myself.
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What does it look like when I'm really repenting? And what does it look like when I'm just when I when I'm when you said playing with God? All right.
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Remorseful because there's difference between remorse and repentance.
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And so let's go through and let's go through these things.
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This is based on 2 Corinthians 7.
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Now, I normally don't use other people's outlines, but I will make mention this is from Dr.
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James Neuhauser.
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He's the director of counseling at Reformed Theological Seminary.
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So this guy's pretty smart guy and knows what he's doing.
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And this is when he's counseling people.
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He uses these things to help them to see whether or not they're dealing with worldly repentance or godly repentance, worldly sorrow or godly sorrow.
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So these are nine nine distinct nine distinctions.
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Number one, worldly sorrow is self-focused and self-protective, while godly sorrow is focused on God and the other person and the well-being of others is the first priority.
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So, for instance, when a person has worldly sorrow, they are they're they're focused on how this has affected them.
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But godly sorrow is how this has affected others and how this has offended God.
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I want you to think in your mind about Psalm 51.
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You remember Psalm 51? Psalm 51 is the prayer of repentance from David.
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And what does he say? Against you, O God, and you only have I sinned and done this evil in your sight.
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You see, David and somebody might argue and say, wait a minute, David sinned against more than God.
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He sinned against Uriah.
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He stole his wife, got him murdered.
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He sinned against the other men who died in battle with Uriah.
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If you read that story, you'll see there's other men that died alongside him.
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And an unnecessary battle that was provoked simply to get Uriah killed.
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And he sinned against Bathsheba, not only by lusting after her, but by inviting her to the palace under pretense of knowing what he was going to do.
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And she was contributing.
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Certainly, it doesn't say he raped her, but there is a sense in which he violated her knowing that that was another man's wife.
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So what does David say? He says, against God, I have sinned.
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You know, a lot of people come and they say, I'm so I'm so sorry what I've done to myself.
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You see, that's focused on you.
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But are you concerned about how you have offended God? That's that's one that I think that's a first step to genuine repentance is understanding that it's not about you, but it's about the God who created you.
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A sin is high treason against the Lord of the universe.
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I've said that many times.
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You've heard me say that before.
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But sin is treason.
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You know what we do to treasonous people or what we used to do? Treason was met with execution because to commit treason meant to violate your homeland.
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It meant to violate your your nation.
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It meant to violate your people.
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So you were treason was met with death.
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Well, what what is it when we sin against God? It's treason, it's treason, and it deserves death.
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And that's David.
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He's saying, I know what I've done.
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I have sinned against the holy one of Israel.
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I've sinned against God.
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I deserve to die.
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And so worldly sorrow is focused on self, while godly sorrow is focused on God and those who you have heard.
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That's number one.
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Number two, worldly sorrow does not hate the sin, but hates the consequences of the sin.
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And godly sorrow hates the sin itself and accepts the consequences of the sin.
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There's a big difference there because a lot of people, they don't hate the sin, they just hate the consequences.
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Now, I really like I really like when I go out and live it up and do these things, but I hate the fact that it hurts my friends or it hurts my bank account or it hurts my health.
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You see right there, you're not hating the sin.
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What's that? Yes, godly sorrow hates the sin itself.
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The difference.
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Think about that.
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Do you hate this? Do you hate your sin or do you hate what your sin causes? You say, well, I don't understand the difference.
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There is a big difference.
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Would you still go do the things you could do if the consequences weren't there? Huh? Yeah, I didn't hear what he said.
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Yeah, yeah, you would do it if it wasn't for the consequences, right? See, the point is sin is still wrong even if you don't see the consequences.
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See, here's a good example.
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Fornication.
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What is fornication? Unmarried, yeah, unmarried sexual intercourse in any way, any way, shape or form is fornication.
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I will tell you this.
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The vast majority of young people today that I talk to and have conversations with have no problem with fornication because they have learned there's there for them there's really no consequences.
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Used to be there was a social consequence.
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If you had sex outside of marriage, that was socially unacceptable and people would say that's wrong, you shouldn't do that.
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So there was a social consequence and there are physical consequences.
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You can get STD or those different things, right? But now they've got shots you can get and patches you can put on and all these things to kind of protect you from STDs.
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So now without consequence people do it because they're not worried about the sin, they're worried about the consequence.
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That's worldly sorrow.
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Worldly sorrow is when the person gets the STD and they say, oh, I'm sorry I got the STD.
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Rather than saying, I'm sorry I sinned against God and did this thing that was evil.
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You say, but it feels so good.
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Yeah, that don't matter.
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You know what? For some people it feels good to hurt other people.
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For some people it feels good to kill people.
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Does that make it right? Not at all.
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So the difference is worldly sorrow hates the consequences.
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Godly sorrow hates the sin itself.
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Number three, worldly sorrow shifts blame and godly sorrow accepts responsibility.
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Now I will tell you this is the one, if I could just do the whole lesson on this, this is the one as a minister, as a pastor, and as a man who's done counseling for years with different people, this is the one I see the most.
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People come into my office, I got two chairs and my chair, and you say it's a husband and wife.
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They come in, they sit down, and immediately it's him.
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He did it.
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He is the jerk.
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He is the one, and he usually is, but it's always about shifting blame, not recognizing our own contributions, not recognizing our own sin, not recognizing our responsibility.
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How many guys you know come here and it's, well mama didn't hug me enough, or daddy hugged me too much, or I mean think about it.
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What are the, what are the excuses you guys have used over the years? It was her.
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Devil made me do it.
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Yeah, that's what it was.
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Split Wilson.
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Parents got a divorce.
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Police brutality.
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That's right.
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I'm the wrong color.
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Whatever, right? It's always something.
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It's always something.
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Shifting blame.
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You, if somebody comes to me and says I'm ready to receive Jesus Christ, and I know I'm a sinner because my mama treated me bad.
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I say you ain't ready to repent.
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You ain't ready to receive Jesus Christ, because you're still blaming mama.
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You ain't blaming.
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Yes, sir.
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Don't we reach generational curse? That is a longer conversation.
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Let me say this.
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There are certainly things that, there are certainly habits that we inherit from our parents.
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There's a, you know, typically if you, if you're brought up in a home where certain things are accepted, then those things get passed on generationally, but the idea of a generational curse being like in the blood or something, I don't think the Bible teaches that.
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I think it's more of a, of a, of a behavioral thing that you're taught, but yes, certainly, you know, here's the thing.
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I'm not saying that nobody else is blame worthy.
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There are certainly people in our lives that could be blamed, but at the end of the day, when you stand before God, you're not going to be judged for what mama did.
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You're not going to be judged for what daddy did.
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You're not going to be judged what your brother or your sister did.
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You're going to be judged on your account.
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Apostle Paul says that very clearly.
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You are going to be judged on your account, not on their account.
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So the idea that you're going to be able to shift blame, think about what Eve did when she was in the garden.
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Did that work? Nope.
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What did Adam do? Adam blamed God.
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The woman whom thou hast given me.
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It's your fault, God.
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You gave me a broken woman.
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I let her gone.
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She was gone for one day.
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Come back.
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She ruined the whole world.
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Yeah.
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So do you understand the difference between blame shifting and accepting responsibility? Go ahead.
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Do you still have worldly sorrow if you're a believer? Yeah, I mean, I guess we all deal with the flesh, and so there would be that.
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But I think godly sorrow, if you notice the distinction, there's a distinction in these things.
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We shouldn't be shifting blame.
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We should be accepting responsibility.
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We shouldn't be hating just the consequences of sin.
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We should be hating the sin itself.
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We shouldn't be focused on ourselves.
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We should be focused on others.
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These are the things that demonstrate godly repentance.
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Number four, worldly sorrow resents accountability and godly sorrow seeks accountability.
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I'll tell you this again.
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This kind of goes back to the last one.
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When someone comes and they said, I've sinned.
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OK, well, let's let's help you through this.
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Let's let's deal with this.
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Let's be accountable.
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No, I don't want to be accountable.
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I just want.
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Yeah, I just want you to overlook it.
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No, godly sorrow seeks accountability, wants to be accountable, wants to be wants to be responsible, not pointing it at other people.
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Number five, worldly sorrow is impatient.
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I told you I'm sorry.
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Why can't you just forgive me? How many of you heard that? How many of you said that? I told you I'm sorry for being mad.
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Can't you just forgive me? See, that's impatience.
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See, when you hurt somebody, they may need some time.
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You can't just go to them say, hey, the Bible says you got to forgive me.
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Bible says you got to forgive me.
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Bible says you got to forgive me.
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That's a good way for them to not want to forgive you.
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Right.
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So godly sorrow is patient, understands that some things take time.
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Godly sorrow.
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And this is what here's the thing that really this is why you can tell if a minister and I'm again, I know I can talk about him because I are one.
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Right.
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Ministers who fall into sin and then immediately want to be restored back.
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They want to be in the pulpit next Sunday.
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They don't want to be patient and seek godly restoration, but they want immediate restoration.
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They want immediate put back in the pulpit.
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I can tell you that's usually a sign of worldly, not godly sorrow because they don't want to be accountable.
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They don't want to seek any type of help.
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They don't want to seek stepping away and growing.
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Huh? That's right.
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That's right.
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They don't want any accountability.
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It goes back to that other one we talked about.
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So that's number five.
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Impatient, worldly sorrow is impatient, wants to be restored immediately, wants to be trusted immediately.
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Somebody got a problem with stealing.
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OK, I've repented.
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Give me a wallet.
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Slow down.
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All right.
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Number six, worldly sorrow focuses on the sins of others.
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Godly sorrow focuses on the sin of yourself.
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And that kind of goes back to blame shifting, sort of similar to number three.
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I can't again.
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Somebody comes into my office.
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I need help with repentance.
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Here's how other people have hurt me.
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That's not where you begin.
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You don't focus on the sins of other people.
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Because that's easy to do.
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It's easy to focus on the sins of other people.
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It's easy to point out where everybody else has failed.
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But when we do that, we're shifting the blame.
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Number seven, worldly sorrow criticizes the disciplinary process.
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And godly sorrow submits to the disciplinary process.
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I think this really goes good for this group, because when you come here, there's a certain disciplinary process that happens, right? When you come here, you don't get no cell phone no more, right? For the first six months or whatever it is, 150 days.
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Godly is submits to discipline, submits to the process.
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Worldly sorrow criticizes it.
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Think about you guys.
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And again, I'm not I don't live here, I don't know this, but I can imagine and you know, if I'm wrong, you can tell me I'm wrong.
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But I can imagine sometimes y'all out there sitting around your circles having conversations, maybe having your having your cigarette or whatever.
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And you look to the guy beside you say, you know what, I don't like the fact that they don't let us have phones.
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I don't like the fact that we got to be in bed at a certain time.
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I ain't a child.
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I'm not five years old.
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But understand this, there's a reason for the process.
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There's a reason why you're here.
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And the guys who are doing this didn't just fall off a turnip truck yesterday.
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The guy in charge here has been through the program.
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I never have.
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I got a set free shirt that they gave me.
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I don't wear it a lot because I didn't earn it.
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Now I do wear it.
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But I'm just saying if some of the guys see me with it, they say you didn't earn that.
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That's right.
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I didn't earn it.
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But I'm proud of the guys I see that do earn it.
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The guys that go through to phase two because they submitted to the disciplinary process.
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They did what they were supposed to do.
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And again, I ain't here just trying to argue with y'all or make a fuss.
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I didn't write these seven things.
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But that number seven really should be considered.
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When you think about the process of discipline, it's put in place for a purpose.
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And to sit and criticize it, you really should examine your heart.
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Number eight, worldly sorrow has an unchanged hard heart and godly sorrow has a changed heart.
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Goes back to repentance.
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A changed heart.
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So how do I know if I have a changed heart? You look at your life differently than you did before.
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And finally, number nine, worldly sorrow, there is no fruit and godly sorrow produces fruit.
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So what are the fruits? What are the fruits of the Spirit? Galatians, love, peace, joy, patience, kindness, goodness, gentleness, self-control.
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Against these things there is no law.
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These are the fruits of the Spirit.
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These are the things that we should see when godly repentance, when godly sorrow is present.
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These are the things that we should see.
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Now, I want you in your mind, I'm going to draw to a close, I want you in your mind to think of two men in Scripture because there's no better example of worldly sorrow and godly sorrow than what the Bible gives us.
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The Bible gives us two men in almost the exact same situation, both responding in two different ways.
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Peter and Judas.
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Both men betrayed Jesus.
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Judas betrayed Jesus by selling him into the hand of his enemies.
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Peter betrayed Jesus by denying him three times in an open courtyard where people could hear him deny Christ.
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Judas had sorrow, but it was real sorrow, right? I mean, you would say it was sorrow.
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He threw the money back at the guy, so he said, I don't want your money, and then he went out and hung himself.
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Most people don't hang themselves when they're having a good day.
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I mean, be honest, he was sorrowful, but he was not repentant.
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Judas did not repent.
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He had worldly sorrow and it led to death.
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Isn't that what the text says? Godly sorrow leads to repentance.
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Worldly sorrow leads to death, and so Judas went out and hung himself.
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But what did Peter do? He broke.
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He broke down.
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He heard that rooster crow, and he broke down, and he was broken over his sins, and he saw Jesus when he rose from the dead, and Jesus said, do you love me? Lord, you know I love you.
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Do you love me? You know I love you.
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And third time, do you love me? And it says he was grieved to his heart.
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Why? Because why did Jesus ask him three times? Because he denied him three times.
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Jesus was giving him the opportunity for restoration, and he said, do you love me? Do you love me? Do you love me? And he says, Lord, you know I love you.
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So we have the difference between godly sorrow.
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Godly sorrow is a repented, changed heart that wants to be in fellowship with the Lord.
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Yes, sir, you had your hand up.
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Well, the Bible calls him a son of perdition, one who was marked out from the beginning.
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You know, I don't see any reason why we would believe Judas repented.
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I know some people argue Judas was saved before he died.
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I have no reason to believe that from the Bible whatsoever.
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The Bible calls him a son of perdition, a son of the devil.
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There's just no reason biblically to believe that he repented.
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So I know some people want to find a way.
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I don't know, but again, I don't have any reason.
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Yeah, I don't have any reason to believe that he did.
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So that's why, and I think, again, looking at 2 Corinthians 7 10, I think we see that, yeah, there is worldly sorrow.
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Everybody who is right now drunk in a gutter is sorry, but they repented.
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Understand this, you all have been sorry, but not repented.
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I've been sorry and not repented.
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That's why sorry isn't repentance.
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Sorrow, worldly sorrow is not enough.
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Yes, and again, it all goes back to his grace.
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It's not something that we can do.
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If we resolve to do it ourselves, we may have some success.
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Huh? Yeah, ultimately, it is the grace of God that gives us the greatest success.
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Because even if, let's say this, let's say we have enough resolve, we have enough intestinal fortitude to get everything right, do everything right, and we live right from now on, we still die and go to hell.
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What's the good in it? None.
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Because that's right.
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That's right.
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Say that.
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Oh, okay.
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That's the thing.
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It all goes back to grace.
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Worldly sorrow comes from within the flesh.
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Godly sorrow comes from grace.
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So I know many of you are saying, well, I still deal with some of that worldly sorrow.
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I still deal with some of that.
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That's probably true.
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We all do.
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But do you have godly sorrow? Is your sin and the issues with your sin focused on God or yourself? Are they focused on hatred of sin or hatred of the consequences? Have you taken responsibility? Have you sought accountability? Are you patient, focusing on your sin and not the sins of others, submitting to discipline, having a changed heart and the fruit of the spirit? Those are the things that would indicate genuine repentance.
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All right.
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I hope this was helpful.
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I hope you guys have enjoyed, as I always enjoy coming here, and I hope you'll have a good new year.
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Let's pray.
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Father, thank you for this day, for this lesson.
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I pray that it has been an encouragement to these men.
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I would encourage all of us to seek not just worldly sorrow, Lord, and not worldly sorrow, but seek genuine godly sorrow.
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Through Christ and in Christ we pray.
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Amen.