Ideas about Repentance
(Study 3 of 5)
Today's Three-minute Bible Study
Print, Study and Apply
Title: Ideas about Repentance - Part
3 ------------------------- Date: 11/03/1999
Keywords: "repentance" "sinner"
Welcome to eXXit, the web site designed to help you stand strong in the
face of sexual temptation.
This is part three in a five part
study. Click the number to see other studies in this series: ---1---2---4---5---.
Passage: Luke
15:8-10*
8. "Or suppose a woman has ten silver coins and loses one. Does
she not light a lamp, sweep the house and search carefully until she finds it?
9. And when she finds it, she calls her friends and neighbors
together and says, 'Rejoice with me; I have found my lost coin.'
10. In the same way, I tell you, there is rejoicing in the presence
of the angels of God over one sinner who repents." --Jesus Christ
Question
What does this story about repentance show about God's concern for
sinners?
Practical help
Whatever remorse is experienced by penitent sinners, no
corresponding grief is felt by God when they repent, only joy.
This may be opposite of what some sinners expect. They think God
will kick their butts when they confess. No wonder they put off repentance.
The story about the lost coin, however, reflects no trace of anger
or frustration with the misplaced object. The same is true with the earlier story in Luke
chapter 15 about the lost sheep (click here to see). Both
stories depict owners who search for lost possessions that are incapable of rescuing
themselves, then party when the lost are found. The two stories are exactly parallel.
Would it be reasonable to expect that such parallelism is meant to
help us understand the third and final story in Luke chapter 15, where it is a person who
is lost, not an animal or object? (See the next study in this series.)
Meantime, those of us stuck in smut can take heart in one thing: God
won't punish us when we repent (the sin bringing on its own devastation).
Instead God will throw a party.
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*Scriptures are from The Holy Bible: New International Version © Copyright 1973,
1978, 1984 by International Bible Society. All rights reserved.