elevate may 8

At elevate this week, we continued our study on the concept of revival.

One of the words that often gets used in the context of revival is the word "repentance". The concept of repentance is one that I believe has suffered from the modern approach to Bible study. In the modern era everything was boiled down to its lowest common denominator. By simplifying the definitions there was a hope that everyone would be a will to agree on foundational truths. This did not occur and actually resulted in multiple divisions amongst believers as well as a lot of ugly fighting. This is not what this blog is about but I'm pretty sure I covered it in an earlier one.

We took the word repentance and expanded or some would say complicate its definition by looking at the book of Acts Chapter 2.

The key idea of repentance was broken up into three concepts. The first one is the idea of Revelation, the second repentance, and the third turning. We also want to make clear that repentance is not something only the unsaved person can do. Repentance is something all of us should participate in regardless of our relationship with God

Revelation is sourced in God. It's the idea that God starts the process of repentance through the prompting of his spirit. Now revelation can occur directly to the person from God's Spirit. Or it could be brought to him through some other source like a person, a miracle, some form of the arts, an aspect of God's creation, all of these things can be used to start the conversation between the individual and God.

Repentance is more than "pain of the mind" it is really a change of mind. When you repent because of some pain that you are in , humiliation, embarrassment, or just plain feeling bad, it's not a bad place to start but true repentance doesn't end there. Repentance allows you to see things from God's perspective. Repentance when done as God intended allows you to see what you've done from his viewpoint. God does not use guilt, manipulation, humiliation to make you do what he wants done. The self inflicted repentance uses those things.

So if we have responded to Godly revelation in a Godly way, the end result will be true repentance where we see ourselves or our sin the way God does.
Which leads us to the third part the turning, The turning is just that it is a new direction. The old direction is the direction of self, pride, intellect, reason, but God’s way he does not use those things. God's Way the way that we turn to when we repent produces godly characteristics and our lives. We seek God's will/plan on earth.
When the first two aspects are in repentance the last thing we do, "the turning" is something that becomes very natural. Doing God's will is so easily stepped into that people may think we are under some sort of chemical influence because of how uninhibited we are in the way we present God in everything we do.