For godly sorrow worketh repentance to salvation.

     — 2 Corinthians 7:10

Conviction of sin is best portrayed in the words –

“My sins, my sins, my Saviour,
How sad on Thee they fall.”

Conviction of sin is one of the rarest things that ever strikes a
man. It is the threshold of an understanding of God. Jesus Christ
said that when the Holy Spirit came He would convict of sin, and when
the Holy Spirit rouses a man’s conscience and brings him into the
presence of God, it is not his relationship with men that bothers
him, but his relationship with God – “against Thee, Thee only, have I
sinned, and done this evil in Thy sight.” The marvels of conviction
of sin, forgiveness, and holiness are so interwoven that it is only
the forgiven man who is the holy man, he proves he is forgiven by
being the opposite to what he was, by God’s grace. Repentance always
brings a man to this point: I have sinned. The surest sign that God
is at work is when a man says that and means it. Anything less than
this is remorse for having made blunders, the reflex action of
disgust at himself.

The entrance into the Kingdom is through the panging pains of
repentance crashing into a man’s respectable goodness; then the Holy
Ghost, Who produces these agonies, begins the formation of the Son of
God in the life. The new life will manifest itself in conscious
repentance and unconscious holiness, never the other way about. The
bedrock of Christianity is repentance. Strictly speaking, a man
cannot repent when he chooses; repentance is a gift of God. The old
Puritans used to pray for “the gift of tears.” If ever you cease to
know the virtue of repentance, you are in darkness. Examine yourself
and see if you have forgotten how to be sorry.

On this day...

• Daniel 5 - 2023
• Daniel 4 - 2023
• Elijah and the Secret of His Power - Chapter 4 - 2011
• Elijah and the Secret of His Power - Chapter 3 - 2011
• Elijah and the Secret of His Power - Chapter 2 - 2011
• Elijah and the Secret of His Power - Chapter 1 - 2011
• Emerging Church - Part 3 - 2011
• Emerging Church - Part 2 - 2011
• Emerging church - Part 1 - 2011
• Apologize sincerely - 2011