I Trust God Only

Can Pride Keep You From Repenting?

Jesus Will be King of Kings for All People

Judges 21:25, In those days there was no king in Israel, and every man did as he pleased.

This scripture is so true when you see how it is no different today then it was back in those days. In the Old Testament they had God to follow if they chose to. In these days, the New Testament, we have Jesus as a choice to follow and when He returns, Jesus will be King of Kings for all people, not just Israel.

As long as you do not accept Jesus (the King of Kings and the Lord of Lords) you can say, ‘I’m going to do as I please and follow my own desires’. In other words, you can rule your own life and be your own king but, there are consequences to this way of living.

First and foremost, you do not have Jesus as your Savior. All you have is the world and the world cannot save you because the world is nothing but vanity. When you die, you are left with nothing.

You can’t go to heaven because you rejected Jesus, the Son of God, King of Kings. Therefore, you reject Jesus, you reject God as well. You see, the only place left to go is the Lake of Fire where all the others are going who rejected Jesus.

The Lake of Fire and The Sacrificial Lamb

Matt.25:41, Next He will say to those on His left hand, “Go away from me with your curse upon you, to the eternal fire prepared for the devil and his angels.”

God didn’t prepare the Lake of Fire for us, He prepared it for the devil and his angels. He sent Jesus to give us the Good News about the Kingdom of God. Jesus came to be the sacrificial Lamb so that those who believe and don’t reject Him can be forgiven of their sins.

God Gave Us a Way Out of Condemnation

John 3:16-18, ‘Yes, God loved the world so much that He gave His only Son, so that everyone who believes in Him will not be lost but may have eternal life. For God sent His Son into the world not to condemn the world, but so that through Him the might be saved.

No one who believes in Him will be condemned; but whoever refuses to believe is condemned already, because he has refused to believe in the name of God’s only Son.

Detach Your Heart From this Passing World

1 John 2:15-17, ‘You must not love this passing world or anything that is in the world. The love of the Father cannot be in any man that loves the world.

The things the world has to offer like–the sensual body, the lustful eye, pride in possessions–could never come from the Father but only from the world. And the world, with all it craves for, is coming to an end; but anyone who does the will of God remains forever.’

Jesus tells us this: John 15:18-19, ‘If the world hates you, remember that it hated me before you. If you belonged to the world, the world would love you as its own.’ Your choice.

Christians are being persecuted all over the world. The world hates them just as Jesus foretold His apostles but, the believers in Christ don’t renounce Him because they have faith and they know there is a better life waiting for them.

Pride is the Root of All Sin

Ecclesiasticus 10:12-13, The beginning of human pride is to desert the Lord, and to turn one’s heart away from one’s maker. Since the beginning of pride is sin, whoever clings to it will pour forth filth.

Ecclesiasticus 10:18, Pride was not created for men, nor furious rage for those born of woman.

Repent — Cease to Sin and Change Your Lifestyle

Psalm 7:10-12, God is the shield that protects me, He preserves upright hearts. God the righteous judge is slow to anger, but He is a God who is always enraged by those who refuse to repent.

Matthew 3:2, John the Baptist said, ‘Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is close at hand’.

Deceiving Ourselves and Refusing to Admit the Truth

James 1:14-15, Everyone who is tempted is attracted and seduced by his own wrong desire. Then the desire conceives and gives birth to sin, and when sin is fully grown, it too has a child, and the child is death.

1 John 1:8-10, If we say we have no sin in us, we are deceiving ourselves and refusing to admit the truth; but if we acknowledge our sins, but God who is faithful and just will forgive our sins and purify us from everything that is wrong. To say that we have never sinned is to call God a liar and to show that His word is not in us.

The People Confess Their Sins and Are Baptized

Matthew 3:5-6, ‘Then Jerusalem and all Judea and the whole Jordan district made their way to him (John the Baptist), and as they were baptized by him in the river Jordan they confessed their sins’. (Also in Mark 1:4-5).

James 5:16, So, confess your sins one to another, and pray for one another, and this will cure you.

Jesus and Two Criminals Crucified

Luke 23:39-43, ‘One of the criminals hanging there abused Him. ‘Are you not the Christ?’ he said, ‘Save yourself and us as well’. But the other spoke up and rebuked him.

‘Have you no fear of God at all?’ he said. ‘You got the same sentence as He did, but in our case we deserved it: we are paying for what we did. But this man has done nothing wrong.’

‘Jesus’ he said, ‘Remember me when you come into your kingdom.’ ‘Indeed I promise you,’ He replied, ‘Today you will be with me in paradise.’

It appears that the first criminal does not care to own up to his wrong doing. He is not remorseful for doing the wrong that he did. All he cares about is escaping the consequences that he was sentenced to as judgement for the crime he committed. We don’t know what this man thought about later on but, at this point his last thought was asking Jesus to help him escape his punishment.

Next, we have the second criminal rebuking what the first criminal was pleading to Jesus about. The second criminal acting out of humility and showing respect to God admitted that he did wrong and that his punishment was justified.

In this man’s last hour he confessed his wrong doing openly and did not try to hide it. He recognized Jesus as an innocent man and as his Savior by asking Jesus to remember him. Jesus told the man that He promised He will and that he will be with Him in paradise.

Acknowledge Your Sins and Admit Them To Yourself | Confess Them to God and to Another Person

The first part of this spiritual exercise is to acknowledge your sins. If you are not familiar with all of the sins that we commit, you can look them up in the bible. For instance, these scriptures lists many of them:

Mark 7:21-23, ‘It is what comes out of a man that makes him unclean. For it is from within, from men’s hearts, that evil intentions emerge: fornication, theft, murder, adultery, avarice, malice, deceit, indecency, envy, slander, pride, folly. All these evil things come from within and make a man unclean.’

Galatians 5:19-21, ‘When self-indulgence is at work the results are obvious: fornication, gross indecency and sexual irresponsibility; idolatry and sorcery; feuds and wrangling, jealousy, bad temper and quarrels; disagreements, factions, envy; drunkenness, orgies and similar things. I warn you now, as I warned you before: those that behave like this will not inherit the kingdom of God.’

Revelation 22:15, ‘These others must stay outside: dogs, fortune-tellers, and fornicators, and murderers, and idolaters, and everyone of false speech and false life.’

Some of the others could be: wrongs you may have done to others, resentments, hate, wishing ill things to happen to people.

Begin Meditating and Writing Your Sins Down

Find a nice quiet place or peaceful setting where you can relax and concentrate without interruption. Begin by asking Jesus give you courage and faith to help you recall the sins that you need to acknowledge and write them down.

Take however much time you wish to spend during this session. You should do this as many times as you can until you feel that you have concluded with covering all bases of the sins and your conscience is clear. Make sure that you have not left out any sin(s) because you feel they’re not appropriate.

You have to be completely honest with this spiritual exercise. This is a very humbling experience and it could lead you to a spiritual awakening.

Once you have completed writing down your sins, you will need to find someone that you feel you can trust. Someone like a pastor, a counselor, someone in the clergy, or someone you feel comfortable with and trust.

Confess Your Sins

Confess your sins to whomever you chose and to God. Spend some time going over your sins. Discuss the difficult ones that you may have trouble with or overcoming.

After you have finished confessing your sins to yourself, God and another person, pray about these sins, forgive yourself and ask God to forgive you and ask Him to remove these sins. Then you can take the paperwork that you wrote your sins down on an destroy them as you like.

Many Benefits to This Spiritual Exercise

There are many benefits to this spiritual exercise that will help you miraculously. It’s a part of picking up your cross daily and following Jesus. It will bring you closer to Him and God. Jesus is the Way, the Truth and Life. Follow Him and He will help you overcome all things that keep that you separated from God.

Using a Journal

There is one item that you may want to start as a daily routine and that would be to keep a journal. Write down the things that you do wrong in the course of the day like, bad thoughts, things you may did or didn’t do, something you might have said like gossiping, etc., etc.

Then at the end of the day, review your journal and evaluate what you wrote down. Take one and think about what you can do to change this negative to a positive.

This will likely take practice but, it will help you to raise your awareness level. The more you are able to change, the better and more manageable your life will be.

Examine Yourself Before Judgement Comes

Ecclesiasticus 18:19-22, ‘Learn before you speak, take care of yourself before you fall ill. Examine yourself before judgement comes, and on the day of visitation you will find yourself acquitted.

Humble yourself before you fall ill, and when you sin repent. Let nothing prevent your discharging a vow in good time, and do not wait till death before setting matters to right.’

Examine yourself daily, read the bible, pray and ask God for forgiveness of your sins.

Repentance – Feel Deep Sorrow About One’s Actions