TEST THE SPIRITS: TRUE REPENTANCE

Happy Father’s Day!  We certainly want to celebrate the commitment and sacrifice of all our fathers.  We hope you do something special for your father! However, Father’s Day does not have a warm meaning for an increasing number of Americans. One out of four children in America do not have a biological, step or adoptive father in their home. This is approximately 18.4 million children in America today. (National Fatherhood Initiative, https://www.fatherhood.org/father-absence-statistic). This is a difficult and harsh statistic for our country, but it is also a commentary on a lot of other themes in our society, such as a lack of commitment, entitlement, the breakdown of the family structure, or sexual responsibility. We need a fundamental change of heart and mind for our society; a change that will build us up rather than tear us down. In our sermon series, Test the Spirits, the sermon is True Repentance. Repentance is the Biblical power of change that leads us to a deeper recognition of our need for God and God’s grace to us!  True repentance helps us to recognize the power of a living God to forgive, redeem, and restore our lives.  We turn to Isaiah 64:1-9. This is Isaiah’s prayer to change the heart his people. He recognizes how they have wandered from the right path and this prayer gives us great direction for a lasting, powerful, transforming path to change because this is the Father who seeks to form our lives and restore our hearts and souls!  It is our prayer that you will sense our Father drawing you close to his heart as you read Isaiah 64:1-9: 1 Oh, that you would rend the heavens and come down, that the mountains would tremble before you! 2 As when fire sets twigs ablaze and causes water to boil, come down to make your name known to your enemies and cause the nations to quake before you! 3 For when you did awesome things that we did not expect, you came down, and the mountains trembled before you. 4 Since ancient times no one has heard, no ear has perceived, no eye has seen any God besides you, who acts on behalf of those who wait for him. 5 You come to the help of those who gladly do right, who remember your ways. But when we continued to sin against them, you were angry. How then can we be saved? 6 All of us have become like one who is unclean, and all our righteous acts are like filthy rags; we all shrivel up like a leaf, and like the wind our sins sweep us away. 7 No one calls on your name or strives to lay hold of you; for you have hidden your face from us and have given us over to our sins. 8 Yet you, LORD, are our Father. We are the clay, you are the potter; we are all the work of your hand. 9 Do not be angry beyond measure, LORD; do not remember our sins forever. Oh, look on us, we pray, for we are all your people. (NIV)