We resume our focus on the theme of Lent, and with what spirit we should go through this season.
Our text in Matthew 3:2-3 describes John the Baptist as proclaiming a message of repentance in preparation for the coming kingdom of heaven: “Repent, for the kingdom of heaven has come near.”
In our text in 2Peter 3:8-9, it has been expressed there that the Lord may appear to be acting slow in fulfilling his promise. Actually, He is being so patient with us, not wanting anyone of his people to perish, but would want everyone, to come to repentance.
And so from John the Baptist to 2 Peter, there is always this constant call to repentance; for John, it is because repentance is a requirement of the coming kingdom of heaven. For 2Peter, it is because the repentance of everyone, not their destruction, is the greatest desire of God.
Repentance, however, cannot be understood without understanding also what is sin, or what is to repent about. We cannot experience repentance if we are not clear on what is the sin that we are to repent about or turn away from.
Usually, sin is understood as the commission of mistakes, wrongful acts, bad behavior or vices, immoral deeds, corrupt, dishonest, destructive practices.
Actually, Sin is our relationship with God gone wrong.
Those small sins, those wrongful, dishonest, immoral, corrupt acts, are but manifestations of this basic Sin. It is our refusal to enter into a relationship of faith, trust and surrender to our God and instead, trusting and having faith only in ourselves. It is deceiving ourselves into thinking that we can go on with our lives without God.
It is believing only in ourselves, in our own abilities and powers to succeed, thinking that God is no longer necessary in our life. It is declaring independence and even rebellion against God, thinking that we are no longer accountable to any higher power and therefore we can do as we wish and get whatever we want in this life without feeling guilty of anything or feeling bothered by conscience on the effects of our actions or decisions.
Thus, we lose our sense of caring and compassion for others as we care only for ourselves. It is living life without any fear of God. This is the basic sin that we need to repent about.
For this is the sin that is at the heart of so many wrongs, so many injustices, so many victimizations going on around us and in many other places around the world.
First, this is at the heart of abuse of power. There is a long list in history of rulers who acted as brutal dictators, pharaohs or emperors to their own people and who eventually have to experience the humiliation and brutality of their being brought down from power (ex. Hitler of Germany, Mussolini of Italy, Qaddafi of Libya, Saddam Hussain of Iraq, and of course, our own Marcos).
Those who reach for the stars while forgetting their own humanity will eventually come crashing back to earth.
This is called in Greek as hubris, or simply, excessive pride manifested in the arrogance and abuse of power.
Do not think, however, that this applies only to those who rule over nations and peoples. They apply also to us who have been used to getting our way, getting what we want and having authority and power over others, even in the way we treat our house helpers, our students, those who work for us and others we think are below us.
We can be guilty of pride, arrogance when we feel too proud to admit our own mistakes and shortcomings, when we feel it’s too much for us to apologize and say sorry to people whom we think are not of equal level or stature with us.
Lent reminds us its time to give up our pride and humble ourselves in genuine repentance before our God. As the Prophet Joel says: “Rend your hearts, not your garments.”
Second, this break in our relationship with God, this sin is at the heart of greed, both individual greed and corporate greed, the unquenchable desire to covet, acquire and possess much more than we need, victimizing, and depriving in the process, so many less privileged people, creating in our society and even in the rest of the world an even greater and widening gap between the rich and the poor.
This individual and corporate greed, in its quest for greater profit is now destroying in its wake much of the balance in our natural resources, and ultimately, the harmony and integrity of God’s creation, with denuded forests, polluted seas, lakes and rivers, contaminated soil, heavily polluted air resulting in what we now experience as climate change and global warming.
We need to repent of this and ask God to free us from this spirit of covetousness that has been enslaving so many and at the same time victimizing countless others.
The third manifestation of sin is also related to pride as we think of ourselves as the only ones who are right, that is racial or ethnic, religious and gender prejudice, self righteousness and bias. This is when we think some others are to be looked down upon, or to be considered inferior, like how some men look at women, or cannot be trusted, or people whom we have to avoid because of their smell, or color or because of their seeming bad hygiene, or because of their questionable social and economic origin, or because they are gay.
Instantly, we have judged and condemned others even without hearing them because of our prior assumptions about them.
This is when we build walls of division, prejudice and hatred instead of bridges of understanding and reconciliation. Look at what’s happening in our world today.
Even in this supposedly modern world, with so much accelerated increase in knowledge, science and technology, in travel and communication that are supposed to bring peoples together, still, we have nations who continue to build walls that keep others out. We have not succeeded in eliminating war and violence in various parts of the word. War is still ongoing in various places all over the world, especially in the Middle East in the same vein as in ancient times.
Nothing has changed. The only thing that has improved is the technology of weapons now being used to kill more people on a more massive and deadly scale.
Pride, greed, prejudice and hatred have remained throughout history. We have not found a more peaceful solution to the conflicts between peoples and nations. We have not really fulfilled the mandate of our Lord for us to become peacemakers and ambassadors of reconciliation in Jesus’ name.
This is where we have failed in our calling. And this is what we need to confess in our repentance, our part in a world that is full of Sin and of Sinful ways and Sinful structures and systems. This is where true and humble repentance have to be undertaken. “For all have sinned and have fallen short of the glory of God.” (Rom.3:21)
Repentance means turning around, change of direction in life, from a life of independence from God to a life of complete dependence and trust in the Lord, from a life of insensitivity to the wrongs and suffering going on around us and without any sense of accountability, to a life of total submission to God and compassion for others in obedience to His voice and will for us.
This can only be a product though of a serious, life changing encounter with God, through His son Jesus, the only one who can understand us fully, and the only one who can forgive us fully and restore us as His children, like the prodigal son, a living encounter with an ever forgiving, patiently waiting father confronting us with the truth of who we are, enabling us to see ourselves as we are, who understands our whole being and who genuinely forgives our sins and accepts us as we are towards a new life and new beginning.
This is truly Good News coming to us no matter how much we remain so undeserving of it. It is now up to us to make the appropriate response especially in this season of Lent, in renewed faith and trusting obedience. Amen.
