Turned Away

 

As they rode on the bus together, night overtook them, and the child commented on how dark it was:

“Oh, sweetie,” said the white-haired lady sitting next to him. “It sure is. Did you see the sun going down when we went across the bridge a little while ago?” 

Shane looked at her with wide eyes. It was his turn to be amazed, his three-year-old linguistic system still interpreting everything literally. “Oh, no,” he replied. “The sun did not go anywhere. We just turned away from it.” (Blest Atheist)

 After a long time, mankind did realize we are not the center of the universe, nor the galaxy, nor even our small solar system. Youngster learn that our earth turns, the sun does neither rises nor sets, but we move around it without being able to change that. We just turn away - and back again.

It's easy to turn away from God. Paul worked with people that did:

For Demas hath forsaken me, having loved this present world, and is departed unto Thessalonica;  (2 Timothy 4:10a KJV)

The Bible is filled with examples of people who knew God, turned away from Him. Some of them turned back - and He was still there. The one who wrote most about that relationship was was David:

To the chief Musician, A Psalm of David, when Nathan the prophet came unto him, after he had gone in to Bathsheba:

Have mercy upon me, O God, according to thy lovingkindness: according unto the multitude of thy tender mercies blot out my transgressions. Wash me throughly from mine iniquity, and cleanse me from my sin. (Psalms 51:1-2 KJV)

How best to come to the Lord on our knees and tell Him we know how wrong we were and beg for His forgiveness, to heal the relationship.

For I acknowledge my transgressions: and my sin is ever before me. Against thee, thee only, have I sinned, and done this evil in thy sight: that thou mightest be justified when thou speakest, and be clear when thou judgest. Behold, I was shapen in iniquity; and in sin did my mother conceive me. (Psalms 51:3-5 KJV)

He broke both of the greatest commandments - he not only ignored God, denied Him the love of his heart, mind, and soul, but he failed to love his neighbor, to the point of stealing his wife and having him killed. Literally a neighbor, for it was from his window David watched Bathsheba. What hope is there after breaking the fundamental commandments God has repeated for ages?

This is what David requested from God, and offered in return:

Create in me a clean heart, O God; and renew a right spirit within me. Cast me not away from thy presence; and take not thy holy spirit from me. Restore unto me the joy of thy salvation; and uphold me with thy free spirit. Then will I teach transgressors thy ways; and sinners shall be converted unto thee. (Psalms 51:10-13 KJV)

Teaching. Just what God had requested of Israel:

Hear, O Israel: The LORD our God is one LORD: And thou shalt love the LORD thy God with all thine heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy might. And these words, which I command thee this day, shall be in thine heart: And thou shalt teach them diligently unto thy children, and shalt talk of them when thou sittest in thine house, and when thou walkest by the way, and when thou liest down, and when thou risest up. (Deuteronomy 6:4-7 KJV)

His Son did the same to the Disciples just before He returned to His Father:

Go ye therefore, and teach all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost: Teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I have commanded you: and, lo, I am with you alway, even unto the end of the world. Amen. (Matthew 28:19-20 KJV)

One of the things we are to teach is that there is no one turned away when they come to our Father. Matthew 15:11-32 tells that story so well. Even after his father welcomed him home, the son told him:

And the son said unto him, Father, I have sinned against heaven, and in thy sight, and am no more worthy to be called thy son. (Luke 15:21 KJV)

I've read that non-religious people are turned off by the word repent. I'm not certain why - perhaps they expect that their entire life will change if they repent, and they are afraid. Look at the people who actually lived their repentance - their lives did change when they took the path to God. They did live with consequences from their action, but once they turned back to God, their lives were better.

That's all repent means - turn away from the way you are going, back to the way God has for all of us. Come, join us and learn of the strait and narrow way. It is so rewarding.