Hope In Repentance

“None of us can ever truly be home until we’re right with the Lord.” — from DANIEL, Sight & Sound Theatres®

Repent. This word doesn’t always resonate well in our day and age. It isn’t often a palatable command because it inherently means we’ve sinned. There’s a sense of doom and hopelessness in it. It can seem like an admission of guilt so that a hard and distant God might spare you some kind of terrible punishment.

The truth is that repentance is hopeful at its very core. Confessing sin while trusting in God’s love for you is very different than sinking into a pit of shame. We can have confidence that we are forgiven, accepted, and redeemed. Then, we get to turn away from that sin and turn back to Him by doing our best to live in obedience to God and in relationship with Him. The Hebrew word for ‘repent’ is ‘teshuva’, which means ‘to return’. Repenting means to turn away from sin and turn toward the Lord. He always welcomes a repentant heart!

The book of Daniel doesn’t have many, if any, examples of Daniel needing to repent for anything! Nonetheless, after decades in Babylon, he felt compelled to repent for all of the people of Israel. We see this in Daniel chapter 9. He uses the term “we,” not “they.” While Daniel may or may not have been guilty of these specific crimes against God, he is a flawed human. Like many leaders in Scripture before, Daniel is doing his best to bridge the gap between the people and God. According to the prophet Jeremiah, the time was almost ripe for the Hebrews to return to the promised land, but Daniel recognized the spiritual distance that was still there. This was his attempt to intercede.

While Daniel was still praying, the angel Gabriel appeared to him and gave him a message. Daniel was favored by God. God would fulfill His promise, but things would continue getting darker and more difficult. However, the Anointed One was coming! He would finally be able to bridge the gap between God and His people. The Anointed One is Jesus. Repentance of sin and acceptance of Him leads to the greatest hope of all: transformation, restoration, and belonging to the one true King and His Kingdom.