What Now?

My last post talked about owning our sin, particularly the sin of adultery. But I didn’t have space to talk about what someone who has sinned does now. That’s what this post is about.

The status is that the person has confessed his (I know women commit adultery too, it just gets crazy to say, his/her every time) sin, asked God to forgive him, has received forgiveness. But now what?

Feelings

When we sin, especially when we sin in huge ways, we feel a lot of guilt and shame, even after we have been assured that God has forgiven us and removed our shame. That is normal. What we need to do is live in the light of what is true, not in the wash of what we feel. I would wonder if someone really knew the weight of his sin if he didn’t feel horrible for a time after having confessed his sin. On the other hand, I would wonder the same thing if he was gloomy for a really long time. I think this situation is a kind of grief and needs to be lived through. But it needs to be lived through in a particular way and that’s what this post is about.

Scripture

After God said this, “Hear, O Israel: The Lord our God, the Lord is one! You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your strength” (Dt 6:4–5), he said this: 

And these words which I command you today shall be in your heart. You shall teach them diligently to your children, and shall talk of them when you sit in your house, when you walk by the way, when you lie down, and when you rise up. You shall bind them as a sign on your hand, and they shall be as frontlets between your eyes. You shall write them on the doorposts of your house and on your gates (Dt 6:6–9).

Jesus said this,

Then Jesus said to His disciples, “If anyone desires to come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross, and follow Me. For whoever desires to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for My sake will find it” (Mt 16:24–25).

And again, he said: Then He said to them all, “If anyone desires to come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross daily, and follow Me” (Lk 9:23).

These three passages are saying essentially the same thing. The things of God are worth giving everything you own to have. Knowing God is the most important thing in the universe and giving up everything is required to know him. 

In the Deuteronomy passage God says to plant God’s word in your heart. How do we do that? We study it, we memorize it, we apply it, we live it, we eat it, we drink it, we live in it. Every fiber of our lives is focused on knowing God’s word until as Charles Spurgeon said of John Bunyon, 

I would quote John Bunyan as an instance of what I mean. Read anything of his, and you will see that it is almost like reading the Bible itself. He had read it till his very soul was saturated with Scripture…’Why, this man is a living Bible!’ Prick him anywhere—his blood is Bibline, the very essence of the Bible flows from him.

And then God says, we need to “teach it diligently to your children.” In doing this we need to live it in front of them, talk to them about it to them, help them to apply it in their lives, and lead them to love it the way we do.

We are supposed to “talk about the Word of God” everywhere we go; when we drive in our cars, when we talk to our co-workers, when we talk to our friends, when we’re out golfing, when we’re getting out of bed and when we’re going to bed.

We’re supposed to put little cards with Scripture on them everywhere we look. When we look at ourselves in the morning, we should see the words of God taped there. When we check our rearview mirrors on our way to work, we should see little cards with scripture on them. When we put our hands in our pockets, we should come out with things that remind of our relationship with God.

The Word of God is to be so a part of our lives that there isn’t any room for us to sin.

In and through all of this we need to know and remember, this isn’t only about knowing the Bible it is about knowing God himself. Prayer is about talking to him, studying and living in his word is about hearing from him. And as we spend time with him, according to his word, he transforms us into the image of his son. We become like Jesus as we imitate him and spend time with him.

And when a person has sinned big time, becoming like Jesus is what he needs to go forward and to avoid the same sin in the future.

Some more applications of Scripture for the repentant (repentance means changed) sinner is that he will love and hang out with Christians (church, bible studies, prayer meetings, etc). He will talk with them about the Bible. He will sing hymns and psalms. He will love his wife in ways that she appreciates. He will take his kids on dates, he will play with them. He will lose his life for Jesus’ sake and will treat others like Jesus treats them.

All of this will be difficult at first, everything new is hard at first. Jesus said to take up our cross and follow him. This means to count yourself dead and alive to God in Christ Jesus (Rom 6:11). It means to stop standing up for yourself because you’re such a great guy and instead, humbling yourself and taking the lower place. It means loving your wife like Christ loved the Church (he let her kill him, you know). It means not frustrating your kids, instead, you will remember their frame and raise them in the nurture and admonition of the Lord (Eph 6:4). You won’t be perfect right away, but as with everything else, you’ll get better and better as you do it. If you sin, confess it, beg for forgiveness and start again.

For those who are watching

If you have been sinned against and you’re wondering whether your husband is really repentant, notice what his attitude is toward what I’ve written here. If he jumps in with all he is, not because it is me, but because it is an accurate reflection of the Scripture I’ve quoted, let him have some grace (I’m not writing Scripture here, there is room for some differences. The main point, however, is that there needs to be a revolutionary change toward Christ and away from his pride). Let him change. Be patient with him. Forgive him and do the things I’ve suggested here yourself. Allow him to rebuild trust. Not because you trust him so much but because you are living in the name of Christ and you trust God. Join him in changing into Jesus’ image.

Know that things may start out with a bang, but slowly drift back to what things were like before. If they do, be very careful. If nothing changes, nothing changes. Jesus talked about this kind of person when he said, “Now he who received seed among the thorns is he who hears the word, and the cares of this world and the deceitfulness of riches choke the word, and he becomes unfruitful” (Mt 13:22). Here is a man who feels guilty because he got caught, but it wasn’t God’s conviction. His confession might be real (in the sense that he’s acknowledging that he actually did it), but his repentance isn’t.

For those who never make any changes at all, I would suggest that you seek some godly counsel about divorcing him. He has broken the marriage covenant and if he doesn’t change, or even try to change, he’ll just do it again when he gets a chance. Your life may feel like Hell right now, but if/when he does it again, you’ll just relive the whole thing again.