Get Your Hand out of the Cookie Jar!

Have you ever experienced the classic scene of walking into the kitchen to find your child with his hand in the cookie jar...the cookie jar you told him not to get into until after supper?  You say, "Johnny, what are you doing in that cookie jar!"  And he replies, "I'm sorry mommy"...all the while, he's stuffing a cookie in his mouth!  Is this not a picture of the type of repentance most people exercise?  A man is caught in sinful behavior, says he is sorry, yet continues on with his life with no change.  A woman knows she is in disobedience to the standards of God's Word, so she confesses that she is wrong, but justifies her actions and does nothing to rectify them.  I vividly recall counseling a lady not to leave her husband for another man because she would be living in sin, only to hear her say..."I know it's not right, but....."  Then came the justifications and reasons why she should be able to be an exception to God's rules.

Beloved, repentance equals change.  Repentance is a change of mind about sin, that reaches the heart and changes the behavior.  If sinful behavior does not stop, the heart has not been reached and the mind has not been changed and repentance has not occurred.  If you are indulging an area of sin and find yourself asking God's forgiveness, only to indulge the same wrong over and over again...maybe you've never taken your hand out of the cookie jar!  It's not enough to tell God that you are sorry...you must be willing to part with the sin and walk in obedience.  That is true repentance.