“The voice of one crying in the wilderness: ‘Prepare the way of the Lord; Make His paths straight.’”   Matt 3:3

Most of us don’t really like the idea of repentance because traditionally it carries a lot of negative and judgemental connotations. The word literally means to ‘turn around.’ We typically use it to demand that people turn away from their sin. But that is only half of what repentance involves. It’s not enough to simply stop sinning. In fact theologically we understand that to be beyond our capacity as mere mortals. We tend to focus more on what we are turning from. But the other side of repentance is about what we are turning to. As I always say, you can’t stop sinning, but you can start walking. The more we walk in the Spirit the less we will walk in sin. Perhaps it would help if we could stop looking at repentance as a crisis event and start seeing it more as spiritual skill that we walk in daily. King David was certainly no sinless saint. Murder. Adultery, Duplicity. You have to wonder what was it that made him “a man after God’s own heart”! One thing is clear – David was good at repentance. Just read Psalm 51 again. “Wash me thoroughly from my iniquity, and cleanse me from my sin. For I acknowledge my transgressions, and my sin is always before me.” David understood that walking with God required the ability to maintain “a broken and a contrite heart”. It is the daily habit of turning to God. Fasting isn’t just turning from food, it’s turning to something even more essential. Turning away from some things for a few days won’t really change your life at all. But turning to God with a hunger for deeper transformation will ‘prepare the way’ for God to show himself strong on your behalf!