There is a battle in our city. It is a battle of words. Words of hate, sprayed in bullets intended for someone else. Words of domestic conflict, beating fists into statements. Words of activism, community, hoping to begin implementing good words. Words of anger and despair for the darts these words impale; the heart of a community. There is one word which would be the groundbreaking for a safe structure in society: it is the word repentance.
This word means “to cut in two, pierce through”. As a surgeon must pierce the tough, outward skin to touch the diseased area and promote a healing, so there must be a piercing in our souls of a word which would bring a remedy.
We need to repent for:
- As a people, neglecting or rejecting Jesus Christ. Any time you take the Creator of a creation, its fabric disintegrates; there is no cement holding it together;
- As individuals, holding responsibility for the behaviors in our lives and the results they project;
- As family units -parents, for neglecting their children, spouse or for provoking them by one’s own anger; children, for refusing to give respect to their parents and elders;
- As educational instructors, institutions, for allowing the students to run the schools and curriculum; students, for not giving teachers, and such, respect and curtesy;
- As civic and political leaders, for forgetting who put you in office, and for neglecting to live by the laws your institute;
- As spiritual leaders, for aiming your sights at building a program, instead of building productive lives, and for demoralizing the Scripture by preaching it and not living it.
We need repentance- individually and as a people. We need to be cut open and flayed, so we see what we really are all about.