Do you have to figure out all your sins before becoming a Christian?
Question:
I have a few questions. If you don't mind.
Do you have to figure out all your sins right away, or is this a lifelong process of seeing sin and repenting?
I read What Repentance Is Not. It gave the example of someone who quit drinking because it was affecting their health. My question is, how do you know you are repenting for the right reasons?
I also have the concern that is there something in my life that I don't see and God does see that is a sin? I don't want something to be unforgivable because I didn't ask for forgiveness. It really worries me that on Judgment day, I will be judged for my sin, and I am not seeing it at all or numb to it right now.
Answer:
No one starts out as a Christian knowing everything. Thus, we have to grow our knowledge. "Therefore, putting aside all malice and all deceit and hypocrisy and envy and all slander, like newborn babies, long for the pure milk of the word, so that by it you may grow in respect to salvation" (I Peter 2:1-2). Along the way, I will learn that some things I have been doing are wrong. Not one of us is perfect and without sin. "If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us" (I John 1:8). Yet, we know that people will be saved. When we learn of sins we are committing, we ask God for forgiveness and make corrections in our lives. "If we confess our sins, He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness" (I John 1:9).
Where we fall short, we depend on God's mercy to get us through. "But God, who is rich in mercy, because of His great love with which He loved us, even when we were dead in trespasses, made us alive together with Christ (by grace you have been saved), and raised us up together, and made us sit together in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus, that in the ages to come He might show the exceeding riches of His grace in His kindness toward us in Christ Jesus" (Ephesians 2:4-7). In other words, we do all we can, and God will take care of what we cannot do.
This doesn't mean we can remain in our sins. The battle must be done.
"What shall we say then? Shall we continue in sin that grace may abound? Certainly not! How shall we who died to sin live any longer in it?" (Romans 6:1-2).
"For if we go on sinning willfully after receiving the knowledge of the truth, there no longer remains a sacrifice for sins" (Hebrews 10:26).
We know the safety net exists, but it doesn't mean we can be careless in our war against sin. I am learning so that I may not sin. "My little children, I am writing these things to you so that you may not sin. And if anyone sins, we have an Advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous" (I John 2:1).
What Repentance Is Not argues that some people change their behavior because they are forced to do so and not because they have changed their attitude about what they have done. "Changing your conduct without changing your heart is not repentance." Repentance is both a change of mind and a change of behavior.
When you read your Bible and realize that you've missed something, pray to God for forgiveness and make changes in your life to conform to what you now know.
The Bible doesn't use the word "unforgivable." It states that some people are unforgiven because they don't leave their sins. The potential to change is there, but some refuse to change. If you strive to do your best and make changes when you learn that you've been mistaken, then you are doing what God asked of you. Growth is going to continue throughout our lives. You and I won't be perfect when we reach the end of life, but I am working to be better than I was the year before.
