by Henry Falcone

Created on: December 28, 2006   Last Updated: May 11, 2007

Why should a nation repent?

Today's article is going to be about "true"repentance. I understand what the bible says it means, but I want to talk about repentance in reality. As I look at my own life, there are still things in my heart that I know don't please God. There are attitudes, habits, mannerism and much more that so contradict the nature of the God I love.

As I have been listening to the Lord for myself, the church, and the nation, I realize that we must truly and genuinely repent. But what is repentance? Is it being sorry for what we have done? Does it come from feeling guilty about what we have done wrong? Is it like getting caught with your hand in the cookie job, and saying to your mom, I am sorry?

Why should we repent? Is it because we were caught in someone's eyes, our own or Gods? I believe the Lord is impressing on my spirit for a nation to repent it has to start with one. I know that may be absurd to your mind, but one person genuinely repenting can change a nation. The Lord reminded me of the prophet Daniel. This man cried and wept over his sin, his forefathers sins and the sins of the nation. Even though he was righteous in God's eyes and highly favored, he did not see the nations sins as theirs and not his. He identified with the sin and the sinners and cried out to God, "we your people, this nation has sinned."

The classical definition of repentance is the feeling or act in which one recognizes and try's to right a wrong. It always includes and admission of guilt, and it also includes at least one promise or resolve NOT TO repeat the offense; an attempt to make restitution for the wrong, or in someway to try to reverse the harmful effects of the wrong where possible. The word in the Hebrew written in the bible is from two verbs, SHUV, which means "to return", and NICKHAM meaning "to feel sorrow." So the definition in the Hebrew is to turn and feel sorrow of the wrong.

The Greek word also has a meaning. METANOIA is broken up into two words. The first is META meaning "after with." The second NOEO meaning to perceive, think differently. The compound of these two words gives us the Greek meaning, "to think differently after." It is a new after thought, or a new way of thinking different from the former thinking that caused you to sin. What does a nation need to do to truly repent? Nothing more than one individual needs to do.

It seems to me that in the church the USA, we have a serious problem with repentance that changes our life completely. Many

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