WHAT IS PENITENCE?

"And when he came to himself, he said, How many hired servants of my father's have bread enough and to spare, and I perish with hunger! I will arise and go to my father, and will say unto him. Father, I have sinned against heaven, and before thee, and am no more worthy to be called thy son: make me as one of thy hired servants. And he arose, and came to his father." — Luke xv. 17-20 (A.V.).

"But when he came to himself he said, How many hired servants of my father's have bread enough and to spare, and I perish here with hunger! I will arise and go to my father, and will say unto him, Father, I have sinned against heaven, and in thy sight: I am no more worthy to be called thy son: make me as one of thy hired servants. And he arose, and came to his father." — (R.V.)

As has been indicated in the previous section, the end of God's judgment is not the destruction of the sinner, but the separation of the sinner from his sin that he may return to God. This reconciliation to God is effected by penitence on man's side, and pardon on God's. We must first of all consider penitence, as it comes first in the order of the tale, which, however, in this respect corresponds rather to the Old Testament revelation than to that of the New Testament. Here, as in the 51st Psalm, the initiative seems to be with man, and not with God. The Psalmist believes that if he will bring the sacrifice of a broken and contrite heart God will accept it, and will forgive his sin; so the prodigal here resolves to return and make his appeal for pardon in the hope that the appeal will not be vain. But in the Christian redemption the initiative lies with God; it is He who in Christ offers His pardon unto men, and so appeals for their penitence. When pardon is granted on penitence, there is the assurance that the sinner has judged his own sin; and therefore God's pardon will not be misunderstood as making light of his sin. But when pardon is offered to penitence, a twofold problem arises. First of all, it must be made clear that God does not so freely pardon sin, because He thinks lightly of sin; but that in forgiving the sin He has already judged it. Secondly, the penitence, to which the pardon is offered, must be awakened in the soul of man, lest the pardon be welcomed as a substitute for, instead of as the source of, penitence, even as in Ancient Israel the animal sacrifices were offered not as a token but in the place of repentance and amendment. This twofold problem Christian faith finds solved in the Cross of Jesus Christ, even although Christian theology ever seems to fail adequately to express for the mind the relation. The sacrifice of God in Christ's Cross expresses God's judgment as well as forgiveness, and evokes repentance as well as faith in man. We must remember then that this parable was spoken before the sacrifice revealed God's pardon to call forth man's penitence; and must not be surprised that, spoken to Jewish opponents, it does not betray to their unfriendly scrutiny the secrets of Christian faith, but is presented from the standpoint of the Old Testament, where pardon waited on penitence.

Although the term penitence, derived from the Latin, suggests mainly grieved feeling, and the Greek word metanoia, used in the Greek Testament, changed mind, yet penitence, as suggested by the words "He came unto himself," involves and affects the whole self, mind, heart, and will alike; and we must try to understand what in each of these exercises of the personality it means, (1) It is first of all for the mind self-discovery. "How many hired servants of my father's have bread enough and to spare, and I perish with hunger!"

(2) It is next for the heart self-disgust. "I am no more worthy to be called thy son: make me as one of thy hired servants."

( 3 ) It is lastly for the will self-denial. "I will arise and go to my father, and will say unto him, I have sinned against heaven, and before thee." It involves a division within the man in order to recover harmony. The self to which the man comes is the higher self, which hitherto has been silenced and suppressed; but now asserts itself, and delivers judgment on the lower self which has so long usurped the rule in the personality; the higher self discovers the sin and the shame of the lower, is disgusted with its degradation and disgrace, and denies its desires and impulses in the resolve to return to God with the confession of sin. As the higher self corresponds to the man as God made him, and meant him to be, this enlightening, quickening, and turning of the higher self against the lower cannot be more fitly described than in the words, "He came unto himself."

1. Self-Discovery.

The shame, misery, and want of the prodigal aroused his reason; he began to compare himself as he was in the far country with what he might have been at home. The servants have fulness of bread, the son is in want of it. Thus he begins to realise the penalty of his sin, and thereby to recognise its guilt. It is just here that the penitence of many men begins. They find out that sin does not pay in the long run, that the game is not worth the candle, that the wages of sin are so bad that its gifts are not worth having. This may not be a very high motive to begin with; but still prudence is better than imprudence, and wisdom than folly. It is better for a man to feel that he has been playing the fool than to be content to sink lower and lower towards perdition. For reason with its louder call may so far still the clamour of passion as to allow the "still small" voice of conscience to be heard. The prodigal discovered himself to be far more miserable than he need have been; but he also confessed himself to be much more guilty. He admitted to himself that it was not his own bad luck, or the fault of his father, or the ill-treatment of others that had brought him to this pass; but he blamed himself. Nothing can be made of a man until his self-discovery has gone so far that he sees himself not only as miserable but as blameworthy, as undeserving of the gifts of God, the want of which now makes him feel so miserable. As long, for instance, as a drunkard blames the drink, or the publican, or his boon-companions, and excuses himself, he is not penitent. He must come to his conscience to be self-condemned before the process of conversion in him has really effectually begun. This self-discovery may come in different ways. It is not always by realising the misery that a man recognises the guilt of sin. One who was used to turn multitudes from sin to God discovered the imperfection of what to others appeared his spotless life when he realised the glory of Christ's moral perfection. Giuseppe Caponsacchi saw himself as the priest who was shaming his calling when he saw the depths of agony in the eyes of Pompilia (The Ring and the Book).

"We are sunk enough here, God knows.

     But not quite so sunk that moments,

Sure though seldom, are denied us,

     When the spirit's true endowments

Stand out clearly from its false ones,

     And apprise us, if pursuing

On the right way, or the wrong way,

     To its triumph or undoing."

                                                       Browning, Cristina.

2. Self-Disgust.

As the prodigal thinks of himself, so he feels about himself. We may imagine that a youth like this when in his home had looked down on the hired servants with contempt, or at least indifference; he expresses his own self-contempt by now placing himself on a level with them. By this comparison on the lips of the prodigal Jesus did surely mean to express the self-disgust that is the next step in repentance. Nay, that self-disgust goes deeper than the comparison to the hired servants. There is a difference between him and them, and it is to their advantage. It is only by an act of the father's grace that he can think of himself as being put even in the place of the hired servants. Reason and conscience, when they thus discover the sinner to himself, cannot but arouse this emotion of self-disgust, of humiliation. The man who knows himself both miserable and guilty cannot be pleased with himself, but must feel heartily ashamed of himself. It is true that the emotional capacity of men varies, as does also the expression of their emotions. Some men cannot feel deeply; and others show least what they feel most. We must, therefore, not attempt to lay down any rule as regards either the intensity of the emotion, or the vigour of its expression, as a condition of the reality of the penitence. This alone must be insisted on, that as long as a man feels quite happy, or comfortable, he is not penitent. There must be some pain and grief at sin before penitence is complete; for it is through the emotions that reason and conscience move the will; and it is by an act of will alone that penitence so places a man before God that he can receive God's pardon. If the self-discovery and the self-disgust do not lead to the resolve of self-denial, the man is pictured for us in the words of James, "If any be a hearer of the word, and not a doer, he is like unto a man beholding his natural face in a glass, for he beholdeth himself, and goeth his way, and straightway forgetteth what manner of man he was." Such a beginning of penitence only hardens the heart the more the oftener it is repeated.

3. Self-Denial.

Self-discovery and self-disgust lead the prodigal to the self-denial of the resolve to forsake the far country, to return home, to humble himself by confessing his sin, and submitting himself entirely to his father's will. Such a resolve involved the self-denial of the lusts that had taken him to the far country, of the wilfulness that had made the father's rule irksome, of the pride of independence, and the shame that kept him from return. The lower self in all its desires and impulses had to be denied that the higher self might be recovered. Genuine and effective penitence must always involve such self-denial. Not only the practice of, but all desire for, and delight in sin must be abandoned. The exercise of the will regardless of restraint of law or constraint of love must be given up. The authority of God, even should He at first appear to impose restrictions and obligations as of servitude to Him rather than of liberty with Him, must be accepted. The darling sin must be surrendered; the strongest temptation must be resisted; the greatest sacrifice, if need be, must be effected. For the practical purpose of this exposition we need not make any elaborate distinction here between repentance and conversion. The one is the negative, the other the positive aspect of the one process; repentance is the separation of the sinner from his sin, and conversion is the return of the sinner to his God. The Latin word pænitentia indicates the grief of the heart; the Greek word μετανοία the change of the mind, and the word conversion points to the decisive act of the will, a turning right round, away from the far country, back to the home. The story represents this decisive act as accomplished by the unaided human will; but in the reality of Christian experience there is what has been called the prevenient grace of God. God anticipates man's return to Him by the proclamation of the Gospel of His grace, and by the working of His Spirit in the reason and the conscience. Repentance itself is an act of faith, receptive of, and responsive to, the seeking, pleading, wooing love of God in Jesus Christ. On man's part it is an activity, the exercise of the mind, heart, and will, as has already been indicated in self-discovery, self-disgust, and self-denial; but it is, and must ever be, a receptive rather than an originative activity; for it is the pardon offered in Christ's Cross that in most men awakens the penitence by which they are crucified unto sin, and the confidence in which they live with Christ unto God. This parable shows us a waiting love of God; we must ever supplement its representation by the companion parables, that present to us the seeking love of God. With God there is ever the initiative of grace, and for men there is the receptivity and the response of submission to that grace in faith.