Six Prayers of Repentance

In chapter twenty-six of Soul Physicians, I outline a biblical theology of putting off the old manner of life (compare Ephesians 4:17-19). I embed within that theology a “Prayer of Repentance” related to each of six areas of our spiritual life:

• Our Relationship to God

• Our Relationship to Others

• Our Relationship to Ourselves

• Our Rational Beliefs/Mindsets

• Our Volitional Behaviors/Motivations

• Our Emotions

Today’s post shares these six prayers.

A Prayer of Relational Repentance: My Spiritual Relationship to God

“Father, I come home to You. I confess as sin my false lovers. I confess as sin living like the old person that I used to be. I confess as sin my spiritual adultery. I acknowledge to You and to myself that my false lovers are horrible lovers and that my pursuit of them is ugly and putrid. How foolish of me to ever believe that anyone but You could ever satisfy the longings of my soul. How shameful. How disrespectful. Forgive me my relational sin. I acknowledge that You alone are my Supreme Good. I acknowledge that You alone are gracious and compassionate. I return to You as my Forgiving Father. I return to Your Son as my Worthy Groom. I return to Your Holy Spirit as my Inspiring Mentor. I love You, Lord. Renew my vision of You as a totally competent and totally good God—boundless in holy love.”

A Prayer of Relational Repentance: My Social Relationships to Others

“Father, I confess as sin my living for self, loving self. I will put off shepherding myself and focus on shepherding others. I reject all the self sins: self-sufficiency, self-promotion, self-protection, selfishness, self-centeredness. I confess as sin my cruel, harsh, manipulative, demanding, shaming, blaming, maiming way of treating others. Most of all, I confess as sin how far I’ve moved from reflecting You and Your radically other-centered Trinitarian existence. I am putting off the flesh, the characteristic ways I used to relate and I’m putting on the Spirit, the new me created to relate like You.”

A Prayer of Relational Repentance: My Identity in Christ

“Father, I’ve been so like Adam and Eve. Running. Hiding. Defensive. Playing dress up. All because I don’t believe You are who You say You are—the Forgiving Father. What sin! I put off my shame identity. I reject my sense of abandonment, ruin, rejection, and condemnation. I put off my futile attempts to quiet my inner restlessness. Instead, I rest in You. I rest in who I am in Christ and to Christ. It’s ugly of me to try to beautify myself. It’s a slap in the face to Your Son, my Savior. Forgive me. Cleanse me. Enlighten me by Your Holy Spirit to grasp how much You love me and how loving You are.”

A Prayer of Rational Repentance: Putting Off My Old Beliefs and Mindsets

“Father, I’ve finally come to my senses. I confess as sin my foolish belief that I can make life work apart from You. I’ve arrogantly suppressed the truth of how perfectly well You care for me. I’ve denied Your fatherly love for me. I’ve sinned against You by believing Satan’s (the False Seducer) smaller story, fleshly mindset that You are not my Supreme Good. I’ve allowed my view of reality to become filled with contemptuous images of You. I’ve allowed my mind to be squeezed into the mold of this temporal world, living according to the dominant plot theme of the earthly story. I’ve been like a deaf man straining to hear the Gospel story. I’ve denied the Cross. I return to You now repenting of these idols of my heart. Though I am not worthy in myself to be called Your child, by faith I claim my adoption in Christ. Thank You for forgiving me.”

A Prayer of Volitional Repentance: Putting Off My Old Behaviors and Motivations 

“Father, I’ve sinned against You by walking in the way of the sinner, by following the self-centered pathway of _______. I must put off choosing compulsively and put on choosing courageously. I must put off the old enslaved pathways and put on my new free, empowering pathways. Help me to quit coddling, cuddling, pampering, and spoiling my flesh. Empower me to be ruthlessly fierce in rejecting it and nailing it to the Cross. Reveal my secret sins, show me the patterns that I’m blind to, help me to detect my fleshly pathways. I reject my fleshly inclinations, patterns, and character. I put on the new characteristic of _________. I reject my characteristic approach to life of _________ and by Christ’s resurrection power I replace it with my new manner of life.”

A Prayer of Emotional Repentance: Putting Off My Old Mood States

“Father, I’ve sinned against You by worshipping feelings instead of worshipping You. My current mood state of _______ exposes how desperately I’m trying to live without You. My failure to face my feelings expose my distrust in Your ability to care for me. My refusal to soothe my soul in You exposes my doubts about Your goodness. I put off my emotional duplicity replacing it, in the power of Your Spirit, with emotional integrity. I will face whatever I feel and bring it to You. I put off my emotional lasciviousness. I put off indulging my fleshly passions. I confess as sin my addiction to ___________. I recognize it for what it is: a symptom of the deeper disorder within me, a spiritual, relational, mental, willful disorder. Forgive me. Empower me to manage my moods for Your glory and the good of others.”

The Rest of the Story

The Bible never tells us to put off without also telling us how God empowers us to put on the new person we are in and through Christ. Tomorrow we share six prayers of renewal.

Join the Conversation

Which of the six prayers hits home the most for you today? How would you word your prayer in that area?

Returning to My First Love

Note: The following material is taken from Soul Physicians. It is Part Three in a series on putting off the old me and putting on the new me in Christ. Read Part One, How to Break the Stranglehold of Strongholds. Read Part Two, Christian: Do You Know Who You Are?

Putting Off Our Old Impure Affections

Satan’s strategy is to belittle Christ’s glory and then to exalt himself, all in the sick hope of causing us to be unfaithful to Christ. He attempts to tempt us with foolish mindsets about God so he can allure us toward false lovers of the soul. Satan shrinks Christ so that we end up with a Lover so small that we fail to relentlessly worship and adore Him and we fail to see Christ as uniquely and supremely worthy.

“I Divorce the Adulterous False Lovers of My Soul”

Rationally, we must put off our old foolish mindsets by saying, “I repent of the insane idols of my heart.” Relationally, we must put off our old false lovers by saying, “I divorce the adulterous false lovers of my soul.” We no longer live like we used to because Christ has returned us to the purity of virgin brides who are motivated by gratitude to passionately love God.

Following Jesus always means not following fleshly affections, impulses, appetites, whims, and dreams. It always means pursuing Him with desperate desire, knowing that He alone quenches our soul’s deepest thirsts. Christ calls us to mortify, crucify, and put to death all fleshly longings.

Affections, longings, thirsts, delights, and desires are “where the action is.” Modern Christianity reduces life to the externals of behavior while the significance of motivating desire is insufficiently emphasized. Our old flesh was habituated not simply to do evil but also and more insidiously, to love evil. Our flesh is ingrained toward patterns of false lovers from its years of disconnection from God. In Christ we have put off these patterns and must daily rid ourselves of any remnants.

Our God-created, renewed appetites face the tension of battling fleshly, worldly, satanic desires. Temptation entices us, awakening the old dead lusts through the attraction, lure, bait, and pull of sin (James 1:13-15). Sin deceives us through its offer of pleasure, fulfillment, and satisfaction. Psalm 1 pictures us as living organisms searching for nourishment. Where do we drink? From the Spring of Living Water or from broken cisterns that hold no water?

False Lovers and Suffering

When faced with suffering, I’m tempted first to think, “Life is bad and so is God.” If I surrender to this fleshly mindset, then I’m easy game for the allure of false lovers who seem to promise protection, comfort, ease, or at least enough pleasure to cause me to temporarily forget my pain.

In divorcing the adulterous false lovers of my soul, I cry out to Father, “I’ve been a relational prodigal. I now reject my past pattern of fearful flight from Father and I put on faith in you as my Forgiving Father. I abolish my fear of cosmic condemnation, of personal and eternal rejection. I return to original trust. When life is bad, I cling to you as my Supreme Good. I say, ‘My flesh and my heart may fail, but God you are the strength of my heart and my portion forever.’”

When faced with suffering, I’m also tempted to think, “Christ is not worth the wait.” Then I’m easy prey for the roaring Lion who disguises himself as an angel of light promising to guide me in his everlasting way. In divorcing myself from Satan, I say to Christ, “I confess as sin my pursuit of false lovers of the soul and put on sole devotion to You. I put off my spiritual adultery. When life is bad, I remind myself, ‘Whom have I in heaven but You? And earth has nothing I desire besides You.’”

When faced with suffering, I’m sometimes tempted to think, “Depending on God is foolish, I had better take care of myself.” Having been strangled by this stronghold, I tumble down into the pit of worshipping false gods of my own invention. In divorcing myself from these false gods, I say to the Holy Spirit, “Dear Spirit, I exterminate my distorted desires. I put off my self-sufficient self-satisfaction. I confess as sin my denial of Christ-sufficiency. My broken cisterns are filthy and useless. I’ve sinned by forsaking my Spring of Living Water and I now acknowledge this for what it is—spiritual adultery.”

False Lovers and Besetting Sins

When faced with a besetting sin that yanks me here and there like a yo-yo and tosses me about like a rag doll in a Doberman’s mouth, I must mortify my fleshly desire. I confess that:

“I’ve allowed my religious affections to grow cold, my love to become lukewarm. I’ve buried the visio Dei—the beatific vision of God. I’ve rejected God as my highest joy, my greatest delight. I’ve replaced God my Hero with false heroes. I’ve replaced God my Lover with false lovers. I’ve not related to You as a good God with a supremely good heart. I have a fundamental worshipping nature, but I’ve not been putting off the fleshly tendency to worship anything or anyone but God. So right now I put off trust in non-God and put on trust in God. In Christ’s resurrection power I put off my false passions, my delighting in lesser gods, my sinfully misdirected longings, and my pursuit of God-designed desires in God-prohibited ways.”

The Rest of the Story

Relationally divorcing the adulterous lovers of our soul is the principle we follow for putting off false lovers. What is the process? Join us in Part 4 for the rest of the story.

Join the Conversation

1. Why has modern Christianity reduced life to external behaviors and reduced the significance of desires of the heart?

2. In what ways have we been habituated not simply to do evil, but to love evil?