Teshuvah. Whether it is a word you may or may not have heard before, I would venture to say its meaning is well known. Teshuvah is from the Hebrew root shuwb (H7725 – shuv), meaning to return, turn back, repent, or to bring back. More accurately, teshuvah can be defined as a turning back to God. According to Jewish tradition, starting forty days prior to Yom Kippur and lasting until Yom Kippur itself, Jews are beckoned to turn from their ways of sin and return to a life committed to God. While I am not advocating that each one should follow the Jewish customs, I do stand by the fact that taking a personal inventory of our lives to see where we may need to repent and return may be a wise decision for each of us. Let me explain.
Perhaps there has been a time when you were driving down the road only to realize you went too far in your journey. In that instance you made some type of turn around so that you could eventually end up at your desired location. In my years of driving I can recall vividly one such trip when I was on the Interstate to work and focused on another thought. By the time I realized it, my exit had been passed. As a result I had to get off at the next exit and turn around. This U-turn of sorts is much like the concept of teshuvah.
This same need for a turn-around can happen to us in our Christian walk. We start on the right course, going down the path that leads us to God and then another thought takes us captive. Perhaps it is a temptation that we are allowing to flood our mind, or a sin that continues to lure us. Anything that has taken the place of God and become an idol in our lives can be looked at in this way and prevent us from continuing down the path God intends. But God, in His patient, loving-kindness, allows us the opportunity to come back to Him; to make a U-turn and come back. This is teshuvah.
We read of teshuvah quite a few times in the Bible. The account of Jonah is a great example. The people of Nineveh were about to experience God’s judgment for their ungodly and defiling actions. Yet because of God’s love for them, He sent Jonah with a declaration that destruction was coming. These words so moved the people and the king that the king even declared a fast. In the end we read, “When God saw their deeds, that they turned (teshvah) from their wicked way, then God relented concerning the calamity which He had declared He would bring upon them. And He did not do it (Jonah 3:10).
The idea of teshuvah is seen also in the words of Jeremiah. In Jeremiah 3, we find the prophet speaking on behalf of the LORD against the house of Israel. He calls the people of Israel faithless. The context here is that Israel had committed adultery against God by pushing Him aside and seeking relations with stone and wood, items which God considered sin. God had fully desired Israel to come back to Him, but they never did. The end result was a certificate of divorce for the backslidden nation of Israel. But Judah sinned as well. Continuing on we find that Judah was watching the sin of Israel and had begun to follow suit. It was to Judah that God then named them the unfaithful sister. Seeing the certificate of divorce given to Israel, Judah still had no fear of her own certificate. The return that Judah would eventually offer was poor and only in pretense, being nothing more than a deceitful sham. But here is what I want us to see from this passage in Jeremiah 3. I want us to wrap our minds around the truth that God continued to desire that His people turn back to Him. In Jeremiah 3:12-14, we read the pleading of God as He beckoned for the faithless to return.
So what does this return look like? Near the end of the seventy years of exile which Jeremiah had prophesied, we find an answer in the prayer of Daniel. In Daniel chapter 9 we find a prayer written from the prophet as he has determined the time frame and the expectation. Seventy years is almost done, but have the people's hearts changed and made the U-turn back to God? Daniel's prayer shows his heart, and perhaps a blueprint for our own. In his prayer he admit and teshuvah-ed for wrongs. He made a point not to cast blame, but to take ownership. Daniel related to the sin, looking internally at the damage it had done. Daniel acknowledged that the shame being felt at this time was based on where they are, a place of forfeiting relationship with God, allowing themselves to be led astray, and seeing themselves only to blame. As verse 19 would go on to note, Daniel was requesting that God not procrastinate is this request to hear His people’s plea for teshuvah and pardon them. Daniel was asking God to heed this prayer and accomplish a sparing of His people.
I urge you to read the prayer of Daniel. Just like the people of Judah, who were still God’s chosen people, we have sinned. But like Daniel, if we call out to God and ask for forgiveness for the sins we have committed, He will forgive us. He will spare us from more years of slavery if we only ask Him now to forgive us, and truly turn from any sin we have embraced. The time for teshuvah is now, what will we do?
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