In his book, The Disciple of Grace, Jerry Bridges says this about the nature of repentance, “The solution to staying on the right side of the fine line between using and abusing grace is repentance.  The road to repentance is godly sorrow.  Godly sorrow is developed when we focus on the true nature of sin as an offense to God rather than something that makes us feel guilty.”

     True repentance is more than feeling bad about what we have done; it is about being repulsed at the way our sin affects God.  Recognition of how sin grieves the Father should be the ultimate cause of repentance, not just the guilt it brings.  A good example of this is found in Luke 15.  The prodigal son initially wanted to return (repent) to his father because of the consequence of sin in his life (guilt).  He said, “How many hired servants of my father’s house have bread enough and to spare, and I perish with hunger!” But upon his arrival back to the father he confessed, “Father, I have sinned against heaven, and in thy sight.”  Somewhere along the journey his guilt turned to grieving.

     Ultimately the nature of our repentance should be in line with the concession of the prodigal son.  It should not derive from our guilt but from our grieving.  Guilt is inward, grieving is Godward. Grieving Godward is the very nature of repentance.