Examination and Repentance

(Message given at Wayside Friends Church on March 29, 2026)

Today is Palm Sunday, and it is also the last Sunday of Lent.

A couple of weeks ago I was driving to work and the Pray-As-You-Go podcast I listen to was leading us through one of the key themes of Lent: a time to examine ourselves, a chance to repent and confess if necessary. 

Repentance and confession are a key part of this season of Lent, and what I immediately thought is all the baggage that comes with those words. 

Because, I think, the church has so often completely botched repentance.

Messages that are designed to push people to repent and confess often cause people to question their own value and worth. Too often, the result of the church’s message of repentance is for people to feel shame and a sense of being unworthy, maybe even unloved.

We are not going to do that today!

God’s love for us and our value as human beings, as creations of God, never changes. We are loved, as we are, no matter what we have done! 

We are loved! We have value! There are not conditions to it! 

God’s love is the foundation that makes repentance an option.

A friend told me recently that she grew up in the church thinking the reverse, thinking that we have to repent in order for God to love us. That’s the message that the church has too often sent, and tonight we’re going to reverse it. God’s unconditional love for us is the foundation that makes repentance an option.

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A couple of Sundays ago someone asked me what still gives me hope.

It made me pause.

I’ve been on the front lines of a church split and a school board takeover, and the things that I worked really hard for disintegrated. I watch as our country inflicts war on other countries without clear reasoning, and tramples constitutional rights in the name of immigration enforcement.

For a lot of my adult life, I have tried to work to create systems where justice for all is closer to the norm—and I have less hope of those systems being created than I probably ever have. 

Systems seem to protect those in power, at the expense of those without it. 

One line, almost a throwaway line from Elizabeth’s sermon two weeks ago stuck with me: people are despairing, she said, because men who have done great harm have not been held accountable. 

And that resonates, because I have walked with friends who have experienced that particular despair. 

Almost 10 years ago, I sat at a table with people I had known for decades.

We were there because we were being sued over an instance of abuse from decades before. The lawyer asked us to tell her everything that had gone on in our churches, whether they were related to this particular case or not. She wanted it in the open. She wanted to know what she was dealing with.

Around that table, people shared multiple instances of harm by multiple leaders, things I had not known until that moment.

I had the sickening realization that people still in leadership had done harm, moved to a new location, and were in leadership still without a full, open, transparent reckoning.

They had not been held accountable in a fully open way. And I realized that things I thought were exceptions in church institutions felt a lot more like the rule.

I am deeply sad about what I am going to say, but I think it has been true too many times.

The church too often speaks about sin and repentance in a way that makes many of us grow up with a belief that we are not worthy. People lose the sense of the unconditional love of God as people standing up front try to bring them to repentance. Often this is so the leaders have visible markers that they are accomplishing something. The message: “Everybody sins, and you better get right!”

The church too often creates shame that causes people to internalize a sense of unworthiness instead of being a beloved child of God.

And yet, when those in leadership cause harm, the church too often says, “Everybody sins, give the leader a break!”

Too often the church absolutely reverses how it should be. For the people sitting in the audience, repentance becomes a talking point that creates generalized shame—a sense that I am bad. For the people sitting in the audience, the church rarely makes room for the Holy Spirit to create conviction—the sense that I have done a bad thing and can come to God for forgiveness.

But for the leader, the church avoids assigning shame. Instead, it’s “Look at all the good the leader has done.” And for the leader, forgiveness is offered readily, when a good dose of conviction and acceptance of the harm done is actually what’s needed.

It’s reversed. A general sense of shame for people who attend, quick forgiveness for those who cause harm while leading.

As someone who used to be in leadership, I didn’t want that for myself.

Miroslav Volf, a theologian who has made a big impact on my thinking and my faith, said in his book “Exclusion and Embrace” that we need both structures and systems that are just, AND we need people who want to act justly.

I’ve thought a lot about that over the years. How do I become the kind of person who wants to act justly? Someone who wants my actions to reflect the loving and just God? 

How do I become someone who doesn’t act selfishly or in ways that harm others?

My gender, my skin color, my social class, and my sexual orientation carry a lot of privilege. They have my entire life. I’ve seen the systems bend to give me the benefit of the doubt, to readily offer me forgiveness for mistakes.

I have long recognized that systems and others are not always going to hold me accountable. I need to take responsibility to hold myself accountable, to invite accountability. Because of the privilege I hold, I have to recognize that I have blind spots. I can cause harm, whether intentionally or out of unawareness.

We all have that capacity to cause harm in whatever places of privilege we hold.

We long for just systems that hold wrong doers accountable, which means we must figure out how to be people who are willing to be held accountable when we cause harm.

Maybe now, because I feel so hopeless about justice in our systems, maybe now is why I am leaning into this personal question: How do I become someone who doesn’t act selfishly or in ways that harm others?

When I frame it that way, I begin to see self-examination and repentance and forgiveness as the gifts they are, the solutions to becoming a person who can change. Who can act more in line with God’s love and justice.

When I try to cultivate a willingness to look at and examine my actions; when I attempt to allow God’s Spirit a chance to bring conviction where needed—not shame about my worth or value, but rather conviction about my actions—when I do that work of examination, I give God a chance to bring true forgiveness and to change how I act.

When I look at myself—especially in my areas of privilege—when I look at myself with humility, vulnerability, and honesty…I give God the opportunity to hold me accountable—to realize my wrong actions and be sad and sorry for what I’ve done. 

I then have the opportunity to make amends. I then have the opportunity to experience forgiveness that frees me to live as a beloved creation of God, with Spirit-strength to make a different, better choice in the future.

Even if we had perfectly just systems—which clearly we do not—even if we did, we would still need something that changes us as people.

We would need something to break our selfishness and vindictiveness, in order that we want to and can act justly.

I think our part is choosing examination, honesty, humility, and vulnerability. And God’s part is forgiveness and transformation.

So that you know I’m not just making this stuff up, I want to look at Psalm 26, verses 2 and 3:

Put me on trial, LORD, and cross-examine me.

Test my motives and my heart.

For I am always aware of your unfailing love,

and I have lived according to your truth.

Now, granted, the context of this Psalm is a writer who is confident in their integrity, especially compared to their enemies. It reads a little bit like, “I know I’m right, test me and see, God.”

But I think there’s a truth here that can be a humble prayer practice for us. Test me, try me, cross-examine me God. Not just my actions, but my motives and my heart. 

Why am I willing to let you do this? Because I am rooted in and absolutely convinced of your unfailing love. I know I am a beloved creation. And so I trust you to look at my life and help me see the blind spots, the things I need to have put right.

The big goal is put more clearly in Psalm 25, and again, it is rooted in God’s compassion and unfailing love as the given, as already present for us. Verses 4-9:

Show me the right path, O God;

point out the road for me to follow.

Lead me by your truth and teach me,

for you are the God who saves me.

All day long I put my hope in you.

Remember, O God, your compassion and unfailing love,

which you have shown from long ages past.

Do not remember the rebellious sins of my youth.

Remember me in the light of your unfailing love,

for you are merciful, O God.

God is good and does what is right;

They show the proper path to those who go astray.

They lead the humble in doing right,

teaching them Their way.

There is the both/and here that I think is essential for us to live as just and loving people.

God is a God of compassion and unfailing love. God has shown us this, over long ages. We can rest and trust that our value and worth is never at risk, no matter what we do.

And at the same time, these verses acknowledge that God’s path is one of truth and safety. God’s way of justice and love is the way for us to follow. “God is good and does what is right.”

The very fact that it starts with “Show me the right path” is an acknowledgement that though we are beloved creations, we do not always choose the right path. And further down, God shows “the proper path to those who go astray,” making it clear we can go astray. 

We contribute to the selfishness and injustice of this world when we do go astray.

So we ask God to examine us, show us where we are missing the path. We trust God’s love in that, and we humbly wait for God’s direction. We trust, as it says in 1 John, that Jesus is faithful and just, and when we confess our wrong paths, God not only forgives, but gives a fresh start.

Psalm 19:12-14:

How can I know all the sins lurking in my heart?

Cleanse me from these hidden faults.

Keep your servant from deliberate sins!

Don’t let them control me.

Then I will be free of guilt

and innocent of great sin.

May the words of my mouth

and the meditation of my heart

be pleasing to you,

O LORD, my rock and my redeemer.

I could give a whole other message about how God dwells with the ones who are mistreated and abused by powerful people and systems. 

It’s needed, because the systems and the people in power are causing such harm. 

In my places of hurt, in the places where injustice has battered me, the bible gives such clear examples of the rightness of crying out and longing for something different. 

Because we are beloved creations, because we are unconditionally loved, because we have value as a creation of God, it is wrong when we are harmed. It is right to cry out for wrongdoers to be held accountable.

Our places of trauma and hurt and woundedness are not the places where we need to call on examination and repentance.

Our places of trauma and hurt are where we lean into the unconditional love of God and ask for God’s presence. My message today about examination and repentance is NOT so that you try to blame yourself for wrong that is done to you.

This season of Lent and this hope that is found in examination and repentance is for the parts of us that selfishly cause hurt, pain, and injustice. Because even those who have been hurt can cause pain and can act unjustly toward others.

Here is where I do start to find my feet under me and feel a sense of hope.

Because I am unconditionally loved by God, I have solid ground to let God show me where change is needed in my life. Because God is loving and just and wants to shape me to be loving and just, I can trust that examining myself and allowing God in will give God the chance to show me a new, better, more loving and just way to live.

I can trust there is forgiveness for when I’ve missed the mark. I can trust that God’s unconditional love will fuel me to choose differently in the future. I can trust that humility, vulnerability, honesty, examination, and repentance are part of how God shapes me into a person who acts more lovingly and justly.

This is why I still hold to Jesus. This is why I still hold to faith.

When systems around us are harming and failing, we can keep changing and learning to live differently. We can walk with each other. We can be people who long for justice and love, and be part of hopefully building new systems alongside our transformed selves.

May we know the rock-solid foundation of God’s unconditional love for us, a love that does not increase or decrease based on our actions.

May we have the courage to examine ourselves, and allow God to lovingly show us where we need a new path. 

May we humbly acknowledge and repent of the harm we have done, and ask God for the strength to do differently in the future.

And may we trust always God’s unchanging love, and let that lead us to lives of integrity, love, and justice.