Your honest cry has come before the Lord and before His people, and we join our hearts with yours in prayer to the God of all grace.
We thank God that you hate your backsliding and desire to return, for that hatred of sin and longing for Christ is itself a token of His work within you. There is a repentance that is of the flesh, a carnal sorrow that washes the outside and leaves the heart unrenewed, that gives no glory to God and brings no lasting deliverance. But there is a true repentance, a repentance unto life, which is the gift of God and is preached in the name of Jesus. It is wrought by the Holy Spirit, it gives glory to God, it makes a man weep and abhor his past life because of the love of Christ which has pardoned it, and it leads him to look out of self to Christ and to Christ only. Faith and repentance are inseparable. The repentance that ejects sin as an evil tenant and the faith which admits Christ to be the sole Master of the heart go together. One pulls down and the other builds up. We pray that the Lord will grant you this holy, healthy, heavenly repentance, that godly sorrow which needs not to be repented of, and with it a simple faith unto the Lord Jesus Christ who alone can save.
Hear the promise for such as you, I will heal their backsliding. What is this healing. It is forgiveness of its sin, and release from its power, and the taking away of temporal chastisement, and the restoration of lost comfort, beauty for ashes and the oil of joy for mourning. If you now sincerely close in with God's way of salvation in Christ and would gladly find deliverance from every sin, you may be assured you are one of those of whom He has spoken. Do not believe, O penitent wanderer, that His mercy is gone forever. Repentance lives as long as faith, and sweet sister Repentance is charming company all the way to glory. She makes a rainbow with her tears of grief for sin and her glances of hope at the love of Christ and His great finished work.
We pray also for your deliverance. We have been delivered from worse enemies than any earthly foe, and saved by a greater salvation. The Lord Jesus has wrought deliverance from sin, from Satan, from the arch enemy of our souls. As He brought Israel forth when the lamb was slain, not by their own power but by His hand and outstretched arm, so He alone can bring you forth out of bondage and strongholds. We ask that He would expose and bring to nothing every scheme of the devil and of those who would harm you, that He would shut the mouth of the accuser and give you songs of deliverance. Even the least thing about Christ is healing, the very leaves of the tree of life are for the healing of the nations, to change the life blood and make the nature new. May the Sun of Righteousness rise upon you with healing beneath His wings for soul and body.
Therefore we pray for you in the name of Jesus:
O most merciful Father, grant to this returning soul true repentance and remission of sins in the name of Christ. Forgive all backsliding, break its power, lift its chastisement, and restore the joy of Thy salvation. Create a clean heart and renew a right spirit within. Give faith to look to Jesus only, to trust His finished work, and to walk in works meet for repentance that shall last and be practical. Deliver from the devil and from every bondage, cause the snares of enemies to fail and be made manifest, and let no weapon formed against Thy child prosper. Lay Thy healing hand upon the body, restore health according to Thy wisdom and mercy, and sustain through every trial. Be Helper, Protector, Deliverer and Provider, and bring forth Thy servant with enrichment out of captivity, willing and yet wholly dependent upon free grace. Keep through this temporary state in Jesus until eternal bliss.
We encourage you to continue in daily repentance and faith, to avoid present sin because of the love of God who died for you, to seek the Lord in His Word and in prayer, and to walk in fellowship with His people. He who began a good work will perfect it. Cast yourself wholly upon Christ, for He will not cast you out.
