Repent, for the Kingdom of Heaven is at hand. (Matt. 3:2).
Repentance is a Sacrament in which a believer confesses (orally reveals) his sins to God in the presence of a priest and through the priest receives forgiveness of sins from the Lord Jesus Christ Himself.
Jesus Christ gave the holy apostles, and through them, all the priests, the power to resolve (forgive) sins: Receive the Holy Spirit. Whose sins you forgive, they will be forgiven; On whomever you leave it, it will remain on him (John 20:22–23).
Even John the Baptist, preparing people to accept the Savior, preached baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins. And everyone was baptized by him in the Jordan River, confessing their sins (Mark 1:4-5).
The holy apostles, having received authority to do this from the Lord, performed the Sacrament of Repentance: many of those who believed came, confessing and revealing their deeds (Acts 19:18).
Repentance is God's greatest gift to man. This is the second baptism, in which we are washed from our sins and again put on clean white clothes, receiving the grace lost after the Fall.
To repent means to change your lifestyle, first of all, to “come to your senses,” that is, to see sin in yourself, realize it, hate it, then repent to God in the presence of a priest and make a promise not to sin again.
To receive forgiveness (resolution) of sins from the confessor (repentant), the following is required: reconciliation with all neighbors, sincere contrition for sins and verbal confession of them, a firm intention to correct one’s life, faith in the Lord Jesus Christ and hope in His mercy.
In special cases, “penance” (a Greek word meaning “prohibition”) is imposed on the penitent, consisting of pious deeds and some deprivations aimed at overcoming sinful habits.
Sin not only infects our soul with evil, but also poisons everything around us. “Every sin, even the smallest one, affects the fate of the world,” says the great elder, Venerable Silouan of Athos. And, on the contrary, our repentance has a beneficial effect on those around us and makes them happy.
Sin is the greatest evil in the world. Our unrepentant sins are new wounds that we inflict on Christ the Savior. These are terrible ulcers of our soul, and the scars from them remain for life.
Only in the Sacrament of Repentance can the soul be cleansed and healed. Repentance pulls us out of the abyss of sin, vices and passions and leads us into the gates of heaven. The Lord Himself opens His arms to us and accepts us as prodigal children. The Lord Himself outlined the image of repentance in the parable of the prodigal son.
One man had two sons. The younger demanded that his father divide the estate and give him a part of it, and when he received what was due, he went to a distant country and there squandered everything, living dissolutely. But the time came, there was famine in that country, and he had to go look for food for himself. He hired himself to graze pigs from a resident and would have been glad to eat even their feed, but they did not give him any. Great sorrow came for him, and then he came to his senses, remembered his father and decided: I will go to my father, fall at his feet and say: “Father, I have sinned in Heaven and before you and am no longer worthy to be called your son, accept me at least as one of your workers.” So he put it in his heart and went to his father. And when he was still far away, his father saw him and took pity, and running, fell on his chest and kissed him. The son said: “Forgive me, I am not worthy to be called your son.” And his father forgave him, and ordered his servants to dress him in his best clothes and prepare a feast, because his son was dead and came to life, he was lost and was found (Luke 15:11-24).
The Holy Fathers distinguish three moments of repentance in this Gospel parable. The first - a person came to his senses, that is, he looked into his soul, realized that he was terribly sinful, guilty before God, he had a feeling of repentance. Second, the person made a decision: he got up and went, that is, he went to church for confession. And the third is repentance itself, confession, when a person in the presence of a priest says to God: Forgive me, listing all his sins, and makes a promise not to repeat them. And then the Lord, a loving Father, forgives him and accepts him, like a prodigal son, into His arms.
Repentance begins only when a person realizes that he is sinful, that sins prevent him from living and poison his soul. If a person does not see his sins, it means that he is seriously spiritually ill and his soul has died to God. She is no longer tormented by sins, the devil has tied this soul hand and foot, her spiritual eyes are closed, her ears cannot hear, her lips are numb. Like a man in a coffin: he doesn’t hear, he doesn’t see, he doesn’t feel. When a person gets sick, the first sign that he is unhealthy is an aversion to food. Likewise, someone who is spiritually ill has an aversion to prayer and everything spiritual. He doesn’t want to read the Holy Scripture, where the Lord speaks to us, he doesn’t want to go to church, and if he forces himself and comes, he’s late for the service, doesn’t stay until the end, suffers during the service and thinks: I wish it would end soon. And he does not see his sins. Because he has gone far from God, from the Light. So, if you run through puddles at night, all your clothes will be covered in mud, and you can’t see it in the dark, but as soon as you step into the light, everything will immediately open up: we’ll look and be horrified.
Until we come to God, we do not live according to His will, we are in darkness and do not see our sins. Our soul is black, and every new sin is a new black spot on it, but black cannot be seen on black...
Great sinners always consider themselves righteous, and saints always consider themselves great sinners. They live in the light of Christ, see even the smallest spots in their souls and realize their unworthiness before God.
Why don't we see our sins? Because we do not control ourselves, our actions, words and thoughts, we do not observe the Law of God, we are entrenched in sins, so accustomed to them that we no longer consider sin to be sin. We know that the Apostle Peter was at first weak in spirit and denied Christ, and when the rooster crowed, he wept bitterly, repented and was forgiven. In the life of each of us there is a night when, among our iniquities, the voice of conscience begins to “crow”, denouncing us, who have denied our Savior and crucified Him with our sins. Woe to him who stops his ears so as not to hear this voice. Joy to the one who begins to cry bitterly about his sins and cleanses his soul with repentance.
No matter what sins we commit, we should never fall into despair, fear that the Lord will not forgive us. “The despair of man is a great joy for the devil,” notes the holy Venerable Barsanuphius the Great. We must not despair, but remember that our Heavenly Father has such love for us as no mother has had for her child in the entire history of the human race. Redemption took place, and the Lord, in His great mercy, left us with faith and repentance. As a child-loving Father, He with great love and joy accepts every prodigal son, every repentant sinner into His arms, and He will not remember our sins forever, but we must not abuse the love of the Lord.
How to prepare for confession
We must prepare for confession in advance: think through everything, remember all our sins, go through the convolutions of our soul and be sure to write everything down, otherwise we will go to the priest for confession, and the enemy may darken our minds and forget everything. Better yet, develop the habit of writing down every day rather than sin. Before going to bed, you can mentally imagine the past day, how we spent it: how we prayed in the morning, were we absent-minded, where were our thoughts - in the words of prayer or in the kitchen, in the store; Didn’t you offend anyone that day, didn’t you quarrel, weren’t you offended if someone scolded us, weren’t you envious, weren’t you vain? How were you sitting at the table? Surely you ate too much? Have you read the Jesus Prayer, prayed before each task, or thought at least a little about your soul? Or only about the flesh? How was the night? Maybe we had unclean dreams because we spent the day in uncleanness... And if we learn to control ourselves like this, we will know what to say in confession.
“Whoever gets used to giving an account of his life in confession here will not be afraid to give an answer at the Last Judgment of Christ,” says the holy righteous John of Kronstadt.