15 For thus says the One who is high and lifted up,
    who inhabits eternity, whose name is Holy:
“I dwell in the high and holy place,
    and also with him who is of a contrite and lowly spirit,
to revive the spirit of the lowly,
    and to revive the heart of the contrite. (Isaiah 57:15 ESV)

DIctionary.com defines contrite as – feeling or expressing remorse or penitence; affected by guilt. “a broken and a contrite heart”

But do we really feel this regarding our sin?

We may well feel bad about our sin, but true remorse is something more. Furthermore, actual penitence regarding sin seems to be lost to an older world or to one of a deeper faith than is practiced today.

In fact, I would wager, that we say a quick prayer for forgiveness and go about our day. True remorse may be there momentarily but as for penitence we figure feeling bad for a moment is enough.

What if we took it a step further and decided we would spend more time in the Word when we sinned? Our penitence then becomes our reward. We take our sin to God and really search the Bible for His view on that sin. We study so that we become right and we do our penitence through our study, bending our will to God’s will and learning a new way forward.

Would we not come out of this act all the better?