CAPA Corner

    I bet you know some generous people in your life.  They really stand above and beyond the rest, don’t they?  Generous people are characterized by a noble and forbearing spirit.  They are also known to be very liberal in giving.  There are many generous people in my life, but none have made more of an impression than the generosity of God, our Lord Jesus Christ.  He was generous to us when we were not generous and he continues to hold his hand open to us even  when our hands are closed to him.  A generous God to an ungenerous people – “All day long I have stretched forth my hands unto a disobedient and gainsaying people.” (Ro.10:21)

    I would love to be a more generous person not only to the people around me , but first and foremost to the one who liberally poured out his love upon me.  How can I accomplish this?  This may sound odd at first, but have you ever been generous in repentance?  Most of the time our repentance consists of a flippant, “I’m sorry God, please forgive me.”, and we go on our way.  What if we were more generous in the area of repentance? What would that be like? 

    I believe the sinful woman who washed the feet of Jesus with her tears in Luke 7:36-50 is a perfect example of generous penance.  She humbles herself at the Lord’s feet and stays at his feet.  She never leaves his feet, she never moves up to the head, but forbears at his feet.  With those tears she generously begins to wash his feet and with her hair she wipes off the mire.  Her HAIR?!?!  A total denial of self – using her glory, her covering (I Cor.11:15) to generously wipe the grime from off the Lord of glory.  Then the unheard of… she liberally gives kisses unto his feet. His FEET!?!?  I don’t know about you, but I’m not much on looking at feet, much less touching feet, and even much less than that – kissing feet.  Can you see the degree of intimacy and the time spent between the guilty and the redeemer?  A generous degree.  Then she finishes by being generous with her money.  She anoints his feet with expensive ointment.  Not the common ointment but the costly ointment.  It seems this woman knew the words of Isaiah – “How beautiful are the feet of them that preach the gospel of peace and bring glad tidings of good things!”  Her generous penance took care of the feet that preached the gospel.  These were the feet the prophet talked about that were to bring glad tidings of good things.

    As we are generous with our repentance it allows the feet to preach the gospel and bring glad tidings of good things.  His generosity leads us to repentance.  Can we be generous in our repentance?

 

Abiding in Christ,

Kenny Kepper

Pastor

Berean Ministries