Repentance

“Make sure that no one is immoral or godless like Esau, who traded his birthright as the firstborn son for a single meal. You know that afterward, when he wanted his father’s blessing, he was rejected. It was too late for repentance, even though he begged with bitter tears.” Hebrews 12:16-17 (NLT)
Jesus began His ministry by preaching repentance, and the church began the same way. When God finally steps on the stage and closes the book on history, we see that the condemned resist God to the very end. Christianity is all about not resisting God; it is birthed and cradled in repentance.
Some believe that you just need to repent to get in and then you’re done with it. To repent means to quit my resistance to the Holy Spirit, see matters God’s way, and follow Him.
As with Esau, God’s Spirit strives patiently with those who resist Him, but will eventually let such people have their own way. His Spirit will not always strive with us. Esau had sinned in selling his birthright, and clearly went on resisting the Holy Spirit for years. Finally he was unable to repent even though he tried to with tears.
I don’t know of any scripture that tells me to take my sin to God and ask Him to deliver me from it and then trust in faith that He will. God promises to deliver us from the power of sin—that is, to make sin no longer irresistible. But it is up to us to repent—to keep our accounts with God short. We must repent and believe…and keep on repenting and believing. Daily. If you don’t, a time may come, like with Esau, when you are unable to repent even though you plead with bitter tears.
-Pastor Dino Griffin