I am weary with my groaning; all night I wash my bed; I water my couch with my tears (Psalms 6:6).
Day replaces night, and night replaces day. Let our daily repentance be succeeded by nightly repentance, and our nightly repentance by daily repentance. Daily repentance is shown primarily in good works; and nightly repentance in prayer, sighing and weeping. Thus, we repay our debt both day and night, by filling them with that which is most worthwhile before the Lord, and that which will go with us to the Judgment of God. Look at King David and behold an example of true repentance. It is not enough to confess one's sin before a priest and consider it forgiven. Behold, even David acknowledged his sin before the Prophet Nathan, saying: I have sinned against the Lord (II Samuel 12:13). However, the great king did not consider this enough, but continually sighed in prayer before God, and washed away his sin every night with tears of repentance. Even lying in bed did not serve as rest for him, but as exhaustion from tearful repentance and tearful sighing. Do not say: ``David committed murder and adultery, and therefore he had much to repent for.'' Do you not kill men by your hatred, and commit adultery by your impure thoughts and desires? Brethren, this life is not to justify ourselves but to condemn ourselves. Blessed is he whom God will justify at the Dread Judgment.
Repentance is not a matter for one hour or for one day. Repentance should be our inner occupation to the end of life. All night I water my couch, said King David. That does not mean that there is no need for repentance during the day, but that the outpouring of spiritual repentance is more suited to the night than the day. In the stillness of the night, both our sins and God's judgment come more clearly into focus. Doesn't the night remind us more clearly of death than the day? Doesn't the bed remind us of the nearness of the grave?
O Lord, just and wonderful, truly we cannot repent without Thy help. Help us, O All-good One, that we might see our sinful wounds, and smell the stench from them, and weep over ourselves-before our kinsmen begin to weep over our dead bodies, and before our guardian angels begin to weep over the carrion of our souls, when they are cast into the unquenchable fire. Help us and save us, O our God.
To Thee be glory and praise forever. Amen.(Prologue from Ohrid, October 6)
In our Morning and Evening Prayers we ask to be pardoned and cleansed. From the Trisagion Prayers, "O Heavenly King, O Comforter, Spirit of truth, who art in all places and fillest all things; Treasury of every good thing and Giver of life: Come and dwell in us and cleanse us from every stain and save our souls, O gracious Lord... All Holy Trinity, have mercy on us. Lord, cleanse us from our sins. Master, Pardon our iniquities. Holy God visit and heal our infirmities for thy Name's sake."
This is then followed by the Our Father - which includes a petition that we be forgiven our trespasses.
These prayers are the opening of our daily prayers, meaning that if you are doing Morning, Noon, and Evening Prayers you will see these three times a day. The Trisagion prayers are also found at the beginning of Matins, Small Compline, and Vespers.
Further more, during Evening Prayers there is a prayer for forgiveness that starts off, "O Lord our God, if during this day I have sinned, whether in word or deed or thought, forgive me all, for thou art good and lovest mankind."
In the Compline that we Oblates do there is a section that reads, in part, "I confess to Almighty God... That I have sinned exceedingly, in thought, word, and deed: by my fault, by my own fault, by my own most grievous fault..."
The response is, "God almighty, have mercy on us, forgive us our sins, and bring us to everlasting life."
Our prayers should be penitential in nature. We should be confessing our sins to our priest, yes, but also constantly to God. We need to recognize that we do indeed sin, and that we should definitely repent of those sins.
This is not to say that we should be focused on guilt, but rather humility. We need to humble ourselves before God and our fellow man. We need to recognize that we have erred, and ask forgiveness for such.
St. Sisoës taught humility to his monks, a story from his deathbed is given,
"When St Sisoës lay upon his deathbed, the disciples surrounding the Elder saw that his face shone like the sun. They asked the dying man what he saw. Abba Sisoës replied that he saw St Anthony, the Prophets, and the Apostles. His face increased in brightness, and he spoke with someone. The monks asked, "With whom are you speaking, Father?" He said that angels had come for his soul, and he was entreating them to give him a little more time for repentance. The monks said, "You have no need for repentance, Father" St Sisoës said with great humility, "I do not think that I have even begun to repent."
After these words the face of the holy abba shone so brightly that the brethren were not able to look upon him. St Sisoës told them that he saw the Lord Himself. Then there was a flash like lightning, and a fragrant odor, and Abba Sisoës departed to the Heavenly Kingdom."(OrthodoxWiki)
"I do not think that I have even begun to repent." What a stark contrast to the attitude of this modern world that seems to be, "I have nothing to confess." There can be nothing to confess because everything seems to be OK to do, at least that is a message that I get from various medias (I honestly think that social media is currently the greatest bane of our existence).
It seems that our culture is not big on recognizing that we do indeed do wrong - unless it is wrongthink. Wrongthink is basically a thoughtcrime that goes against the widely accepted groupthink. However, despite what our world tries to claim, we definitely do wrong. If we curse at someone in traffic for cutting us off, or driving slower than the rest of traffic, we have done wrong. If we curse our brother or sister, we have done wrong. If we strike someone, if we think ill thoughts about someone, if we give in to our passions, we have done wrong.
I know that for a lot of people what I have written is unanodyne, but it is the truth of the matter - no matter how much they will try to deny it and twist the words around so they can deceive themselves further into thinking that it is not the truth.
The truth is, simply, that we do wrong. We err. And we need to repent with our whole hearts.
The Prophet and King David - though he had many faults - when he was confronted with his sins cried his heart out in repentance every night to the point that nighttime was not a time of rest for him. St. Sisoës, who was thought to be a holy man by his monks, spent his last moments alive repenting saying that he hadn't even begun to repent.
May I one day reach that level of repentance.
Please pray for me, a sinner.
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