Signs of Repentance
Mike Stone
2 Corinthians 7:5-11
In 1971, John List, a reclusive New Jersey accountant with psychiatric disorders, tragically took the lives of his wife and their children in ways I will not describe in this pulpit. For 18 years he was a fugitive from justice, having successfully recreated his identity. He ended up in Michigan, remarried to a woman who knew nothing of his terrible, horrible, criminal past.
In 1989, forensic artists and criminal psychiatrists created a clay model, a bust, of what they believed he would look like. They studied family photos of relatives and created their statue, down to the type of eyeglasses they believed he would wear.
Pictures of that bust were broadcast on the TV Show, "America's Most Wanted." Because of the incredible, even eerie accuracy of the bust, John List was almost immediately arrested. He had been living under the pseudonym of "Bob Clark."
As a crime buff, the story is fascinating to me because of the forensics. As a theologian and pastor, the story is captivating because of something he said to Connie Chung of CBS News. During a 2002 interview, he said, "I wish I had never done what I did. I've regretted my action and prayed for forgiveness ever since."
Whether he regretted his actions, I do not know. It's possible. But on the authority of tonight's text, I can tell you, he had never during that time "repented."
Because as we will see tonight, you cannot repent of a sin while continuing to wallow in it. You cannot repent of a sin while never confessing it to the extent it involves other people. You cannot repent of sin while never yielding yourself to its consequences.
Theologically, this is even further compelling to me because while List was on the run, he was a leader in a Lutheran church. And nobody at the Zion Lutheran Church of Kalamazoo had any idea about his past.
This has a direct bearing on tonight's service because the Lutheran Church received the Lord's Table ever ...
Mike Stone
2 Corinthians 7:5-11
In 1971, John List, a reclusive New Jersey accountant with psychiatric disorders, tragically took the lives of his wife and their children in ways I will not describe in this pulpit. For 18 years he was a fugitive from justice, having successfully recreated his identity. He ended up in Michigan, remarried to a woman who knew nothing of his terrible, horrible, criminal past.
In 1989, forensic artists and criminal psychiatrists created a clay model, a bust, of what they believed he would look like. They studied family photos of relatives and created their statue, down to the type of eyeglasses they believed he would wear.
Pictures of that bust were broadcast on the TV Show, "America's Most Wanted." Because of the incredible, even eerie accuracy of the bust, John List was almost immediately arrested. He had been living under the pseudonym of "Bob Clark."
As a crime buff, the story is fascinating to me because of the forensics. As a theologian and pastor, the story is captivating because of something he said to Connie Chung of CBS News. During a 2002 interview, he said, "I wish I had never done what I did. I've regretted my action and prayed for forgiveness ever since."
Whether he regretted his actions, I do not know. It's possible. But on the authority of tonight's text, I can tell you, he had never during that time "repented."
Because as we will see tonight, you cannot repent of a sin while continuing to wallow in it. You cannot repent of a sin while never confessing it to the extent it involves other people. You cannot repent of sin while never yielding yourself to its consequences.
Theologically, this is even further compelling to me because while List was on the run, he was a leader in a Lutheran church. And nobody at the Zion Lutheran Church of Kalamazoo had any idea about his past.
This has a direct bearing on tonight's service because the Lutheran Church received the Lord's Table ever ...
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