day no. 14,740: good grief

2 Corinthians 7:8-11
For even if I made you grieve with my letter, I do not regret it-though I did regret it, for I see that that letter grieved you, though only for a while. 9 As it is, I rejoice, not because you were grieved, but because you were grieved into repenting. For you felt a godly grief, so that you suffered no loss through us. 10 For godly grief produces a repentance that leads to salvation without regret, whereas worldly grief produces death. 11 For see what earnestness this godly grief has produced in you, but also what eagerness to clear yourselves, what indignation, what fear, what longing, what zeal, what punishment! At every point you have proved yourselves innocent in the matter.

Grief x8

Grief is not good in and of itself. But that doesn't mean it is bad. It can be bad, but it isn't always bad. It is good when it leads to repentance.

When you feel godly grief, it leads to repentance which means the grief produces a net gain. You are better off for having felt the grief than if you had never felt its sting. Godly grief produces repentance which leads to salvation without regret.

Worldly grief, by contrast produces death which leads to more death with regret for a net loss. It is a loss that leads to more loss.

Godly grief is a loss that leads to ever increasing gain because what it grasps is Christ who gives abundantly. Repentance leads to innocence.

The worldly approach is to remove the sting of sin by categorically changing the game. If we call evil good, then we can commit evil and call it, "good," without shame, grief or regret. But that leads to ever increasing guilt.

Repenting (agreeing with God) and Confessing (calling sin by its name) leads to salvation without any regret.

So those who own their sin are the ones who are free from it and those who deny their sin are the ones enslaved to it. Those attempting to escape shame by clinging to their sin only ensure the shame they seek to avoid. Those who embrace shame by repenting of their sin ensure their salvation and break free from the shame fully and finally.