‘Even now,’ declares the LORD, ‘return to me with all your heart, with fasting and weeping and mourning.’ Rend your heart and not your garments. Return to the LORD your God, for he is gracious and compassionate, slow to anger and abounding in love, and he relents from sending calamity. Who knows? He may turn and have pity and leave behind a blessing--grain offerings and drink offerings for the LORD your God. Joel 2:12-14 (NIV)
The theme “return” flows freely throughout all Scripture from Genesis to Revelation. God begins by asking our original parents after their fall: “Where are you?” in Genesis 3:9 and states in Revelation 3:19: “So be earnest and repent” and countless times in between. Repent means to “undergo a moral reorientation of the soul in which one acknowledges the error of his ways and turns toward the prescribed way of truth and righteousness” (New Testament Lexical Aids Hebrew – Greek Key Word Study Bible). It is a turning back from our point of departure to God. God, in His gracious and compassionate way, is constantly calling the prodigal back. Thankfully.
We, who do not deserve anything but death and destruction, discover His eye is on us for good and not evil. He lovingly desires for none to perish but all to come to repentance. No matter who you are, no matter how far you have strayed, no matter how low you have gone – He lovingly issues forth the same call to all. And the time to turn is now. “Come to me,” says He.
We are therefore Christ's ambassadors, as though God were making his appeal through us. We implore you on Christ's behalf: Be reconciled to God. God made him who had no sin to be sin for us, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God. As God's fellow workers we urge you not to receive God’s grace in vain. For he says, “In the time of my favor I heard you, and in the day of salvation I helped you.” I tell you, now is the time of God’s favor, now is the day of salvation. 2 Corinthians 6:1-2 (NIV)