In politics, no one wants to be called a flip-flopper. The use of this kind of language is usually a term to belittle or discredit another person. Usually the term flip-flopper is used on someone who has flopped on a position for political gain, the kind of flopping I’m talking about here is of another kind. It’s the kind of flipping that happens similar to an electronic switch. However, biblically, this is what we are called to be. The term in Scripture is repent. This means a lifetime of repenting.
Some think that to repent means a one time prayer is all that is required for taking the label “Christian”. Surely that right starting point is necessary but Scripture teaches this is as an ongoing practice. Not to be “saved” again, but the effect of the submitting to God once requires endurance to the end.
This kind of ‘flipping’ may be better understood as reformation. A work of re-forming or re-molding. The apostle puts it like this…
With eyes wide open to the mercies of God, I beg you, my brothers, as an act of intelligent worship, to give him your bodies, as a living sacrifice, consecrated to him and acceptable by him. Don’t let the world around you squeeze you into its own [mold], but let God re-[mold] your minds from within, so that you may prove in practice that the plan of God for you is good, meets all his demands and moves towards the goal of true maturity. (Romans 12:1-2; Phillips)
It’s the language of Scripture…
- I once was lost…
- I once was blind…
- I once was disobedient to God…
- I once loved darkness
- I once was…
Like when you flip on a light switch. Every light switch I flip today will be a reminder of the redeeming work of Christ in my life. The light switch can’t turn itself on, it must be turned on by the master of the home. The work of the flip has a reaction. For me, that action is repent. I am a repenter, what about you?