Good grief or bad grief?

There is a difference in kinds of grief. This verse clearly shows us the good and the bad:



2 Corinthians 7:10



10 For godly grief produces a repentance that leads to salvation without regret, whereas worldly grief produces death.



Let me try to explain, What I call good grief is actually know as conviction by the Holy Spirit. This is when you sin and the Holy Spirit lets you know you have done wrong by grief, the feeling you know you have sinned. Many times the Holy Spirit even had warned you before you had done that sin but you chose to do the sin any way and now you feel guilty before God which you are! This kind of grief leads to repentance, which is confessing your sin to God and asking for forgiveness and striving never to do that sin again!



Now if this is the first time in your life that you are calling upon God then it leads to salvation, being made right with God by accepting the shed blood of Jesus to cover your sins. However, if you have already followed Jesus, you are saved but asking God for to forgive you of the sin you have just committed and again striving to live a holy life before God.



The other side of the coin is bad grief. This is where you have a knowledge of right and wrong but you are unwilling to totally surrender to God, you may even have yourself fooled into thinking you are saved, so you feel bad for you sin and you may even confess it to God but you go right back to doing the same sins as before which eventually leads to death and an eternity in hell. This is worldly grief. Sadly many churches are full of folks like this who have fooled themselves into thinking a Sunday morning in the pew makes everything all right when in reality the only thing that makes us right is a relationship with Jesus Christ and a lifetime of following Him and His Word.



So what kind of grief do you have this morning? Godly or worldly?



Tom