'Repent'
It is a translation of a term passed down through many languages and always implying change of mind and heart because of sorrow about the way a decision turned out. Even God 'repented,' His decision to trust mankind with authority over aspects of Creation and headed in a new direction. 'Repent' therefore cannot only be a term focused on personal sin, since God has none of His own and still 'repented.' The sin is the reason we make a new decision, whether it is ours or others or both. Someone 'missed the mark' however, and it actually doesn't matter right now who did it, since it has put us all in the same proverbial boat. The more pressing personal question is about what we can each do about it now, not who is 'most' to blame, since we all share a common fate until we do.
Originally an ancient military command to soldiers announced by the 'rear-guard' when an enemy was flanking them from behind during a forward assault and a 180 degree turn was required without stopping to turn around. 'Repent' means 'jump in the air, twist around completely and run the opposite way!'
Why sound the alarm now?
Jesus' message was: I have been watching your back. The kingdom of heaven is about to arrive. It is already 'within you' and it is about to be 'at hand' (in front of you). If I believe this then my 'forward assault' is not only not necessary, since no 'enemy' exists in front of me, but I realize now that I have been treating this arriving kingdom as my 'enemy' by forcefully marching in my current direction. My true enemy has already been scattered and has regrouped behind me. Since this battle is not one of flesh and blood, but one of psyche and emotion:
How does a person actually 'repent?'
Christ's first public words of explanation:
'Do not judge. With the measure you use, it will be measured again to you.'
This command was confusing, but it was successfully stolen for glory and gain, altered and reissued as a purely physical 'law' that has proven very useful and accurate:
'Every action has an equal and opposite reaction.'
When we march against the kingdom, we will be scattered with the same zeal that we applied to our original rebellion. When we 'repent' we will be embraced with the same zeal with which we obediently turned. If we hesitate, stop and then turn we will be honored with only few honors, having fallen behind the truly obedient and courageous. If we instantly jump, twist and land boots already running, we will be honored with many honors.
Do we still 'judge' others using standards that reflect our own desires for power and not any real sense of justice? We cannot hide the energy and thoughts we are actually applying even if we deceive ourselves, since this action will have an equal and opposite reaction, always revealing our 'hidden' intentions and any taint of hypocrisy covering our own carefully disguised sins. We are all more intimately intertwined than we like to believe. I always play a 'hidden' role in causing what has reached me and harmed me. Any 'retribution' against it will return again to me with commensurate skill in camouflage, taking me equally by surprise---even if I am not intelligent enough to see my own hand in society's 'problems,' the truth comes to me as a personal and very specific instructor. My response can either end the need for future 'lessons' or send a new call out for more personal 'instruction.' This is not God's 'favoritism,' since He has none. Rather it is nature's impartiality, governing with laws that apply to all equally. It is not merely 'nice' not to judge, but absolutely required if we wish to avoid later judgment ourselves. It is not subjective, governed by shifting tides of interpretation, prevailing public opinion or party. Nature acts in totalities not partialities, whether we appreciate them or not and whether we choose to look for them or not. Nature is the domain of the only true Judge and He answers through it with perfect impartial equality and no need for any other docket or courtroom.
The world is filled with self-proclaimed 'judges,' and many hidden ones. It is proportionately filled with natural responses to that judgment: planet poisoning mega-industry; untraceable and incurable diseases; exponentially expanding asymmetrical violence, lineage ending tragedies. 'We' are to blame for it, not him, her, them, or those. 'We' bear its burdens equally unless we choose to place our share on him, her, them or those. Many hands can make even such a massive burden light.
The words of Christ:
“Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest.
'Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy and my burden is light.' (Matthew 11:28-30)
If we place the blame and burden upon others as an excuse not to do our small share, we have not yet 'repented.' If we excuse some from playing their small part and attempt to bear everyone's burdens ourselves, consequently finding ourselves crushed by them, we have not yet 'repented.'
Jesus taught us to each play a small, humble but powerful role without the empty pride of personal attempts at conspicuous heroism followed by an equally conspicuous blame of others when we inevitably fail and are crushed by its immense weight. And also without the destructive and uninspiring sorrow of abandoning all hope as one of the 'judged,' excusing our own small yet vital role as unimportant now compared to the 'heroes,' whose constant failures we excoriate as though we are somehow fit to 'judge' them while doing nothing ourselves.
It is from this entire illness and to an often unnoticed or even 'secret' role of small-scale burden bearing that Jesus calls each of us to 'repent,' then begin immediately to fight the battle of numbers against a tide that only grows when we unjustly judge our fellow 'kingdom citizens'---feeding that tide our own precious souls as we do. Instead, let us each apply great mental and emotional zeal gently to daily, simple, barely noticeable but vitally powerful acts of small scale thoughtfulness, kindness, consideration, gentleness, patience, goodness, loyalty and personal example---and, just as importantly, to avoiding the temptations of hero worship and hero 'complexes.' It is only upon this Path that we will escape from the harsher lessons of the laws of nature. They are miraculously overcome by peaceful and humble first actions, requiring then of nature only peaceful and humble opposite and commensurate reactions. This is intimacy with God our Father, something more of a meaningful 'conversation' rather than yelling and screaming, sorrow or need for any further 'repentance.'
True 'glory' is measured in degrees of quiet intimacy with the ultimate Celebrity. This intimacy deepens with every ironically simple, secret, quiet, peaceful, inconspicuous act of love for others---those acts done with no requirements of personal pride attached, no lesser and emptier forms of glory or wasted pursuits of self-importance at others' expense, no self-abusive murmuring complaints, self-pity, or unfair standards--- Just an appreciation of power in numbers and the supreme importance of every single individual soul created by an impartial God of impenetrable purpose and omnipotent resolve.