How does God repent but not repent?

Twice the Bible says that God repented for something he had done in the past and at least eleven times it says he repented or would repent of something he was about to do in the future Nevertheless, the Bible also says that God will not repent.

In today’s church, two ideas are expressed about repentance. One suggests it means being deeply sorry for sin. The other says it means turning from sin to a godly way of behaving. That is, I could be deeply sorry for lying, and I should turn from that and always tell the truth.

But God is not a human and He cannot sin. So when the Bible says God relents or repents it is not suggesting He regrets doing something wrong. However, if read carefully with that in mind, these Scriptures mean His heart is grieved and yet He will accomplish His good purpose another way.

I get it. Yesterday I started to make a quilt from scraps. Because of one mis-cut and a mis-count, it wasn’t working according to the design in my mind. I was grieved (mildly) that the plan had to be changed and yet I did it, with good results. While my mistakes could be called sin, the repenting was more like God’s repenting than it would be if I’d lied or did something else He forbids.

In other words, when God repents, His plan remains the same. It could be described that God never changes His mind or alters His purposes, though He sometimes changes the course or the way He causes things to happen. He knew of the resistance and the downfall of man before He created man. His original purpose was for Adam and Eve was to live in the garden, cultivate it, and be prosperous. Then, when their sin happened, He put them out of the garden and altered the course to eventually accomplish the final result. Sin gave Him sorrow but did not turn Him from what He wanted.

This is not like me. Sin gives me sorrow, but repentance is turning from the sin and fitting in with God’s plan, not coming up with a new way to have my own way. Repentance on my part is not manipulation, or at least repentance properly defined and understood.

I suppose part of the problem is imagining how our sinless God can feel deep sorrow for things that happen. Why didn’t He use His power to not allow those events in the first place? Yet the way all things work out, how would we know His love, goodness, wisdom, or persistence, or anything else about Him if He never created people capable of sin like Adam and Eve, or me, and if He ordered all things perfect in the first place?

Again, God’s “repentance” is not an acknowledgement of failure, as it is for me. His  righteousness and judgment is complete and perfect. He does not change His plan but in grace, alters the details to accomplish the result. When He “repents” His purpose for us is revealed. And I must remember that redemption happens, but sadly so does judgment.God’s view of sin and His plan to deal with it have never changed.

LORD, Your emotions are hard to understand, probably because so many of mine have a sinful and some sort of selfish root, or are not related to You, like fear or doubt. What did Your tears mean when Lazarus died? What did Your anger mean when You cleansed the temple? I know what Your word says but cannot relate to the purity of what You feel without thinking of my own reasons for how I feel. Yet You are God and I can believe and trust Your goodness and be content to know that I don’t need to know everything unless or until You reveal it to me.