Self-Pity vs. Repentance

Self-pity and repentance are two different things. I came to a place in my life when I realised that 90% of what I had thought I had been doing as repentance, throughout most of my life, was really just self-pity.

The difference between self-pity and repentance is this: self-pity is thinking about what a mess your sin got you in to. Self-pity is thinking about the consequences of it, what a wreck it's made of you, how God will probably get me for it, or how my parents will probably get me for it, or how my boss will probably get me for it, or all the problems it's going to create in my life, or already has created in my life. O Lord, how sorry I am that this has happened, O Lord get this out of my life!

And what you're really doing is saying, I hate the consequences of my sin. But you haven't learned to hate the sin. So what's happening is, instead of hating the sin, you're hating the consequences of your sin, and you're hating your self for being so stupid. Self-pity leads to continuing to love the sin, so it still has power over you, but hating yourself.

Real repentance is saying, what has this done to God? What has it cost God? What does God feel about it?...When you see what effect it's had on the loving God, who died so you wouldn't do it, who died for your holiness- when you begin to see that, it melts you, and it makes you begin to hate the sin, and it begins to lose it's attractive power over you. And instead of hating yourself, you begin to hate it, and bit by bit the idol begins to get crushed.

--Tim Keller, from this talk.