Jeff JacobyBen WattenbergRoger Simon Mona CharenLinda Chavez Paul Greenberg Larry ElderJonathan S. Tobin Thomas SowellClarence PageWalter Williams Don FederCal ThomasPolitical Cartoons

Jewish World Review / Sept. 15, 1998 /24 Elul, 5758

Cal Thomas

Repenting when
the end is near

WATCHING PRESIDENT CLINTON being "baptized'' with forgiveness by a carefully chosen group of theologically and politically liberal clergy last Friday recalled a similar event 25 years ago.

Richard Nixon held Sunday "morning-worship'' services in the White House attended by theologically and politically conservative clergy. As a young reporter I covered these strangely sterile events, which were devoid of hellfire and brimstone and any criticism of Nixon's Vietnam or domestic policies. That's because, like last Friday's liberal conclave, the guests were carefully screened.

All presidents, regardless of party, love to wrap themselves in men (and women) of the cloth, especially when their presidencies are unraveling.

President Clinton's advisors clearly made the case to him that the sawdust trail was a preferred path to trod. So, the president attempted to emulate Jimmy Swaggart with his own version of "I have sinned.'' He parsed the scripture a bit when he spoke of having a "broken but strong heart.'' The correct reference was to King David's "broken and contrite heart.'' But President Clinton vowed to again "sic'' his lawyers on Ken Starr, the House of Representatives and public opinion in order to hold on to power.

Only God knows a person's heart, but the rest of us can discern certain clues from a penitent's behavior. The credibility of repentance diminishes the closer one gets to being found out. In President Clinton's case, his came on the day the Starr referral arrived on Capitol Hill. Repentance also appears more genuine when it doesn't have to be extracted but is freely offered --- when it comes from the heart and not from focus groups.

Worldly sorrow is being sorry that you got caught. Godly sorrow acknowledges how short one falls from God's standard and brings with it a turning away from old patterns of behavior to new and better ones.

That point is eloquently made by the devotional writer Oswald Chambers in his classic work My Utmost for His Highest. Chambers says a truly repentant person "proves he is forgiven by being the opposite to what he was, by God's grace. Repentance always brings a man to this point: I have sinned. The surest sign that God is at work is when a man says that and means it. Anything less than this is remorse for having made blunders, the reflex action of disgust at himself.''

As for those who claim that the president should be granted immediate absolution by the public because he said the words some wanted to hear, the passage of some time is necessary to judge the sincerity of a man for whom truth has not been a strong suit. After his impressive televised performance, Jimmy Swaggart returned to the arms of prostitutes. In spite of Richard Nixon's White House church services, he resigned rather than face impeachment. The tape recordings of Oval Office conversations revealed that Mr. Nixon was more gifted in the language of the devil than he was at utterances pleasing to the Lord.

President Clinton's spiritual life is between himself and God. The president's political future is between himself and Congress. Without any insights into or conversations with the Office of the Independent Counsel, I have a suspicion that last week's referral is not the final word from Ken Starr. Emerging from a Saturday meeting with the president, Rep. Charles Rangel (D-N.Y.) seemed cocky when he said that Starr had fired his "best shot'' and it was a blank.

Don't look now, congressman, but the next sound you hear may be the dropping of additional evidence of wrongdoing by a man for whom sexual sin is only one failing in a totally dishonest individual.