Repentance And Gratitude

Si tibi indulgentia Domini adcommodat, unde restituas quod amiseras, iterato beneficio gratus esto, necdum ampliato. Maius enim restituere quam dare, quoniam miserius est perdidisse quam omnino non accepisse. Verum non statim succidendus ac subruendus est animus desperatione, si secundae quis paenitentiae debitor fuerit. Pigeat sane peccare rursus, sed rursus paenitere non pigeat; pudeat iterum periclitari, sed iterum liberari neminem pudeat: iterandae valitudinis iteranda medicina est. Gratus in dominum extiteris, si quod tibi denuo offert, non recusaveris. Offendisti sed reconciliari adhuc potes: habes cui satisfacias et quidem volentem.  Id si dubitas, evolve quae spiritus ecclesiis dicat: desertam dilectionem Ephesiis inputat, stuprum et idolothytorum esum Thyatirenis exprobat, Sardos non plenorum operum incusat, Pergamenos docentes perversa reprehendit, Laudicenos divitiis fidentes obiurgat: et tamen omnes ad paenitentiam commonet, sub comminationibus quidem. Non comminaretur autem non paenitenti, si non ignosceret paenitenti, dubium, si non et alibi hanc clementiae suae profusionem demonstrasset: Non, ait, qui ceciderit, resurget et qui aversatus fuerit, convertetur? Ille est scilicet, ille qui misericordiam mavult quam sacrificia. Laetantur caeli et qui illic angeli paenitentia hominis; heus tu peccator, bono animo sis: vides ubi de tuo gaudeatur! Quid illa similitudinum dominicarum argumenta nobis volunt? Quod mulier dragmam perdit et requirit et repperit, amicas ad gaudium invitat, nonne restituti peccatoris exemplum est? Errat et una pastori ovicula, sed grex una carior non erat; una illa conquiritur, una pro omnibus desideratur, et tamen invenitur et humeris pastoris ipsius refertur: multum enim errando laboraverat. Illum etiam mitissimum patrem non tacebo qui prodigum filium revocat et post inopiam paenitentem libens suscipit, inmolans vitulum praeopimum convivio gaudium suum exornat: quidni? Filium enim invenerat quem amiserat, cariorem senserat quem lucri fecerat. Quis ille nobis intellegendus pater? Deus scilicet: tam pater nemo, tam pius nemo. Is ergo te filium suum, etsi acceptum ab eo prodegeris, etsi nudus redieris, recipiet quia redisti magisque de regressu tuo quam de alterius sobrietate laetabitur, sed si paeniteas ex animo, si famem tuam cum saturitate mercennariorum paternorum conpares, si porcos inmundum relinquas pecus, si patrem repetas vel offensum Deliqui dicens, pater, nec dignus ego iam vocari tuus. Tantum relevat confessio delictum quantum dissimulatio exaggerat; confessio enim satisfactionis consilium est, dissimulatio contumaciae.  Tertullianus, De Paenitentia, Caput VI-VII Source:  Migne PL 1.1241c-1243a

If the Lord's indulgence grants to you the means of restoring what you had lost, be thankful for the benefit renewed, not to say amplified. For to restore is greater than to give, as much as to have lost is more wretched than never to have received at all. Truly let not the spirit be immediately cut down and undermined by despair, if any incur the debt of second repentance. Certainly let it displease to sin again, but let it not to repent again; let it displease to imperil one's self again, but let it not shame anyone to be set free again; repeated sickness demands repeated medicine. You will show your gratitude to the Lord if what He offers to you again you do not refuse. You have offended, but you can yet be reconciled. You have Him whom you may satisfy and He is willing. If you doubt this, consider 'what the Spirit says to the churches.' He imputes to the Ephesians forsaken love; 1 reproaches the Thyatirenes with fornication and eating of things sacrificed to idols; 2 accuses the Sardians of works not full; 3 reproves the Pergamenes for teaching perverse things; 4 rebukes the Laodiceans for trusting in wealth; 5 and yet gives them all general warnings to repentance, under threat, it is true, but He would not threaten the unrepentant if He did not forgive the repentant, which would be doubtful if He had not elsewhere demonstrated this profusion of His clemency. Does He not say, 'He who has fallen shall rise again, and he who has been turned away shall be turned back?' 6 He it is, indeed, who would have mercy rather than sacrifices. 7 The heavens and the angels who are there rejoice at man's repentance. 8 Listen, sinner, and be encouraged. See where there is joy concerning you. What is it that the Lord's parables wish to persuade us? A woman has lost a drachma, and she seeks it and she finds it, and she invites her female friends to share her joy; is this not an example of a restored sinner? 9 One little ewe of the shepherd strays but the flock was not more dear than the one; that one is most diligently sought; that one is longed for instead of all, and when she is found, she is carried back on the shoulders of the shepherd himself, for she had exerted herself much in her straying. 10 That most gentle father, likewise, I will not pass over in silence, who calls his prodigal son home and willingly receives him repentant after his poverty, slaying his best fatted calf and adorning his joy with a banquet. Why not? He found the son he had lost, he had felt him dearer who he had regained. Who is that father to be understood by us to be? God, surely; no one is so truly a Father, no one so pious. He, then, will receive you back, His own son, even if you have wasted what you received from Him, even if you return naked, receiving you because have returned, and He will delight more over your return than over the sensible conduct of other, but only if you truly repent, if you compare your own hunger with the plenty of your Father's hired servants, if you leave behind the pigs, the unclean herd, if you again seek your Father, offended though He be, saying, 'I have sinned, nor am I now worthy to be called yours.' 11 As much as confession relieves sin, so much dissimulation increases it; for confession is counseled by the wish to make satisfaction, dissimulation by contumacy. Tertullian, from On  Repentance, Chapter 6-7 1 Apoc 2.4 2 Apoc 2.20 3 Apoc 3.2 4 Apoc 2. 14-15 5 Apoc 3.17 6 Jerem 8.4 7 Hosea 6.6 8 Lk 15.7 9 Lk 15.8-10 10 Lk 15.3-7 11 Lk 15.11-32