Oops...

Have you ever run to Psalm 51 right after sinning or perhaps turned to a Christian song about forgiveness? I have. But while we want the guilt to go away immediately and our spirituality restored we make our spiritual growth primarily about our feelings. We want to feel better and we want to feel better NOW. We'd do great incredible tasks to feel that way if God demanded that of us but God wants something we typically don't want to give Him. What He wants is simple and clear yet because of this simplicity, we almost despise what He asks of us. Like Naaman in 2 Kings 5, we believe the task is pointless or beneath us. But we need a friend like Naaman's servants to say, "My father, had the prophet told you to do some great thing, would you not have done it? How much more then, when he says to you, ‘Wash, and be clean’?"
God wants us to change and grow through His Word. To grow we need to be in His Word daily. Jesus prayed to the Father for us to be sanctified in His Word. God's prayer to God was that we would be growing spiritually by, through, and in God's Word. Spiritual growth isn't about us, and it's definitely not about our feelings. When we want to grow spiritually, especially right after falling, we need to fight the urge to cover up the problem by finding a way to feel better. Rather, Jesus wants God's Word to transform us. We need God's Word to grow.

John 17:17(NASB)

"Sanctify them in the truth; Your word is truth."