“Therefore, my dear friends,
as you have always obeyed—not only in my presence, but
now much more in my
absence—continue to work out your salvation with fear and trembling, for it is
God who works in you to will and to act in order to fulfill his good purpose.”
(Philippians 2:12-13)
Two young children were asked
the question, “What does repent mean?” The little boy said, “It means to be
sorry.” The little girl said, “It means to be sorry and stop.”
This little girl had a better
understanding of “repent” than many Bible ‘scholars’ of today.
We are being told repeatedly
that repentance means to just “change your mind,” so just believe in Jesus and
you will be saved. I agree that it is faith alone that leads us to salvation.
“For it is by grace you have
been saved, through faith—and this is not from yourselves, it is the gift of
God—not by works, so that no one can boast.” (Ephesians 2:8-9)
Clearly, we are saved by
grace. The instrument God uses is our faith. We cannot save ourselves. It is a
gift of God. Our works can never ever save anyone.
The question is, “Does
repentance have any part of salvation, other than just changing our mind about
Jesus?”
Recalling the two children,
will feeling sorry for our sins save us? The answer is obviously, “No.” If the
answer were “Yes,” we would then have to ask, “How sorry must I feel?”
So is there really any need
for repentance, other than changing our mind about Jesus?
Repentance is a result of the
conviction of the Holy Spirit in the life of the unbeliever (and also the
believer). If the lost soul acknowledges the Holy Spirit’s conviction in
his/her heart, then that seed will blossom into true repentance.
True repentance will change
the mind of the unbeliever from, “I don’t need Jesus” to “I need Jesus in my
life.” But what made that lost soul, the unbeliever, change his/her mind? The
conviction of the Holy Spirit helped them to see themselves as God sees them;
i.e. one who is knee deep in sin, bound for hell, and in desperate need of a
Savior.
So what is behind the word
“repent” other than meaning a change of mind? In Strong’s Lexicon ‘repent’ is
defined as:
to change one's mind, i.e. to repent
to change one's mind for better, heartily to amend
with abhorrence of one's past sins
In the above, ‘amend’ means
to adjust or modify, and ‘abhorrence’ means disgust or hatred.
Tyndale defines “repent” as:
"Repentance (metanoia, 'change of mind') involves
a turning with contrition from sin to God; the repentant sinner is in the
proper condition to accept the divine forgiveness." (F. F. Bruce. The Acts
of the Apostles [Greek Text Commentary], London: Tyndale, 1952, p. 97.)
The word ‘contrition’ above
means remorse, regret, sorrow or shame.
Strong’s definition states:
met-an-o-eh'-o; from G3326 and G3539; to think
differently or afterwards, i.e. reconsider (morally, feel compunction):—repent.
The word ‘compunction’ above
means regret, guilt or shame.
Strong’s NT Word Study shows:
μετανοέω, μετάνω; future μετανοήσω; 1 aorist
μετενόησα; from (Antiphon), Xenophon down; the Sept. several times for נִחַם;
to change one's mind, i. e. to repent (to feel sorry that one has done this or
that, Jonah 3:9), of having offended someone, Luke 17:3f; with ἐπί τίνι added
(the dative of the wrong, Hebrew עַל, Amos 7:3; Joel 2:13; Jonah 3:10; Jonah
4:2), of (on account of) something (so Latinme paenitet alicujus rei), 2
Corinthians 12:21; used especially of those who, conscious of their sins and
with manifest tokens of sorrow, are intent; on obtaining God's pardon; to
repent (Latinpaenitentiam agere): μετανοῶ ἐν σάκκῳ καί σποδῷ, clothed in
sackcloth and besprinkled with ashes, Matthew 11:21;
“I am afraid that when I come
again my God will humble me before you, and I will be grieved over many who
have sinned earlier and have not repented of the impurity, sexual sin and
debauchery in which they have indulged.” (2 Corinthians 12:21)
“Woe to you, Chorazin! Woe to
you, Bethsaida! For if the miracles that were performed in you had been
performed in Tyre and Sidon, they would have repented long ago in sackcloth and
ashes.” (Matthew 11:21)
So from all this, it is most
obvious that to be truly repentant is to feel ‘disgust,’ ‘hatred,’ ‘regret,’ ‘remorse,’
‘sorrow,’ ‘shame,’ ‘guilt,’ etc. over the sins in our lives that have kept us
from Jesus, and that He has paid in full. Because our eyes have been opened, we
see ourselves as God sees us and we change our mind about our need to call upon
Jesus to be saved. As a Christian, true repentance will cause us to see the
need of our life being ‘modified’ (changed) through the power of God in Jesus
Christ.
How are we saved? We are
saved by grace through faith, any and all of our works excluded, but what
brought us to put our faith in Jesus? Seeing ourselves through God’s eyes and realizing
our need for Jesus led us to faith. In other words, true repentance led us to
faith, and by faith we believed in Jesus Christ.
What does it mean ‘to
believe’ in Jesus? First of all, what does it not mean? Believing in Jesus is
not a casual, flippant, empty-hearted acknowledgment of believing ‘about’ Him.
True belief in Jesus is total trust that He is who the Bible (His Word) says He
is. It is a ‘commitment’ of faith that He will save me and keep me. It is an
acceptance that Jesus will save me and perform all He has promised, even though
I now recognize that I am not worth saving. It is the seed that grows into one
who desires to follow Him and be like Him.
So we see that we cannot ‘work
out our own salvation’ in assisting God in saving our soul. However, we now
must see that Paul is talking to those who have already been saved. There must
also be an emphasis at this point that we are not ‘working out our own
salvation’ in order to keep the salvation God has given us. We can no more keep
our salvation through our works than we could get it in the first place through
our works. We are saved by the grace of God, and we are kept for eternity by
the grace of God. In other words, once we are His child through Christ, we are
forever His child through Christ.
“For I am convinced that
neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither the present nor the
future, nor any powers, neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all
creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ
Jesus our Lord.” (Romans 8:38-39)
Any person, who takes the
credit for their salvation, is not saved. Yes, those are strong words, but they
ring consistently true throughout the Bible. If we really are a true Christian,
God did the saving through His Son Jesus and used our faith (that He provided)
to get us there. If we take credit for that, over Jesus, we are not His child.
Now, I’m at the point I’ve
been aiming at throughout this article. Every Christian should be ‘working out
their own salvation.’ What does that mean? It means simply that as a Christian,
we should be “studying to show ourselves approved unto God, a workman who does
not need to be ashamed.” (2 Timothy 2:15) We need to put on the whole armor of
God. (Ephesians 6:11, 13) The bottom line is: we need to start acting like a
child of God, instead of trying to keep one foot in the Devil’s playground. As
the little girl said in the beginning of this article, “Repent means “to be
sorry, and stop.”
Millions of ‘professing’ Christians
today have never truly repented, and therefore have never exercised true faith
in Jesus Christ. They claim Christ, but they still live for the Devil.
Is it possible that true
Christians are still living for the world and not Jesus? Yes it is, but if they
are really a child of God they are not happy and they are tempting divine
punishment.
I realize that Christians
mature spiritually at different rates. Some mature quickly and some mature
slowly, but they all will mature if they are truly a Christian. Why is that? It
is true because His Spirit works with our spirit in aiding our growth, and God
never fails.
If you are not committed to
Jesus, perhaps you should seriously consider what the apostle Paul said to the
Corinthians.
“Examine yourselves to see
whether you are in the faith; test yourselves. Do you not realize that Christ
Jesus is in you—unless, of course, you fail the test? And I trust that you will
discover that we have not failed the test.” (2 Corinthians 13:5-6)
If you seem to be constantly
failing, but your desire is to please the Lord Jesus, then persevere.
“His divine power has given
us everything we need for a godly life through our knowledge of him who called
us by his own glory and goodness.
Through these he has given us
his very great and precious promises, so that through them you may participate
in the divine nature, having escaped the corruption in the world caused by evil
desires.
For this very reason, make
every effort to add to your faith goodness; and to goodness, knowledge; and to
knowledge, self-control; and to self-control, perseverance; and to
perseverance, godliness; and to godliness, mutual affection; and to mutual
affection, love.
For if you possess these
qualities in increasing measure, they will keep you from being ineffective and
unproductive in your knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ.” (2 Peter 1:3-8)
Grant Phillips
Email: grantphillips@windstream.net
Pre-Rapture Commentary: http://grant-phillips.blogspot.com
Rapture Ready: http://www.raptureready.com/featured/phillips/phillips.html
