Tatham, Ernest: Repentance ~ What Is It

There can be no question whatever that the greatest exponent of vital New Testament Christianity was the Apostle Paul. And Paul, who wrote most of the epistles in the New Testament, I believe summarizes, condenses, and gives the very essence of his message in a statement that's recorded in Acts twenty and verse twenty one. I will not ask you to turn to it, just let me quote it. Paul said that his ministry was to testify to Jew and also to Greek repentance toward God and faith in the Lord Jesus Christ. Now I propose, with the Lord's help, to talk to you a little this morning on the subject of repentance, and next Sunday morning on its twin, faith. So we want to consider the question, or the answers to the question, what is repentance? And next Sunday morning, what is faith? And I want to read with you from Luke chapter thirteen. You have your New Testament. We always make good use of our Bibles here at Palm Bible Chapel. Luke chapter thirteen. we have a very explicit statement from the lips of our Savior. I refer to verse three. I refer to verse three of Luke thirteen. I tell you, nay, said he, but except ye repent, ye shall all likewise perish. Except ye repent, whatever that means, ye shall all likewise perish. And if that isn't enough, look at verse five. I tell you nay, but except ye repent, ye shall all likewise perish. And then I'm so glad that our friend Mr. Joy, who pre- pre- uh, prepares these weekly bulletins for us, used as a text at the masthead of this week's bulletin, these words from Second Corinthians seven and verse ten. This is not my suggestion, but I couldn't think of a more appropriate text than this. For godly sorrow worketh repentance to salvation. Now the rest of the text goes like this. Godly sorrow worketh repentance to salvation, never to be regretted. Godly sorrow worketh repentance unto salvation. Now, I'm sure, friends, the assertion this morning that we live in a broken, bruised, and dislocated, and sinful society calls for no defense. We don't need to defense that, defend that statement. It's too obvious to require defense. We live this morning in a society that's desperately sick and disordered. In fact, society around us and the society in our own hearts and lives spells out in plain terms wreckage, Disorder. disorder. Sin. I'm reminded of the old colored lady who had an accident on the highway. Her car got mixed up with another car, and the result was a wreck. Well, where there's a wreck, there's usually a lawyer not too far. And when the lawyer investigated the terms and the details of the accident, he went to the old colored lady, and he said, Auntie. He said, I've been looking into this, and he said, uh, I find that you can collect damages. Her reaction was this, she said, man alive. She says, I doesn't need more damages, what I need is repairs. And of course she was right. She'd collected enough damages, what she needed was repairs. And you know, I was thinking as I read that, this is true of the whole human race. The car of mankind calls for not only repairs, it's far grimmer than that. It calls for replacement, and this necessitates what our Lord speaks of as repentance, repentance toward God and faith in our Lord Jesus Christ. You see, my friends, the fact of the case is this, that man is a rebel in God's universe, that man has listened to the insidious attack that Satan made on the character of God, and therefore man is estranged from God. He's alienated from God. He's lost. Sin is much more than mere ignorance. Therefore, knowledge is not the answer. Sin is much more than an upset environment. Therefore, the remedy does not lie in a change of circumstances. Sin is much more than poverty. Therefore, its remedy doesn't lie in economic betterment. Sin is rebellion against the living God. It's transgression. When God said no, man said yes. And when God says yes, man says no. And this simply reflects the attitude of his heart toward the will of God himself. This is what sin is. And hence, against that ugly background, our Lord and the prophets call for repentance, and our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ said emphatically, except ye repent, ye shall all likewise perish. So you and I must take our choice. Now, I want you to think with me this morning of three approaches. First of all, repentance emphasized. Secondly, repentance explained, and finally, repentance exemplified or illustrated. Now, let us be clear on this, whether we understand what the word means or not. Let me say this, that the New Testament emphasizes the, the, the necessity, the inescapable necessity for it. I quoted a verse or two about it. This isn't just an isolated passage. For example, in Luke five thirty two, the Savior said this, I came not to call the righteous, but sinners to repentance. Again, let me quote what he said in Luke thirteen, twice over, except ye repent, ye shall all likewise perish. In Luke twenty four and forty seven, he gave the marching orders to his people after he died and rose again, and he said, your message is to be this, you're to preach repentance and remission of sins to all. In Acts three nineteen, we have Peter echoing the same words, and Peter says, repent and be converted that your sins may be blotted out. Again, in Acts seventeen and verse thirty, Paul said, God now command all men everywhere to repent, because he has appointed a day in which he will judge the world in righteousness by that man whom he has appointed, whereof he has given assurance unto all men, in that he raised him from the dead. In Acts twenty six and verse twenty, Paul said that he was converted and sent among the nations to preach repentance and the remission of sins. And again, in Acts twenty twenty one, he summarized his me- ministry by saying it was repentance toward God and faith toward our Lord Jesus Christ. And if you want another one, another text flashes into my mind as I speak. I think it's in second Peter chapter three where it reads something like this: God is long suffering to usward, not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance. Now then, what I've simply, eh, what I have simply done is to just air a number of exact quotations from the New Testament, from the ministry of our Lord, from the ministry of Paul, from the ministry of Peter, and we could go on. And I've simply aired these texts in order that we might see that this is the consistent teaching of New Testament Christianity. So much for the emphasis. But then someone says, I want the term explained. What is this thing called repentance? If I am going to perish, eternally perish, eternally perish, unless I repent, then I want to be crystal clear on what the word means. Now, perhaps it might helpful, it might be helpful if we take, first of all, what it does not mean, in order that we might clear the ground. Let me say that repentance is not mere penitence. Penitence is sorrow. Penitence is regret. But you say, isn't that good enough? It's good as far as it goes, but it doesn't go far enough. Esau is a picture in the Old Testament. Esau made a bad bargain one day, and Esau regretted it. He regretted it, but he found no place of repentance. He found no way of repairing the damage. He was sorry, but his sorrow was unavailing and unproductive. Our jails, our penitentiaries this morning are filled with men, yes, and women too, who are sorry. Sorry for what? Oh, they're not sorry, friends, for their crimes. They're not sorry for the wickedness of their hearts that caused them to commit that burglary, that rape, that murder. They're not sorry for what they are. They're sorry they got caught, and they're sorry that the judge and jury weren't a bit softer. So repentance is not mere sorrow. Again, repentance is not penance. Now I think we should be clear on this. What is penance? Penance is an attempt to atone for my sins by doing something or producing something. The earlier Roman Catholic versions translated the word repentance almost always by do penance. For example, they have him saying, or John the Baptist saying, do penance, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand. Except ye do penance, ye shall all likewise perish. But I'm happy to say, I think I have one here somewhere, I'm happy to say that the Confraternity Roman Catholic Edition, which is the best, I believe, that you can get, changes the word and goes back to the original word, repent. You see, do penance means to produce something that will placate God, buy him off, bribe him, uh, pay him for my sins. Do penance. This is not repentance. It's not repentance. Doing penance on the part of the Roman Catholic or doing religious works on the part of the ignorant Protestant falls far short of the New Testament idea of repent. It's not penitence, it's not doing penance, nor is it even reformation. Now, wait a minute. What do you mean it's not reformation? Listen, listen. Reformation is the product of repentance, but reformation is not repentance in itself. Repentance is coming and acknowledging as true what the judge on the holy bench of heaven has to say about my case. A friend of mine was about to face a live microphone and make a broadcast in a radio studio in Cleveland, Ohio. As they were waiting to be flashed onto the air with the, uh, announcer beside him, a radio commercial came on, and the commercial was advertising a certain jewelry store where watch repairing was a specialty. And the commercial went on to recommend or to urge people to bring their watches to this particular jewelry store for repair. The announcer who was sitting beside my friend grinned and said, he said, that doesn't touch me. I don't need a watch repair, what I need is a watch. My friend said to himself, that's my text for this message. Not a watch repair, but a watch. Listen, repentance is not just merely a change of outward conduct. I repeat, this is the product of repentance, but repentance itself is much deeper than a mere outward. We all perhaps come to the place where certain clothes that we wear, shoes that we wear, need replacing. We take those shoes, we have them resoled or reheeled or stitched up, and we wear them again and give them another go, until they come to the place where if we take them back to the shoe repair man, or the cobbler, as we used to call him, he looks at them, turns them over, and says, Mister, they ain't worth it. They ain't worth it. In other words, they're beyond repair. And so we chuck them, or perhaps pass them on to the goodwill. At any rate, they're no good to us. Now, friends, look, man's condition in the sight of a holy God is absolutely beyond repair, and we can never become Christians, believe you me, by putting on certain religious hassles or certain religious patches. God says the shoe's worn out, except a man be born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God. Except you repent, you shall all likewise perish. Well, you say you told us what repentance is not. It's not penitence, it's not doing penance, and it's not merely reformation. Well, then what in the world is it? Look, repentance, in essence, is a change of mind and a change of attitude. Our brother Mr. Taylor read to us this morning from Matthew chapter twenty one. I, our Lord explains it there very simply. He tells the story of a certain employer who said to two men, he said to the first, go and work today in my vineyard, and the man said, I will not. And then Jesus said he afterward repented and went. Ah, this helps me. He said at first, I will not. Then he repented and went. What did he do? He changed his mind. Ah, but let me say that repentance is more than a mere change of mind. It's a change of attitude as well. It's a change of attitude as well. Repentance is simply bowing to the authority of another, and when the judge says guilty or not guilty, repentance lies in the truth of two word- of one word, guilty. Guilty. Repentance is the debtor acknowledging his debt. Repentance is the patient acknowledging his disease. Repentance is honestly facing the fact of my lostness, my helplessness in the presence of a holy God. For example, the Lord Jesus Christ said in Matthew, no, in Mark chapter seven— these words. He said, out of the heart of men. Now listen, hold on. This is not flattering. People talk about the, people talk ignorantly about Jesus' confidence in human nature. I want to say this, my friends, boldly and emphatically this morning. Jesus Christ never spoke of confidence in human nature. He spoke just the opposite. He had no confidence in human nature because it's fallen human nature. By virtue of our first birth, beloved friends, we are alienated from the life of God, and this is what Jesus Christ said. He said more than this, but this is what he said to begin with. That which cometh out of the man that defileth the man, for from within, out of the heart of men, proceed evil thoughts. Ever have any? Ever have any? Evil thoughts? Evil imaginings. Adulteries. They come from where? The body. No, no, they don't. They come from the heart. The body follows the heart. Fornication, murders. No man ever pulled the trigger. No assassin ever plunged the knife into his victim until, first of all, he had reached into the till. From within proceed murder, theft, covetousness, wickedness, deceit, lasciviousness, blasphemy, pride, foolishness. All these evil things come from within and defile the man. Now, I've said from this pulpit before, and it needs saying again. Our Lord isn't saying this, that every man is a murderer, every man's a fornicator, every man's a thief, every man's proud, every man's this, that, and the other. He's not saying that I have done all these things. Someone might rise up and say, listen, what do you think we are? I've never committed murder in my life. I've never raped in my life. I've never stolen in my life. I've never used vile language in my life. Not a case of what I have done, it's a case of what I am. See the difference? And these things are all potentially there in the heart, and repentance is coming to God and saying, oh God, you're so right. You're so right. I fool my friends, but I know in myself that these evils are bottled up down below. And sometimes I hate it, and sometimes in a flare of temper, I, I've said I could kill it. What's that? Murder. Oh, the act. No. But the essential is there. Repentance is coming and acknowledging that in the presence of God, acknowledging my need, and there can be no salvation apart from repentance. Did you hear what I said? There can be no faith apart from repentance. You see, my friends, it's as simple as this, that sin, sin has distorted our whole attitude toward God. Distorted it, alienating us from him. I'm not going to put my trust in a God in whom I have no confidence, any more than I think of stepping on board a jet if I think there's a live bomb on board that's going to explode an hour after we get off the ground. I'm not going to get on that machine. I'm not going to trust my life to a doctor whom I believe is inferior and incompetent. I will not trust my soul for eternity to a Jesus Christ who is a phony. Repentance. Repentance lays the groundwork for faith. In fact, that's what our Lord said in that chapter that we had in our scripture reading this morning. Listen, the Lord said this to these righteous, self-righteous Pharisees. John came unto you in the way of righteousness, and you believed him not. But he says that the publicans and the harlots believed him, and ye, when ye had seen it, repented not afterward that ye might believe him. I've underlined those words in my Bible. You didn't repent. You didn't change your mind, that you might believe. Do you get the, do you get the thought there? You didn't change your mind, you didn't repent that you might believe, so that repentance is the basis of faith in Christ. Repentance is, I repeat, the debtor acknowledging his debt, not trying to camouflage it, sidestep it, forget it. The debtor acknowledges his debt. The condemned acknowledges the justice of the sentence. The ill man says, yes. Doctor, I realize your diagnosis is correct. It's cancer I have, and I want to know the remedy. Repentance is self-judgment. Repentance is changing my mind or my attitude toward sin and toward God and toward Christ. It's as simple as that. Are there any examples of it? Listen, Second Corinthians seven and verse ten. I referred to it in our calendar. Let me explain what this text means, will you? Very simply. It says, for godly sorrow worketh repentance to salvation, never to be repent- never to be regretted, but the sorrow of the world worketh death. Now, this takes a little bit of explaining. May I simplify? He says, godly sorrow works repentance to salvation, never to be regretted, but the sorrow of the world worketh death. What does he mean, godly sorrow? You know what it actually means? Simple as this. It simply means sorrow toward God. Oh. Sorrow toward God worketh repentance unto salvation. Repentance is sorrow toward God. I think I understand that now. Does this mean that I come at last to the realization that my attitude, that my sin is an offense toward God? It's contrary to God, the God who loves me, the God who gave his son to die for me on the cross, the God who wants me to be his child, the God who wants to save my soul and take me to heaven. My attitude toward God has been all wrong, and my sin has created a barrier between myself and him. Sorrow toward God. You see, my friends, we get all mixed up on this. Rep- uh, sin is primarily Godward. It's frequently manward, and it's always selfward. All sin is primarily against God, sometimes against others, and always and ultimately against oneself. It's like a boomerang, and it comes back and it strikes the man from whom it originally flows, but primarily it's against God. When the prodigal came back from the far country, he illustrates it. What did he say? When the prodigal came back in all of his stench and rags and hunger, he said to the father, Father, I have sinned against heaven and before thee. You get it? I have sinned against heaven and before thee. David in the fifty first Psalm, after his terrible sin with Bathsheba, he sobbed his confessions in brokenness and tears, and David said, against thee and thee only have I sinned and done this evil. That's repentance. That's repentance. It's the sentence of self-judgment without any excuse in the presence of God. This is it, and this prepares the way for faith. Now then, when I plead guilty, I cast myself on the mercy of the court. I cast myself upon God's mercy. Then God comes out with his remedy, and he brings me to a cross and precious blood and a substitutionary sacrifice. And he says, I've made all the provisions for your eternal salvation. Did you see, I will never repent of my sins until I get into the presence of God. Most people don't know the God of this book. The, the God of modern theology isn't the God of the Bible at all. The modern God is a God of putty, a God who has no sand in his constitution at all, no iron. A soft God who can be manipulated like wax with the pressure of one's thumb or, or fingers. A God of their own creation. I want to know the God of the Bible. What kind of a God is he? He's a God of absolute light. He's a God of absolute love. And because he's light, he cannot overlook sin. And because he's love, he cannot overlook the sinner. And when I get into the presence of that great, holy God, then, friends, you don't need to tell me I need to repent. If I'm in the presence of God, I'll abhor myself. I'll feel uncomfortable. You, dear wives and mothers who are in this Sunday morning service, you're going to take your family home, and you're going to have dinner, Sunday dinner, very, very shortly. Your family will gather around the table. You, mother, will not feel the least bit embarrassed or uncomfortable. You say, well, why should I? But supposing at the close of the service I were to say to you, say, I'd like to talk to your mother for a minute. You know that President-elect Nixon is out in the parking lot, and he apparently has got your address, and he he'd like to come home and have dinner with you today. What would you immediately think of? You'd immediately panic. If I know you, you'd say the President of the United States is coming to our place? My, my, what have I got in the oven? What have I, what have I prepared? Say, how will my children behave? You see, what makes the difference? The difference is a certain personality, a certain presence that you're in. When I was a little boy, I had two maiden aunts, Aunt Ellen and Aunt Ada. I remember my Aunt Ellen. She died when I was very young, that I remember her, but I vividly remember Aunt Ada. She lived to be a ripe old age. She was very prim, very proper. She lived by herself. She cultivated roses, and what roses. She loved the finer things of life. Aunt Ada loved the arts. She loved painting, music. Her manners were immaculate. Her grammar was faultless. We admired Aunt Ada. But you know, when she paid one of her visits to our home, and when Mother invited Aunt Ada, we always got a extra special meal. I tell you, the meat and the potatoes and the vegetables and the pudding, they were all extra when Auntie came. But you know, my brother Sid and myself were always a bit uneasy. Mother was particularly demanding on that occasion. Our hands had to be really scrubbed. We had to have our white, uh, shirts on, blouses. Our knicker pants, we wore them in those days. They had to be just right. Our best Sunday clothes were on, and Mother would always brief us ahead of time how we were to act at the table, and Aida was coming. You see what I'm trying to say? Certain personalities that come into our homes or into our lives sometimes make us cautious and a little apprehensive of our own, uh, particular conduct, our deportment, our appearance, and sometimes our appearance, if we're caught unawares, oh, we become painfully conscious of our, perhaps our shabby clothing, and said, if I'd have only known, I'd have changed my dress. I'd have, you know, you know what I'm talking about? Look, friends, Job one day, a very, very self-righteous man, a very, very, a man of a very, very enviable standard and reputation was brought consciously into the presence of God. One of the greatest stories in the Old Testament is the story of Job. Some, sometime we'll get around to that, perhaps. But when Job got into the presence of God, all of his self-righteousness went out the nearest window. Job cried out these words, and I quote, he said, O God, I have heard of thee by the hearing of the ear, but now mine eyes seeth thee, and I abhor myself and repent in dust and ashes. Well, up to this time, he had been giving a pretty good account of himself. When those three friends of Job gathered around him, he returned their fire. He held his own. He maintained his reputation and his self-righteousness. He, my friend, could compete with the best. When he got in the presence of God, in that blinding light, he said, oh, I've heard of thee by the hearing of the ear, but now mine eye seeth thee, thy glory, thy holiness, thy righteousness, but I abhor myself, and I repent in dust and ashes. It was written. What'd you do? My friend, she said, I am unworthy. I am unworthy. I'm lost. I'm just no good. Have you ever come to that place in your life? Friends, I repeat, this is the prerequisite of faith in the provision that God has made. What is God's attitude? God's attitude toward you is one wherein he hates your sin, but he loves you. He loves you. And the proof of this is the cross of Calvary. For God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten son, that whosoever believeth on him should not perish, but have everlasting. Oh, my friend, God loves you. Christ died for you, and Christ has paid the price of sin on the cross. God raised him from the dead, and Jesus Christ alive this morning is the proof that God is satisfied with his work, and the believer can say, sweetest rest and peace have filled me. Sweeter praise than tongue can tell. God is satisfied with Jesus. I am satisfied.