Repentance Towards God

Introduction: The Deficiency of Popular Conversion Terminology and the Manifesto's Affirmation

0:00 The following message was delivered on Sunday morning, June 28, 1992, at the Trinity Baptist Church in Montville, New Jersey. Now may I urge you to turn with me in your own Bibles to Acts chapter 26.

0:24 Acts chapter 26 and breaking into Paul's account as he stands before King Agrippa, the account of his own conversion and commission to be an apostle and a preacher of the gospel of Jesus Christ. He quotes the words of the risen Christ to him beginning in verse 16, but arise and stand upon thy feet, for to this end have I appeared unto thee to appoint thee a minister and a witness, both of the things wherein thou hast seen me, and of the things wherein I will appear unto thee, delivering thee from the people and from the Gentiles unto whom I send thee,

1:12 to open their eyes, that they may turn from darkness to light, and from the power of Satan unto God, that they may receive remission of sins, and an inheritance among them that are sanctified by faith in me. Wherefore, O King Agrippa, I was not disobedient unto the heavenly vision, but declared both to them of Damascus first and at Jerusalem and throughout all the country of Judea and also to the Gentiles that they should repent and turn to God doing works worthy of repentance. For this cause the Jews seized me in the temple and assayed to kill me.

2:00 Having therefore obtained the help that is from God, I stand unto this day testifying both to small and great, saying nothing but what the prophets and Moses did say should come, how that the Christ must suffer, and how that He first, by the resurrection of the dead, should proclaim light both to the people and to the Gentiles. Accepting Christ as personal Savior Trusting in Christ Deciding for Christ Opening one's heart to Christ

2:50 Praying the prayer The words I have just uttered capture the most popular current terminology to describe that wonderful biblical reality of becoming a Christian. And while the terms that I've quoted in your hearing contain and convey some aspects of biblical terminology and biblical teaching on what it means to become a true Christian, such terminology is woefully deficient in setting forth the biblical teaching that in receiving the gift of life and salvation offered in Jesus Christ,

3:39 sinners are radically and fundamentally and permanently turned out of the way of sin and death and into the way of righteousness and of life. Therefore, in setting forth some of the truths that have formed the very nerve centers of our life together as a church for our first 25 years of existence as a congregation, we are presently considering the ninth affirmation in what we have entitled A Manifesto of Trinity Baptist Church, an affirmation that I have expressed as follows. we are determined to maintain a balanced New Testament perspective and expectation concerning conversion, the Christian life, and the mission of the Church.

Review of Previous Studies on Conversion

4:41 In the previous three messages, all of which have focused on the subject of the New Testament doctrine of conversion, we have opened up the following aspects of biblical teaching. First of all, we considered the absolute necessity for conversion, focusing our attention primarily upon three texts of Scripture, Acts 26 and verse 18, Matthew 18 and verse 3, and 1 Thessalonians 1, verses 9 and 10. Then we considered together in our second study the obvious diversity of God's work in conversion. And after looking at a broad and brief overview of five recorded conversions in the New Testament,

5:33 we then saw from these and other examples the diversity of the work of God in converting grace. And I made the following four statements based upon that biblical material that genuine conversions need not be circumstantially identical, conceptually identical, sequentially identical, nor do they need to be emotionally identical. Then we began to take up the third major heading of our subject. If we are to maintain a balanced New Testament doctrine and expectations relative to this subject of conversion, we must not only be convinced of the absolute necessity for conversion, the obvious diversity of the work of God in conversion, but we must understand those things which constitute the essential elements of conversion.

6:38 And in our last study two, three Lord's days ago, I set before you this fundamental and first essential element of conversion, and I expressed it this way. In genuine conversion, we are brought to an acute sense of spiritual need, which we become convinced can be met only in the person and work of the Lord Jesus Christ. And that acute sense of need is most frequently focused upon the issue of sin. Either the guilt of sin, the pollution of sin, or the bondage of sin.

7:22 But we saw from the scriptures with equal clarity that not infrequently that acute sense of need does not focus upon the issue of sin, but rather upon a felt need of the soul. It may be the felt need of emptiness, of thirst, the need for light, a felt oppressive ignorance of the great issues of life and of death and of the age to come. And whatever that need is, if it is owned of God to drive us out of ourselves and into Christ as He is offered in the gospel, then it is perfectly legitimate that God should use that need

8:12 as His means to make us acutely aware of our need of His Son. As we have so often sung with faith and joy in this place, All the fitness He requireth is to feel your need of Him. This He gives you. This He gives you, tis the Spirit's rising beam.

The Second Essential Element: A Lifelong Disposition of Repentance and Faith

8:40 And when God is opening the eyes of a sinner, in the language of Acts 26, that He may turn from darkness to light and the power of Satan unto God in order to receive forgiveness and a lot or a portion among the true people of God, that first rising beam of light is to bring the sinner to an acute sense of spiritual need. Need which he becomes convinced can only be met in the person and work of the Lord Jesus Christ. Now today we take up the second necessary or essential element in conversion, and I'm expressing it in these words.

9:30 In genuine conversion, we are brought to a lifelong disposition of repentance and faith along with the inevitable fruits of this disposition. So you have the Spirit of God bringing man to an acute sense of need, and then bringing him to have his need met as he is brought into the way of repentance and faith. In genuine conversion, we are brought to a lifelong disposition of repentance and faith,

10:17 along with the inevitable fruits of this disposition. Now in explaining the words of this second or basic necessary element of conversion, let me just briefly underscore what I mean by the use of several of the words and then we will dig into the scriptures themselves. Again, we are concerned with genuine conversion. The Bible speaks of spurious conversions, temporary conversions, but we are concerned with that converting work which is unto life and unto salvation.

10:58 And I am asserting that the Bible teaches that in genuine conversion, the same God who brings us to an acute sense of spiritual need brings us to a lifelong disposition.

11:17 Repentance and faith will many times begin in a memorable crisis of spiritual experience.

11:28 Levi could never forget when he was called to repentance. Saul of Tarsus could never forget when he was called to repentance. But true repentance and faith need not be memorable in their beginnings. They may be undiscernible in their beginnings.

11:52 In the case of people like Timothy who know the scriptures from infancy, there are many times when the first actings of repentance and faith are not memorable in the spiritual consciousness and memory of the person who has been brought to repentance and faith. But whether the beginnings are memorable or not memorable, if they are real, they become lifelong dispositions of the soul. And that is what is of crucial importance. whether they come like the rising of the sun and those of you who have been up early enough

12:39 to see the stars sparkling and to say it is the dead of night and to see the sun rise until you could say it is day, all day, nothing but day who is prepared to say when dawn became day?

13:00 There is a gentle dispelling of the darkness by the rising of the sun. And sometimes God's dealings are just like that in the souls of his people. There are other times when you get up in the morning and thick clouds make you wonder if you've woken up earlier than you normally do. And then suddenly at midday the clouds part and the sun breaks in with suddenness.

13:27 Some people's experience spiritually is like that. But whether there is a dramatic, memorable beginning of repentance and faith or a gradual dawning, in genuine conversion we are brought to a life-long disposition. A disposition is a prevailing state of the soul, a prevailing attitude of the mind and of the soul. And in true conversion it is that to which we are brought, not an occasional acting of repentance, an occasional acting of faith, but a lifelong disposition of repentance and faith along with the inevitable fruits of that disposition.

14:20 Hence in our text Paul says that he preached that men should repent and turn to God doing works worthy of repentance. And those works worthy of repentance were the only infallible proof that they had been brought to an experience and disposition of genuine repentance. Now, having stated this element in conversion Having briefly explained the terminology Now, this morning, I want you to consider with me from the Scripture First of all, the necessity for repentance in connection with conversion And then, the nature of that repentance involved in conversion

The Necessity for Repentance in Conversion: The Teaching of Our Lord

15:09 Two simple headings The necessity for repentance in connection with conversion and the nature of that repentance involved in conversion. And in opening up this matter of the necessity for repentance in connection with conversion, remembering our definition of conversion now, It is that process by which hell-deserving sinners are turned out of the way of sin and death and brought into the way of righteousness and life. I set before you four very simple lines of evidence. Number one, the teaching of our Lord.

15:50 Secondly, the commission given by our Lord. Thirdly, the preaching of the apostles. And fourthly, the principal text on conversion. First of all then, to demonstrate the necessity for repentance in connection with conversion, the teaching of our Lord.

16:08 Turn please to Mark chapter 1. Surely if anyone should know what is essential for conversion, the Lord Jesus who came from heaven to save His people from their sins ought to know what is essential for that conversion which is unto life. And we read in Mark chapter 1 this summary statement concerning the ministry of the Lord Jesus. Verse 14 Now after John was delivered up, Jesus came into Galilee preaching the gospel, the good news of God.

16:48 He came heralding this message of good news that God's salvation was now come in the person of Messiah. And as he came preaching the gospel of God and saying, this again is a distillation of his message. The time is fulfilled. The kingdom of God is at hand.

17:14 God is near in the person of the King of Grace God is near in the very coming of the long promised Messiah Who would be anointed with the Spirit to open the eyes of the blind To open the prison to those that are bound To proclaim the acceptable year of the Lord The time is fulfilled The kingdom of God is at hand Would you enter that kingdom? Would you be taken out of the realm of the kingdom of darkness, the kingdom of sin and of death and enter the kingdom of God the kingdom of life and of light then this is what you must do Repent ye and believe in the gospel

18:03 Now notice he doesn't say, repent ye by believing in the gospel. There are those in our day who say, the only repentance connected with gospel preaching in our day is that the sinner is to change his mind about the gospel. Where once he ignored the gospel, where once he refused to embrace the blessings of the gospel, he has a change of mind and he now believes in Christ as his personal Savior. He may have no brokenness of heart.

18:35 He may have no deep repudiation of sin. He may have no submission of heart to God as lawgiver and as master to Christ as Lord, but if he believes in the cross work of Christ, that's the only repentance required in the gospel in our day. Now that's taught by men with earned doctorates who can read from their Greek New Testament like you and I can read from our English New Testament, but it's damnable heresy. Jesus did not say, repent ye by believing in the gospel.

19:08 He said, repent ye and believe. in the gospel, indicating that without this commodity of repentance, there could be no genuine faith and belief in the gospel. That the belief in the gospel that was unto life and salvation, i.e. true conversion, is inseparably joined to a work of repentance in the heart.

19:37 And this is why our Lord Jesus did not scruple to identify the very purpose of His mission in terms of repentance. The text we've looked at many times in this place, Luke 5 and verse 32. We're considering the necessity for repentance in connection with conversion in the teaching of our Lord. Mark summarizes his ministry as one of calling men to repentance and to faith.

20:10 Luke 5.32 I am not come to call the righteous. I have not come on a mission that will somehow simply be a plus factor to those who in their own estimation are already right with God. Those who think that what they are and what they do can commend them to God.

20:31 I have not come simply to give them a plus factor that will give them a little boost and added assurance that all is well. That's not my mission. A direct reference to the self-deceived Pharisees. I am not come to call the righteous, but the words I am come assumed, but I am come to call sinners to repentance.

20:56 If I have come to turn men from darkness to light, from the power of Satan unto God, that they may receive forgiveness of sins, I have come to do so, as I call them effectually and powerfully, to repentance. I have come to call sinners to repentance. In other words, the whole incarnation and its rationale is neutralized if we cut out repentance from the work of God in converting grace. Serious business.

21:35 Then we turn to the well-known 15th chapter of Luke, where you have three lost commodities in the parables of our Lord Jesus. answering the objection of the Pharisees that he was always receiving sinners. It's very interesting that these words come after the context is very clearly defined by the Spirit of God. Verse 2 of Luke 15, or verse 1, Now all the publicans and sinners, those that were notorious for their life, lived out in a pattern contrary to the revealed will of God.

22:13 But publicans and sinners were drawing near unto him to hear him. And both the Pharisees and the scribes murmured, saying, This man receives sinners and eats with them. Receives and eats. In the Eastern context, eating was more than just a matter of meeting one's basic physical needs.

22:37 To eat with someone was to enter into an unwritten covenant of friendship and commitment. Any man hear my voice and open the door, I will come in to him and sup with him, and he with me. This is why the barring of social intercourse at a meal was significant in New Testament church discipline. With such a one known not to eat.

23:02 What fellowship hath light with darkness? And this is what got under their skin. that Jesus was not merely receiving sinners to get them against the wall and machine gun them with gospel bullets or with Sinaitic thunderings and condemnations for their lifestyle. He was eating with them.

23:25 He was making it plain that He was drawing sinners into a relationship of a covenant of commitment to do them good. This galled them. This bothered them greatly. There was no place in their theology.

23:40 So Jesus speaks three parables. The parable of the lost sheep, the lost coin, and the lost son. And he says the disposition of you Pharisees is antithetical to the whole disposition of heaven. And notice how he describes the disposition of heaven when the lost sheep is retrieved.

24:02 The lost coin is found and the lost son is received back. Verse 7, I say unto you, even so there shall be joy in heaven over one sinner. And it's very interesting, you have a present participle. Not an heiress participle, but a present participle.

24:21 Over one sinner that is repenting. When a sinner is given a lifelong disposition of repentance There is joy in heaven God himself being the chief rejoicer Like the shepherd who found his lost sheep And gathered his friends to rejoice with him God rejoices when sinners acquire in true conversion A lifelong disposition of repentance so that Jesus receiving sinners in Eden with them does not leave them wedded to their sins. When He's entered into a covenant of commitment to them and they to Him,

25:09 it's in the way of repentance. There is joy then in heaven. Likewise, verse 10, with regard to the lost coin, the woman who finds it, she calls her friends together and says, Rejoice with me. Even so there is joy in the presence of the angels of God.

25:30 God's the great rejoicer like the woman. And he calls the angels to rejoice with him. When? Over one sinner that present participle again that is repenting.

25:42 One sinner that has been brought into the possession of a disposition of repentance. It is that which brings joy in the courts of heaven. And then you know the story of the prodigal. When the father sees the son who has left the hog pens and the whore houses.

26:01 And the haunts of iniquity in the far country. And begins to make his way home. The father is the one whose joy is unbounded. And he runs and throws his arms about him.

26:11 And then he commands his servants and his household. Make merry. Make merry. God is the Father who receives Christ is the Father's heart revealed in the receiving of sinners not who still stay in the far country and still ply the trade of the hookers and still live by the law of their own depraved passions but who leave the whorehouses and the honky tonks and a lifestyle that dishonors God then come back under the Father's rule in the Father's house to see the Father's face, to live by the Father's will in communion with the Father's heart.

26:59 Then there's joy. Then and only then is there joy. So in the teaching of our Lord, repentance is not an ancillary, a secondary issue. In the teaching of our Lord, repentance is absolutely necessary.

The Necessity for Repentance in Conversion: The Commission and Preaching of the Apostles

27:15 in true conversion. And then secondly, in the commission of our Lord. Surely if anyone should know what should be preached when the Lord has given His life for sinners, risen from the dead,

27:30 has promised that the Spirit would come, is about to go back to the right hand of the Father. Turn to the last chapter of Luke with me, if you will, please. We read in these closing verses of Luke's Gospel, Verse 45 of Luke 24.

27:47 Then opened he their mind that they might understand the Scriptures. And he said unto them, Thus it is written, that the Christ should suffer and rise again from the dead the third day, and that repentance and, or perhaps better rendered, repentance unto remission of sins should be preached in His name among all the nations beginning from Jerusalem. Ye are witnesses of these things. Do you see the three central focal points of their proclamation?

28:32 They are to proclaim that the Christ must suffer, that the Christ must rise again from the dead, and that sinners who seeing in the person and work of the Lord Jesus, crucified and risen, their only hope of life and salvation should repent unto the receiving of the remission of their sins. The commission of our Lord does not envision any gospel proclamation with a view to seeing sinners converted and made true disciples. He does not envision any message that would be effectual to that end, but one that included these things.

29:23 The centrality of the cross, the centrality of the open tomb, and the necessity of that repentance which is unto the remission of sins. Preach a crossless gospel, and it is no gospel. Preach a resurrectionless gospel And it is no gospel Preach a repentanceless gospel And it is no gospel It turns the grace of God into less idioseness And instead of being the means By which men abandon their sins And embrace the Savior with joy They become hardened in their sins While saying they are forgiven And on their way to heaven and Christ becomes a minister of sin

30:10 instead of a minister of righteousness. And God have mercy on those who preach such a gospel. Well, what about the preaching of the apostles? Did they take their commission seriously?

30:21 What place did repentance have as they sought to see men converted? Well, very quickly, take Peter, the great apostle, to the Jews. What did he preach? Turn to Acts chapter 2.

30:32 And on the day of Pentecost, when the Spirit who has been poured out deals with multitudes at the same place at the same time and they cry out of agony of felt conviction. What shall we do? Acts 2 and verse 37. Now when they heard this, pricked in their heart is a weak translation.

30:53 They were cut as with a dagger in their heart, stabbed, pierced. And they said to Peter and the rest of the apostles, Brethren, what shall we do? What did Peter say? Well, whatever you do, I don't want to embarrass anyone.

31:09 Now everyone close your eyes, bow your heads. Want no one embarrassed?

31:15 No. Did he say? Well, in just a moment we'll give you an opportunity to walk into an inquiry room and there there'll be someone there to help you and put words in your mouth and conditioned responses to get out of you and then give you Protestant absolution and tell you you're saved and never to doubt it, no such nonsense. Peter said unto them, Repent ye!

31:38 The first words out of his mouth in response to their painful inquiry brought repentance central in the matter of their spiritual well-being. Repent ye! And be baptized, every one of you, in the name of Jesus Christ unto the remission of your sins. And without getting into the abuse of this text that is made by the so-called Campbellites or the disciples of Christ and others who would teach baptismal regeneration, we know from the analogy of Scripture, that is the overarching teaching of Scripture, that baptism as an ordinance has no necessary connection with the forgiveness of our sins.

32:20 This very Peter says that in his own epistle. He said, Baptism which now doth save us, not the putting away of the filth of the flesh, but the answer of a good conscience toward God. Peter interprets his own words and says, If you ever read into my Pentecostal sermon, baptismal regeneration, I'm going to make you read it out. And it's interesting that Peter is the one who says that.

32:44 Baptism doth now save us, not, because he had said the light figure. It is a figure. It's a picture of something. But what is crucial in our text this morning is that if these people are distressed in heart, Peter's not playing games with them.

33:00 He's not entering into a little game of psychological manipulation. And he tells them, Look, if you are going to be delivered from your present state of guilt and culpability, culpable of the very murder of the Son of God, you are going to have to get acquainted with what it means to repent. with a repentance that is deep enough that you're prepared to be identified publicly with the very one whom you crucified and now own Him as your Messiah. That's why He said, Repent and be baptized in the name of Jesus Christ.

33:35 The very Jesus whom you crucified, whom God has made Lord in Christ. You must now be prepared to be openly identified with Him and you may get the same treatment from your fellow countrymen. But the issue of being right with God will be so important, you don't care if you're right with God and soon go to meet Him by means of their persecuting sword. The only thing that will matter is you're right with God.

34:00 And then after He got them quieted down and assured them that the promise of the gift of the Spirit that would come to all believing penitent sinners was to all such near at hand and afar off. Look at verse 40. And with many other words He testified that He solemnly declared and exhorted, He sought to motivate them, saying, save yourselves from this crooked generation. He was calling them to conversion.

34:27 Get out of the way of sin and death in which your own generation is found, and be delivered into the way of righteousness and life. You will find that deliverance only in the way of deep and thorough repentance. Chapter 3 and verse 19. though there is no evident breakthrough in the same way of deep penetrating conviction Peter here is preaching his sermon he has charged them again verse 14 with murdering the son of God you denied the holy and righteous one and asked for a murderer to be granted and you killed the prince of life think of it you killed the prince of life he charges them with deicide you killed the prince of life

35:14 But this time, no evidence of deep conviction. Does he change his message? Lower the standards? Well, when the Holy Ghost is really dealing with people, then we'll set a high standard.

35:23 When he isn't, we'll lower the standard because we've got to get converts. Not on your life. Look what he says in verse 19. Repent ye therefore and turn again.

35:34 There's our word converted.

35:37 Repent and turn again that your sins may be blotted out whether the Holy Ghost is working in visible demonstrable power or whether He is working silently secretly or not working intensively at all the message doesn change The message does not change! It never gets accommodated to the observed state of the people. It's determined by God Himself. And woe be unto the man who tampers with it.

36:17 So Peter preached that. So much so that he summarizes the whole rationale. For this period in which the Lord delays His coming, is having one great end in view. 2 Peter 3, 9.

36:29 The Lord is not slack concerning His promises. Some men count slackness. It is long-suffering to new word, not wishing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance. He uses coming to repentance as synonymous with being saved, with all of God's elect being brought in, long-suffering to you, words, people, not wishing that any should perish, but that they should come to repentance.

37:02 But someone says, Pastor Martin, haven't you been told that yes, repentance was the message for the Jews. But Paul, the preacher of the gospel of the grace of God, his message was only believe.

37:17 Aren't you instructive? You're like an Apollos. You're back in the period of John the Baptist with his message of repentance. You say, Pastor, nobody believes this.

37:26 Listen, I get a magazine every single month that is persuading people by the thousands around the world of the very heresy I'm now parroting called the Berean Searchlight. It comes out of Chicago. O'Hareism is what it is some kind called an extreme dispensationalism that actually teaches that the message of repentance was to the Jews. But not now the gospel of the grace of God simply says, except Christ is Savior.

37:54 He leads. Is that so? Listen to the great apostle to the Gentiles summarize his ministry in Acts chapter 20. The necessity of repentance in connection with conversion was looked at the teaching of our Lord, the commission of our Lord, the preaching of the apostles.

38:10 Peter's witness is clear. What about Paul's? Acts 20. Summarizing three and a half years of ministry at Ephesus.

38:20 Notice what he says in verse 20. After describing the manner of lowliness, genuine compassion. Verse 20. I shrank not from declaring unto you anything.

38:32 He doesn't say that was palatable, but he says profitable. Not all of God's truth is palatable, especially to the unconverted. None of it is palatable. But he said, I did not shrink from declaring unto you anything that was profitable, teaching you publicly and from house to house, testifying, solemnly bearing witness both to Jews and to Greeks.

38:55 Notice, he said, I didn't have one message to Jews and another to Gentiles. To Jews and Greeks. And here were the two pivots around which my message clustered. Here they are.

39:06 Repentance toward God and faith toward our Lord Jesus Christ. He solemnly testified to Jews and Greeks not merely faith in Jesus, but faith in our Lord Jesus Christ. Not only faith in our Lord Jesus Christ, but repentance into or in, repentance towards God. And he saw no contradiction in that with the doctrine of the grace of God.

The Necessity for Repentance in Conversion: The Principal Text on Conversion (Acts 26)

39:39 Verse 24, I hold not my life as of any account is dear to myself so that I may accomplish my course in the ministry I receive from the Lord Jesus to testify the gospel of the grace of God. There is one gospel of the grace of God and that gospel includes the summons to repentance towards God if we would be truly converted, turned from darkness to light in the power of Satan unto God in order to receive forgiveness and an inheritance among the sanctified. That's the Apostle's testimony. And then we come in the fourth place to the principal text on conversion. That's the passage I read in your hearing.

40:24 Is repentance necessary in this principal text on New Testament conversion? Well, let's look at it. Acts 26, verse 18. Paul, here is your task under my direction and blessing and with my presence to open their eyes that they may turn from darkness to light, from the power of Satan unto God, that they may receive remission of sins and an inheritance among them that are sanctified by faith in me.

40:56 Wherefore, O King Agrippa, I was not disobedient unto the heavenly vision. I did obey my Lord in the intent of my ministry and in the content of my preaching. And did Paul have the notion, if I just hold up Christ in all His glory, Christ in all His beauty, and tell men to behold Him, then I would not need to tell them that they had to repent and turn from their sins and unto God. Their sins would drop off like the leaves drop off when the fresh sap comes up in the spring.

41:30 And though they've clung to that oak tree throughout the entire winter and refused to let go their hold to their twigs and branches, when the new life comes in the spring, the dead leaves drop off. I've heard people teach that nonsense. No need to preach repentance. If men will just embrace Christ, their new life in Christ, their sins.

41:48 Well, it sounds beautiful if you're talking about a tree. But don't get your theology from a tree. Get it from the Bible.

41:55 What did Paul declare? Verse 20. I declared both to them of Damascus first. The first sermon I preached.

42:04 I sounded this note. And then when I went to Jerusalem. And they didn't want to accept him at first. Remember he went and tried to become a church member.

42:12 And they said, uh-uh. You're trying to be a fifth columnist. There's no way we're going to let you in. Barnabas came along and said, Look, he's all right.

42:17 He's the real thing. Let him in. And it says he was with them, going in and out, preaching and testifying boldly. What did he preach in Jerusalem?

42:26 Then throughout all the country of Judea and also to the Gentiles, in other words, from my first sermon until the last one I preached, until I was held in bonds and while I'm in bonds and people come to me and I continue to preach the same message. What did he preach? Look at it. that they should repent.

42:48 It was an integral, dominant note in my preaching. I was not disobedient to the heavenly vision. That vision of the resurrected, exalted Christ in which He told me, I'm going to send you to the people and to the Gentiles. I'm going to protect you and deliver you through you.

43:08 Their eyes will be opened. They will turn from darkness to light, from the power of Satan and the God. They'll receive remission of sins and a lot among my true people. He says, O King Agriph, I was not disobedient to that vision and all of its content.

43:23 But from my first sermon until my last, this is what I preached. Men must repent.

43:33 They must turn to God. And they must do works worthy of answering to, consistent with their professed repentance. In other words, they'd better have a lifelong disposition of repentance toward God.

43:56 Now, my friends, if that doesn't convince you of the necessity for repentance in connection with conversion, then as far as I'm concerned, you can't be convinced of anything from the Bible. I'll have to leave you to your own willful ignorance.

The Nature of Repentance: God as the Great Object of Concern

44:17 Now then, briefly, and I can see in the light of the time, I can only take up the beginning strand, and I'm not overly concerned about it. This is too vital to rush through. What is the nature of that repentance involved in conversion? We've seen the necessity for repentance in connection with conversion, but what is the nature of that repentance involved in conversion?

44:42 Well, there are a number of ways we could approach this. We could take the shorter catechism's definition of repentance. I've never seen anything better in all the theology books that I've read, in the hundreds of pages on conversion and repentance. I don't know of anything that more beautifully, succinctly, in a more balanced way, brings together all the strands of biblical truth on evangelical repentance than does the shorter catechism.

45:10 What is repentance unto life? Repentance unto life is a saving grace. A saving grace. A saving grace whereby a sinner, out of a true sense of his sin, and an apprehension, a laying hold of the mercy of God in Christ, does, with grief and hatred of his sin, turn from it unto God with full purpose of and endeavor after new obedience.

45:49 That definition breaks down into all kinds of ways. You can break it down logically, you can break it down visually. I've done that in teaching it in the past and shown it has its roots. You can make a tree out of it.

46:00 It has its roots. A sense of need. A laying hold of Christ crucified. It has its main trunk.

46:07 Grief and hatred of sin turning from it unto God. It has its branches. It has its leaves. But the approach I'm taking this time I've never taken before.

46:16 But it's helped me, I believe, to get a hold of this matter with greater simplicity and clarity. And I hope it will help you. and I will just drive home one nail this morning as we conclude. The nature of that repentance involved in conversion, what are the key issues without which the thing itself doesn't exist?

46:38 Well, I want to make just this one statement this morning. If we can establish this, God willing, we'll pick up the second next Lord's Day. God is the great object of concern in true repentance essential to conversion. God is the great object of concern in true repentance essential to conversion.

47:06 And where do we see this? Well, I want you to look with me very quickly now. Two texts we've already looked at this morning. One we looked at, in fact, the other two we looked at in our first message.

47:15 Go back to Acts 20.21. when Paul says that among the Ephesians he preached repentance, notice he is careful to tell us what the great object of concern was in that repentance that he preached. He says in verse 21, testifying to Jews and to Greeks, repentance towards God.

47:43 In other words, it was a repentance that had God as its primary focus of concern. It was not repentance towards your sins. It was repentance into, unto, towards God. God was the primary object of concern in the repentance that Paul preached.

48:13 Acts 26.20. I trust you picked that up in the two readings of that verse this morning. Look at it again.

48:22 I preached, he says, throughout all the country of Judea and to the Gentiles. Now notice that they should repent and turn to God.

48:36 Now he could have said that they should repent and turn from their sins. That would have been accurate, as we'll see in subsequent studies. But the primary focus, the primary object of concern in true repentance is God Himself. Repentance toward God.

48:56 That they should repent and turn to God. And then in Acts 15, when they are summarizing the conversion of the Gentiles in that Jerusalem council, between the Jerusalem church and representatives of the church at Antioch and apostles present. Notice how they describe the work of conversion among the Gentiles. Verse 19 of Acts 15.

49:25 Wherefore my judgment is that we trouble not them that from among the Gentiles turn to God. But in that repentance, which was an essential element in their conversion, God was the great object of concern. And then one other text, 1 Thessalonians 1, a text we looked at when establishing the necessity of conversion. Paul says, wherever we go, people report concerning us what manner of entering in we have unto you.

50:01 And what do they report? Verse 9 of 1 Thessalonians, for they themselves report concerning us what manner of entering in we had unto you, how that ye turned unto God. Yes, you turned from your idols, but you turned to God. That's the dominant thought.

50:25 There you have the main verb. You turned unto God. Oh yes, it was from your idols, and it was with the attending disposition of serving and waiting. But the heart of the sentence, if you were diagramming it, is this, you turned to God.

50:49 And you say, Pastor, you've made your case. So what? Well, this is the so what. In that repentance which is an essential element of conversion In its first risings in the heart Whether it comes in like the dawn Or whether it comes in like lightning and thunder In a memorable work of converting grace When it is planted in the heart It becomes a settled disposition in which the great object of concern in the truly penitent sinner is God.

51:31 It takes a self-centered sinner and makes him a God-centered saint. To put it as simply and bluntly as I know how, True conversion, which brings within its orbit God's gracious working of repentance in the heart of the sinner, takes this sinner who is self-centered and makes him God-centered. in God's dealings with that person in conversion and in His subsequent growth in the Christian life, which is growth in the grace of repentance, God's person as offended is His great concern

52:19 when He thinks of His sin. God's rights rejected is His great concern when He thinks of His lifestyle. God's salvation ignored or spurned is the thing that breaks his heart when he thinks of his years of unbelief. God's law defied and broken is his great pinpoint of genuine grief and sorrow.

The Prodigal Son and David: Illustrations of God-Centered Repentance

52:51 Isn't that what we see in the incident of the prodigal son? He leaves home. He doesn't want the Father's face. He doesn't want the Father's fellowship.

53:01 He doesn't want the Father's rules. He doesn't want the Father's regulation. He doesn't want the Father's ways. He doesn't want his Father's friends.

53:09 Everything pertaining to home links him into his Father and he no longer wants it. All he wants is his Father's stuff, his money. So he'll take what he can from his Father to do what he can as far away from his Father to please himself. That's the story of the prodigal.

53:29 Isn't that right? But when he comes to himself, turn to Luke 15. As Jesus describes this returning sinner who comes to repentance illustrative of every sinner who comes to repentance How does he describe it Luke chapter 15 And look at this language that is so precise on this point. Verse 20, we'll back up to verse 18.

53:59 Now we go back further. We'll go back to verse 17. But when he came to himself, he was in a state of moral madness, as every sinner in this place is.

54:11 You're in a state of moral madness if you're in the far country, serving yourself. When he came to himself, he said, How many hired servants of my father's have bread enough and to spare, and I perish here with hunger. He has an entirely different view of his father. Notice the first reference was, my father's servants have it good.

54:35 Why? Because he's a good and gracious man. He's not the man I made him out to be when I left home. I made him out to be hard-hearted and narrow-spirited and bigoted and unappreciative of the appetites and desires and interests of a young buck.

54:53 Give me what belongs to me, and I'm going to really live when I split from this place and spread my wings. Now God's clipped his wings and he says, Things are really good back at Dad's house. How many hired servants of my father's have bread enough to spare and I perish with hunger. I will arise, now notice he didn't say, and go back to my bedroom and back to my kitchen and back to my dining room.

55:20 No, no, no. He said, I'll go back to my father. You see that? How central it is.

55:25 I will arise and go to my father. and I will say to him, Father, I've sinned against heaven and in thy sight. I'm no more worthy to be called thy son. Make me as one of thy hired servants.

55:45 I've sinned in thy sight. Father wasn't out there in the far country. Ah, yes, but he carried with him all the noble standards that his father had inculcated in him. he carried with him the example of his father's life he carried with him all that his father represented of the ways and the will of God and so he can't separate the two things he said I will arise and go to my father and say father I have sinned against heaven that is God and in thy sight I am no more worthy to be called thy son you see he had a radical change of mind about his father.

56:28 Now his father's face, his father's government, his father's rule, his father's ways, all appear in a different light. My friend, if you are ever brought to true repentance, that will be the central issue of concern. Because the heart of your sin is this, that you, like a sheep, have gone astray from what? You've gone astray from God.

56:56 as the supreme object of your love, your devotion, your desire. We read about it in the psalm this morning. God looked down from heaven to see what? Who was breaking the seventh commandment?

57:10 No. Who was breaking the second commandment? No. He does look down from heaven to see that.

57:15 For the eyes of the Lord are in every place, beholding the evil and the good. But what did our text say? He looked down from heaven to see if there were any that did what? Seek after God.

57:26 That's it. Is there any who regards me to be worthy of the undivided devotion of the heart? The earnest seeking of the soul? And God says there wasn't a one.

57:44 That's the common denominator of all of our sin, no matter what the particulars of our sinful lifestyle may be. And the common denominator of every true work of repentance is its repentance toward God. It is a preoccupation of the soul of the returning sinner with the God whose person he has spurned, whose rights he has rejected, whose salvation he has ignored, whose law he has defied. it's the spirit of a prodigal saying I'll go to my father and isn't that exactly how that disposition

58:30 expressed itself in a mature man called David the prodigal is the marvelous classic picture of the man returning for the first time but now I close with Psalm 51 and just two parts of it Psalm 51 when David as a middle-aged man who has known God from his youth falls into the sins of adultery murder hypocrisy dullness of conscience what a horrible thing to fall into any sin and to be dull of conscience but to fall into such grievous and gross sins be held in the grip of them

59:15 for approximately a year. But you see, because the basic disposition was there in his heart, though it lay dormant for a while, God's going to stir it up again as He does in all of His true saints. So He sends Nathan on a mission of mercy and restoration. You remember how Nathan tells a parable.

59:34 That parable stirs up David. He becomes angry at that man in the parable. And then the prophet says, You are the man. And God reopens the fountains of repentance And as they flow out, this is how they express themselves.

59:50 Have mercy upon me, O God. He pleads for mercy. He knows that God is a God who has a multitude of tender mercies. He's asking to be forgiven, to be cleansed.

60:01 Now verse 4. Against thee, thee only have I sinned and done that which is evil in thy sight. That's the heart of it. You see, whether it's the initial returning of the prodigal, I've sinned against heaven and in my sight.

60:24 David, who violated Bathsheba, violated that noble converted pagan, that man Uriah, who was of the Hittite nation, idol-worshipping, godless nations. He had become a believer in the Jehovah of Israel. A noble saint in Old Testament terms who sins so grievously against him tries to get him drunk so he'll go home and bed down with his wife and cover up David's deed and live for the rest of his life with the question why he has a kid that looks like the king and not him. David didn't care.

61:02 He was ruthless, ruthless, ruthless, ruthless.

61:08 Frighteningly ruthless. now when he feels the full weight of his sin he has the nerve to say against thee and thee only have I sinned David only against God when you looked and when you lusted and when you sent the servant and you had Bathsheba come and you talked her into bed and you sad her conscience and seduced her Didn't you save against her normal virtue? When you called back Uriah from the battle,

61:45 your conscience no doubt was pricked. You ought to have been out with your soldiers. Instead, you're home, lolling around in your bed in the evening. That got you in trouble in the first place.

61:54 And it smites your conscience when he sleeps on the steps. Won't even go into his room. He says, how can I go in and eat and drink and enjoy the conjugal intimacy with my wife when my soldiers are all fighting. I'm sure that struck an arrow to David's name.

62:10 That's where you belong, David. Had you been there, you wouldn't have had him home trying to cover up your dirty work.

62:17 And when that doesn't work, he sends out a secret note. Put him up at the front of the battle. Get him killed.

62:25 David's general does that. And then to me, the height of David's callousness, when the news comes back that Uriah is dead. He says, oh well. In battle, you don't win them all.

62:38 Some you win, some you lose. Gain some victories, lose some soldiers.

62:44 Didn't he sin against that noble man?

62:48 Look at the words. Against thee, thee only, have I sinned. Done that which is evil in thy sight. David was not excusing his sins against Bathsheba his sins against Uriah his sins against the whole nation because the prophet said this thing has now become common knowledge and you've given even the enemies of God occasion to blaspheme but my friend listen if your sin had been ten times more aggravated than David's you get a real sight of it and in the first motions of your repentance Only one person matters.

63:31 The infinite God against whom we stand. For anyone else is a finite creature. What is Bathsheba's torn and shredded virtue compared to besmirching the name of Jehovah? What is Uriah?

63:53 In the tragic, scheming, rotten, stinking way He had him put to death and tried to cover his tracks He is still a creature But he, as it were, has sent arrows into the heart of the God who redeemed him The God who laid his hand upon him in his youth The God who was with him out in the hills of Judea that when the lion and the bear came, he was able to protect his sheep, the God who was with him, when he went out and faced the blaspheming Goliath, and goes out and says, I come in the name of Jehovah.

64:34 What is your eye compared to this God whose hand had been upon him, who had been his shepherd, who had protected him, cared for him, nurtured him, protected him during all that period when Saul chased him like a dog over the hills of Judea. I tell you when true conviction breaks in in the beginning or at any point along the way, God is the great object of concern and true repentance. I've offended the God who made me, the God who has sustained me, the God who has given me life and breath, and in a Christian, the disposition of repentance, the God who sent His Son to die for me, The God who sent His Spirit to regenerate me.

65:21 The God whose Spirit indwells me. The God who has preserved me and protected me. My heart is broken. Because I have sinned against so glorious and great and gracious God.

Call to God-Centered Repentance

65:36 My friend, I am here to tell you this morning. And I want you to listen. Listen carefully. if your sin and your lifestyle your pattern of life in the presence of God has never become the all consuming concern of your heart you know nothing of that disposition of true repentance which is an essential part of true conversion now I'm not saying that unless that disposition has been sustained to the most heightened degree through every day and every hour of your life, I'm not saying that.

66:18 If that's so, write me off.

66:22 Call me a reprobate. But what I'm saying is this. If you've never come to the place where you can say, yes, I know what those words mean. Repentance with specific, primary reference to God.

66:40 Against me and the only have I sinned. I sinned against heaven and in thy sight. Oh, you dear young people, that's the missing issue in your whole experience. You've never gotten beyond mom and dad's standards and the church's standards and the rest of it.

67:03 You've never seen that your great sin is your clenched fist against God. your great sin is your indifference to God's goodness that should lead you to repentance your great sin is indifference to God's Son whom He has sent a willing and able Savior for all who will come to Him how can you be indifferent to such a God and yet you are and that's your great sin and if you ever get your eyes open you'll see it and like the prodigal You'll come to yourself and say, I will arise and go even to that God. I'll arise and go to Him. I'll arise and go to Him.

67:50 Not to the standards of Mom and Dad. Not to the standards of the church. Not to rules and regulations. But I'll go to God.

67:59 I'll turn to God for my idols. to serve that God in the joy of forgiveness through His Son. We've seen the necessity for conversion, the diversity of God's working in conversion. The essential elements of conversion are an acute sense of need that you become convinced can only be met in Jesus Christ.

68:23 And then you must be brought to a lifelong disposition of repentance and faith along with the inevitable fruits of that disposition. have sought to demonstrate the necessity for repentance in connection with conversion. In just the first line of the nature of that repentance involved in conversion, God is the great object of concern.

68:47 Do you know anything of that? If not, may you not let this day close without crying to God to grant you repentance unto life. Let us pray. Our Father, as we speak and think of these things, we feel afresh the shame, the shame, the horrible shame.

69:22 We should live in indifference to You. Some of us remember the years lived in that way. We wish we could cauterize all of the parts of our brain that hold the memories. O Lord, we marvel, we marvel that you didn't snuff us out.

69:47 Pure holy angels sinned but once and you threw them out of heaven forever. We sinned a thousand, thousand times and yet you bore with us. Gracious God, may your goodness lead to repentance. You've set your Son before us, crucified, buried, risen, willing, able, calling us in the Gospel.

70:14 And some of us spurned the overtures of His voice for years, yet you called and called and called again. We marvel at your patience. Oh, gracious God, bring some today to that repentance that is unto yourself. that change of mind and heart regarding your person, your being, your glory, your ways, your law, your gospel, your Son.

70:45 Oh Lord, do that work without which they shall perish and rekindle in each one of us that disposition that we may more and more be a people whose greatest concern in every circumstance and situation of life is Your glory, Your law, the claims of Your Son, the righteous demands that Your own grace makes upon us. Seal Your Word, we pray, for Jesus' sake and for our good. Amen.

71:25 Thank you. Thank you.