Andy Woods - Soteriology 06: Repentance

well good evening everybody guys hear me alright um good to see everybody tonight there are some handouts they might all they might all be gone I don't know but it's got the powerpoints they're all gone okay if you if you need a handout just put your hand up and we can get you on it's just that the slides that I'm using by the way all the slides for this course the doctrine of soteriology you can find on our website as long long with video archives and audio archives of all these teachings so it's there for you long after the class is over but this class is basically what's called soteriology which basically means the doctrine of salvation you know what is that what does the whole Bible reveal about the subject of salvation and we are in lesson 6 and if you haven't been here for the prior lessons that's ok you should be able to still pick up where we left off because each of these lessons is sort of self containing and I want to thank Earl last week for filling in Thank You Earl oh there he is right there in the front and if you're a man so that would exclude women unless you really want to come then we'll let you we're having a mince breakfast this Saturday morning at 8 a.m. and our speaker is going to be Doyle Davis who is a pastor in Houston and he usually brings messages that are very politically incorrect and deal with volatile political issues so if you're into that kind of thing we'd invite you to come and listen to pastor Davis 8:00 a.m. Saturday morning so we're looking forward to that so here we are in our course on the doctrine of salvation and we're in this section called God's one condition of salvation and what we tried to communicate in that session prior session because I wasn't here last week Earl taught but the last time I taught we were in this section called God's one condition of salvation and we basically worked through this whole idea that the Bible is very clear that salvation is conditioned upon one human response and what's that one human response faith and we saw that the Bible teaches this close to two hundred times so that was the big idea from that session and now what we're moving into and we're not going to be able to get through all of these tonight but we're moving into passages that at first glance seem to contradict the 200 passages that teach salvation is by faith alone so at first glance there are a handful of passages that make it look as if at first glance that you don't just believe in Christ to be saved you believe in Christ plus do something else so there are actually passages in the Bible that read this way and so what I'm trying to teach you how to do is to harmonize the handful of passages with the 200 clear ones and what you'll discover today in modern-day even Jellicle ISM is people for whatever reason they don't build their salvation message off the 200 clear ones they always gravitate toward the remote ones and I think that's sort of a backwards way of thinking I think we need to understand the remote ones in light of the 200 clear ones so that's what I mean by problem passages if that makes any sense so here's sort of a large outline that we're gonna follow and we're not we may not even get through the first one today because there's a lot of confusion in the body of Christ today about this but if salvation is by faith alone what do you do with the word repent what do you do with people that say you have to submit to Christ's lordship to be saved what do you do with phrases like receive Christ and accept Christ what do you do with passages that say faith without works is dead what do you do with passages that make it look like you've got to be baptized to get to heaven what do you do this is a controversial one we won't be getting to this tonight but what do you do with those passages that say you've got to confess Christ because most you vent evangelistic tracts that you see out there they say you're saved by faith by grace not by works and then they give you three works to do so they contradict themselves and so a lot of people make it sound as if you have to make some kind of public confession of Christ you know you have to walk an aisle other people say you've got to ask Jesus into your life other people say you've got to confess your sins to be a Christian you've got to forgive others to be a Christian a lot of people say you've got to sell all your possessions to be a Christian and some people say you've got to pray a prayer of saving faith in other words you haven't prayed a prayer of saving faith and a lot of people will question whether your Christian at all and at first glance there are passages that people use that look like they support these ideas but what I'm going to try to show you in these sessions is these passages can all be harmonized if understood properly with the 200 clear ones that say that say you're saved by faith alone in Christ alone so that's sort of the direction that we're moving in is the mic picking up okay you guys good with that all right so let's start with the first one and this is a very very controversial one that's why I'm gonna go through each of these slowly it may take me I usually teach till 8 o'clock which is about an hour then we open it up for questions but it may take me the whole hour just to cover the first one what do you do with the word repent and then as time permits I'm not sure we'll get to it what do you do with lordship because you have passages where Jesus told Peter if any man wants to follow me he must pick up his cross deny himself so he was calling Peter to submission what do you do with passages like that and can passages like these be harmonized with the 200 clear ones that say we're saved by faith alone in Christ alone so let's start with the word repent you might take a look here at acts 2 verse 38 and we went through all of these passages last time we were together or the last time I was with you showing that salvation is by faith alone and then all of a sudden you get to acts 2:38 and Peter doesn't even mention faith on the day of Pentecost when he's calling for the unsaved to be saved acts 2:38 says Peter said to them repent so you don't see the word faith there at all you see the word and there are a series of verses that say this I have them there on the screen at the top acts 3:19 you'll see the word repent in the context of what the unbelievers supposed to do Paul on Mars Hill in acts 17 verse 30 says repent Peter says it's God's desire for all men to come to repentance and be saved so you know you read these verses you say well which is it do we repent or do we believe and if there are two different things which one comes first do I believe first and repent or do I repent first and believe and so you can see how just the words that the scripture uses bring forth a lot of confusion unless you understand these words properly so let's focus just for a minute on the word repent and you'll notice there at the top I've got a list of things of what repent means and then towards the bottom you'll notice I've got a couple of things repent does not mean and half the battle is trying to figure out what this word repent means so taking for example the word repentance what exactly does it mean the Greek word repent now these words both come from the same root you can use the word as a noun or you can use the word as a verb okay just like the word run I could use it as a noun I went on a run or I could use it as a verb I need to make a run to the store so that's how language functions you have words being used in the noun form and the verbal form well what's the original meaning of this word repent the greek verb translated repent is meta no AO the greek word repentance in the noun form translated repentance is Mehta no a somet - no a / meto no a noun what does that word actually mean well it's what you would call a compound word a compound word is basically two words that are combined into a single word so the word repentance is made up of two different words combined into one the first one is meta and the second one is no AO and if you understand what those words mean you won't be confused about repentance because a lot of times as Christians we're throwing out the word repentance to unbelievers and they don't even know what you're talking about to them repentance means something totally different than the way we use it many times and because we don't take the time to explain it we end up preaching a gospel to them that's very confusing and can actually be a works oriented gospel which God will not accept so meta is the first of those words you know you know you recognize the word meta meta means to change from the word meta you get all kinds of different words that you're familiar with like metabolism or the food has entered your mouth and stomach and it's changing it's digesting I think some of that's going on right now actually after that fine meal we had particularly that cheesecake very good by the way some metabolism change you recognize the word metamorphosis as in change something morphs or morphus morph means form changes from one form to another like water can be changed to ice through freezing or steam through through boiling it and then this is always a scary word to get from your doctor metastasize that's never good when your doctor says that that means your cancer has metastasized it's changed from one part of your body to another so meta just means change now the other compound word is no AO from which we get the word notion things notions are ideas and where do ideas come from they come from the mind so know AO means change I'm sorry meta means change no AO means mind so putting those two words together into a single word met said no AO repentance the only thing it really means is change of mind so when the Bible is using the word repentance particularly when it's being used with reference to what unbelievers are supposed to do to be right with God the Bible is basically telling unbelievers to change their minds that's literally what the word repentance means when you understand its etymology and don't take my word for it let me quote a few Greek lexicons by the way you'll notice Jim McGowan picture up there and that's because he put together a very good PowerPoint presentation back in 2003 on the whole concept of repentance so I just went into his PowerPoint and stole most of his slides there because he did such a good job why reinvent the wheel and if you asked Jim very nicely he might send you that PowerPoint presentation so this is what dr. McGowan writes he says the key question he's talking about repentance must be addressed is the word repentance to repent correctly defined as a turning from sin and see when you toss out the word repentance to an unbeliever they don't understand anything about Greek and when they hear the word repentance what they think it means is to become a Christian I've got to give up a bunch of things so they think it means don't smoke don't and don't go with girls who do kind of thing in other words three steps to Jesus and if that's true that contradicts the 200 passages which revealed that salvation is by faith alone so he writes a brief look at two of the most authoritative Greek resources indicate that indeed this is not the case in other words repentance does not mean turn from sin and here he's quoting bag D those those letters bag D that means Bauer their authors Greek scholars Bauer aren't gingrich no no correlation to the politician gingrich another guy Gingrich and danker that's what those mean so bag D is just a very well accepted Greek lexicon so he's quoting from this lexicon he says a Greek lexicon of the New Testament other early Christian literature indicates that the Greek word met to know a oh that's our word is used to translate the English verb repent and it means to change the mind and it gives the page number moreover this is a compound verb made up of the preposition meta after and the verb no AO meaning to grasp or comprehend on the basis of a careful thought to perceive or to think close quote thus repentance means to perceive afterwards or to change the mind so I'm not making things up this is what the key lexicon of the day says about the word repentance here's another key lexical work it's called the theological dictionary of the New Testament he's quoting from this in pre biblical and extra-biblical usage meant to know AO and meant to no no no mitsuno AO our firmly related to our not excuse me firmly related to any specific concepts at the first stage they bared the intellectual sense of subsequent knowledge with further development both verb and noun then come to mean change of mind which is exactly what I've been trying to argue the change of opinion or decision the alteration in a mood or feeling which finds expression in the terms is not in any sense ethical it may be bad as well as for the good you could change your mind about something bad change your mind about something good for the Greeks met to know a oh never continuing with theological dictionary of the New Testament for the Greeks meta no AO never suggests an alteration in the moral attitude a profound change in life stretching a conversion which affects the whole content that the Greek word meant to know AO means to change the mind is the consistent judgment of all lexicographers so so when you throw the word repentance out you have to understand the word biblically the word simply means to change one's mind what do you change your mind about as an unbeliever you change your mind about whatever was inhibiting you from trusting in Christ alone so for example I heard the gospel clearly when I was 16 years of age prior to that point in time if you asked me why I should go to heaven I always gave this Pat answer well I'm a good person look at all the things I've done look at how I went to Sunday School and I had a perfect attendance look how I was an acolyte which is another way of saying an altar boy in the Episcopalian Church and I've tried hard to live a good life that was my answer and then I by God's providence came to a Bible study when I was 16 years of age I heard the gospel at that Bible study and I heard that salvation is a free gift based on what Jesus has done for me and at that point I trusted in Christ and at that point I changed my mind simultaneously I repented I was no longer trusting in myself my good works my religiosity my mind was changed my confidence was shifted away from myself and it was shifted exclusively to Jesus Christ so the unbeliever needs to change their mind about whatever it is that's inhibiting them from trusting in Christ so for the atheist they need to change their mind about the fact that there is no God to shift their confidence in Jesus Christ as the only way of salvation to the going back here to acts 2:38 Peter tells this audience of Jews gathered on the day of Pentecost to repent what does he ask him to do he's asking them to change their mind and what he's saying is change your mind about who Jesus is stop being a Christ rejecting Jew siding with what the nation of Israel just did in rejecting Christ and change your mind away from the message of unbelieving Israel to my message Peter says where Jesus Christ is the only way of salvation so that's what you change your mind about and when understood in this way repentance becomes not an antonym for faith but a synonym for faith so now we got to go back into eighth grade English we gotta remember what a synonym is and what an antonym is well an antonym is a different word opposite meaning and that's how your typical unbeliever it looks at the word repentance when they have no training in the subject they think it's I've got to believe in Jesus but do something don't smoke don't chew don't go with girls who do give up my tattoo I can't pierce my ears anymore or pierce my nose or bellybutton and that's and and you throw that word repentance an unbeliever that's what they think the gospel is and that's not the gospel the gospel is trust in Christ alone so repentance if you understand it as a change of mine is not an antonym for faith it's a synonym for faith what is a synonym it's a different word same meaning so when you believe you automatically repent and when you repent you automatically believe because your mind is chained has been changed regarding what you are trusting in you see that so that is what repentance means and I like to put up these quotes because a lot of people when I talk this way they think I'm talking some foreign language and I'm just making things up but I'm put up these quotes to show you that this is a very traditional teaching that I'm giving here Lewis Sperry chafer the founder of Dallas seminary says this a serious are many an error now don't worry about the word Arminian right now we'll be going over that later on in the course a serious armenian error respecting that this doctrine occurs when repentance is added to faith or believing as a condition of salvation Schafer says it is true that repentance can very well be required as a condition of salvation but then only because the change of mind which has been in ball when turning from every other confidence to the one needful trust in Christ such turning about of course cannot be achieved without a change of mind this vital newness of mind is part of believing see that it's a synonym for believe after all and therefore it may be used as a synonym for believing see I've got synonym underlined at times and he goes through many different scriptures that use the word repentance with respect to unbelievers and what he's saying is it's a synonym for believing then he says repentance nevertheless cannot be added to believing as a condition of salvation because upwards of a hundred and fifty passages of Scripture condition salvation upon believing only the moment you start to understand the word repentance as something different than faith added to faith that's the moment you've taught the wrong gospel and that's the moment you have contradicted close to 200 passages that teach the opposite see now look at what he says here similarly the Gospel of John which was written that men might believe and by believing have life through Christ's name let me stop right there look just for a minute at John 20 Gospel of John now 20 verses 30 and 31 John comes out and he gives you his purpose statement in writing his gospel and in the process he says something that no book in the New Testament says and notice what John says John 20 the last two verses of the chapter says therefore many other signs Jesus performed in the presence of the disciples which are not written in this book but these have been written so that you might believe that Jesus is the Christ the Son of God and that by believing you may have life in his name John's Gospel is the only New Testament book that we have which was written to the unsaved Romans wasn't Romans was written to the church at Rome Philippians wasn't Philippians was written to the church at Philippi and you can go right on through the other 26 New Testament books and you'll see they're all written to believers to help them grow john is different john is written to the unsaved how do I know that because he wants people to understand who Christ is that means they must not know who Christ is so John demonstrates who Christ is by a record of Christ's signs John's Gospel highlights about seven signs the first is changing the water to wine in John 2 the last sign would be the resuscitation of Lazarus from the dead but you put all those signs together is about seven of them and John carefully records these signs so that the unbeliever might know who Jesus is and after reading this record of the seven signs they would say Wow Jesus is the Christ now Christ is not Jesus last name we don't refer to him as mr. Christ Christ means the Messiah so John catalogs these seven signs so that the reader who doesn't know anything about Jesus would conclude Jesus is the Messiah that he's also the Son of God and then John says don't fold up your Bible and go home this is not a theology lesson just for the sake of theology now you as a believer need to go one unbeliever rather need to go one step further and believe in Christ trust in him and when you do you'll consequently experience the gift of life that means this book was written to people that hadn't believed in Christ yet or this statement here makes no sense and they had not received the gift of life yet so John's Gospel you have to understand that every book of the Bible is given for a particular purpose John is given to evangelize the Lost and the reason that's so significant is in your life as a Christian you're gonna find people who are gonna say to you I don't you know I'm really thinking you know I'm not a Christian but I'm interested what book of the Bible should I start with where do you send them Leviticus you'll kill them in Leviticus I'm not arguing that people can't get saved through Leviticus God uses all sorts of ways to get people saved what I'm trying to say is this book is unique or special it's designed by God for a purpose to reach the lost if someone asks you that question you send them to John that's why John was set up so John's Gospel is evangelistic it's different than the other books of the of the New Testament Canon so back to this quote similarly the Gospel of John which was written that men might believe and by believing have life through Christ's name what's he quoting there the purpose statement that we just read this gospel watch this does not once use the word repentance and I have people telling me all the time you better use the word repentance when you share the gospel well let me ask you a question if the word repentance is so critical as everybody makes it out to be why is it that the only evangelistic book of the Bible that we have uses the word believe 99 times but it never once uses the word repentance and I would say this when you're interacting with an unbeliever I would focus on the word believe' properly defined as trust I personally when I'm with unbelievers I don't even bring up the word repentance and the reason I don't bring it up is because I know if I use the word they're gonna interpret it differently and unless I have time to explain to them what repentance is I don't even use the word so my advice to you and your evangelism is to not even use the word repentance unless you have time to explain its meaning Metz had no AO as a synonym for faith if you don't have time because a lot of times evangelism is fast and it depends on the circumstances there is absolutely no shame in dropping the word out entirely if you want to bring it up that's fine too but make sure you explain to people what what it is exactly you're talking about so chafer says similarly the Gospel of John which was written that men might believe and by believing have life through Christ's name does not once use the word repentance in like manner the Epistle to the Romans to formulate the complete statement of salvation by grace alone does not use the word repentance you know the word does show up in different places but not in relation to salvation so what are we trying to say exactly Jim McGowen writes this in contrast to the teachings of lordship theology now I'll be explaining not tonight but probably next week what lordship theology is lordship theology is the idea that you don't just believe in Christ to get saved you have to submit to his lordship to be saved so you don't just do one thing to be saved you do two things and I'll try to explain to you next time why we don't feel that that is a proper under understanding so there's a lot of confusion about this but he writes in contrast to the teachings of lordship theology that repentance and belief are separate acts it must be recognized that when the words believe and repent are found together they are never used in a manner that would suggest two separate requirements or salvation on the contrary when salvation from eternal condemnation is in view repent parenthesis a change of mind and believe are in essence synonyms that captures the point that we're trying to make here regarding repentance Schaefer again says it is dogmatically stated as language can declare that repentance is essential to salvation and that no one could be saved apart from repentance but it is included in believing and cannot be separated from it why is that because when you're believing in the biblical sense you're repenting because your mind is changing about who Jesus is back to Schafer just for a minute you're you're shifting in your mind towards the end of that quote away from every other confidence that you may have had self denomination whatever and you're shifting that confidence away from those things exclusively into Christ you are believing or trusting in Christ and consequently you are simultaneously not separately simultaneously repenting or changing your mind so hopefully I'm being somewhat clear this PowerPoint goes on and it says a few examples repentance is equivalent to belief in the person and work of Christ here he uses Luke 532 Jesus declares I have come to call I have come not to call the righteous but sinners - repentance here repentance is evidently a synonym for faith or salvation through faith the whole tenor of Jesus ministry was to call men to faith in the gospel thus he says repent mark 1:15 and believe the gospel not looking at those as separate things but simultaneous things 200 times the Bible says believe I think about 30 to 35 times the Bible says repent but those are not separate actions those are synonyms when you understand that repentance means change of mind or change of confidence acts 1118 the Apostle declared God has also granted to Gentiles repentance to life it is clear from the context that repentance to life refers to Gentiles faith in Christ because when you study some of those verses he's got there in parenthesis X 10 43 acts 11 17 what you'll see is in the surrounding context its belief that leads to life it's belief that leads to forgiveness of sins and then this verse comes in and says it's repentance that leads to life it's repentance that leads to sin excuse me not sin but forgiveness of sins and there is no contradiction there whatsoever if you understand that sometimes the Bible uses repentance synonymously for faith note no contradiction there at all if you don't understand that it looks like you've got to do two different things it looks like they're antonyms but they are not antonyms these are synonyms consider also acts 10:43 with acts 11 17 and 18 acts 13 verses 38 and 39 with acts 2:38 I mean you'll see this over and over again in the Bible some verses say believe and be forgiven other verses say repent and be forgiven believe and receive the Holy Spirit repent and receive the Holy Spirit no contradiction whatsoever if you understand that the two words are used synonymously different word same meaning take a look at second Peter 3 and verse 9 it says there the Lord is not willing that any should perish but all should come to repentance now if you don't have any background in the word repentance you're gonna think well what does that mean sorrow emotion no when he says the Lord wants all to be saved and come to repentance he's all the only thing he's saying here is God wants the world to change its mind about Jesus and to trust in Jesus which is a synonym for faith these verses actually get pretty easy to understand if you have just this little tiny background under your belt if you don't have the background under your belt you're left somewhat bewildered and confused so that is what repentance means Metta no aom it no no ayah meta means change no ao means mind repentance means change of mind you change your mind about whatever it is preventing you from trusting in Christ and if understood that way repentance becomes a synonym for faith you know what that we went over what repentance means someone wrote an article I like this article it says we need to repent of how we use repentance and I like that title why does repentance not mean talked about what it means what does it not mean repentance does not mean feel sorry or feel guilty you see on TV the Billy Graham Crusades you've got all these people coming forward to become Christians and the TV cameras focus on all the tears people are shedding you know people some people are crying a river their emoting and people see enough of that and they say wow to become a Christian there must be some kind of emotional response on my part that I have to give to God well let me ask you this if God if you give to God an emotional response to be saved then your salvation is based on not just faith but a work you created God as we saw in our prior session together will not accept good works that's why the gospel has to be kept crystal-clear the moment you insert a single work in it is the moment it's no longer the gospel that's why I'm going through this very slowly and very methodically I mean this is a big deal because the souls of people to a very large extent hang on how we share the gospel with them are we giving them God's message or a garbled and Confused message now when you when you get saved is it wrong to cry no cry all you want emote and weep and a lot of times people come to Christ weeping that's not wrong at all but that weeping is not a requirement see there's only one requirement which is faith by itself now how do I know this because in the Greek language for emotion such as sorrow or we've or feelings of guilt there is a totally different word that's used it's not met - no AO it's a totally different word called meta Mello my meta Mello my refers to emotion do you recognize the word Mello hey buddy bitter mellow out in other words you need to relax your emotions see we get emotional emotionally oriented words from met mellow my and the Bible never says meta no AO and meta mellow my it simply says meta no AO so if emotion were required for a lost person to be saved a totally different word would have been supplied other than meta no AO and let me give you some verses that show I think pretty clearly that repentance is not always the same thing as emotion you know there's a lot of criminals that are very emotional why are they emotional because they got caught but they're not repentant you can show a lot of emotion without ever actually changing your mind about something so Hebrews 12 17 this deals with Jacob and Esau remember Esau was cheated out of the birthright and then when he figure out what he lost in the book of Genesis you know he got very emotional about it and this is what it says for you know that he even afterwards when he desired to inherit the blessing he was rejected now look at this for he found no place for repentance meant to know a oh he was unrepentant though he sought for it with tears so this guy cried this guy emoted and yet Hebrews 1217 says even though he cried and amounted he was unrepentant his mind was never changed so the two ideas of being emotionally upset and repenting we conflate these ideas with with English in English language but that's not how Greek functions emotion is a completely different word in the Greek language so don't confuse repentance with emotion remember one of the disciples Judas did he feel bad about what he did Judas sold out for thirty pieces of silver you remember Matt and he felt bad about it Matthew 27 verse 3 says then when Judas had betrayed him he saw that he had been condemned he felt remorse now that's met amel oh my and returned the thirty pieces of silver to the chief priests and the elders Judas cried Judas felt bad but did Judas ever repent no he did not how do I know that I know that because of the end of John 6 John 6 64 says but there Jesus speaking there are some of you who do not believe for jesus knew from the beginning who they were who did not believe and who it was that would betray him now he meant Judas the son of Simon Iscariot for he one of the twelve was going to betray him so this very clearly says the one that betrays me Judas would never believe Judas never believed that's why Jesus says of Judas it'd be better for him if he had never been born so he was unrepentant he didn't he never changed his mind about Christ and yet back to Matthew 27 verse 33 he had a lot of met amel oh my he had a lot of emotion so you should not confuse a motion with bonafide repentance or changing your mind about who Christ is so another example take a look at acts 2:38 we were there just a little while ago you might go back to acts 2:37 Jim and his powerpoint writes this the first example of apostolic preaching of repentance is Peters sermon recorded in acts 2:38 that's where Peter told folks that were unbelievers to repent change your mind about who Christ is go from being a christ-rejecting Jew to a Christ accepting Jew which is a synonym for faith the first example of apostolic preaching of repentance is peter's sermon recorded in acts 2:38 there he responded to the crowds question what shall we do with the words repent and let every one of you be baptized in the name of Jesus Christ for the remission of sins and you shall receive the gift of the Holy Spirit now go back to verse 37 notice that the text verse 37 the immediately preceding verse describes the emotional state of the people what does that text say it says they were cut to the heart that's the greek verb cata Newsome I so they heard the message they were cut to the heart what does that word mean it connotes a sharp pain connected with remorse or anxiety this is a description of their deepest innermost feelings so Peter preached on the day of Pentecost and he talked about how the nation of Israel had betrayed Jesus Christ and killed innocent blood and there were 3,000 Jews sitting there hearing that message and they felt really bad about it they felt guilty but Peter will not content to let them simply feel guilty because feeling guilty in and of itself doesn't save anybody what he communicated to them is to allow that guilt that they were experiencing to manifest itself and to propel them to changing their minds about Jesus Christ so he went on and he actually told them to repent Peter's admonition to repent therefore must certainly address another kind of response besides emotional grief see if emotional grief is repentance then Peter could have just left them as they were in verse 37 and dropped out what he told him to do in verse 38 Peter's admonition to repent therefore must certainly address another kind of response besides emotional grief clearly the people were compelled by feelings over mores to seek an avenue of change and it was for this reason that Peter says repent or in other words change your mind and attitude about Jesus Christ but how are these devout Jewish men brought to this point this is the crucial question there are clues in the context about the focus of their repentance first of all Peter addresses the specific sin of Israel's crucifixion of the Lord Jesus and the context then verse 37 reveals the source of their remorse was the mistake of crucifying the Messiah now they must repent or change their minds about who he is and change their disposition toward him Charles Talbert a scholar comments the condemnation of Christ had been done in ignorance but in raising Jesus God showed that the Jews that they had made a mistake they had crucified Christ now however the Jews are given a chance to change their minds or to repent if a motion wasn't enough Peter would have just said if emotion was enough would have just said you guys already repented you feel bad but obviously a motion is not bonafide repentance because he moved them from emotion to pushing them towards an actual change of mind just trying to demonstrate here that sorrow and repentance are two different things that's my point Dwight Pentecost agrees and writes they had already come to regret their sin now Peter urges them on to a change of mind about Christ of course repentance to the exclusive Jewish audience had special significance in that they had to change their attitude about their own righteousness in contrast to God's provided Messiah notice that the progression in acts 2 37 and 38 is expressed by 2nd Corinthians 7:10 for godly sorrow produces salvation see how sorrow and repentance are different words I think I misspoke therefore godly sorrow produces repentance to salvation from their sorrow the Jews were led to the point of repentance and being repentance they simultaneously believed in Christ their remorse over their sin of crucifying Christ move them toward a true repentance which focused on their thinking about Christ simply put Peter challenged these heartbroken Jews to change their minds and attitudes repent about Messiah a change that if real would then lead to their outward identification with Christ through baptism the natural result of the new spiritual birth so what is the bottom line here BLT bottom line time repentance means change of mind which is a synonym for faith repentance does not mean emotion a repentant person many times experiences emotion but in and of itself does not constitute the biblical definition of repentance comprende so far one more and we're done here repentance also does not mean turning from sin what are we telling unbelievers are we telling them clean yourself up and come to Jesus give up sins a B and C and come to Jesus is that our gospel to the unbelievers may God help us if that's what we're preaching to them for the simple reason that we just preached works to them and by using sloppy language they've interpreted our message as a works oriented message repentance does not mean turn from sin the gospel is not clean yourself up and come to Christ the gospel is come to Christ by way of faith and then guess what enters you the Holy Spirit and guess what he starts to work on after you're saved sinful tendencies sinful problems but you see because we're so untaught on the subject we've got the cart before the horse many times and we're well intentioned but we just preached a wrong message see so just a couple of now I'm gonna bring up John MacArthur when I do this people pick up stones to stone me to death let me say this I like John MacArthur John we hear him on the radio and other things he says a lot of good things but on the doctrine of salvation we have a vast area of disagreement with him it's not that the man has hasn't done good things in other areas but his gospel presentation and doctrine of salvation is very very confused and I'll be saying a lot more about that next time John MacArthur writes in his book the Gospel according Jesus he says in the Gospel according to Jesus John MacArthur initially agrees for the basic meaning of change of mind for repentance but then later says biblically its meaning does not stop there he's about to load up the word repentance with a bunch of other stuff echoing this sentiment mark Muller declares repentance is far more than a change of mind about who Christ is we would disagree with that we think repentance is a change of mind about who Christ is period the basic tenets for both reform fiat theologians and lordship advocates those terms will be defining later on in the course according to this view one is saved by repenting which always means a turning from sin Ken Gentry puts it this way the necessary element in Salvatori repentance is a true recognition of one's evil state and they decided resolved to forsake sin and thrust oneself at Christ's mercy look at all that baggage he just dumped into the word repentance it's not just a change of confidence as if we've tried to argue which is a synonym for faith it's a resolve to forsake sin and thrust oneself at Christ for mercy it's a recognition of one's evil state this gentleman Mark Mueller goes on repentance is related to the issue of sin which also includes unbelief in Christ the primary New Testament word Metanoia Oh always speaks of a change of purpose specifically a turning from sin see I'm quoting the guys we don't agree with just to show you what's out there and what you're hearing and reading in Christian literature John MacArthur made that statement some illustrative quotes from the lordship camp here's aw pink look at all the baggage he just throws into the word repentance repentance is a supernatural and inward revelation from God giving a deep consciousness of what I am in his sight which causes me to love and condemn myself how do you know if you've loved or condemned yourself enough how much low thing do you have to do to get saved my goodness which I which caused me to love and condemn myself resulting in a bitter bitter sorrow for sin a holy horror and hatred for sin and a turning away from or forsaking sin I don't deny that God does this in people but it's after the Spirit comes into them to get the spirit into them in the first place they have to come to Christ on Christ's terms which is believed only as stated these definitions make turning away from sin an essential and necessary component of repentance and ultimately salvation Richard trench a lot of scholarship here today I'm sorry about that Richard trench getting very near to wrapping up by the way if I don't wrap up fast I will repent for going too long Richard trench deals a fatal blow to this idea of a greater meaning demonstrating that these added concepts have been forced upon the text you see what is happening is people are reading their theology into the text rather than getting their theology what from the text that's the basic difference here that's why I started with a basic lexical definition of repentance means so Richard Trent says it is only after meta no AO or Metanoia has been taken up in the uses of Scripture that it becomes predominantly to mean a change of mind with the added idea of taking a wiser view of the past a regret for all ill done in the past and out of this is a change of life for the better Richard Trent says this all of these meanings people are bringing to the word repentance is imported into and does and does not ademma logically nor yet by primary usage lie in the word itself did you get that this so-called greater meaning for meta no AO came into the picture only after certain theologians added to its legitimate and received definition as demonstrated by all the lexical sources we call it a little earlier closing verse here John for woman at the well was this woman messed up the woman at the well what do you think pretty messed up look at John 4 verse 10 unsaved woman a samaritan jesus answered her and said if you knew the gift of God and who it is that says to you give me a drink you would have asked and he would have given you living water jesus tells her receive the living water that I want to give to you which would be the Holy Spirit by way of faith I want you to see how morally messed up this lady was verses 17 through 19 the woman answered and said I have no husband jesus said to her you have correctly said I have have no husband you have had five husbands and the one whom you are currently with he is not your husband this you have said correctly go get your husband I don't have a husband Jesus had just answered correctly because you've had not one but five and you're current for lack of a better expression bed buddy you're not even married to and then you have this tremendous statement that she makes in verse 19 sir I perceive that your profit good answer what I'm trying to say is you cannot get a more morally messed up person than the woman at the well in John four look at what Charles Ryrie says in his study Bible Charles Rory as we said in prayer time passed away this week he writes this in John 4:10 new life through the spirit salvation is a gift from Jesus Christ the Son of God the Messiah notice that Christ asked the woman to receive him and his gift without any prerequisite change in her life he never told her you need to quit sleeping around and received the Holy Spirit you need to stop being sexually immoral and received the Holy Spirit what he simply said is you need water to come into you that will quench this desire that you have for meaning that is being misdirected by you into all of these promiscuous experiences but if if if the gospel is clean yourself up and come to Jesus if there was a never an opportunity for Jesus to preach that this is it you can't get a more morally confused person than this woman but you'll notice as Ryrie said that Jesus asked the woman to receive him and his gift without any prerequisite change in her life he didn't tell her to alter her behavior at all what he said is you need to receive me and my resources by faith I guess what happens when the resources of God come into you what happens to your behavior typically starts to change some slower than others but there's usually some kind of change that manifest itself Ryrie says after she believed because she believed her way of living would be changed and was it ever she went out and became a tremendous evangelist for Christ when you get to the end of John for that's because something greater than herself entered her you see that and Jesus says he evangelizes her is not getting the cart before the horse the change of behavior comes on the other side once you have received the gospel by way of faith conclusion is repentance a condition for receiving eternal life question mark yes if it is repentance or changing one's mind about Jesus Christ no if it means to be sorry for sin or to resolve to turn away from sin for these things will not save conclusion is repentance a condition - faith no though a sense of sin and the desire to turn away from it may be used by the Holy Spirit to direct someone to the Savior in his salvation repentance may prepare the way for faith but it is faith that saves not repentance unless repentance as understood as a what synonym for faith or changing one's mind so hopefully I haven't confused everybody taught you how to harmonize repentance with faith alone next week we look at how to harmonize the teachings of following Christ as Lord with faith alone so we'll stop now and we'll let folks pick up their kids sorry for going about five minutes longer than I wanted and feel free to we'll open it up for Q&A those that want to stick around for that you

Channel: Andy Woods' Unofficial Channel

Views: 7,333

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Keywords: andy woods, soteriology, andrew woods, repentance, sin, turn from, osas, once saved always saved, eternal security, grace, faith, gospel, Jesus, salvation, lordship, calvinism, calvinists

Id: vAnm9duR-ho

Length: 66min 57sec (4017 seconds)

Published: Wed May 22 2019