Repentance

Repentance has something unique about it. It is a spiritual grace that comes from Jesus in heaven to his people on earth, but which he does not give to his people in heaven. Yet for those travelling there from earth, the journey began with repentance, and repentance will mark every stage of their spiritual journey. This ongoing repentance is not only about their sins, but also over the things that they did well to an extent. Repentance therefore is a friend for life, a gift suitable for use as often as possible.

 

Start

The prophet Zechariah announced that the day would come in Jerusalem when repentance would take place: ‘I will pour out on the house of David and the inhabitants of Jerusalem a spirit of grace and pleas for mercy, so that, when they look on me, on him whom they have pierced, they shall mourn for him, as one mourns for an only child, and weep bitterly over him, as one weeps over a firstborn’ (Zech. 12:10).

 

Some expositors reckon that it is a prophecy of the repentance that took place on the Day of Pentecost. On that day, after Peter had preached to his audience about their sin in rejecting Jesus, he said to them in response to their request for guidance, ‘Repent and be baptized every one of you in the name of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of your sins, and you will receive the gift of the Holy Spirit’ (Acts 2:38).

 

The speaker through the prophet in the prophecy is not God the Father, but Jesus, as we can see from the phrase in the middle of the verse, ‘when they look on me, on him whom they have pierced,’ a reference to what happened to Jesus on the cross at Calvary. He is therefore also the ‘I’ who speaks at the beginning of verse 10, informing readers that this outpouring will be one of his Messianic activities. As Peter says about Jesus as the glorified Messiah, ‘God exalted him at his right hand as Leader and Savior, to give repentance to Israel and forgiveness of sins’ (Acts 5:31).

 

What kind of repentance does Jesus give? Clearly, it involves those repenting as looking at Jesus as a wounded person, it involves them seeing themselves as the cause of his wounding, and it expresses itself in deep distress, so deep that the only human experience that can be likened to it is the loss of a child.

 

This means that the sorrow of real repentance is indescribable beyond words. Why? Because they realise that they have sinned against the gracious God of heaven, the creator God who gave each of them their unique personhood, who has put up with their sinful rebellion, perhaps for years, and who will yet be the final Judge of their lives.

 

Where does initial repentance take place? Learning from this prophecy we can say that it takes place at Calvary within sight of the wounds of Jesus. People in Zechariah’s day could look at it long before it happened, and we can look at it long after it happened. Unforgiven sinners must go there, and although the event occurred two thousand years ago, they can go there now in spirit and weep at the foot of the cross. As Isaac Watts sang:

 

See from His head, His hands, His feet,

Sorrow and love flow mingled down!

Did e’er such love and sorrow meet,

Or thorns compose so rich a crown?

 

How long should we sit at Calvary and look? Until we mourn for our sins, until the heart is breaking.

 

It is important to distinguish between what used to called legal repentance and evangelical repentance. Legal repentance may occur because we have read the ten commandments and see that we have fallen short. But that response is not enough to make it genuine repentance. Legal repentance may bring about legalism, a confidence that I can sort out my own flaws. Legal repentance is a wrong response and can replace sadly a correct response to the gospel. We must be sorry for our sins because of what they did to Jesus.

 

Story

The obvious difference between initial repentance and ongoing repentance is that ongoing repentance comes from those whose sins have been forgiven by the Lord. They repent not to receive from him judicial pardon as criminals but to receive from him familial pardon as children of God.

 

What should they repent over? Everything, really, because they do not do anything perfectly. This means that repentance is a normal, regular spiritual activity that takes time, which means that we must make time for it. Such repentance must be private, of course, but there are lots of ways in which we can make time for it. Go for a walk along the shore, go for a drive in the car, go into a room and shut the door, and many other ways.

 

One of the unusual expressions of repentance is that of Job. In the last chapter of the book, he repents in dust and ashes because he has spent the last while discovering something of the wonder of God’s dealings with the animal creation. God ensured that Job took the time to bring about repentance. Then after Job had expressed his repentance, God told the three friends that Job had spoken correctly about him throughout the terrible experience he had. It was important that the man who feared God should repent.

 

Of course, there are times when believers fall into a sin. Plenty of examples of them in the Bible. Usually, Peter and David come to mind, but we know about them because we have the information. The fact is, every converted person in the Bible repented of their sins whether or not we know about their sins or their repentance.

 

What tools are useful, even essential, for keeping a spirit of repentance? I would suggest three helpful tools that every Christian can consider. The first is motives. Why did I do what I did? It may have looked right, but the motives made it all wrong. This is usually an easy tool to use because normally our conscience points it out to us very quickly.

 

The second tool is memory, and this tool has lots of aspects to it. There is the fact that have repented before, perhaps over the same sin, many times. There is all the past experience of the Lord’s goodness to us in his providence and in his grace. It might help us through the day if we spent a few minutes each morning recalling the Lord’s goodness. We will find all kinds of past expressions of his goodness almost coming from nowhere. Our memories take up lots of space. It is hard to repent if we don’t use our memories and evaluate the circumstances, especially the fact that we sinned against a good God.

 

The third tool is the means of grace, both individual and communal. We know what they are: meditating on the Bible, prayer, fellowship, church services. They have their effects because each of them is a living activity in a spiritual sense. One effect is repentance. Reading about the sins of people in the Bible should lead us to repent of our sins. Listening to prayers by others should lead us to repentance. Seeing spiritual progress or decline in others should lead us to repent. One way to profit from what we hear in church services is personal repentance.

 

The place of ongoing repentance is the throne of grace. We draw to God’s throne, the place of ultimate authority and discover repeatedly that penitents are welcome. They find a Father’s heart revealed, a Brother’s care shown, and a Spirit’s blessing given. Contact between a holy God and a penitent child is a sweet experience for the believer.

 

Surprise

The words of the dying Covenanter David Dickson come to mind and they illustrate repentance at the close of life: ‘I have taken all my good deeds, and all my bad deeds, and cast them in a heap before the Lord, and fled from both to the Lord Jesus Christ, and in him I have sweet peace.’

 

How would we like to spend our last day if we are conscious? Saying farewell to friends and family, thinking of the better country, rehearsing the promises to get comfort for our souls, anticipating meeting the king, confessing again our sins. They are all good. Then suddenly we find ourselves in another place, and to our surprise, repentance is over for evermore.