Sermons
Repentance: A Turning To God
Series: The Way Of SalvationREPENTANCE: A TURNING TO GOD
Sermon By Terry Siverd
Cortland Church of Christ / July 28, 2019
We are in the midst of a sermon series titled, The Way Of Salvation.
This morning I want to speak about REPENTANCE.
If you've read the Old Testament you would have noticed that the topic of repentance is ubiquitous (everywhere).
The call to repent was an overriding theme of the Old Testament prophets.
E.g., In the book of Ezekiel, God tells the prophet Ezekiel (Ezk.14:6) - - Therefore say to the house of Israel,'Thus
says the Lord God, Repent and turn away from your idols, and turn you faces away from all your abominations.'
We must not read this text and think that it is a only a message for a generation long gone.
We still have “idols” and our sins remain an abomination to the Lord.
Ezk.18:30-31 states - -
Therefore I will judge you, O house of Israel, each according to his CONDUCT, declares the Lord God.
Repent and turn away from all of your transgressions, so that iniquity may not become a stumbling block to you.
Cast away from you all your transgressions, which you have committed and make yourselves a new heart and spirit!
For why will you die, O house of Israel? For I have no pleasure in the death of anyone who dies, declares the Lord.
Therefore, REPENT AND LIVE!!
When we open our New Testaments, we don't go very far at all until we meet up with this same theme.
Mt.3:1-2 notes the arrival of John (the Baptizer) who came preaching:
Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand.
When Jesus began His preaching ministry at the age of 30 (Lk.3:23), His message reiterated
that of John and the Old Testament: Repent for the kingdom of heaven is at hand (Mt.4:17).
Jesus charged the Twelve apostles to proclaim this same message (Mk.6:12) - -
And they went out and preached that men should repent.
When giving His disciples the great commission (Lk.24:46), Jesus told them - -
Thus it is written, that the Christ should suffer and rise again from the dead the third day;
and that repentance for the forgiveness of sins should be proclaimed in Him name to all nations...
In the book of Acts (a journal of the actions of the apostles), this is precisely what we observe in
Peter's first sermon. In Acts 2:37-38 we read - - Now when they heard this, they were pierced to the heart,
and said to Peter and the rest of the apostles, 'Brethren, what shall we do?' And Peter said to them,
'Repent and let of you be baptized in the name of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of your sins...'
Peter repeats this very important emphasis in another sermon to another audience (Acts 3:19) - -
Repent therefore and return, that your sins may be wiped away,
in order that times of refreshing may come from the presence of the Lord...
In Mt.12:41, when Jesus was confronted by hard-hearted, legalistic and self-righteous
leaders within first-century Judaism, He gave them a stark reminder of what was expected
of them: The men of Nineveh shall stand up with this generation at the judgment,
and shall condemn it because they repented at the preaching of Jonah;
and behold, something greater than Jonah is here.
I cannot think of a better text than the book of Jonah to clarify and magnify the meaning of repentance.
This picture of repentance comes to us in two ways.
First in the life and actions of Jonah himself.
When God directed this Old Testament prophet to preach to the Assyrians - -
arise, go to Nineveh the great city, and cry against it (Jonah 1:1-2) ... he attempted to run away.
He utterly detested the Assyrians because of their horrible treatment of the Jewish people.
He was so determined to escape from this assignment, he behaved totally irrationally.
He attempted to run and hide from God (an act that all Hebrews knew to be impossible).
Furthermore, his sense of desperation is evident in that he boards a ship to sail the Great Sea (the god-less abyss).
After God engineered a very serious “Time Out” for His disobedient servant (Jonah chapter 2), he came
to his senses: While I was fainting away, I remembered the Lord; And my prayer came to Thee... (Jonah 2:7).
The Lord commanded the mighty sea creature to vomit Jonah up onto dry land (Jonah 2:10).
Thus, In chapter three we see a penitent Jonah.
Jonah 3:1-3 / Now the word of the Lord came to Jonah the second time, saying, 'Arise, go to Nineveh
the great city and proclaim to it the proclamation which I am going to tell you.
So Jonah arose and went to Nineveh according to the directive of the Lord.
Secondly, we see repentance on the part of the people of Nineveh.
Jonah preached for forty days and the people not only heard his message but heeded.
Jonah 3:5ff states, Then the people of Nineveh believed in God; and they called a fast and put on
sackcloth from the greatest to the least of them...the King even issued a decree: let men
call on God earnestly that each may turn from his wicked way and from the violence which is in his hands.
Here then, in this little four chapter book that can be read from start to finish in 15-20 minutes,
we find in bold relief, two fleshed-out, full-color illustration of the meaning of repentance.
First Jonah was disobedient - - unwilling to comply with the will of God.
But then he turns to God and subsequently we find him yielding fully to the directives of God Almighty.
When Jonah heard God's second calling, if he would have again refused to go, he would not have truly repented.
Secondly, the people were wicked in so many ways, but then they repented.
And apparently their penitence was so genuine that Jonah 3:10 records: When God
saw their deeds, that they turned from their wicked way, the God relented concerning
the calamity which He had declared He would bring upon them. And did not do it.
Repentance is more than “being sorry”. It is even more than just “sorrow for sin”.
Repentance is not just an intellectual exercise. It also involves one's emotional nature (our inner being),
causing “godly sorrow” or regret. True repentance also brings a moral change, a turning from delight in sin and
its enticements to delight in God and His pleasure. It is a turnabout in attitude from rebellion to obedience.
The apostle Paul wrote several letters to the church at Corinth.
In what we often refer to as Second Corinthians (2Cor.7:8-10/NCV), Paul writes these words - -
Even if my (previous) letter made you sad, I am not sorry I wrote it. At first I was sorry, because it
made you sad, but you were sad only for a short time. Now I am happy, not because you were sad, but
because your sorrow made you change your lives. You became sad in the way God wanted you to, so you
were not hurt by us in any way. The kind of sorrow God wants makes people change their hearts and lives.
This leads to salvation, and you cannot be sorry for that. But the kind of sorrow the world has brings death.
Blaise Pascal was a brilliant Frenchman who lived a short life of 39 years (1623-1662).
He was a mathematician, physicist, inventor, writer and theologian. He once wrote:
The Christian religion teaches men these two truths; that there is a God whom men can know,
and that there is a corruption in their nature which renders them unworthy of Him.
It is equally important to men to know both these points; and it is dangerous for men
to know God without knowing his own wretchedness, and to know his own
wretchedness, without knowing the Redeemer who can free him from it.
Open your New Testament to Lk.19:1-9.
I invite you to follow along as I read Luke's account of a visit Jesus made with a man named Zaccheus.
(Jesus) entered and was passing through Jericho. And behold, there was a man called by the name
of Zaccheus; and he was a chief tax-gatherer, and he was rich. And he was trying to see who Jesus
was, and he was unable because of the crowd, for he was small in stature. And he ran ahead and
climbed up into a sycamore tree in order to see Him, for (Jesus) was about to pass through that way.
And when Jesus came to that place, He looked up and said to him, 'Zaccheus, hurry and come down,
for today I must stay at your house.' And he hurried and came down, and received Him gladly.
And when they saw it, they all began to grumble, saying, 'He has gone to be the guest of a man
who is a sinner.' And Zaccheus stopped and said to the Lord, 'Behold, Lord, half of my possessions
I will give to the poor, and if have defrauded anyone of anything, I will give back four times as much.'
And Jesus said to him, 'Today salvation has come to this house, because he, too, is a son of Abraham.
This is true repentance.
Traveling the way of salvation involves steps on our part.
First we must hear. Secondly we must believe. Thirdly we must repent.
Over the next few weeks we will speak confession, baptism and living faithfully.
While we need not be baptized over and over again,
our lives must be in a perpetual state of hearing, believing, repenting and living faithfully.
Let me offer one final brief addendum that comes as a postscript to the story of Jonah.
As we have noted, chapter three ends with a full-scale repentance on the part of Ninevehites.
Sadly, the story closes with a relapse on the part of Jonah.
Jonah 4:1 / But it greatly displeased Jonah, and he became angry.
Basically, Jonah is upset with God's grace - - it was fine for him, but he didn't like it when God extended it to others.
He expresses to God that he would just as soon die. The story of has a very rare ending, it's a cliff-hanger.
We can only hope that Jonah once again came to have a penitent heart.
For those of you who are not yet Christians (you have not been baptized into Christ),
let me boil down the concept of repentance into one sentence.
Repentance is surrendering sovereignty; it is a
turning to God in obedience to His will for your life.
However, I must note in closing that this simple definition also applies to those who are already Christians.
Our spiritual journey requires that we constantly surrender our will to God's.
A week (sometimes a day) seldom passes in our lives where we do not need to repent.
I dare not tell you that this is an easy undertaking, but I can boldly declare to you that this is God's way.
My job as your preacher is to simply tell you what the word of God teaches.
