Resolution vs Repentance

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Hello, welcome back to Coffee with a Calvinist.
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This is a daily conversation about scripture, culture and media from a Reformed perspective.
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Get your Bible and coffee ready and prepare to engage today's topic.
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Here's your host, Pastor Keith Foskey.
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Welcome back to Coffee with a Calvinist.
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My name is Keith Foskey and I am a Calvinist.
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Today is the day, the final day of 2020.
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Are you ready? Are you ready for this year to be over? Boy, what a year it has been, certainly a year to remember and we will look back upon it with a lot of negatives, but there have been a few triumphs as well, a few victories.
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So today I wanted to end the year by actually talking about looking forward, looking forward to the new year.
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Every year at this time, people start thinking about the concept of New Year's resolutions.
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And the concept of a resolution or to resolve to do something is not necessarily wrong, but is something that is often looked at with a little bit of humor because people say, well, I'm going to resolve this year to lose weight, or I'm going to resolve this year to be better at spending money, or I'm going to resolve this year to not drink so many sodas or eat fast food or whatever the particular thing that someone may think is their resolution.
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And oftentimes it lasts maybe a week or two, if that, and people laugh it off as, oh, no big deal.
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It was just my New Year's resolution and it's already broken.
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And sometimes it's broken before New Year's Day is even over.
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And so today I want to talk about the difference between a resolution and repentance.
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Because when we talk about the concept of biblical repentance, I think honestly it gets very confusing for people.
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And as many of you know, I teach at a ministry.
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It's a men's ministry.
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I teach every Thursday.
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And so what I'm doing today on the podcast is actually a mini version of what I'm going to be doing with the men of Set Free later today.
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I teach every Thursday at 9.45 a.m.
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and this podcast will go live at 6.30 a.m.
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So if you're hearing this in the morning, you may be hearing this before I actually teach the lesson, but if you would like a longer treatment on what I'm talking about in today's podcast, then my encouragement would be for you to go to our sermon audio page if you're not already on our sermon audio page and look for our recording.
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Because I do normally take the recordings that I do at Set Free and I post them for people to listen as well.
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So that might be something that you're interested in doing.
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And also, if you're listening to this lesson today and you have a question, we now have an interactive way for you to interact with the program.
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Simply go and email calvinistpodcast at gmail.com.
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That's calvinistpodcast at gmail.com and that will allow you to send me a question directly and also it will allow you to engage with the program and possibly even be a part of the program.
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Because if you ask a question and I think it would be beneficial for everyone, then I will answer your question on the air in a future broadcast.
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So keep that in mind, calvinistpodcast at gmail.com.
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Also, before I get into the lesson today, I want to remind you that I am the pastor of Sovereign Grace Family Church in Jacksonville, Florida, and we are meeting every Lord's Day.
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We continue to meet and we pray that the Lord will continue to strengthen us and sustain us no matter what may come.
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So we pray that we'll continue to meet and we will as the Lord gives us strength and ability to do so through the midst of whatever we may face.
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And so if you would like to come and join us at Sovereign Grace Family Church, we would love to have you, and you can get information about our church at sgfcjacks.org, sgfcjacks.org.
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So getting back to the topic at hand, the subject of repentance versus a resolution.
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Well, as I mentioned already about a resolution, a resolution is not a bad thing.
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As I noted, Jonathan Edwards was known for having written resolutions that he lived by.
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I actually have a shirt that has a couple of his resolutions written on it.
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The first resolution is I will live for God.
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Resolution number two, even if no one else does, I will.
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And so that's a good thing.
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That's a positive thing to consider for a resolution.
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And if your resolution for 2021 is I'm going to live for God, and if nobody else will, I still will, then that's great.
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That's a great resolution.
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But when we talk about the subject of repentance, I think people often confuse the concept of resolution with repentance, because often resolutions deal with things that are things that we should be repenting of.
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Because if we say, well, I'm going to resolve in 2021 to no longer have premarital sexual intercourse, well, that's not something you need to resolve.
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That's something you need to repent of.
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Or I'm going to resolve in 2021 to deal with my outbursts of anger.
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Well, outbursts of anger are sinful.
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And so these aren't things that need a resolution.
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These are things that need repentance.
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And so I would encourage you to distinguish between resolving to do something good and repenting of sin and understanding the difference.
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Now, again, I mentioned earlier, repentance is often a confusing topic, because people define it differently.
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And the word repentance often leads to some of that confusion, because the word repentance comes from the Greek word, as many of you know, metanoia, meta meaning to change, and noia from the word gnosis or knowledge or the mind.
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So it means to change our mind.
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And so people say, well, if I change my mind about my sin, that means I've repented of it.
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But what we have to understand is it's not just a change of mind in the sense that I go from thinking something's good to thinking something's bad, but it is also a change of mind which accompanies a change of behavior and a change of countenance, a change of how we understand ourselves.
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And one of the passages of Scripture, which I believe best describes this, is found in 2 Corinthians chapter 7.
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So if you want to open your Bibles today to 2 Corinthians 7 and turn to verse 10, the apostle Paul is writing to the Corinthians, as you probably already know, and he writes this, for godly grief produces a repentance that leads to salvation without regret, whereas worldly grief produces death.
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For see what earnestness this godly grief has produced in you, but also what eagerness to clear yourselves, what indignation, what fear, what longing, what zeal, what punishment.
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At every point you have proved yourselves innocent or pure in this matter.
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So ultimately what we have here from the apostle Paul is a description of a distinction between godly grief and worldly grief.
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And what he says is that godly grief produces repentance, and a worldly grief does not produce repentance, rather it produces death.
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And there are two men that come to mind immediately when I think about this passage.
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The first man is the apostle Peter, and the second is Judas Iscariot.
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Both Peter and Judas Iscariot sinned against Christ.
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Judas Iscariot sinned by being a traitor.
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The apostle Peter sinned by denying the Lord three times.
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But Peter repented, and Judas Iscariot did not.
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But one could say that Judas was sorrowful.
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He was very sorrowful.
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He went and gave the money back that he had received for denying Christ.
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He went, and the Bible says he committed suicide.
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So here we have an example of a man who was grieved, but it was not a godly grief.
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It was in fact worldly grief, and it didn't lead to repentance.
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It led to death.
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But with Peter, it was different.
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With Peter, there was a godly grief, and he did repent, and the Lord received his repentance.
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In fact, the Lord gave him the opportunity to be restored.
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If you remember that story where Jesus said, do you love me? And he asked him three times.
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Why did Jesus ask Peter three times, do you love me? Well, he asked him three times because Peter denied him three times.
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He gave Peter the opportunity for restoration.
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So godly grief is exemplified in Peter, and worldly grief is exemplified in Judas.
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But I want to take us back to 2 Corinthians 7 for just a moment, and I want to reference the work of Dr.
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James Neuheiser.
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He is the Director of Counseling at Reformed Theological Seminary in Charlotte, and this is the outline that I'm going to be using for my lesson at Set Free.
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And so if you want to hear more about this, again, I encourage you to listen to that lesson when it's posted.
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But this is what he gives us.
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He gives us an outline of nine points and the distinction between worldly sorrow and godly sorrow.
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And again, since we're talking about what brought this up, the subject of resolutions, the difference between resolutions and repentance is repentance is dealing with sin, and sin should bring godly sorrow to the believer and should encourage genuine repentance.
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What does godly sorrow look like versus worldly sorrow? Number one, worldly sorrow is self-focused and self-protective.
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Godly sorrow is focused on God and other people.
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The well-being of others is the first priority.
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Number two, worldly sorrow doesn't primarily hate the sin, but it hates the consequences of the sin.
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Godly sorrow hates the sin itself and accepts the consequences of the sin as being right.
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Number three, worldly sorrow shifts blame, points the fingers outward.
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It's not my fault.
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It's someone else's.
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Godly sorrow fully accepts responsibility.
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Number four, worldly sorrow resents accountability.
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But godly sorrow seeks accountability.
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I can always tell when someone is really not repented because they don't want to be accountable for what they've done.
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They resent any accountability.
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Number five, worldly sorrow is impatient.
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It demands to be trusted immediately, to be restored without question.
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That's worldly sorrow, but godly sorrow is patient.
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Number six, worldly sorrow focuses on the sins of others while godly sorrow focuses on the sin of self.
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Number seven, worldly sorrow criticizes the disciplinary process while godly sorrow submits to the disciplinary process.
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Again, looking back at number four, it's seeking accountability, seeking to be discipled and to be disciplined.
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Worldly sorrow is accompanied, number eight, by an unchanged hardened heart while godly sorrow is accompanied by a changed heart.
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And finally, number nine, worldly sorrow produces no fruit while godly sorrow produces much fruit.
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One of those being, of course, the fruit of repentance, genuine repentance.
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Well, I want to say that I appreciate this information that Dr.
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Neuhauser has provided, and this is a useful tool.
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I think these nine distinctions between worldly sorrow and godly sorrow are helpful.
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And again, if you'd like to hear me talk about this more, this is going to be the subject of my lesson for tomorrow at set free.
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So, or today, if you're listening to this today.
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So, let me begin to close by saying this.
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First of all, thank you for listening to me this year.
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I started this podcast back, well, actually, I started it as a series of YouTube videos back at the height of the lockdown when people were stuck in their homes, and I wanted this to be a daily devotion.
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And what I did at that time was I simply read a passage of Scripture, talked a little bit about it, and that was a daily devotional that I was doing for our church members.
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And this podcast has grown out of that.
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And from this, we now do a daily conversation about Scripture, culture, and media from a Reformed perspective.
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That's what Coffee with a Calvinist is.
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And I have my two partners who come in from time to time, Sam Brown and Richard Rodin, and we do our caffeinated Calvinist roundtable.
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We've done some humorous podcasts where we've talked about foods that we liked, and we've talked about movies at Christmastime and all kinds of stuff.
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And sometimes we've talked about very serious subjects like politics and the president and decisions that were being made.
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And we even did a response to a debate, the presidential debate.
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So, there's been a lot that we've done this year with the program.
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And I'm looking forward to 2021, continuing the podcast.
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And I want to ask you for one thing.
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If you are a listener to the podcast, would you let me know? Either send an email, or again, if you're listening to this through Facebook or YouTube, drop a comment below and just let me know that you're there.
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I see our stats.
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I know that we have listeners, and I appreciate everyone who listens.
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But it is encouraging to get messages, and it's one of the things that helps me know that this is valuable in the lives of believers, and maybe even encouraging, maybe even in the lives of unbelievers to encourage them to look to Christ.
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And so, I look forward to continuing in 2021 with Coffee with a Calvinist.
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I pray that it has been a blessing in your life, and I pray that it continues to be so.
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And I hope that today's lesson has been helpful.
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Understanding the difference between a New Year's resolution and genuine biblical repentance.
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Thank you for listening, not only today, but for this year, listening to Coffee with a Calvinist.
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Know that we will not have a program tomorrow, because tomorrow is a holiday.
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So the next time that I will be on the air will be Monday, January the 4th.
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So have a wonderful and safe New Year, and I look forward to seeing you on the other side.
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And I hope that you have a great beginning to 2021.
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May God bless you.
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And my name is Keith Foskey.
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I've been your Calvinist.
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Thank you for listening to today's episode of Coffee with a Calvinist.
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If you enjoyed the program, please take a moment to subscribe and provide us feedback.
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We love to receive your comments and questions and may even engage with them in a future episode.
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As you go about your day, remember this.
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Jesus Christ came to save sinners.
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All who come to Him in repentance and faith will find Him to be a perfect Savior.
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He is the way, the truth, and the life, and no one comes to the Father except through Him.
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May God be with you.