The Necessity of Biblical Repentance — Al Whittinghill

Biblical Humility, Submission, and Repentance

It says in James four, six, but he giveth more grace and wherefore, he says, God resists the proud, but gives grace unto the humble. Submit yourselves, therefore, because he gives grace to God, resist the devil and he will flee from you, draw near to God and he will draw near to you.

Cleanse your hands, you sinners, and purify your hearts, you that are double minded, be afflicted and mourn and weep and let your laughter be turned to mourning and your joy to heaviness. Humble yourselves in the sight of the Lord and he will lift you up.

Now, that's not very exciting to read, we don't like to think about that, we don't like to do that, we want to let our laughter continue and our joy continue and we even have a revival sweeping our country that's called a revival, which is no revival at all, called a laughing revival.

Beware of any revival that calls itself that that tries to bypass repentance and brokenness. And here we see that the way to revival is repentance and over in the next chapter in verse 10, it says, take my brethren, the prophets who have spoken in the name of the Lord for an example of suffering, affliction and of patience.

Behold, we count them happy, which endure. You have heard of the endurance or patience of Job and have seen the end of the Lord. What God had in mind, God had something in mind with Job that the Lord is very pitiful or merciful and full of tender mercy.

Job as a Biblical Model of Repentance

And so Job was a man who found himself in the fire. You've heard some testimonies about people finding themselves in the fire. Job was a man who went through that fire. We sang about and he was becoming, because of God's faithfulness, a man that God could trust.

Now, just a few thoughts about Job before I get into this message, because I want to use his example to preface our remarks. The book of Job is the oldest book in the Bible. Did you know that it was the first book in the canon that was written down?

In fact, Abraham surely studied it. It was written at that time. Moses studied the book of Job. It was before Israel became a nation. It was an ancient writing and its message. Therefore, if God wrote it down first is totally foundational to everything else in the word of God.

It's basic and it's vital and it's central. And a lot of people will tell you that the theme of Job is suffering and endurance. And there's surely a lot we can learn from the book of Job, from the Lord about suffering and endurance.

But the key to Job is another message. It's one we often miss. It's easy to miss the word Job. Its name comes from a Hebrew word meaning greatly tried. And that word comes from an ancient Arab root, which means repentance, repentance.

And God's first book that he ever wrote down was about a man in the fire. And its whole theme was repentance. If you or I were going to write a book about repentance, I would take someone in society today that is a notorious fellow.

And I would then have someone come and share the Lord with him or give him a set of rules. And then I would see him totally change his mind and become a wonderful person. And I'd say, what a repentance.

Or I would take one of the characters in the Bible that blew it. And I would then write a book about him, how he changed his mind and became right with God. And I would call it repentance. But the bad thing about doing that is I'm tempted when I look at that kind of person to say I'm not as bad as they are.

And I don't really need the same kind as Jack the Ripper or someone like that or some political figure that we might pick out arbitrarily from any place in government. We can use that language on the inside.

We would say, I'm not as bad as they are. You see, that's what man would have done if he'd written the book of repentance. Take the worst guy and show him becoming a better person. But see, God's not like that.

What God did when God wanted to write a book about repentance, he took what the Bible says is the best man on earth at the time famous for being, it says he was a perfect God. Three times, God says, initiating the trial of Job with Satan.

He said, have you considered my servant Job? There is no one like him in the earth. He is perfect. He is entire. He is lacking nothing. And he hates evil three times. It says that from God's standpoint, Job didn't know it was being said.

God said it when God wanted to write a book about repentance. Get this, brother. He took the best man on earth and showed that even in the best man on earth, whoever that is, he needs to repent. And so it shows the links, you see, that God is willing to go to to produce repentance.

We behold the patience of Job and the end, the goal of God, says in James five, we see what God is after and we begin to understand. You see, the reason God took the best man is to silence me or you from ever saying, well, I don't really think that there's a need for repentance in my case because Job needed it.

You see the best man. And so when we see a book like that, we see his sufferings. There's a deep and secret fear inside of us. We dread what we read because we say, don't let that happen to me, Lord. And it just shows we do not know the end of Job and what God was really after.

And it's normal to fear these things, I suppose. But even like Job, the Lord give us and the Lord take us away. Blessed be the name of the Lord. You see, some here may be tempted to think that there's not a real need of repentance in your life.

But I believe tonight, brother, you couldn't stand up next to Job and you couldn't stand up next to many of the people. I certainly couldn't. Job was a wealthy Oriental sheik who was famous. He loved God.

And it shows the book of Job, the repentance of a saint. That is necessary to an ongoing walk with God, and it shows that the best man, no matter who that is, has a great need. Whoever the greatest saint you've ever known is, there's still a great need for perpetual, ongoing, daily, renewed repentance in their life.

Job’s Self-Righteousness and His Encounter with God

And so in the whole book of Job, the Bible says Job was captive, but that the book were amazed that, I mean, you he has bankruptcy, bereavement, boils, a badgering wife. He's sitting on a pile of cow manure and people are standing around going, ha, ha, ha, ha, some some believer you are.

And he says, though he slay me, I will praise him. You know, he's way down the road. I mean, I'm telling you, he starts where you and I set the goal. I mean, God's got something in mind, he's but God says he's captive.

I mean, I'd never have known that Joe probably didn't know that. But God says he's captive. What's he captive to at the end of the book? You see God coming to him and reasoning with him through through Elihu and others.

And he kind of comes and says, Lord, I think I'm sort of wrong. But through the book, he says, though he slay me, I'm going to maintain my walk before God. I have not done anything to deserve this, but I'm going to trust God.

You see, halfway repentance until finally at the end of the book, God comes, God comes himself and he appears to Job and Job, when God comes in a mighty whirlwind, he reveals himself to Job. Now, up to that time, Job was kind of like you and me at a Bible conference.

He had heard the word of God. He studied the word of God. He was a righteous man, but he'd never seen who he was really dealing with. Let me tell you, when we see in church meetings who we're really dealing with.

And we sense his presence, then this will happen, what we're talking about here, Job in chapter forty two, he says, he says, I have he's silenced. He said, I've answered before, but I'm going to put my hand upon my mouth.

I've heard of you by the hearing of my ear. That's what faith is. We come by the hearing of the ear. I've heard of you by the hearing of the ear, but now my eye seeth thee and I hate myself. I repent.

In dust and ashes, you see, Job was decentralized up to that moment, he was self-righteous, his whole life consisted of becoming a more godly man, everything was was all for himself. It was spiritual growth and I'm righteous in the Lord and it was all me, me, myself and I.

And suddenly God comes and dissolves Job and Job then turns from his own problems and prays for his friends. He's thinking of others. And it says, and the Lord turned the captivity of Job. When he got his mind on others and he prayed for his friends, you see, that was repentance that God was after he was after that, it was a captivity turned a man, finally, that God could trust.

Repentance as an Ongoing Way of Life

Now, tonight, I want to talk about repentance, but not repentance as an act like we often think, like you need to repent in the sense of something you do at one point in time. That is when it might manifest itself.

But I want to talk about repentance as an ongoing way of life. It's the universal need for every man, whether he's a lost man, he needs to repent or whether he is a saved man, he needs to repent. Now you say, then what is repentance?

Well, first of all, let me just ask you, like Job, have you ever come to that point where you've wept over your sins, not just what you've done that have made you miserable? I mean, most people are sorry for their sins because of what their sins cost them.

And it's really a subtle form of self-love. I'm sorry that I've been so hurt because of my sin. Instead of I am sorry for sin, for what it costs you, Lord, and I want to turn from the pain that I ongoingly make in your eternal holy presence as you set your eyes on me, who are of pure eyes and to look on sin and I'm causing you pain and oh, God, I change and I turn.

Have you ever wept over your sins? Has God ever really shown you who you're dealing with? I'll tell you that's happened to me and it doesn't happen often, but when the Lord really comes in and shows you who you're dealing with, it's a it's an awesome moment when you begin to weep over your sins.

I want to pray with you right here, Father, in Jesus name. We want to just say to you, you have our permission, that part of our permission that that you don't really need, but because of your great grace, you want us to give you have our permission to deal with us.

Do it, Lord. We have to say yes to that on the inside, we can't just think it, we've got to say yes to you and your Holy Spirit knows. So may our hearts say, yes, Lord, do it, do it. Do it, Lord, and may we see clearly like Job, even after so long in in the things of God, may we see in a new dimension in Jesus name we pray.

Amen. And. Well, I wonder if you've ever thought about what my sins and what Jim's sins that he said were compared to others, they looked on a human level, minimal growing up, but the good person, the missionary kid that grows up and never does all the bad things.

I wonder if you've ever seen what our sins, those kind of of of sophisticated sins merit before a holy God. What do our sins merit in the presence before holy God? Well, the death of the Lord Jesus never changed God's attitude about sin.

We act as if his death made sin less serious now so that Christians can toy around with what God hates as if it's some no big deal. And and God kind of lowered his standard. But the truth is that Calvary makes his standard even more poignant that that he hates sin even more than ever, because now it's high handed rebellion in the light of all that God has done to show us how he hates sin only in the Lord Jesus.

As we've heard over and over, can we be presented to God? Perfect in him is no darkness at all. Now, I want you to think about this for a moment. We're told in the Bible and we see it in history that God is love and that he wants to bless, he wants to save people and we claim to to want to see him move in revival.

We say, Lord, sin revival. And we know that God wants to revive his church. He loves his church. He's coming for a bride. But if both facts are true, if God wants to revive his church, but yet and God is love, then why is there a discrepancy?

Where is the missing piece, the missing link? Well, it's right there. It's that bridge called repentance right there. If if if the missing puzzle piece is not there, you won't see revival. And some people say, do you believe that that's everyone is a sinner?

Yes. Do you believe that God loves sinners? Yes. Do you believe that everyone is going to heaven? No. Well, what's the deciding factor? I mean, of course, it's the sovereignty of God ultimately. But if God is not designing that any man should perish and we preach the gospel and his sovereignty, those who hear the missing puzzle piece is those who respond to the gospel and they repent.

See, most people don't really know what repentance is and they don't really care to know of what repentance is because you might have to do it. I mean, when was the last time you heard a message on repentance?

And the only thing more rare than a message of repentance is when you preach a message of repentance and somebody repents. That's even more rare. But you see, the Bible will show we'll see tonight that repentance is the doorway to eternal life.

It's the doorway to the joy filled life. It's the doorway to restitution with the things of God. It's the doorway. And Jesus said in Luke 13, twice in three verses, except you repent talking to religious people, you will all likewise perish, except you repent.

Repentance Against Religious Consumerism

Now, in our day, people are lured to churches because we've overextended ourselves by budgets that are extravagant and some sort. We have to make our preacher a mascot instead of a messenger. And if he offends anybody, the big givers leave.

So we're afraid to do that. So we have we're luring nickels and noses and we become, what would I say, seeker sensitive, which means really we don't want to offend anybody. And I know we need to be sensitive to lost people.

I'm not after anybody's thing thereafter. I'm just simply saying that we need to center our services around God and not man. We need to center our services around what he wants and not what we think those who might come might want.

And so we make messages on repentance rare and conversion seems to be as easy as walking an aisle, making a two minute apology to a God who is only slightly offended because of our mild mannered ignorance.

You see, I'll tell you something, Luther, after the Dark Ages, after the Bible went out to all of Europe, he wrote a book on seven songs. It was called the Penitential Psalms of David. And he went to Wittenberg and he nailed ninety five theses on the door of Wittenberg addressing the church of that day.

Do you know what the theme of every single one of those ninety five theses was? Do you know what he nailed on that door? Every single point was repent. The whole point of that word was repent the theses that he let know in that door.

Do you know that, brother? It's an amazing thing. His book on the Penitential Psalms of David, seven of them he wrote and and it went all over Europe and that was the beginning of the Reformation. But you see, repentance is the lost word in our day.

Repentance was not. Just a word, it was the last word, it was the first word, it was the last word, he said to the churches, as we'll see, wasn't a great commission, he spoke revelation after that when he said to five of seven churches, repent, what did he mean by that?

The Meaning of Repentance

Well, what is repentance? Let's talk about that. What is it? First of all, the main word used in the New Testament is metanoia, metanoia, and it means to with the mind, but it actually means to to change the mind.

But it's not just academic because the Bible says that the real me is as a man thinks in his heart, not just here, but it's the moral center of a man. So to repent means to change at the moral center of a being the way that you don't just think academically, but your whole approach to things at the very center of your being as a man thinketh in his heart.

So it's a change of the soul's intention, the heart's desire. It's an inner renouncing of what the Bible calls independence from God or which is sin or breaking what God says is the law. You've tried to break the mirror to say that I'm not as bad as the mirror says I am.

Sin is a revelation of the Holy Spirit, you would never know, I would never know sin in my life except for God's pure love and mercy coming to show me how when he has come, he will convict the world of sin in the world.

There's a generic for everybody. When the Holy Spirit comes, we are convicted of unholiness and sin, and that's wonderful. Pity the person that God doesn't convict. There's no hope for them because they cannot turn to God unless God has mercy and convicts them of sin.

So when God shows me sin in my life, it is not to torment me. It is not to make me upset or bitter at somebody else. It is to have me, by the amazing grace of God, deal with it in his plenteous mercy and be changed by his pure power and grace alone.

I can't change it. If I try to change it, I'll just make a bigger mess of it and get more tangled like a baby you try to pick up and it gets all over you. But when I let him do it, it's a wonderful thing now.

So repentance is a course of action that is possible only when the person genuinely regrets a previous course that God has shown. You cannot repent until you see that the way you've been going needs to be changed.

God wants to show the heart. Look at Matthew 21. Jesus gives a vivid example of how realistic and practical repentance really is. In Matthew 21, verse 28 and following to parable. Simple truth with deep meanings and parables hidden from wise and prudent, but revealed to those who are babes and want the truth, and you'll get it if you want it, brother, to read it.

Jesus is writing to the fair. He's speaking to the Pharisees. And he says, what do you think? A certain man had two sons, he came to the first son and said, son. Go work in my vineyard, kind of like, son, go mow the yard might be a good modern day rendition.

And the son answered and said, I will not. But afterward, he repented. And he went, in other words, he said he wouldn't, but he changed on the inside and he acted on the change and went and he did it.

And the man came to the second son and said, go work in my vineyard. And he said, I will go, sir. But he went not. He said the right thing. And Jesus asked these people what they thought. And he says, which of the two of them did the will of the father?

And the Pharisees said the first one. And by answering that, they showed that they saw the whole principle that God is not after words, he's after surrender. And they saw it. And so Jesus, after they condemned themselves by their own answer, he said unto them, Verily, I say to you that the publicans and the harlots will go into the kingdom of God before you.

And he explained it for John came to you in the way of righteousness. John came calling you the right way. What was John's message? We'll see it. Repent. He came telling you and you believed him not. But the publicans and the harlots believed him and you when you had seen it, you repented not afterwards that you might believe him.

In other words, John came and said, prepare the way of the Lord, make straight his paths, make the crooked straight, bring the low up to the high and get ready to make a landing strip for God to move in your life and your in your experience.

And the publicans and the harlots said, I need that. And they came and they let God change them on the inside. And Jesus said to these religious, smug, empty people, there's more hope of a whore than you.

Because they feel their need, they're like that person, God be merciful to me, a sinner, and they're willing to let God change them because they see there's a need. And it's an amazing thing, repentance precedes believing, do you see that right there, they did not repent that afterwards they might believe what is repentance.

Listen, it's the obedient action confirmed that shows the change of mind to be genuine. It's when God comes and I give an obedience by pure grace alone that shows an inner response to God's grace is true.

Obedience is the result. It's not the way to it's the result, it's the fruit of repentance, nobody is saved by repentance, but nobody saved without it because it makes the way for God to save me. It's like it's just like the Roman road, nobody saved by the Roman road.

The Roman road ends at the feet of Jesus. It's not the plan of salvation that saves. It's the man of salvation, not the plan, believe, but the man received that I end at his feet. So real repentance gets this always results in a God wrought righteousness and presence in the life.

And what it does is it breaks up the deepest parts of our lives and allows God to renew our mind and to restore our soul and purify our heart and conscience and revive our wills and heal our emotions.

It's a response to God's grace based upon new truth that he gives to me that doesn't add up in my experience. And I say, oh, God, I'm willing to let you change me. And deep down in that mysterious realm of heart, it's when we say, God, you're right and I'm wrong.

And as a change of moral purpose on the inside, there may be tears, there may be little tears. Most of the time there are a lot of tears, but there is a challenging counterfeit to real repentance. And we see it in our churches all the time.

Godly Sorrow and the Fruit of Repentance

Look at Second Corinthians, chapter seven, Second Corinthians, chapter seven. And I want to Paul had written a letter about a certain believer who was in the church, who was well known, apparently, but he had he had taken his stepmother in an affair and he wrote a letter.

And it was very severe in First Corinthians, and apparently this man, when he got the word about being turned over to the devil so he could learn not to blaspheme, he turned around and he repented. And he says in verse eight, though I made you sorry with a letter, I do not repent, though I did feel regretting, for I perceive that the same epistle has made you sorry, even though it was for a season.

Now, he says, but now I rejoice not that you were made sorry, but that you sorrowed to repentance. In other words, you were sorry enough to act on what you saw. You were made sorry after a godly manner so that you might receive damage by us in nothing.

For godly sorrow works repentance to salvation, not to be repented of. But the sorrow of the world works death. There's a counterfeit sorrow that the world has when their plans are changed and when they're disappointed and it weeps and cries, I'm sorry, I'm so bad, but it ends in death.

If you want to know what repentance is, verse 11 says, behold, this very thing you sorrowed in a godly sort. And here's what repentance resulted in real what carefulness. And I've done a little word study on these different things here.

Carefulness is the word that means diligence or earnest care with no trifling. So what carefulness it formed in you? Yes. What clearing of yourselves. It means you made it right. There was an apology and their restitution and what indignation it wrought in you.

This word means to be angry at sin, to hate the thing that you've been in before. And it says what fear this word is to hate evil, not just the sin. Yes, what vehement desire this word means, intensive hunger and longing.

Yearning to do his will and to fellowship with him. Yes, what zeal it's a word for passion, fervency and energy that God puts in and it makes us commendable and pleasing to God. And then finally, what revenge this is a word that means to avenge yourself against the powers of darkness.

When there's real repentance, we sorrow to those kind of things to where that results and it becomes real. And then Paul says in all things you have approved yourselves and the word is to be put in the fire and shown to be genuine.

You have approved yourselves to be clear in this matter. So that's what repentance meant to Paul. And that's what repentance still means today. It breaks us up. May I say that only when I am willing to be changed.

Is my repentance genuine? The little girl said repentance is when you're sorry enough to quit. So any soul not disturbed enough to forsake sin has not yet repented in that particular area. They've just had a sorrow of the world for what it costs them.

It's inconvenienced their plans. And it will never last. Submission is the real test of repentance. Yes, Lord. Yes, Lord. Anybody can obey God when they want to, because they're their own motivation. But the test of repentance is when you don't want to, when God's will crosses yours.

I have known people that have made big choices and I commend them for it, but they wanted to. But I'll tell you what, the test of God is when he tells you to do something that you hate to do and you do it anyway.

That's when you change your mind. That's when you repent. God comes and says something. Offer Abraham your Abraham. Offer Isaac your only son. But no, he didn't say, but but many people say, but and there's a but in someone's experience that separates you from fellowship with God.

I want you to do this, but Lord, but and they're always reasonable reasons to us. But from God's standpoint, they're entirely illogical because we fail to take into consideration his grace. And so the test of rebellion is right there for me and for you on that.

But I'll tell you that just this morning, the Lord convicted me of something that I had seen and thought was no big deal. And before I could preach tonight with the promise of his presence, I had to make a covenant with him that as soon as I get back to Atlanta, I'll make it right.

And I don't want to. But I've got to, and if I don't now, if you see something happen to me next week, you'll know that I didn't do it. If you see me go to the woodshed, you'll know it's because I didn't do it, but I'm going to do it.

You asked me, Chuck, on Monday if I've done it now, OK, because I got to I don't want to go to the woodshed. It's going to remain the area of test until we yield, we've got to yield, we've got to face it.

It's God's area of controversy with you, brother. And like we said this morning, he'll leave you in the wilderness until you deal with it and let him change your mind. So repentance is an inner repudiation of independence.

It's when I reject independence and it results in obedience to the Holy Spirit. That's repentance. It's an inner attitude that results in outer action because God is practical. He's practical. Now, it's when you want God enough to give up what the Holy Spirit says, that's wrong.

That's repentance. It's a settled refusal to limit the claims that God can make on my life. I'll serve you this much, but not that much. That's not repentance. That's just convenience. And you're losing God for a stepping stone to your own ideas.

It's got to be, yes, Lord, no, but it's a necessity that my attitude be changed. I've got to have a new approach, a new attitude and you focus God's whole redemptive purpose is to make me holy and you holy in Christ and restore his image in me.

Now, we know this is true. Some of you have sons. I've got three sons, two daughters, and I already see how vulnerable I am. When my children do things that I know will cause them pain, I am extremely vulnerable and I have sort of a semi panic as my son, 15, just got his learner's permit.

And my daughter, 13, came home the other day with the braces off and I almost fell through the floor because she looked like a real woman and I just scared me to death. And then Catherine, who's 11, who's just going to I mean, she's I've already got my shotgun ready.

I'm telling you, I'm concerned. Well, some of you have children that are already in that place and some of them may be causing you pain. I heard about a man that had two sons and one son had three sons and one son was the one son that was rebellious.

And perhaps this being his first born, he might have loved that son even more, not not in the sense of loving them more. But but it hurt him so much when this son became rebellious and went out and went away.

He had raised him the right way, but you see, he tried to reconcile with that son and could not kind of like the prodigal son, Luke 15. And you see, he's not reconciled. The man longed for that son. Perhaps him being gone made him long for him even more than the sons at home.

But this man's heart yearned and he longed to show his love to that son. But while this son was out in a forbidden way, he could not go and just love this boy. Why? Because it would be to sanction what he's doing.

I mean, in a sense, he couldn't just go and just ignore the sin he had to deal with the sin. And when the son wouldn't respond, he had to wait and it broke his heart. It broke his heart. He couldn't go and just fall on his neck because the sons had cross purposes with the will of the father.

And if he did that, the father would never see him come back to what he needed to. He would embrace him, but he couldn't. So he had to wait like the prodigal son's father. And he waited and he waited.

And when he came back, that's prodigal son of chastened been to the hog trough and he'd come to his cell. He come to his right mind. That's repentance. I will arise and I will go. You see, he couldn't just stay in the hog trough with good thoughts.

He had to get up and go. And when he went up and went and he went, he broke the horizon. I can see his father on the rooftop looking out. Those old eyes and grown old looking down that road and where the horizon meets the sky.

There he saw that boy who left so proud now coming back bent. And boy, that old man pulls up his robes and he runs down. He's so old, but he runs out. Love made him limber and love made his eyesight keen.

And he goes and he says, give him a bath, do the best thing for him, because now you can shower him with all that he wants. Let me tell you, that's how God is. He can't show me all the things he longs to show me and bless me the way he longs to bless me as long as I'm doing it my way.

He wants to, but he can't because it would harden me in a state that will never last and I wouldn't enter into the fullness. He's preparing me for eternity, not just time. He's willing for me to be unhappy for a season if I have to be until I'm weaned from the things that dishonor him.

He wants me wholly, not just happy. I'll be happy forever in his presence. And so he's willing. So what's the place of repentance in the word of God? We've got to get to that. I mean, I'm up here practically railing on some of you until you see it in the word.

Look at Isaiah fifty five. I want you to see how deep it goes. We're going to look at a lot of scriptures and I'm asking you now to turn with me. And if you can't turn, then write it down and look at it later.

Isaiah fifty five in the Old Testament, the place of return of repentance. Isaiah fifty five, verse six, seek ye the Lord while he may be found, call upon him while he is near. Let the wicked forsake his way and the unrighteous man, his thoughts.

So here's a man outwardly that's bad, but a man inwardly that's bad outer way and inner thoughts and let him return to the Lord and he will have mercy upon him. And to our God, for he will abundantly pardon.

See, repentance deals with as a man thinketh in his heart and let a man forsake the way that he's always thought about things in his own heart. Why? Verse eight, for my thoughts are not your thoughts and neither are your ways.