Repentance — Alan Redpath

I'd just like to know what I'm speaking in terms to start with, anyway. I'm sure it would take much more than a visit of one week to turn your pastor into an Englishman. It's made a good beginning that way.

I should explain that an English waffle and an American waffle are entirely different, and I much prefer the American waffle. I hope that's what we're having tonight. An English waffle is simply a visit.

When you visit with people, you waffle with them. And I'm thankful that an American waffle is something you eat. Something which I've fallen for in a big way. Now let's read the word together. A portion, I think, in Luke chapter 3, which would clear an acre of ground, as it were, for us.

John the Baptist’s Call to Repentance

Luke chapter 3. I'm going to read tonight in the paraphrase of the English, the Living Bible. Always must remember when you read from the English, from the Living Bible, you're reading a paraphrase and not a translation.

There's a big difference. If you want to know what it is, ask your pastor. But this I like to use from time to time. And to avoid these long words, we'll begin with verse 3. Then John went from place to place on both sides of the Jordan River, preaching that people should be baptized to show that they had turned to God and away from their sins in order to be forgiven.

In the words of Isaiah the prophet, John was a voice shouting from the barren wilderness. Prepare a road for the Lord to travel in. Widen the pathway before him. Level the mountains. Hill up the valleys.

Straighten the curbs. Smooth out the roads. And then all mankind shall see the Savior sent from God. Here's a sample of John's preaching to the crowd that came for baptism. You brood of snakes. You're trying to escape hell without truly turning to God.

That is why you want to be baptized. First, go and prove by the way you live that you really have repented. And don't think you're safe because you're descendants of Abraham. That isn't enough. God can produce children of Abraham from these dead stones.

The axe of his judgment is poised over you, ready to sever your roots and cut you down. Yes, every tree that does not produce good fruit will be chopped down and thrown into the fire. The crowd replied, what do you want us to do?

If you have two coats, he replied, give one to the poor. If you have extra food, give it away to those who are hungry. Even tax collectors, notorious for their corruption, came to be baptized and asked, how shall we prove to you that we have abandoned our sins?

By your honesty, he replied. Make sure you collect no more taxes than the Roman government requires you to. And us, ask some soldiers, what about us? He and John replied, don't extort money by threats and violence.

Don't accuse anyone of what you know he didn't do. And be content with your pay. Everyone was expecting the Messiah to come soon, and eager to know whether or not John was he. This was the question of the hour, and was being discussed everywhere.

Jesus answered the question by saying, I baptize only with water. But someone is coming soon, who has far higher authority than mine. In fact, I am not even worthy of being his slave. He will baptize you with fire, with the Holy Spirit.

He will separate chaff from grain, and burn up the chaff with eternal fire, and store away the grain. He used many such warnings as he announced the good news to the people. Now just a word of prayer together.

Would you echo in your heart the prayer which I offer on your behalf and on my own? Speak, Lord, for thy servant heareth. Speak just now. Some message to meet my need, which thou only dost know. Speak now through thy holy word, and make me see some wonderful truth thou hast to show to me.

For Jesus' sake. Amen. Would you just for a minute allow me a moment of recapitulation concerning this morning. We were talking together about how a Christian gives himself away by his reactions based on the fact that he is living a supernatural life in the power of the indwelling spirit of God.

Repentance as the Mark of the Christian

I want this evening to say a few words to you about what lies at the root of that experience and what is the explanation for it. What do you think is the most distinguishing factor about a Christian? What is it that makes the difference between him and an unbeliever?

What is it that is absolutely at the root of the Christian experience of every one of us, if we're genuine, here tonight? The theological word is the word repentance. A Christian is a broken man. A repentant man.

Acts 17 and verse 30, taken from the sermon of the apostle Paul at Athens, says, the times of ignorance God overlooked, that now he commands all men everywhere to repent, because he has fixed a day on which he will judge the world in righteousness by a man whom he appointed.

And of this he has given assurance to all men by raising him from the dead. God commands all men everywhere now to repent. Now this city in these days of this particular year, indeed this country, is embarking upon this tremendous key project.

A wonderful thing to do, but unless it has this word of repentance right at the heart of it, it means nothing. Over and over again for generations, this and other countries have engaged in mass evangelism, and the country has been left practically the same after it was all over.

You can never win a city to Christ by mass evangelism. Now please, please don't get a postcard out and write a letter to Billy Graham and saying I was having a crack at him, because that wouldn't be true.

I happen to be, I trust, a good friend of his, he certainly isn't mine, and I pray for him regularly and thank the Lord for his ministry. But in 1962 we had a Billy Graham crusade in Chicago. Quite tremendous it was.

I was vice chairman of the committee planning that crusade, a thing for which I got raked over the coals, but that's another issue, I didn't mind. I just rolled up my sleeves and went to it, and I would do it again if ever I had the opportunity.

And at the end of that crusade we had about, I think it was 48 referrals to us at Moody Church. We were all thrilled and many, many ministers could have said exactly the same. I think there were about 8 ,000 who professed conversion.

That was quite tremendous. But you know, supposing, supposing, every member of Moody Church had led one individual to Christ in that one whole year. How many people do you think we'd have added? 2 ,600.

The difference, you see, is that you'll never, never do it. That crusade, Billy Graham himself turned to me on the platform and he said, you know, if the church was doing its job, I'd be out of work. But how does the church do its job?

I mean, is it by program? It may be to some extent necessary. Or is it by some strange, strange motivation that comes to a life of a Christian who has really, really repented? I believe, I believe that evangelism is based on this word repentance.

A word which we really haven't understood in our own experience. As a matter of fact, this word has become to mean to me as a Christian, the most wonderful word in New Testament teaching. So may I just take one moment to be quite sure that you don't think I'm sort of, I just have a line on this.

Let me take a moment to show you the tremendous prominence this word takes in the New Testament. I was amazed as I really made a study of this to find that this is the prominent word. For instance, in Matthew's Gospel at the third chapter in the second verse, you have the similar account to that which I have just read of the opening of the ministry of John the Baptist.

Incidentally, this is in brackets. There are many things in the Bible I don't understand. I used to think I knew all the answers, but now I don't. Lots of things I don't understand. So what I've done with them is, I've put them down in a little book.

And I'm taking that book up to heaven with me in order that I might really get the answers. As a matter of fact, probably on the way up I shall lose it. In any case, I suppose I'll know the answers when I get there.

But listen, do you know the answer to this one? Why did Jesus allow John the Baptist to be beheaded? What an amazing disciple he would have been. Tremendous. After all, our Lord saved Peter from the same fate.

He could easily have saved John the Baptist, but he didn't choose to. But you see, when I don't understand anything in the Bible, I don't make it the basis of unbelief. But I make it the basis of worship.

For if I understood all the answers, I'd be God. So I just don't understand. But this man, who was to me the one who would usher in the ministry of the Lord Jesus Christ, began his ministry by saying, Repent ye, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand.

Matthew 3 and verse 2. And then our Lord himself, after 30 years of preparation, for 3 years of ministry, and again in brackets, just a moment, we've reversed all that. We have 3 years of preparation for 30 years and more of ministry.

After 30 years of preparation, our Lord comes from the privacy of Nazareth out to the Jordan. And there, heaven opens upon him, and a voice speaks which says, This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased.

The Father's approval of the life of his dear Son for all those years. And then, as Mark tells us, he was driven by the Spirit into the wilderness. For a face-to-face combat, when God's perfect man encountered the greatest rebel in the universe.

And Jesus came out from that encounter unscathed and began to preach. As I think of that, I want to curl up. I've finished preaching almost, with ever having known an encounter like that. But Jesus, after an encounter with Satan, came in the authority and power of the Spirit, and said, Repent ye, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand.

Matthew 4 and verse 17. And this then became the first word of the gospel. And then after he had risen from the dead, he got around him a little group of people, who had committed their lives to him. 12 of them, 11 of them.

By the way, that should silence, should silence forever, the idea that the success of a ministry depends on results. If that was true, he was a hopeless failure. 12 convicts, one of them a traitor. And gathering them around him, he says in Luke chapter 24 and verse 46.

Thus it behoved the Son of Man to suffer, to be killed, to rise from the dead, and that repentance and remission of sins should be preached in his name among all nations. Then, Peter, on that day of Pentecost, the man who must have thought that his ministry was finished, yet the chosen spokesman of heaven for the most strategic sermon ever preached in history, stood up and preached the word with such power, that the congregation said to him, Men and brethren, what shall we do?

I wish that people said that today more than they do after our sermons are not their fault, it's ours. The same authority was in our pulpit, the same conviction would be in the congregation. But with tremendous sense of conviction, the crowd said, Oh, what shall we do?

And Peter's answer immediately was, Repent and be baptized, every one of you, for the remission of sins. And then Paul takes up the same feet. In Acts 26, giving his testimony before King Agrippa about his conversion, he says, Wherefore, King Agrippa, I was not disobedient to the heavenly vision, but proclaimed to all in Damascus, Jerusalem, Judea, Jews, and Gentiles, that they should repent and turn to God, and bring forth fruit, meat for repentance.

And you remember, to crown it all, in the seven letters to the churches in Asia Minor, to five of them, the Lord said, Repent, or else. This then, I suggest to you, is the dominant word in New Testament experience.

And yet, it's the neglected chord in the evangelical symphony today. Today, and for a generation, it's been, Believe, Believe, Believe, Believe. And heaven comes thundering back at us and says, No, repent, repent, repent.

For faith in Christ, which is not based upon repentance and followed by obedience, is invalid. Absolutely invalid and meaningless. I hope, therefore, I've said enough to establish the fact that this is not a queer idea I've got hold of.

But this is the main emphasis of New Testament teaching. Change your mind, change your actions, repent. Now then, let's just take a minute to ask ourselves what this word means. What does it mean? I think maybe, maybe I could describe what it means by telling you what it doesn't mean.

Repentance Is Not Penance or Mere Remorse

For instance, it doesn't mean doing penance, as with the greatest respect and love in the Roman Catholic view. When the Greek word for repentance was translated into Latin, it became the word penitentia.

And that word has two shades of meaning. The one meaning repentance as we know it, and I'll describe it to you in a moment. The other meaning doing penance. And consequently, through history, we have this word which led to absolution, confession, doing penance, and the priesthood.

But you know, the New Testament won't stand for that. Because the Lord Jesus Christ at Calvary did a perfect work to which we can add nothing for the salvation and forgiveness of our sins. Have you ever allowed yourselves to be absolutely thrilled by the language of Hebrews chapter 10 and verses 12 to 14?

You can look them up if you wish, but I'll give you what they say. Every priest, daily, oftentimes, sacrifices, offering sacrifices, the same sacrifices which can never take away sin. Every priest, standard, daily, offering, oftentimes, the same sacrifices which can never take away sin.

That's the most monotonous verse in the Bible. But this man, when he had offered one sacrifice for sin forever, sat down at the right hand of God. That's a thrilling verse. See, in the tabernacle there was all sorts of bits of furniture.

There was a table, there was a lamp stand, there was an altar, but there wasn't any chair. Poor fellow, he could never sit down. At it day and night, constantly on duty, daily ministering, oftentimes, the same sacrifice which could never take away sin, and never finished.

But this man, when he had offered one sacrifice for sin forever, sat down on the right hand of God. Jesus, our Lord. So repentance does not mean doing penance. And repentance does not mean remorse. At least only in part.

Remorse means that I am sorry for the consequences I have done, of sin I have done. Not for sin itself. Sorry because I have lost face in the sight of other people as a result of what I have done. You see, remorse follows the breaking of the eleventh commandment.

Perhaps you thought there were only ten. There aren't really, there are eleven. And the eleventh is, thou shalt not be found out. In a permissive society, everything is okay if you are not such a fool as to be caught.

You have, in these days, that tremendous statement, it's alright when you have situational ethics. Everything is okay, no longer any standard of right and wrong. That's all gone now. And remorse follows the fact that you have been caught and found out, and your sin has been discovered, in the eyes of other people, you have lost face.

Your reputation has suffered. You have that in the Bible, an example of it, for instance, in 1 Samuel, chapter 15, and verse 30, where Saul is talking to Samuel, and says to him, I have sinned. And the next breath he says, honour me before the people.

That's not repentance. I have sinned. Yes, but honour me before the people. Sorry for the consequences of what he had done, but not sorry for the thing itself. That's not repentance. The Bible says, in 2 Corinthians, chapter 7, there is a godly sorrow and a sorrow of the world.

There's all the difference between the two. If I'm only sorry for the consequences of what I've done, and the ignominy of being found out, I just perpetuate the situation because I leave myself at the centre of the picture.

Understood? Strutting round in my own little kingdom. But repentance, when it hits me, gets me right out of that situation altogether. So, let me say, having said what repentance is not, what it is. The word for repentance is the word metanoia.

Two words, really. It means a change of mind, leading to a change of behaviour. Meta means after. Noia, to think. Think again. Remember the Lord Jesus told us the story about the man who had two sons.

And said to them, go work today in my vineyard. And one of them said, I will not. But afterward, he repented and went. So repentance means a change of mind, leading to a change of behaviour, change of action.

Repentance Changes Our View of God

Now then, what do I change my mind about? Well, when I repent, I change my mind about God, to start with. There are some strange ideas about God going around today in the theological climate. He's a sort of policeman.

Someone we mustn't get too near. Someone who's snipping around to take all the kicks out of life. He's our enemy. But you know, when I find and meet God in Jesus Christ, I discover something wonderful.

He's not against me, he's for me. He's on my side. When I meet him in Jesus, I change my mind about God. I have a friend who is a minister in the church in Scotland. He's a Presbyterian. And he has four children.

And one weekend recently, his wife said to him, look, I'm going away for a weekend. I can't take these kids any longer. They're just getting me down. One especially. She said, I'll take away three, but I'll leave that boy with you.

I really can't cope any longer. Because he was always talking. Like turning on a tap. He'd never stop. They couldn't keep him quiet. Nothing would keep him quiet. So she said, I'll take away the three and leave the one with you.

So my friend was a preacher, and he said, well, all right. But I'll have to decide on some strategy on this. So he decided that he'd go to bed at 8 o 'clock on a Saturday night together with a boy. Bring a little boy's bed in and put it in his room and then go to bed.

And get him fast asleep and get up again about 4 o 'clock in the morning and continue his preparation for the next day. Well, that boy went on talking all that Saturday. And at 8 o 'clock at night, he put him, got him into bed.

Now he said, son, shut up. Not another word. For 10 minutes there was silence. Then suddenly in the darkness, having put out the light, suddenly there was a voice that said, daddy. Oh, he's at it again.

What is it, son? Daddy, is your face turned this way? Yes, son, it is. Thank you, daddy. And not another word. The boy went sound asleep. And my friend, if I didn't say another word to you, it would be worth coming to Tyler, Texas, to tell you that God's face is always turned your way.

He's never against you. A man or a girl, fellow woman, could go to the end of a skid row, but God is still for them. He's against their sin, but he's for them. And when I realize that God in Jesus has made provision for the forgiveness of all my past through the cross of Calvary, and ensured the potential for all my future by the power of Christ indwelling my life, then everything makes sense.

Nothing means anything to me about religion until I understand that. I've got hold of it. When you see it, that there at the cross, God makes provision to forgive all my past. And he makes provision to fulfill my maximum potential in the power of his Spirit in my heart every day.

God is not against me. He is for me. I changed my mind about God. Some years ago in Chicago, I'd better be careful when I don't want to get in the hot water or skate on thin ice, whatever it is. But I was at a seminary, not as a student, where the program for the seminary for the year was being given to them by the president.

And you know, it sent a chill down my spine. Or it was put much more ably than I could ever put it, but it boiled down to this. Achieve your maximum potential. Major in the things in which you succeeded.

And, this was not the language, but this was the message, be a big shot. Be a big shot. Just that week, I'd received a telephone call from a church in New Jersey, which were without a minister. And the chairman of the board was on the phone, and he called me and said, Pastor Redpathway, without a pastor, do you know anybody in Chicago area who might come and help us?

Well, I named one or two, three or four men, and I discussed with him their qualification, their degrees. He asked me all these questions, the seminaries they'd been at, etc., etc., etc. It took about three quarts of an hour.

I didn't mind, it was his call. But we went on and on and on and on, and then I shall never forget how he finished. He said, thank you so much, thank you so much, that's kind of you. But he said, frankly, none of those men are big enough for our pulpit.

Big enough? I said to him, sir, are you quite sure you don't mean they're not small enough? God reduces a man to a minimum that he might do through him his maximum. That's the whole principle of evangelism, the whole principle of Christian service.

And unless we realize that, we'll have our big schemes and our big projects and our big ideas. But I'll tell you, we'll get nowhere. For we haven't learned that without me, said Jesus, you can do nothing.

Repentance Changes Our View of Ourselves

I changed my mind about God. And, of course, this inevitably means I changed my mind about myself when I repent. You know, most of us think, let's be honest, most of us think we're a decent sort of people.

And we're all so conceited that we put self at the center of the picture. The basic problem I find today in preaching is not telling people the truth, it's getting them to unlearn error. Things we've learned in the wrong way.

The trouble is not that we don't know enough, but we've learned so much and absorbed so many ideas like blotting paper without ever sifting them out or thinking them through. The prodigal thought he was a fine fellow when he left home, but his repentance began when he came to himself.

And the mental mechanism that we've all got butters us up, make us think we're great people. But it's a tremendous moment when I come to terms with God's verdict concerning what I am. You see, when sin came into the world, how did it come?

It didn't come because man or woman ate of the fruit. That was sin in action. Sin came into the world when man believed the devil's lie, that he could be man without God. And he went it alone. But disastrous consequences ever since, I think it's Major Thomas who says that ever since that day, man, though never anything more than man, has been strutting around as though he was never anything less than God.

And when Jesus came into the world, he came, he came. Never anything less than God to live and behave as never anything more than man. Man as God intended him to be. And repentance begins, begins at the moment when I exchange my independence from God for my dependence upon him.

That's repentance. In other words, I get off the throne and I put Jesus on it. No longer do I seek to live my life with self and control, but I begin to live a life in dependence upon the Lord. I wonder if we've seen the significance of this and how in life, you know, you parents here, you and I.

You remember the day when you held in your arms the first little child that God gave you? And you said, looking very sentimentally at your wife or your husband, isn't he or she an angel? He wasn't around more than three months before you discovered there was something other than an angel there, wasn't there?

My word, yes. You never have to teach a child to do wrong. You always have to teach it to do right. My daughter, my elder daughter, wouldn't like me to tell you this, but she's a long way in Africa now, so it's all right.

When she was about eight, she had a boyfriend. It was her first love affair. Very sweet. He was nine, lived next door. Every morning they had a date, never failed, seven days a week, a date at 8 .30. And he used to come into our garden, jump on the garden gate and swing on the gate.

And she would be there to meet him and swing on the gate together. Rather sweet, really. But this particular morning, she went out at the appointed time and he didn't appear. Never came. So he swung, he didn't arrive.

I knew, I knew, not by looking at her face, but by looking at her back, that he was in for a bad time. You can always tell what a girl thinks of by looking at her back. Presently in about half an hour, this boy arrived late.

Thinked it didn't matter. Just jumped on the gate beside her. And she took her elbow and gave him a terrific push and he slipped and fell right on his back and his head in the path. Now no Englishman takes that from a lady lying down.

And so he got up and slapped her. I heard the crack through the window. And you know, what was my amazement? Because that daughter of mine had always been one of the placid variety, you know, the type.

When I saw her get hold of that boy by the scruff of the neck and shake him like a rat. And they both fell off the gate, both fell onto the path. Well, I had to go and rescue him. Poor fellow, he was having an awful time with nails and teeth and all that a girl uses when she's really, really blowing her top.

What do you think that was caused by? Just two people who were selfish. Just two people who were jealous. Just two people who couldn't get on together. Just two people who thought, well, now the only answer to all of this is a stand-up fight.

What do you think causes unhappy marriage? What do you think causes breakdown on home level? Just exactly the same thing. Two people who haven't learned to live together. Two people who want their own way.

Very soon jealousy, envy come in. We found ourselves overwhelmed. I changed my mind about myself. Self in me, which, amazing to say, in spite of years of Christian profession and Christian experience, hits back at me.

In ordinary, nitty-gritty situations of life. Changed my mind about myself. I love the Twenth Living Bible paraphrase of Romans 7 .18. Here it is. I know I am rotten through and through. As far as my own sinful nature is concerned.

No matter which way I turn, I can't make myself do right. I want to, but I can't. That's coming to terms with the Lord's view on me. Rotten through and through. Have I ever admitted it? That the cross of Jesus Christ leaves me without a leg to stand on.

I changed my mind about myself. Another thing. I changed my mind about other people. Until I've repented, I'm always thinking about what others should do for me. And so I live selfishly. But when repentance comes, I begin to love people, love my neighbor.

Look on him not as a rival, but a partner. Somebody to whom I give the same attention as myself. 2 Corinthians 5 .16, Paul says, Henceforth I know no man after the flesh. In other words, I'm not going to allow my likes and dislikes to be governed by race, color, background.

That's repentance. I have traveled some five years on mission fields. Do you know what's done the most harm in every mission field in the world? The imagined superiority of the white race. We don't seem able to get it out of our system.

We're the bosses. I stood in the country of Zaire, not so long ago, Congo, in the midst of a tribe of pygmies. I was introduced to the chief. I could just reach him. He was about three feet high. He stretched up his hand, we shook hands.

And the missionary who introduced us said, Well, that's amazing. I said, What do you mean? He said, You both said exactly the same thing. What did we say? He said, Good morning, brother. Brother? Well, he's three feet, I'm six feet too.

He's black, I'm white. He had his birthday suit on, I had a suit of clothes on. I can't imagine two people more unlike each other in all God's creation. But brother? Oh, my friend, that's the church. And if we understood that, we'd treat each other a little differently.

We wouldn't always be hiding off and forming our own Bible-believing independent church. We'd need another of those like we need a hole in the head. I tell you, we wouldn't. We'd grieve the Holy Spirit.

We'd find ourselves loving each other and disagreeing agreeably. And keeping rank and holding fellowship instead of disagreeing disagreeably and breaking up. I changed my mind about other people. And there's nothing the Church of Christ in America needs today than a baptism of love.

Repentance in Restored Relationships

Holy Spirit love. One thing that'll see Key Project 73 right off the ground, love. Priests who may disagree on some matters of theology but are bound together by the love of Christ because they're all indwelled by God the Holy Spirit.

They've been born again. That's the church. Now, may I ask you just a moment before we stop. How's this going to work out in my life? Well, listen. It means that I'm prepared to put right the past. You remember little Zacchaeus?

Many, many people in the Bible have said, I've sinned and made the confession. Pharaoh said that, but he went on sinning. Balaam said it, but he went on from bad to worse. Saul, but he put the blame on other people.

Judas, but he committed suicide. But little Zacchaeus, that income tax collector, up his little sycamore tree, heard a shout from Christ and he came down with a thump. And he said, Lord, half my goods I give to the poor.

In other words, I get straight with my neighbor. If I've taken from anything, anything from anyone falsely, I restore him fourfold. I put right the past. May I say very lovingly to you, but with deep conviction, that nobody has repented if they're still living in a relationship, in a broken relationship, which they have never attempted to repair.

May I say that again? Nobody has truly repented. If you are living with a broken relationship, which you've made no attempt. I almost tremble to suggest it, but is there somebody in Tyler, or anywhere else for that matter, who would never come to church, who isn't a bit impressed by your witness and by your churchgoing and by your fellowship and all that you're doing, would never darken a church door, because they're bearing the scars of a wound that you or I have afflicted.

They're bearing the scars of a wound that you or I have afflicted. And we've never had the grace to go and say, I'm sorry, let's repent. Get right back into the past. Have I begun repenting? I'm not truly repenting unless, like Judas, I abandon the fruit of my sin.

Many people haven't gone so far as he did. We've still got the thirty pieces of silver in our pockets. But repentance has a future reference. I notice in that passage which I read to you this evening, when people came to John the Baptist and said, Lord, what do we do?

Bring forth fruits, meet for repentance was his answer. And I noticed that all fruits for repentance were in the realm of money, property, and a man who brings his life into line with the law of God, in repentance does so in his home, and the way he gets his money and spends it, and the way he does his job, and the way he keeps his standards, and in every relationship with friends.

Repentance as a Lifelong Walk

And you see, the thing that's come to mean so much to me in this word is this, that this isn't something that happens when I'm converted and I'm finished with it. It isn't just that I give up some sins then of which I'm conscious and stop doing them.

Oh no, it's not that. It's the beginning of a process when my mind is lit up by the Holy Spirit on renewed areas of the word of God, and there isn't a day, there isn't a day when God doesn't call upon me for some fresh repentance on some new truth.

And say, somebody might be saying to me, but listen, didn't you once write a book called Victorious Christian Living? Yeah. Well, where's the victory in that? If I wrote that book again, don't you believe it anymore, you say?

Oh yes, I believe it. Of course I do. But if I wrote that book again, I'd like to add a chapter on repentance. Dear Dr. Tozer, that man of God who such a helped me in Chicago days, writes in his book, Book in Pursuit of God, this.

To omit repentance from Christian experience is to invite another Pearl Harbor into spiritual warfare. The life of the redeemed ought to be a constant attitude of repentance. It must get into every relationship of life, home, church, husband, family, wife, friends.

As soon as we cease repenting, we lose our peace. And you see, basically it just means this, that every time I take a step out of the will of God, I have to take a step back into it. That's repentance.

Have you done that recently? Dear friend, how's your repentance getting on? Is it up to date? Up to date? Before you can ever speak to touch taller, with a real, real touch of Holy Spirit power and life and authority.

Oh God, God never gives the power of His Spirit to a man who hasn't been broken at the cross. Have you repented? I wonder if tonight, even tonight, if you're to be honest, there's a letter to be written.