LOOKING TO PRAISE AND WORSHIP JESUS THE CHRIST, THE SON OF THE LIVING GOD. 18 No man has ever seen God at any time; the only unique Son, or the only begotten God, Who is in the bosom [in the intimate presence] of the Father, He has declared Him [He has revealed Him and brought Him out where He can be seen; He has interpreted Him and He has made Him known].

Saturday, September 15, 2007

Spurgeon Preached Repentance

To counter-act even more misinformation on another blog... Yes, Spurgeon preached repentance...

The entire sermon can be found here - http://www.monergism.com/thethreshold/articles/onsite/spurgeon_regfaith.html

Now, let me say a word or two in reply to certain questions. But must not a man repent as well as believe? Reply: No man ever believed but what he repented at the same time. Faith and repentance go together. they must. If I trust Christ to save me from sin, I am at the same time repenting of sin, and my mind is changed in relation to sin, and everything else that has to do with its state. All the fruits meet for repentance are contained in faith itself. You will never find that a man who trusts Christ remains an enemy of God, or a lover of sin. The fact that he accepts the atonement provided is proof positive that he loathes sin, and that his mind is thoroughly changed in reference to God. Moreover, as to all the graces which are produced in the Christian afterwards, are they not all to be found in embryo in faith? "Only believe, and you shall be save," is the cry which many sneer at, and others misunderstand; but do you know what "only believe" means? Do you know what a world of meaning lies in that word? Read that famous chapter to the Hebrews, and see what faith has done and is still able to do, and you will see that it is no trifle. Wherever there is faith in a man let it but develop itself and there will be a purging of himself from sin, a separating himself from the world, a conflict with evil, and a warring for the glory of Christ, which nothing else could produce. Faith is in itself one of the noblest of graces; it is the compendium of all virtues; and as sometimes there will lie within one single ear enough seed to make a whole garden fertile, so, within that one word "faith," there lies enough of virtue to make earth blessed; enough of grace, if the Spirit make it to grow, to turn the fallen into the perfect. Faith is not the easy and light thing men think. Far are we from ascribing salvation to the profession of a mere creed, we loathe the idea; neither do we ascribe salvation to a fond persuasion, but we do ascribe salvation to Jesus Christ, and the obtaining of it to that simple, child like confidence which lovingly casts itself into the arms of him who gave both his hands to the nail and suffered to the death for the sins of his people. He who believes, then, is saved—rest assured of that. "Everyone who believes that Jesus is the Christ has been born of God"

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6 Comments:

Blogger Daniel said...

My first reaction when I read the title (Spurgeon preached repentance) was to say to my self, "well duh - no kidding...how can you preach the gospel without it?"

I think one of the reasons some rail against the notion of repentance is because they confuse repentance with penance. That is they imagine that repentance means to "stop doing bad and to start doing good" or some such nonsense. They may couch what they believe in right sounding words - that is they may well speak of a "change in mind" etc, but what they really mean is that they have changed their mind about "bringing to an end the doing of what was bad and beginning to do what is good." That is they don't understand what it means to have a change of heart. They confuse it with having a change in practice, or a change in direction, or even a change of mind about the way we are going to approach trying to earn our salvation.

But repentance happens when God changes our heart so that we suddenly are able to overcome our lifelong and continued rebellion, and instead of rejecting the yoke of obedience, we are willing to bear it to be with Christ - this bowing of the knee before the king doesn't mean that we will be eternally perfect in our obedience, but it means that when God's spirit came upon us we were in that moment -willing- to be, and that willingness to surrender all is the foundation upon which saving faith is built, that foundation is the heart of Christ that was put in us - it wasn't generated by us - it was placed in us, and whatever we build must be built upon that foundation or those who build it work in vain.

Repentance is not a thing we produce by some effort or new method, or intellectual persuasion - no one can be intellectually persuaded to surrender everything about themselves to Christ - we can be persuaded that it is good and right to do so, but conviction is the odor and not the substance, and no one who has tasted the difference could ever mistake the two.

Yet I fear that there are some who will continue to misunderstand what repentance is, and will continue to presume that you can be saved without coming to Christ in your heart - as long as you come to him with your lips, good intentions, and a certainty that doing so has got you into the fold.

Confusing one's own certainty for saving faith is a tragic error.

September 15, 2007 11:51 PM

 
Blogger mark pierson said...

Daniel, Spurgeon has been quoted and used out of context lately; that's the reason for this post.

Thanks so much for your comment. You are a blessing to me and to so many of the contributors here at BC blog.

Hope you join the team.

Mark

September 16, 2007 12:15 AM

 
Blogger Daniel said...

Mark I sent you an email. I would be >honored< to join.

September 16, 2007 12:16 AM

 
Blogger Daniel said...

I am just glad I didn't have to arm wrestle you for a place on the team.

September 16, 2007 12:17 AM

 
Blogger mark pierson said...

"I am just glad I didn't have to arm wrestle you for a place on the team."

You'd prolly win.

September 16, 2007 11:50 AM

 
Blogger Daniel said...

well, maybe with the carpal tunnel, but only because... otherwise... ;-0

September 16, 2007 4:34 PM

 

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