I’ve thought alot about the question – “By bypassing repentance, are we extending a false hope?”
The answer is definitely YES, we do extend a false hope by overlooking repentance! Repentance is such a bondage-breaking experience. Laying our sins at the foot of the cross and walking from them, brings real hope!
I love hearing the all-is-well, pump-you-up, so-you-feel-good-about-yourself sermon as much as the next gal, but when I walk away, I realize that all is not well and no matter how much I tell myself that I am great and lovable, the reality is I still have to face this world as it is. And it is NOT the way I would like it to be and it is NOT the way it was supposed to be. Where do I go with that? Do I say, Oh well, I’ll just wait for the next all-is-well, pump-me-up, so-I-feel-good-about-myself sermon? Or do I seek to find real hope? A hope that lasts. That as I lay my burdens at the cross and I repent of the sins that I have committed against God, who is all-powerful and could tear me away from breath at any moment, that He will not only restore innocence before Him, but also restore the innocence that I lost in my own mind to set me free to enjoy the wonders of this world!
This was a follow up to an essay by my friend, Danny Mann, who is on the faculty of the New York School of the Bible.
Here is the original essay:
Sensitivity towards the seeker is Biblically mandated. We’re called on to humbly enter the lives of others to the extent of becoming a Jew to a Jew and homeless to someone who is homeless (1 Cor. 9:19-22). However, this principle does have its limits. Scripture never gives us permission to hide offensive elements of the Gospel message in order to make it more attractive. To do so is nothing less than misrepresentation, a preaching of a different Gospel, and a failure to trust our God with His own plan of salvation.
However, we want to see results and count heads. This is only natural. Throughout the 1700s, the U.S. South was acknowledged to be a Christ-less place. The North repeatedly sent missionaries with an anti-slavery message of repentance and faith in Christ. However, the South would have none of it! Their world had been built on slavery.
Understandably, the missionaries gravitated to a more seeker-sensitive message. In order to win the South for Christ, they conveniently dropped the part about slavery being a sin, and it worked. At least, it seemed like it did. Today, we do many things that seem to work. We don’t bring up Darwinism or Creationism, even though it’s so clear that God’s initial creation was “very good” (Gen. 1:31) and we screwed it up, as opposed to the Darwinian account of an initial screwed-up, brutal and bloody fight for survival. We don’t bring up questions of sexual preferences and we never are so insensitive as to correct another’s errant theology. We’re determined to be more gracious than God and stock our mega-churches to overflowing. But at what cost?
By bypassing repentance, are we extending a false hope? Are we preaching a salvation which isn’t God’s? Are we watering down our churches and consequently making them into just another worldly institution, bringing disrepute upon our faith and Lord?
Do we have the right to pick and choose what we preach according to prevailing fashions? The apostle Paul recoiled from such an idea. In his final meeting with the Ephesian elders, he confessed:
I have declared to both Jews and Greeks that they must turn to God in repentance and have faith in our Lord Jesus…Therefore, I declare to you today that I am innocent of the blood of all men. For I have not hesitated to proclaim to you the whole will of God. (Acts 20:21, 26-27)
Although we might attain results by dropping offensive teachings, this will not argue in favor of our “innocence” before God. Granted, there is a great temptation to withhold the “unattractive” aspects of the Gospel. But are we truly wise enough to reject certain teachings, namely regarding repentance, because we don’t see them as necessary? Perhaps we just have to trust God for the results! Actually, in the long run, faithfulness will bear the best fruit.
And the follow up:
I received many responses regarding my last essay in which I questioned the viability of a salvation message without a full-bodied call to repentance. One response was from Chris, a former lesbian, who has a great heart and understanding for others caught in this lifestyle:
“We go to the PrideFest parade and picnic with a message of Radical
Love…I’m always amazed at how comfortable I feel at PrideFest. It’s like, I
know these people. They’re my kin. They’re my family…I understand them.
I know what they want and I know how they feel. I’m not so far removed
from them that I can’t remember myself there…They really just want to be normal people, but feel that it is unobtainable, so they settle for what is available, faults and all…The people I talk to there are happy to see me, though they know why I’m there. They know that I’m there to love them…”
Despite her sensitivity regarding this struggle, she still recognizes the necessity for repentance:
“I’ve thought a lot about the question – “By bypassing repentance, are we extending a false hope?” The answer is definitely YES, we do extend a false hope by overlooking repentance! Repentance is such a bondage-breaking experience. Laying our sins at the foot of the cross and walking from them, brings real hope!…I repent of the sins that I have committed against God…that He will not only restore innocence before Him, but also restore the innocence that I lost in my own mind to set me free to enjoy the wonders of this world!”
Salvation without repentance is a plane with one wing. It’s not going anywhere. An example will help to demonstrate this absurdity. Imagine a bigamist, who has secretly married multiple women to bilk them out of their money. He is told that Christ will forgive all his sins and grant him eternal life apart from repentance. It sounds like a great deal, so he takes it without any intention of changing his behavior. The church receives him as a brother but must immediately caste him out of their midst for being unrepentant of his bigamy—the height of absurdity!
This is absurd because it divides what is inseparable–faith and repentance–opposite sides of the same coin. We can’t have one without the other! The very same motion that turns us to God in faith, turns us away (repentance) from our former ways. We can’t truly turn to God without turning from something else! Therefore, if someone says he has faith but is unwilling to repent, his faith isn’t a true faith (James 2:14-26)!
Scripture reflects this same connection between faith and repentance. These two concepts are so closely associated that they are used interchangeably. Repentance, like faith, is preached as a prerequisite for forgiveness (Acts 2:38; 3:19; 8:22; Luke 24:47). Consequently, in the same way that faith comes as a gift from God (Eph. 2:8-9), so too does its counterpart (2 Tim. 2:25; Acts 5:31; 11:18), so that boasting is eliminated.
We can’t turn to God without turning from sin. This doesn’t mean that we won’t continue to struggle with sin, but it does mean that we will confess our sins and turn from them, although perhaps with difficulty and backsliding. But a refusal to repent is a rejection of the gift of eternal life, while a refusal to preach repentance is a betrayal of the Gospel.