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Thoughtful Thoughts 17 Jan. 2025 by John Dunning. REPENTANCE

1). INTRODUCTION… Houston, we have a problem…

a). The weakness of the Anglican church in England to teach what the Bible said about sin was highlighted in January 2020, when the Bishop of Liverpool cancelled the contracts it had made with Franklin Graham (Billy Graham’s son), for its churches to be used for his evangelistic outreach tour in the city. That became a story on the national news, and when interviewed about it, the Bishop said that Franklin Graham’s views on sin was “hate speech”. After that, Billy Graham’s son took the evangelistic outreach to other venues, but felt that he had to sue the church in court for breach of contract, in order that the Gospel message was not besmirched;- and he won the case. 

b). When David Pawson talked about his journey of faith, he said his journey with Jesus started without any help from the Methodist church he had been brought up in. Having had an Anglican upbringing myself, I can identify with his point completely, as that was my experience too, except that a church worker gave me a small KJV Bible at age 8, which I started reading as best I could, which led onto me knowing just enough to reach out to God at age 11, asking Jesus to be my Lord and Saviour. The point of saying all this is, that after David Pawson became a church pastor, he found that nearly all the problems that Christians came to him with, for counselling, all had a common denominator. They all had a lack of understanding of what a Christian was in the New Testament, and what Jesus meant when He said ‘You must be born again’.

David Pawson said that it took him 17 years from start to finish, to complete the process of being ‘Born Again’ by the New Testament definition of what a Christian is. It was not the church which showed him the New Testament way as it had not taught him about repentance, believer’s baptism, or the Holy Spirit. So this week we start a mini series on this subject, by looking at repentance. 

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2). WHAT JESUS TAUGHT…

a). RECOGNISING SIN…

Jesus said that when a repentant sinner begged for forgiveness in the temple, God heard 

Him. But when a religious leader prayed without repenting, his prayer was not heard.

(Luke 18:9-14).

The Anglican Alpha course in lesson 3 fails to teach the condition of repenting before asking for forgiveness. Listen, to repent is what we do. To forgive is what God does. So, it is no good teaching what God does, but leave out what we have to do in order to be forgiven. This point is important as God requires repentance before forgiving us. Thanks to Billy Graham, this became the most widely known requirement that most people in the world are aware of, before asking for forgiveness from God.

In contrast to the Alpha course, Christianity Explored tries to correct the weakness in the Alpha course by setting aside a lesson on sin. John Stott put Rico Tice in charge of Christianity Explored. However, even Rico Tice became so disillusioned with the church’s position on sin and repentance, that he wrote to the Archbishop of Canterbury to ask what the official position was. The reply he had from the highest authority in the church was so disappointing, that he recently resigned from the Anglican Church, because he said, “It no longer preaches repentance”.

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b). STOPPING SIN. (What Jesus said.)

John 8:1. Jesus returned to the Mount of Olives, 2. but early the next morning he was back again at the Temple. A crowd soon gathered, and he sat down and taught them. 3. As he was speaking, the teachers of religious law and the Pharisees brought a woman who had been caught in the act of adultery. They put her in front of the crowd.

4. “Teacher,” they said to Jesus, “this woman was caught in the act of adultery. 5. The law of Moses says to stone her. What do you say?”

6. They were trying to trap him into saying something they could use against him, but Jesus stooped down and wrote in the dust with his finger. 7. They kept demanding an answer, so he stood up again and said, “All right, but let the one who has never sinned throw the first stone!” 8. Then he stooped down again and wrote in the dust.

9. When the accusers heard this, they slipped away one by one, beginning with the oldest, until only Jesus was left in the middle of the crowd with the woman. 10. Then Jesus stood up again and said to the woman, “Where are your accusers? Didn’t even one of them condemn you?”

11. “No, Lord,” she said.

And Jesus said, “Neither do I. Go and sin no more.”

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c). HATING SIN…

Said Jesus; “If a fellow believer hurts you, go and tell him—work it out between the two of you. If he listens, you’ve made a friend. If he won’t listen, take one or two others along so that the presence of witnesses will keep things honest, and try again. If he still won’t listen, tell the church. If he won’t listen to the church, you’ll have to start over from scratch, confront him with the need for repentance, and offer again God’s forgiving love.” (Matthew 18:15-17.)  

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3). TURNING FROM SIN 

Having been brought up in the Anglican church, I can say from personal experience that the Anglican church pretty much ignores Peter’s answer to an honest enquiry in Acts 2:38; “Repent, be immersed and receive the Holy Spirit.” 

Acts 2.38 makes it clear that we need to repent first, which means we must have a complete change of heart. Repentance is being sorry enough to stop sinning. 

It is God’s mercy we need, as it is God’s law we have broken and now God commands that all men everywhere repent; (Cf. Jesus’ parable of the prodigal son.)

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4). LETTING GO OF SIN

To repent means turning away from sin… being sorry enough to stop sinning.

“The fourth Angel poured his bowl on the sun: Fire blazed from the sun and scorched men and women. Burned and blistered, they cursed God’s Name, the God behind these disasters. They refused to repent, refused to honor God.” (Revelation 16:8-9).
“The fifth Angel poured his bowl on the throne of the Beast: Its kingdom fell into sudden eclipse. Mad with pain, men and women bit and chewed their tongues, cursed the God-of-Heaven for their torment and sores, and refused to repent and change their ways.” (Revelation 16:10-11).

John the Baptist refused to baptise the Pharisees who came to be baptised, because they came for baptism without first repenting of their sin; (Matthew 3: 6-10). 

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5). EPILOGUE;- “YOU MUST BE BORN AGAIN…”

Nicodemus was one of the members of the Jewish Council in Jesus’ time.  He came to believe that Jesus was the long expected Messiah, after he had a conversation with Jesus. It is from that conversation that we get the often quoted statement from Jesus, (John 3:3), telling this religious leader “You must be born again”.

v.4 Nicodemus said to Him, “How can a man be born when he is old? Can he enter a second time into his mother’s womb and be born?”

v.5-8 Jesus answered, “Most assuredly, I say to you, unless one is born of water and the Spirit, he cannot enter the kingdom of God.  That which is born of the flesh is flesh, and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit. Do not marvel that I said to you, ‘You must be born again.’  The wind blows where it wishes, and you hear the sound of it, but cannot tell where it comes from and where it goes. So is everyone who is born of the Spirit.”

There’s an old chorus about turning from sin to God, which goes like this;-

“There’s a way back to God from the dark paths of sin.

There’s a door that is open and you may go in;

At Calvary’s cross is where you begin;

When you come as a sinner – to Jesus”.

This is John Dunning signing off from “Thoughtful Thoughts” for another week.

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