back to indexAll Church Retreat Session 2
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>> All right everybody, we are going to be starting our -- 00:01:05.520 |
>> So as a final call, those of you guys who are in the back, 00:01:13.560 |
And again, those of you guys who are just, you know, 00:01:16.440 |
getting your final drink and all that kind of stuff, 00:01:19.040 |
let's go ahead and make our way over to our seats. 00:02:37.560 |
If you would join me in a word of prayer as we start. 00:02:47.360 |
Thank you that we are able to spend time together 00:02:53.040 |
At this retreat and onward, may we strive to build up your church 00:02:56.160 |
and love with eager hearts to fellowship with one another 00:02:59.280 |
and spur each other on toward love and good deeds. 00:03:02.160 |
Above all, let us seek you first, your kingdom 00:03:05.120 |
and your righteousness, that our greatest desire would be to know 00:03:11.600 |
May the praises that we sing now be a blessing to you, 00:03:16.000 |
to sing together the great truths about the gospel 00:03:48.360 |
Who would have thought that a lamb could rescue the souls of men. 00:07:24.880 |
The Father's love is a strong and mighty fortress. 00:07:34.880 |
You can stand against us if our God is for us. 00:07:48.880 |
even when I turn back, still your love is sure. 00:08:08.880 |
The Father's love is a strong and mighty fortress. 00:08:18.880 |
You can stand against us if our God is for us. 00:08:43.880 |
He who gave his son to free us holds me in his love. 00:09:03.880 |
He who gave his son to free us holds me in his love. 00:09:20.880 |
The Father's love is a strong and mighty fortress. 00:09:29.880 |
You can stand against us if our God is for us. 00:09:39.880 |
The Father's love is a strong and mighty fortress. 00:09:48.880 |
You can stand against us if our God is for us. 00:10:27.880 |
When your love reached out with soaring hands and beckoned us 00:11:11.880 |
We are heirs with Christ bought by his blood. 00:11:22.880 |
Oh, how great the love that we've been shown. 00:11:50.880 |
We are strangers to the world, but no strangers to our friend. 00:12:22.880 |
And forever we will be amazed that you made us your own. 00:12:47.880 |
We are heirs with Christ bought by his blood. 00:12:58.880 |
Oh, how great the love that we've been shown. 00:13:30.880 |
We are heirs with Christ bought by his blood. 00:13:41.880 |
Oh, how great the love that we've been shown. 00:14:34.880 |
Now, this is the hard session of the entire retreat because it's after lunch. 00:14:39.880 |
And I understand how that is, sugar levels and the whole thing. 00:14:42.880 |
So, I'm going to do my very best, stopping short of standing on my head in the corner 00:14:49.880 |
I'm going to do my very best to keep you awake and keep you going and focused on what's happening 00:14:54.880 |
Well, we want to turn to the issue of repentance. 00:15:00.880 |
Why is this so important? because when you read books, secular books as well as many 00:15:05.520 |
Christian books, this is a strangely, again, neglected topic when it comes to conflict 00:15:14.600 |
And yet, reconciliation is critical here, but you can't get there without going through 00:15:30.520 |
You have to go straight through the process of repentance. 00:15:33.960 |
And as I'm talking about this this afternoon, I want you to really focus on you, not the 00:15:44.720 |
What are we talking about in reference to you? 00:15:48.080 |
Now, one way I can probably illustrate this is by sharing with you a really quick story 00:15:54.080 |
about how I got involved in biblical counseling. 00:15:58.880 |
You've got to understand, I did not get involved in this willfully. 00:16:03.160 |
God dragged me into it kicking and screaming. 00:16:08.120 |
I went to seminary and graduated from seminary. 00:16:12.640 |
I loved everything that I received in seminary, especially the biblical languages. 00:16:17.040 |
I just ate those up and I got to a point where I loved Hebrew so much. 00:16:26.400 |
If you took a look at my third grade homework, I wrote everything perfectly backwards. 00:16:30.920 |
And if you held it up to a mirror, you could read it. 00:16:35.720 |
And I think that's one of the reasons why I loved Hebrew. 00:16:37.720 |
It was natural for me to read that direction. 00:16:44.600 |
I added Hebrew lexicons and everything for publication. 00:16:51.760 |
And one of the things that I really wanted to do, my whole focus through seminary was 00:16:58.520 |
And I still think to this day, I'm a whole lot better preacher than I am a counselor. 00:17:09.880 |
So I graduated from seminary, and there's probably no one on the planet more dangerous 00:17:19.920 |
Because they believe that they have the entire world figured out. 00:17:30.280 |
And I went on staff of a church, and eventually with the goal of actually planning a daughter 00:17:43.320 |
But the senior pastor of the church required everybody on staff, secretaries, all staff, 00:17:48.360 |
everybody on staff, to get biblical counseling training. 00:17:50.680 |
Now, you understand, I just spent four years in college and four years in seminary. 00:17:56.000 |
The last thing I wanted to do was go back into a classroom. 00:18:02.800 |
A good deal of my undergraduate work and even a lot of my seminary work was in the area 00:18:10.520 |
And especially in the seminary work was in the area of Christian psychology. 00:18:17.520 |
So in order to be on staff of this particular church, I had to jump through that hoop. 00:18:24.720 |
Made matters worse, this class I had to take was a three-hour drive away. 00:18:29.160 |
It started at 9 o'clock in the morning, went all day long, and ended at 10 o'clock at night. 00:18:34.400 |
And it went on for 12 weeks, every Monday for 12 weeks. 00:18:49.640 |
And I went, I remember the first day driving there on the freeway, grumbling, complaining, 00:19:02.040 |
I'm going to jump through this hoop and get through this type of thing." 00:19:07.840 |
I sat in the very back, hunched down like this on my Bible notebook, hoping nobody will 00:19:14.840 |
see me, and just going to endure the next 12 weeks. 00:19:21.240 |
Went through the class until about noontime, broke for lunch. 00:19:25.400 |
After lunch, we were assigned to sit in on actual counseling. 00:19:29.880 |
Myself, another pastor was assigned to sit in on a counseling that a good friend of mine, 00:19:36.760 |
Dr. Bill Gooden, at that time, I didn't know Bill, but later on he became a really good 00:19:41.660 |
Bill really loved the Lord, and he was the counselor. 00:19:47.820 |
And so I sat at one end of the desk, this other pastor sat at the other end of the desk, 00:19:53.020 |
He said, "You know, I've got people coming in that drove out of state, from out of state, 00:20:05.780 |
Eventually, that couple showed up, and they came in, and this was an elderly couple, probably 00:20:14.100 |
He was really well-dressed, three-piece suit on, tie, cuff links, the whole shoot and match. 00:20:20.180 |
She had a beautiful dress on, but I noticed none of them, neither of them looked us in 00:20:28.220 |
Bill had told us, "Now, you guys are in training. 00:20:37.060 |
So I'm going to sit there and be a little fly on the wall. 00:20:41.260 |
So I'm going to sit there and just kind of observe what happens here. 00:20:46.780 |
After prayer, he said, "I understand you've driven from out of state. 00:20:50.900 |
Obviously, what's going on in your life is really, really important. 00:21:02.820 |
Very soon, the husband spoke up and he said, "I have a company that I own. 00:21:14.340 |
I have been the chairman of the board of our church for the last three decades. 00:21:20.420 |
And this past week, I was arrested in a public park for flashing people." 00:21:25.700 |
Now, they tell you in counseling, you're not supposed to look shocked at anything. 00:21:33.500 |
But I'm sure that I look something like, "What is an almost 80-year-old guy doing in a public 00:21:42.860 |
park in the middle of winter flashing people?" 00:21:56.140 |
And I thought to myself at that particular point, "Hmm, this ought to be interesting. 00:22:00.300 |
I want to see how Bill deals with this thing." 00:22:06.660 |
And this elderly man went on to explain the fact that in their community, he and his wife 00:22:17.740 |
and their family had been at the pinnacle of respect in their community. 00:22:22.140 |
And when all of this came to light, they went from the pinnacle of respect to being rejects 00:22:28.300 |
Appeared on the front page of the paper, brought his name through the mud, brought his church's 00:22:32.820 |
name through the mud, brought his company's name through the mud. 00:22:48.900 |
She had no idea that this was something that her husband was participating in. 00:23:00.780 |
So I'm sitting there thinking, "Hmm, this ought to be interesting." 00:23:06.120 |
So I'm thinking to myself, "Okay, John, you just graduated from seminary. 00:23:15.820 |
Where would you go in Scripture to address this problem?" 00:23:20.020 |
And the first thing that came to my mind was David dancing naked before God. 00:23:28.260 |
I knew that that was not going to help things. 00:23:36.400 |
I started thumbing in the back of my English Bible for the word "flashing" just in case 00:23:49.480 |
So it's easy to conclude, "Wow, you know, the Bible really doesn't deal with this issue. 00:23:53.820 |
We're going to have to reach out to other sources in order to address this particular 00:24:00.560 |
And then I saw Bill Good open his Bible and begin addressing that man's heart, much in 00:24:12.660 |
a similar way that I talked about in our first session. 00:24:17.460 |
What are the central, commanding, dominating cravings that are idolatrous in your heart, 00:24:24.880 |
and at the same time minister hope to that devastated wife? 00:24:33.540 |
And it dawned on me at this particular time, "Wow, seminary taught me how to dispense the 00:24:42.300 |
Bible, but it didn't teach me how to minister the Bible. 00:24:47.460 |
It taught me how to deliver truth, but didn't teach me how to minister where people are 00:25:01.420 |
I could parse verbs and participles in the Hebrew and Greek language with the best of 00:25:06.580 |
them, but that didn't mean I knew how to minister the Bible. 00:25:16.980 |
I went home that night, three-hour drive home. 00:25:33.140 |
I got home and my wife had just gone to bed, and I woke her up. 00:25:43.180 |
And she rubbed her eyes and looked at me and squinted a little bit. 00:25:47.380 |
And I knelt next to the bed and I said, "Sweetheart, I'm a lousy husband. 00:25:58.080 |
And she looked at me and she goes, "I don't know what this class is doing, but I like 00:26:14.500 |
All of a sudden now, addressing serious problems strictly from a biblical point of view now 00:26:21.300 |
become paradigm, a very important paradigm in my life. 00:26:42.500 |
And since then, I have never regretted for one nanosecond the direction that God took 00:26:53.300 |
I've seen God take the most horrible circumstances and turn them around for good with people 00:27:02.880 |
who are murderers, with people who are sex abusers, with people who have serious, serious 00:27:16.580 |
struggles with depression, with people who are fearful and plagued by what the world 00:27:25.820 |
would call panic attacks, people that are overwhelmed with anxiety, people who have 00:27:34.340 |
problems in their interpersonal relationships. 00:27:39.860 |
And I've seen God take them just simply and carefully ministering, not dispensing, ministering 00:27:46.300 |
the Word of God to where people are coming from. 00:27:55.500 |
Well, we want to talk about the issue of repentance. 00:28:03.580 |
So if you have your notes in front of you, there's a little comment that we make there, 00:28:11.100 |
"Resolution of conflict involves a careful understanding and practice of repentance. 00:28:17.580 |
Repentance of sin is proved genuine when it's followed by a thorough repentance. 00:28:23.620 |
Repentance involves a change of mind that is so complete that it leads to a change of 00:28:43.700 |
When there's a conflict, there's an interpersonal conflict, this is what God desires. 00:28:51.720 |
The word repent basically means to turn or to change. 00:28:56.760 |
And it's best illustrated by the picture of someone who is walking one way, does an about 00:29:06.060 |
When I was in the military, that's what we used to call it, to do an about face, go the 00:29:16.300 |
Repentance is a necessary component of genuine conversion. 00:29:19.420 |
Luke chapter 3 verse 3, 2 Corinthians 7, 10, "Unsaved people must turn from sin, which 00:29:26.180 |
is the status self-rule that they've lived in as their own Lord and Master." 00:29:35.980 |
But repentance also remains continually necessary after conversion. 00:29:40.380 |
We see this in the life of David in Psalm 51. 00:29:42.740 |
You can see this in Jesus' teaching in Luke 17 verses 3 through 4. 00:29:47.940 |
"Saved persons must turn from sins, which are the specific symptoms of a lingering disease 00:29:58.660 |
Now all true repentance has reference to a turning from the state or occurrence of a 00:30:04.420 |
sin and turning to God for forgiveness and renewal. 00:30:11.500 |
Scripture often alludes to a false repentance that does not actually bring forgiveness. 00:30:17.900 |
So we've got to understand some elements, some effects and examples of repentance in 00:30:24.500 |
order to practice it ourselves and to help others do so as well. 00:30:36.140 |
Let's talk about some of the elements of true repentance. 00:30:41.580 |
And the first thing that's really key here is that of comprehending. 00:30:48.860 |
We must understand the truth relevant to our sin and our Savior before we can repent. 00:30:58.700 |
The Greek word most often translated repentance is the term metanoeo, which denotes a change 00:31:10.820 |
In fact, it's a compound word which actually means meta, which means after, and mind or 00:31:21.780 |
noeo, which means mind, that would be the verbal form, or nous, which means mind, that 00:31:32.840 |
So it means afterthought or hence change of mind about a particular attitude, a deed, 00:31:44.400 |
or behavior, or words, or circumstances, real change in conflict reconciliation has to go 00:31:59.420 |
Now, the way that the word is used, if you just take a look at the etymology of the word, 00:32:06.160 |
you're not going to get the full sense of it. 00:32:07.920 |
You've got to trace through the New Testament the way in which metanoeo is used. 00:32:16.900 |
And when you trace it through, you find out that it means more than just a change of mind. 00:32:23.440 |
Every time it's used, it's used within the context where there is a change of mind that 00:32:28.340 |
is so complete that it leads to an entire change of life. 00:32:34.520 |
In other words, it's fundamental to changing everything within us. 00:32:45.120 |
It's way more than just saying, "Oh God, I'm sorry about this." 00:32:51.760 |
Nowhere in the Bible does it ever say we're supposed to say we're sorry. 00:32:59.320 |
What do you mean by that when you say you're sorry? 00:33:07.120 |
The question is, what did you do that was wrong? 00:33:12.540 |
And what do you need to do in order to make it right? 00:33:21.400 |
All sin involves a breaking of a relationship, first and foremost with God, but then secondly 00:33:31.800 |
with the people around us, because sin always brings alienated relationships. 00:33:39.380 |
It always yields the fruit of alienated relationships, first with God, then with others. 00:33:48.800 |
So if I'm truly repentant, I see what I've done, I comprehend it to be an awful sin that 00:33:58.940 |
is really an attack upon the God that I say that I love and the God that I say that I 00:34:05.900 |
serve, first and foremost, and then I have to understand how my sin has affected others 00:34:22.900 |
How has it affected the people that I work with? 00:34:30.260 |
Because there is an effect there, even though at first you may not even perceive it. 00:34:36.740 |
Sin, there is always that lingering effect that's always going to be there. 00:34:46.460 |
So the question is, how has it affected those relationships? 00:34:51.340 |
I can't really deal with that interpersonal relationship until I see my own sin, I comprehend 00:35:02.860 |
that it has been first a rebellion against God, and then it has affected my relationship 00:35:11.860 |
I've got to see the vertical impact as well as the horizontal impact of my sin. 00:35:22.660 |
If there's going to be real change in interpersonal relationships, you've got to be able to see 00:35:33.980 |
What did you do or think or want that was wrong? 00:35:48.100 |
What is it that you're craving in the depths of your heart, as we talked about in our first 00:35:54.380 |
What seems to dominate or rule your thoughts at that particular time? 00:36:14.620 |
The second element has to do with confession. 00:36:19.380 |
Now the twofold nature of inward confession is revealed in the meaning of the Greek word 00:36:33.060 |
Homo means same, legao means to speak or to say, hence homo legao, to say the same thing. 00:36:40.460 |
So when I confess my sin, listen to this, I say the same thing about it that God says. 00:36:52.740 |
The attitude that I have, the desire that I have, the craving that I have, the actions 00:36:58.940 |
I have, the verbal way that I respond to other people, that's sinful. 00:37:06.420 |
Even the very disposition of my heart is sinful. 00:37:10.980 |
It's like a husband and wife that gets into an argument in their morning before he leaves 00:37:17.660 |
She's upset, he's upset, he storms out the door, slams the door, jumps in the car, wheels 00:37:26.220 |
the car around spinning real estate all over the place, jumps on the road, off onto the 00:37:32.900 |
freeway weaving in and out of cars, thinking to himself, "I hope the children make her 00:37:53.300 |
She's standing there in the kitchen, she's thinking to herself, "I hope he has a rotten 00:38:09.540 |
A general wishing of ill will towards someone else. 00:38:14.940 |
General wishing of ill will towards someone else. 00:38:21.580 |
I remember when I was in high school, I sat next to a girl, no matter how hard I studied 00:38:26.220 |
for that particular subject, she always got a better grade than I did. 00:38:29.260 |
I remember sitting there thinking, "Oh God, if you just let her flunk one exam." 00:38:45.780 |
That comes out of the heart, and it comes from what you want. 00:38:49.740 |
You think that there is something there that's going to bring you happiness that you're receiving 00:38:55.660 |
or you're not receiving, or that you're not receiving, and sometimes it's something that 00:39:02.100 |
you wish we were receiving that would bring us happiness and we don't receive it. 00:39:07.020 |
And that causes maliceness, because you see that other person as an obstacle to getting 00:39:16.940 |
So you've got to be willing to say, "No, no, no, you know what? 00:39:20.820 |
You have to acknowledge to God the fact of your sin and agree with God about the nature 00:39:29.300 |
Let's go to an Old Testament passage real quickly. 00:39:39.740 |
But I will frequently use a passage like this in counseling. 00:39:43.820 |
"He who conceals his transgressions will not prosper, but he who confesses and forsakes 00:39:56.380 |
"He who conceals his transgressions will not prosper," God says. 00:40:01.220 |
I will make sure that if you decide to hide your sin and not to confess it before me, 00:40:07.020 |
I'm going to make sure your life will not prosper. 00:40:13.060 |
But he who confesses and forsakes them will find compassion. 00:40:25.020 |
In fact, early on, let's go back to Psalm chapter 32. 00:40:38.940 |
That means it was a regular teaching song in the temple area. 00:40:46.980 |
This is what was regularly taught over and over and over again. 00:40:53.740 |
Psalm 32 says, "How blessed is the one whose transgression is forgiven, whose sin is covered. 00:41:00.340 |
How blessed is the man whom the Lord does not impute iniquity and in whose spirit there 00:41:08.440 |
When I kept silent about my sin," verse 3, "my body wasted away through my groanings 00:41:14.580 |
all day long, for day and night your hand was heavy upon me. 00:41:18.420 |
My vitality was drained away as with the fever heat of summer." 00:41:24.540 |
You know, over the past 40 years, I've worked with a lot of people who struggle with depression. 00:41:30.460 |
I'm absolutely convinced 60% of them, if not 70%, 60% of people who struggle with depression 00:41:38.700 |
are really at the very core struggling with guilt. 00:41:48.900 |
He says, "When I kept silent about my sin, my body wasted away through my groaning all 00:41:54.580 |
day long, for day and night your hand was heavy upon me. 00:41:57.740 |
My vitality was drained away as with the fever heat of summer." 00:42:00.940 |
That's describing somebody severely depressed because of guilt. 00:42:12.640 |
Verse 5, "I acknowledged my sin to you," there's the confession, "and my iniquity I did not 00:42:19.860 |
hide," or actually that word "hide" is the word "cover" in Hebrew. 00:42:28.340 |
I said I would confess my transgression to the Lord, and you forgave the guilt of my 00:42:38.500 |
He's basically saying in verse 5, "What I uncover and become naked before God, God covers," 00:42:51.380 |
"What I uncover," in verse 5, "and become naked about before God, God covers with His 00:43:03.380 |
"How blessed is He whose transgression is forgiven, whose sin is covered." 00:43:06.940 |
Now, by the way, we're going to come back to that when we talk about forgiveness because 00:43:18.940 |
But right now, I just want you to see that when we decide to uncover ourselves before 00:43:24.660 |
God, when we decide to confess our sins before God, when we become naked before Him, "Lord, 00:43:30.900 |
here I am with all of my iniquity, with all of my sin, I'm revealing it all to You," then 00:43:49.380 |
So the idea is that we've got to be able to comprehend both vertically and horizontally 00:43:56.820 |
how our sin has had its impact on our relationship to God and then how our sin has had an impact 00:44:07.260 |
We've got to be willing to confess our sins and repentance is, or I should say, confession 00:44:47.340 |
And in 2 Corinthians chapter 7 and verse 10, Paul contrasts worldly sorrow with godly sorrow. 00:45:05.620 |
He says, "For the sorrow that is according to the will of God produces a repentance," 00:45:10.980 |
here you are, "without regret, leading to salvation, but the sorrow of the world produces 00:45:28.220 |
Now, godly repentance has a, or godly sorrow has a repentance without regret. 00:45:39.980 |
That means that when you turn away from your sin, you don't regret leaving it. 00:45:49.200 |
When you turn away from your sin, you don't regret leaving it. 00:45:56.660 |
God had commanded Lot and his wife to leave Sodom and Gomorrah because they had become 00:46:06.860 |
That's the reason why he commanded them to leave. 00:46:15.320 |
And by the way, when you leave, don't even look back. 00:46:22.840 |
And even though Lot's wife, her body had left Sodom and Gomorrah, externally her actions 00:46:29.860 |
said that she had left that, her heart was still back there. 00:46:34.980 |
She's looking longingly over her shoulder back at her hometown, where that's where all 00:46:47.100 |
That's what she's known for most of her life. 00:46:52.460 |
She's looking over her shoulder, regretting having to leave there. 00:47:04.260 |
Because her body had left, her body was doing the right thing, but her heart was still there. 00:47:26.780 |
When you leave your sin, you're happy that you're leaving your sin. 00:47:32.140 |
That's how you know you're genuinely repentant. 00:47:46.700 |
People leave and they say, "Oh yeah, I'm repentant." 00:47:55.820 |
Too many times as a counselor I've had to deal with men who have cheated on their wives 00:48:07.620 |
They're going to try to make their marriage work, but you can tell their heart's still 00:48:17.980 |
And by the way, first opportunity they think they can get away with it, they'll be back 00:48:24.000 |
First opportunity, they'll be back in that sin. 00:48:43.540 |
Worldly sorrow, on the other hand, it's like Esau. 00:48:57.860 |
Gave up his birthright, which was the Abrahamic covenant in essence. 00:49:04.100 |
But he gave it up for a momentary desire to eat food. 00:49:08.540 |
He gave it all up for that particular purpose. 00:49:14.460 |
And then he expresses sorrow over it later on. 00:49:22.460 |
Not sorrow in the sense that he really wanted the Abrahamic covenant, he really wanted his 00:49:50.740 |
Judas betrays Jesus, and then what happens to Judas? 00:49:54.380 |
After he betrays, he's smitten in conscience over the fact that he has betrayed an innocent 00:49:59.380 |
man so much so that he goes back to the temple, takes the 30 pieces of silver, throws them 00:50:05.660 |
back in the temple, and he has a chance at that particular point to genuinely repent 00:50:28.220 |
Plenty examples in Scripture of worldly sorrow, but godly sorrow leaves no regrets, none whatsoever. 00:50:41.500 |
It shows a true Christian, but the sorrow of this world produces all kinds of death. 00:50:49.740 |
If you're confessing your sins, you're calling that particular sin what God calls it. 00:50:57.900 |
You're saying the same thing that God says about that sin. 00:51:01.500 |
You're saying, "That attitude in my life, those actions, those words in my life are 00:51:10.900 |
And because it's repugnant to you, God, it's repugnant to me, and I'm leaving that behind. 00:51:20.940 |
And then notice this, not only does repentance involve this comprehending and involves a 00:51:34.100 |
It always includes a willful resolve not to repeat the sin again. 00:51:44.300 |
A willful resolve not to repeat that sin again. 00:51:51.980 |
You're not going to cover it up, as Proverbs 28, 13 says. 00:51:58.580 |
You're asking for forgiveness, but you're not going to be like the person who says, 00:52:07.660 |
I know that God will forgive me, but I'm going to go ahead and do it anyhow." 00:52:20.460 |
And by the way, the bigger you make Him, the bigger He can deal with you in judgment. 00:52:27.820 |
I know God's going to forgive me, but I'm going to go through with the divorce anyhow. 00:52:33.380 |
It's like a man who robs a bank, gets caught, says he's sorry, but refuses to return the 00:52:51.500 |
Several years ago, probably many of you know the story of Bill Clinton, former president 00:52:58.260 |
I think he's a perfect example of this kind of wrong view of repentance and forgiveness 00:53:03.060 |
and his actions with Monica Lewinsky, the affair that he has with her. 00:53:12.420 |
He goes on national television saying to everybody in America, "I'm sorry for what I was caught 00:53:20.540 |
with," and at the exact same time where the president was saying he's sorry, his lawyers 00:53:27.100 |
were trying to prove that he was innocent of what he was saying that he was sorry for. 00:53:39.140 |
They say they're sorry, but they're trying to convince everybody else that they're innocent 00:53:53.980 |
No, if you're going to repent, there's got to be a choice. 00:54:01.340 |
Take your Bible, let's go over to 2 Peter 2, verse 22. 00:54:16.900 |
Peter says, "It happened to them, according to the true proverb, a dog returns to its 00:54:20.900 |
vomit and a sow, after washing, returns to wallowing in the mire." 00:54:28.820 |
Why does a dog, it's really gross, sorry about this, but why does a dog go back and eat its 00:54:40.180 |
You can take a pig, wash a pig, perfume a pig, put a big red bow around that pig, you 00:54:48.380 |
It's going to find the nearest mud puddle, hop right back in. 00:55:01.140 |
Answer is, Peter says, it's the nature of a dog to eat vomit. 00:55:06.380 |
It's the nature of a pig to wallow in the mud. 00:55:17.140 |
What he's basically saying is this, in true repentance, real genuine repentance, it changes 00:55:46.240 |
When I'm truly repentant, I am changed on a fundamental level. 00:55:50.780 |
There's nothing left in me that's not changed. 00:55:55.220 |
I willfully, gladly, willingly, excitedly, with zeal, want to leave my sin. 00:56:16.460 |
There has to be this choosing that I will not go back to this sin ever again. 00:56:30.340 |
Now, that doesn't mean that a person can't sin in the future. 00:56:35.440 |
But if they do, they'll be grieved over their sin, even if they do it again. 00:56:40.560 |
Because as far as their will is concerned, they have decided they will never return to 00:56:55.760 |
I'm not going to go back and say those mean things anymore. 00:56:58.820 |
I'm not going to cultivate an attitude of bitterness and resentment and hatred towards 00:57:06.540 |
I'm not going to be angry with them and cultivate a heart of anger towards them and allow that 00:57:13.380 |
to flavor everything I do and see in that person's life. 00:57:19.220 |
I realize that that's sinfulness, and I'm going to get away from that sinfulness. 00:57:42.580 |
Fasten your seatbelts and put your crash helmets on. 00:57:49.060 |
Let's go to the hard part, which has to do with the effects of repentance. 00:57:55.140 |
How do we know that I've really repented of this idol in my heart, this idol that's guided 00:58:11.980 |
Although repentance itself is an inward turning that takes place in a heart and in mind, it 00:58:17.220 |
inevitably leads to change in other areas of a person's life. 00:58:21.100 |
If it's not accompanied or followed by such effects when they are appropriate, it's not 00:58:25.940 |
real repentance, but a false one that fails to bring forgiveness. 00:58:32.180 |
Let me highlight three things that are key that are a part of the effects of true repentance. 00:58:40.340 |
Just a biblical theological summary of what it should be in terms of the effects. 00:58:57.660 |
The word means literally to set things right, to set things right. 00:59:04.880 |
When I participate in restitution, I'm trying to set things right that were made wrong by 00:59:14.380 |
We need to fulfill any obligations we have to the party that we have offended. 00:59:24.440 |
You can trace this through several different places in the Old and New Testament, but let's 00:59:40.540 |
"If man steals an ox or sheep and slaughters it or sells it, he should pay five oxen for 00:59:59.100 |
Anything you've broken, stolen, taken, destroyed, used, that's restitution. 01:00:13.320 |
When you take somebody else's wife that's not yours or husband and uses it for your 01:00:20.960 |
own, uses them for your own personal, greedy, covetous, sexual desire, you're using someone 01:00:36.240 |
It's not true repentance unless there's restitution. 01:00:44.500 |
Let's jump to the New Testament and look at this in Luke chapter 19 and verse…well, 01:00:52.060 |
we don't have time to go through the whole thing, but you know this story. 01:01:08.420 |
And in verse 8, Luke chapter 19 and verse 8, Zacchaeus is truly saved. 01:01:14.180 |
Verse 8 says, "Zacchaeus stopped and said to the Lord, 'Behold, Lord, half of my 01:01:18.960 |
possessions I will give to the poor, and if I have defrauded anyone of anything, I will 01:01:28.940 |
He says, "Today salvation has come to this house because he too is a son of Abraham. 01:01:36.620 |
For the Son of Man came to seek and to save that which was lost." 01:01:42.400 |
It showed the genuineness of Zacchaeus' heart to do that. 01:01:46.220 |
Zacchaeus was a tax collector, and back in ancient times, tax collectors would collect 01:01:50.900 |
tax from Rome, and they had the right by law to collect additional taxes to support themselves. 01:01:57.660 |
It's just that most tax collectors took way beyond what they needed, and so tax collectors 01:02:04.020 |
were filthy rich and had the power of Rome behind them, and they would bilk people out 01:02:18.580 |
Most of the people who were tax collectors were Jews, but they were Jews taking advantage 01:02:28.020 |
And so they were taking money, but to show Zacchaeus and the fact that he was genuinely 01:02:34.780 |
converted and his heart was right before Christ, he says, "Half of everything I'll give to 01:02:40.580 |
the poor, and if I have defrauded anyone of anything, I'll give them back 400% what I 01:02:59.660 |
Back several years ago while I was pastoring back in Ohio, we had planted our church and 01:03:07.380 |
it was growing, everything was going really, really well. 01:03:10.220 |
There were a couple of young men in our church who were pretty sharp young men. 01:03:15.960 |
They were entrepreneurial type, and they had this idea to start a business, and they went 01:03:23.700 |
around to all the older men in the church and said, "Hey, what do you think about this? 01:03:31.580 |
And all the older men in the church who were businessmen thought, "Hey, this is a great 01:03:39.300 |
The only problem is, and this is always true with young men, they had no money. 01:03:51.180 |
There was a widow in the church a couple of years before her husband had died, left her 01:03:57.420 |
So these two young men went to the widow and said, "Listen, if you're willing to loan us 01:04:01.660 |
six figures, we're going to launch this and we will pay you back with interest after we 01:04:14.140 |
She thought about it for a while and then she went and said, "Okay, I'm willing to loan 01:04:20.540 |
She didn't have a real lot, but she loaned these two young men this money and they started 01:04:26.940 |
their business and it started with gangbusters. 01:04:36.200 |
But eight months after they started their business, the American economy crashed. 01:04:46.420 |
They lost everything, including everything that they had earned. 01:04:54.780 |
The older men in the church didn't see it coming. 01:05:05.300 |
They went back to the lady in our church and they said to her, "We're so sorry. 01:05:13.180 |
We had no idea this was going to happen to the economy. 01:05:21.900 |
She was a very sweet gal and she needed that money. 01:05:25.620 |
And she said, "Well, yeah, I'm willing to forgive you." 01:05:35.700 |
And they're ready to walk away from this until their meddlesome pastor got involved. 01:06:33.980 |
I don't care if you have to get a job flipping hamburgers. 01:06:57.020 |
Now, those young men, their word is as good as gold. 01:07:17.660 |
Genuine repentance means you're willing to make things right that your sin and your wrong, 01:07:24.620 |
your promises that you were willing to break, made wrong. 01:07:37.860 |
Fasten your seatbelts, put your crash armaments on, number two. 01:07:43.060 |
Real repentance also involves reconciliation. 01:07:49.860 |
That's what we're talking about here in conflict reconciliation, right? 01:07:56.940 |
When your sin has resulted in a broken relationship with another person, true repentance will 01:08:02.060 |
cause you to do whatever you can to transform that conflict into a peaceful and edifying 01:08:13.620 |
It's not where you resolve the issue, the conflict, and then you walk away from it and 01:08:25.060 |
That's why we're not for conflict resolution. 01:08:32.740 |
When parents are dealing with a brother or sister or two brothers or two sisters, and 01:08:38.180 |
they have a fight over a toy or whatever the case may be, parents will often step into 01:08:50.660 |
Before you go, you need to ask your brother or your sister for forgiveness." 01:09:02.500 |
You need to stick them in the smallest room in your house, closet if you will, and teach 01:09:18.460 |
God is after reconciliation, not mere resolving of a conflict. 01:09:29.580 |
That means putting that relationship back to where it was better than it was before. 01:09:45.660 |
It's about bringing parties in conflict together because that is the very fabric of the unity 01:09:56.060 |
of the body of Christ, not just in your church but around the world. 01:10:19.140 |
And the third thing, tighten your seatbelt, is regret. 01:10:30.260 |
I thought you said in 2 Corinthians 7.10 that there is no regret." 01:10:37.260 |
There is no regret in leaving your sin, but there is regret in having done the sin in 01:10:46.580 |
There's no regret in leaving your sin, but there is regret in having done the sin in 01:10:54.820 |
True repentance may not always be accompanied by emotions, especially those that are visible 01:11:00.420 |
to others, but in many cases a feeling of sorrow corroborates other evidences and points 01:11:13.880 |
This becomes critical because if a person is truly repentant over their sin, they are 01:11:23.340 |
crushed because of how wicked their sin is before a holy God. 01:11:45.660 |
Remember when we talked about the issue of the heart earlier in James 4 verses 1 through 01:11:58.780 |
But then he goes back to repentance here and he says in verse 6, James 4.6, "But he gives 01:12:07.700 |
a greater grace, therefore," it says, "God is opposed to the proud but gives grace to 01:12:16.620 |
The reason why people don't regret sinning is because of pride. 01:12:29.180 |
That's the reason why they don't regret sinning, because of pride. 01:12:36.100 |
Verse 7 says, "Submit therefore to God, resist the devil and he will flee from you because 01:12:41.300 |
pride is at the very core of one of the tools that Satan uses in our life. 01:12:49.340 |
Draw near to God," verse 8 says, "and he will draw near to you. 01:12:55.220 |
Cleanse your hands, you sinners, and your hearts, you double-minded." 01:13:01.780 |
Notice how heart is equated with double-mindedness. 01:13:10.420 |
Then he says, here we go, here's true repentance, "Be miserable and mourn and weep. 01:13:18.780 |
Let your laughter be turned into mourning and your joy to gloom. 01:13:23.820 |
Humble yourself in the presence of the Lord and he will exalt you. 01:13:27.380 |
When is the last time," listen to this, "you wept over your sin?" 01:13:38.500 |
When was the last time you were so crushed, you wept over your sin? 01:13:44.140 |
You mourned over it, even though you knew you were forgiven, even though you trusted 01:13:51.820 |
You regretted having done it in the first place. 01:13:58.340 |
There's not going to be true reconciliation among believers until we are grieved over 01:14:04.260 |
the sin that caused the conflict in the first place. 01:14:11.300 |
We have to regret whatever caused that conflict in the first place, regret whatever it is 01:14:23.660 |
Remember, a dog returns to its vomit, a sow returns to the mud. 01:14:31.500 |
By the way, there in 2 Peter 2:22, he's actually quoting Proverbs 26:11 about the dog. 01:14:47.820 |
In 1 Peter 1:13, Peter gives us a good exhortation. 01:14:52.420 |
He says, "Gird your mind for action, keep sober in spirit, fix your hope completely 01:14:56.140 |
on the grace that will be brought to you at the revelation of Jesus Christ." 01:15:05.220 |
That doesn't mean that we're overtaken by our sinful sorrow. 01:15:09.100 |
That doesn't mean that we have to go to our room, curl up in a fetal position, and weep 01:15:17.920 |
I'm not talking about allowing sorrow and overwhelming, terrible emotions rule us. 01:15:26.460 |
Then you're not focusing on Christ's forgiveness. 01:15:28.900 |
But I'm talking about being genuinely grieved in your heart over having done the sin to 01:15:45.460 |
Two really good examples about this in Scripture. 01:15:50.840 |
For one, you've got David in Psalm 51 where he talks about "against thee and thee only 01:15:57.860 |
You're like, "I don't think that's a really good English translation of that because the 01:16:01.900 |
Hebrew terminology for the word "against" can also be translated "before." 01:16:06.500 |
I think that would actually be a better translation, "before thee and thee only," because David 01:16:10.260 |
knows that he had sinned against Bathsheba, he knew against…he had sinned against her 01:16:16.220 |
He knew that, not just against God, but before that he thought that this was a secret sin. 01:16:24.160 |
He thought before God and God only he had sinned until Nathan the prophet brought it 01:16:37.040 |
But it does serve to illustrate the fact that all of our sin is really a sin against God. 01:16:44.640 |
And then in 2 Corinthians chapter 7 verses 9 through 11, we looked at verse 10, he says, 01:16:50.280 |
"I now rejoice not that you were made sorrowful, but that you were made sorrowful to the point 01:16:54.720 |
of repentance, for you were made sorrowful according to the will of God." 01:16:58.260 |
So there was a genuine sorrow over what had been done according to the will of God. 01:17:05.120 |
Now, you understand at this particular point that if there's going to be genuine reconciliation, 01:17:15.080 |
then you have to go through the territory of genuine repentance. 01:17:24.080 |
If you don't, and this is why very seldom, very seldom do Christians ever really truly 01:17:32.480 |
They kind of bring some kind of false peace between people, but they don't really reconcile 01:17:38.920 |
because there is no willingness to set aside the pride at this particular point to genuinely 01:17:45.520 |
repent and as a result of that just humble themselves before God and another person and 01:17:53.800 |
seek to rebuild that relationship to where it was better than ever before, where it is 01:18:04.720 |
Now listen, at this particular point, I told you in this session, you had to put on your 01:18:17.600 |
I want you to bring your crash helmets and seat belts back to our next session along 01:18:28.280 |
Because our next session, which will be tomorrow, you're going to need every one of them in 01:18:39.520 |
Gracious Father, we thank You for Your goodness and Your grace towards us. 01:18:45.680 |
Even while we were yet sinners, You died for us. 01:18:52.480 |
And Father, we should be grieved over the relationships that we have ruined in our lives 01:19:02.240 |
because of our own pride, our own unwillingness to genuinely repent. 01:19:10.720 |
I pray, Father, that You'll take us through the land of genuine repentance in order to 01:19:24.680 |
Let us all rise as we sing our closing praise. 01:19:33.680 |
Now to see the dawn of the darkest day, Christ on the rooter calling. 01:20:02.680 |
Trampling, trampling, trampling, trampling, trampling, trampling, trampling, trampling, 01:20:22.680 |
trampling, trampling, trampling, trampling, trampling, trampling, trampling, trampling, 01:20:51.680 |
trampling, trampling, trampling, trampling, trampling, trampling, trampling, trampling, 01:21:17.680 |
trampling, trampling, trampling, trampling, trampling, trampling, trampling, trampling, 01:22:40.960 |
Written in the wounds For through Your suffering 01:22:52.960 |
Death is crushed to death Life is mine to live 01:24:16.960 |
Heavenly Father, we want to take this moment as we sing that song to thank You, God, that 01:24:22.520 |
You have brought us to repentance through Your mercy and grace and kindness. 01:24:27.960 |
It leads us, Father God, to trust You with our entire lives. 01:24:30.960 |
For we know, Lord, in the future there will come a time when You will cause every single 01:24:35.720 |
man to submit themselves to You, but You will leave them in their hardened state. 01:24:41.060 |
So Lord, help us, having seen Your grace, to fully entrust ourselves to You, relinquishing 01:24:48.440 |
And, Lord, sometimes we feel the hardness of our flesh and our hearts resisting, resisting 01:24:55.680 |
feeling as bad as we are, justifying ourselves and not willing to either acknowledge what 01:25:01.720 |
You have said, to come to points of humility, but we pray, Lord, that Your Spirit would 01:25:07.320 |
guide us to that end, for we know that God, truly the greatest, most blessed place to 01:25:14.600 |
Lord, we thank You, God, today it's in Christ and we pray, amen. 01:25:21.200 |
So at this time, what we're going to do is take what's called like a necessities break, 01:25:30.240 |
Just we're going to try to start our Q&A session shortly after. 01:25:36.160 |
So just bare necessities, if you guys need to go and do a run, please go ahead and do 01:25:41.560 |
But in about five minutes or so, we're going to start pulling people together and start 01:25:45.200 |
the Q&A, which also means, A, you have a moment to submit more questions. 01:25:50.200 |
I'm going to put my phone numbers on the Facebook group. 01:26:00.120 |
I'm sorry, real fast, Jason, did you have an announcement? 01:26:04.120 |
Everyone, we'll see everybody back in about five minutes.