ACBC Theology Exam 17 - Doctrine of Repentance

00:00:00.000 | counseling, and we're so glad that you've joined us on this webinar. Hope you had a wonderful

00:00:05.520 | Sunday worshiping our Lord Jesus Christ. This is our 17th class meeting, and we are working our way

00:00:13.520 | through the ACBC Theology exams. We are on Theology exam number 17 tonight, which has to do

00:00:21.440 | with the doctrine of repentance, and I trust that this is going to be a wonderful study for each of

00:00:28.080 | us, both to apply to our own lives and then also to use in counseling ministry to others. So thank

00:00:35.760 | you so much for joining us tonight. I hope that your studies are going well and that the Lord is

00:00:40.560 | blessing your essay exams, and we're just so excited about all that the Lord is doing to

00:00:47.760 | train biblical counselors for His glory. We are here at Kindred about to open five

00:00:55.760 | dedicated counseling spaces that are soundproofed and private in our church offices, and I'm

00:01:03.440 | so excited to be able to show those offices to you, Lord willing, in the next couple weeks,

00:01:09.680 | and we're praying that God will fill those rooms with counselors who will be able to minister

00:01:17.040 | God's truth and His word to others, and this all is part of that process. So thank you for

00:01:24.000 | your faithfulness and for your encouragement as we continue to work through this class.

00:01:29.040 | Well, as I mentioned, tonight we are looking at the doctrine of repentance

00:01:35.360 | tonight, which is a very important subject and also one that is very practical for

00:01:42.080 | each of our lives. Martin Luther has well said that our Lord and Master Jesus Christ

00:01:50.400 | willed the entire life of believers to be one of repentance, and so all of life, according to

00:01:58.160 | Martin Luther, is repentance, and I think that is reflected in the essay exam that we'll look at

00:02:06.720 | tonight. The Christian life begins with repentance, turning from sin and turning to Christ,

00:02:15.680 | and then the Christian progresses in the Christian life as the believer repents of sin and

00:02:23.360 | embraces Christ on a daily basis, and that is true for you. That is true for me as well. Each of us

00:02:32.240 | grow as we continue to repent of sin and as we continue to embrace Christ by faith, and that

00:02:41.760 | is true for our counselees. Our counselees will make progress in the counseling issue that they

00:02:49.040 | face as they learn to repent of sin and embrace Christ by faith, and so this is a really an

00:02:58.640 | important topic for each of us to look at and to think deeply upon, and that is why this is in the

00:03:05.520 | theology essay exams. Just far from being a kind of a morose and depressing subject, I hope you'll

00:03:15.760 | find that the doctrine of repentance really is the doctrine that leads us to joy. It is the doctrine

00:03:23.840 | that leads us to true blessing in Christ. I can't think of a more morose or depressing person than

00:03:34.160 | the Christian who does not repent of sin. Repentance really is the path to joy, and I think

00:03:43.200 | that's reflected in David's statement in Psalm 32, verse 1, where David said, "Blessed is the one

00:03:51.520 | whose transgression is forgiven, whose sin is covered. Blessed is the man against whom the

00:03:58.160 | Lord counts no iniquity and in whose spirit there is no deceit," and then David goes on to describe

00:04:06.960 | a period of his life where he had hidden his sin from the Lord, and he describes this period as a

00:04:15.280 | period of spiritual misery, a period of spiritual depression. He says in verse 3, "For when I kept

00:04:25.600 | silent, my bones wasted away through my groaning all day long. For day and night your hand was

00:04:32.240 | heavy upon me. My strength was dried up as by the heat of summer," and so this period in which David

00:04:41.360 | did not repent of his sin was definitely a period in which he was lacking joy, but then in verse 5,

00:04:52.000 | we see David's repentance, and David says this, "I acknowledge my sin to you, and I did not cover

00:04:59.520 | my iniquity. I said I will confess my transgressions to the Lord, and you forgave the iniquity of my

00:05:08.400 | sin." I think we see in that wonderful psalm that repentance was the key for David to experience

00:05:19.440 | joy and spiritual blessings in the Lord, and the same could be said to be true for you

00:05:26.720 | and for me. We see that the doctrine of repentance is really connected with the truth of God's grace.

00:05:37.120 | God does a wonderful work of grace in the sinner's heart in opening the sinner's eyes

00:05:44.640 | and helping a person see his or her sin before the cross, and then helping that person to turn

00:05:52.560 | from sin and to embrace all that Christ has done for us through his work on the cross and his

00:06:00.160 | glorious resurrection. This is a wonderful work of God that God performs in each person's heart,

00:06:08.160 | and it is the pathway to joy and blessing. So, I hope to kind of do away with this idea that to

00:06:15.920 | study repentance is to study this gloomy topic, this kind of brooding and morose spiritual topic

00:06:25.600 | that leads us just to kind of despair over our sin. I hope you will embrace the doctrine of

00:06:32.960 | repentance as a doctrine that leads us to joy and to blessing. So, let me give us this

00:06:40.960 | introductory thought as we open our class together. I want to just read from 2 Timothy 2 verses 24 to

00:06:52.000 | 26, Paul's encouragement to Timothy, and then draw some implications, some applications to

00:06:59.600 | counseling ministry, and I love this passage. By the way, my senior pastor, Philip DeCourcy,

00:07:07.200 | has a killer message on this from 2 Timothy 2 verses 24 to 26, and he preached that at the

00:07:14.960 | Master's Seminary Chapel and also at Kindred Church. I would encourage you to pick that up

00:07:21.040 | online or download that. It's for free, but he really did a great job expositing this passage,

00:07:29.280 | and it's a wonderful passage connecting the doctrine of repentance to how the Lord's servant

00:07:35.520 | ought to behave. In that passage, the Apostle Paul tells Timothy this. He says, "And the Lord's

00:07:44.800 | servant must not be quarrelsome, but kind to everyone, able to teach, patiently enduring evil,

00:07:54.400 | correcting his opponents with gentleness. God may perhaps grant them repentance,

00:08:00.800 | leading to a knowledge of the truth, and they may come to their senses and escape from the snare

00:08:09.040 | of the devil after being captured by him to do his will." I just want to focus on that one thought

00:08:19.840 | for a moment that repentance is the gift of God. Repentance is a gift from God. You see there that

00:08:32.320 | Paul tells Timothy God may perhaps grant them repentance, meaning that God must work in a

00:08:45.520 | person's heart and grant them to see the enormity of their sin, grant them to see the work of Christ

00:08:54.480 | on the cross. He must grant them to, as Paul says here, come to their senses and grant them this

00:09:04.880 | work of grace in which they turn from their sin and they turn to follow Christ. Repentance is

00:09:15.040 | a gift from God. Now, we call people to repentance, and you see throughout

00:09:20.960 | the New Testament Scriptures as well as the Old Testament Scriptures that

00:09:25.680 | the Bible calls people to repent of their sin, and so repentance is a human responsibility.

00:09:37.120 | We are given the responsibility to repent and to believe in Christ,

00:09:42.720 | but that truth needs to be balanced with this whole idea that repentance is the gift of God.

00:09:49.520 | In other words, when you see a person repent of his or her sin, you are seeing the work of God

00:09:56.560 | in a person's heart. God is the one who grants repentance. Some other verses that are related to

00:10:08.560 | this theme include Romans 2, verse 4, where Paul says, "Do you presume on the riches of his kindness

00:10:16.880 | and forbearance and patience, not knowing that God's kindness is meant to lead you to repentance?"

00:10:26.880 | In Acts 11, verse 18, says this, "When they heard these things, they fell silent, and they glorified

00:10:35.600 | God, saying then to the Gentiles, 'Also, God has granted repentance that leads to life.'"

00:10:46.240 | God is the one who grants repentance, so when you counsel someone and that

00:10:53.360 | counselee sees his or her sin and humbles himself before the cross, repents of sin,

00:11:03.520 | and has a changed life, what you don't do is go home and pat yourself on the back and say,

00:11:10.000 | "What a wonderful counselor I was. It was my ability that meant the difference

00:11:17.520 | in leading this person to repentance." Now, God may have used you in a wonderful way,

00:11:24.320 | but ultimately what you do is you go home and you praise God, and you thank God that He has

00:11:32.960 | granted repentance to the person you are ministering to. Now, what are the implications

00:11:42.240 | of this truth for the counselor's conduct, the truth that God is the one who grants repentance?

00:11:51.920 | Well, Paul tells us in 2 Timothy 2, verse 24, "The Lord's servant must not be quarrelsome."

00:12:00.720 | We must not be quarrelsome. When we engage in counseling ministry with people, we are

00:12:11.280 | oftentimes working with people who are blinded to their own sin. They can't see their own

00:12:19.920 | contribution to a conflict, for example, or they can't see how they have contributed to

00:12:28.240 | a difficult situation. Oftentimes, we deal with counselees who are really stubborn in not wanting

00:12:37.440 | to turn to the Lord in faith. You may even work with counselees who argue with you, or who dispute

00:12:45.920 | with you, or just who say they don't agree. And even most painfully of all, at times, counselees

00:12:53.440 | will actually divert the attention from their own behavior by criticizing the counselor's

00:13:02.000 | qualifications or skill set. And so, some counselees even get real personal,

00:13:09.120 | and they blame you for their lack of repentance or spiritual growth. What you have to remember in

00:13:18.720 | those seasons and in those situations is that the Lord's servant must not be quarrelsome.

00:13:26.960 | We don't engage in this kind of prideful disputing. Instead, we pray that God will

00:13:38.000 | open the counselee's eyes to see their sin and to see their need of repentance. We don't allow

00:13:46.560 | the issue to become defending ourselves. But as Paul says, the Lord's servant must not be quarrelsome,

00:13:54.560 | but kind to everyone. A word meaning to be gentle or mild or peaceable. The word kind was used to

00:14:05.040 | describe a medicine that was soothing or assuaging. And it says here that the Lord's bondservant must

00:14:15.440 | be kind to who? To everyone. Every counselee that you will minister to

00:14:23.760 | is a counselee that must be treated with kindness. The Lord's bondservant must be able to teach

00:14:34.240 | patiently, enduring evil, correcting his opponents with gentleness. And then Paul says, "God may

00:14:43.680 | perhaps grant them repentance, leading to a knowledge of the truth that they may," and this

00:14:49.280 | is the same language that was used of the prodigal son in Luke chapter 15, "that they may come to

00:14:55.360 | their senses." Sin is irrational. People lose themselves when they are caught in sin. They

00:15:07.280 | don't know their way out. They lose all perspective on life. And they will even hurt anyone who tries

00:15:15.840 | to help them come out of that situation. But we pray for our counselees that they may come to

00:15:22.320 | their senses. That their hearts would be awakened with the truth of God's word. And Paul even says,

00:15:32.640 | holds out the prospect of the person escaping from the snare of the devil after being captured

00:15:39.600 | by him to do his will. So there is spiritual warfare in the ministry of biblical counseling.

00:15:48.720 | We are fighting against the demonic realm, and we use the truth of God to work on people's hearts.

00:16:00.960 | And so we engage in this ministry desiring to lead people to repentance, and we pray that God

00:16:09.760 | will grant them repentance. Now I've been very honest with you all in saying that I'm not an

00:16:18.240 | expert biblical counselor by any means. I have my share of failures and shortcomings in this

00:16:26.560 | ministry, but I have done it counseling enough to know that there are times in the counseling

00:16:34.240 | ministry where you're sitting with a believer in Christ, and you're opening God's word,

00:16:39.360 | and you're just conversing about the issues of life, and the Holy Spirit does a work in the

00:16:46.080 | counselee's heart. And there's this aha moment, or there is some realization of the truth, or there

00:16:53.920 | is some understanding of something that the counseling never saw before, and there is a heart

00:17:00.240 | change that takes place. Even sitting with a married couple where they're at odds with one

00:17:06.960 | another and fighting and arguing over different things, and you minister the truth of God's word,

00:17:12.560 | and there's a moment in that counseling session where the husband or the wife reaches out and

00:17:20.080 | holds the other spouse's hand, and there is contrition, there is humility, there is

00:17:25.920 | brokenness, confession of sin, and reconciliation, and God grants repentance, and you get to see it.

00:17:35.040 | You get to be a first row seat and view to see this work of God that takes place. And I'll just

00:17:45.120 | tell you that those moments, you fight hard for them. It takes a lot of labor to get there,

00:17:53.120 | but when you're privileged to be able to sit in those moments, you look back, and you look back

00:17:59.040 | on the essays that you worked your way through, and you look back at all the training that you

00:18:03.760 | went through in phase one and phase two of ACBC training, and it's all worth it. It's all worth

00:18:10.000 | it to be part of this work of God where someone's life is different because you are able to bring

00:18:21.040 | the word of God to bear in the ministry of biblical counseling. And so this is a wonderful

00:18:29.280 | ministry. God does grant repentance is what I would encourage you with, and when he does,

00:18:35.600 | it is a beautiful thing to see. So let me pray for us briefly, and then we'll dive into our notes

00:18:40.960 | and look at the essay exam tonight. Let's pray. Father, thank you for the truth that you do

00:18:47.760 | indeed grant repentance. This is an expression of your grace and your favor toward us. You do

00:18:55.680 | change hearts. You do awaken eyes. You do soften people's attitudes. You do change lives through

00:19:08.240 | your word, and we thank you that it is your kindness that leads us to repentance. We pray

00:19:15.200 | that, Father, you would help us to apply this doctrine to our own lives first. As Luther said,

00:19:22.480 | all of life is repentance. Help us to be daily repenting of sin and embracing Christ through faith

00:19:29.520 | that we ourselves may be a model of the things we wish to see in the lives of our counselees.

00:19:38.640 | Thank you for each student in this class. Bless them richly. Thank you for their faithfulness.

00:19:44.320 | Thank you for our time together. Work in our hearts. Through your word, we pray in Jesus' name.

00:19:50.240 | Amen. Amen. All right, we are looking at the essay exam tonight, which is "Describe the

00:19:58.640 | Role of Repentance in Beginning and Continuing the Christian Life,"

00:20:02.160 | and the question is to explain the importance of the doctrine of repentance for

00:20:08.640 | biblical counseling. On your handout, you have the normal reading from Wayne Grudem,

00:20:17.760 | Paul Enns, and Heath Lambert, and in addition to those three resources, I sent you a Dropbox

00:20:25.360 | link with a few other handouts that I think you'll find helpful in your study of this

00:20:32.720 | topic. There's a reading there by J.C. Ryle on the doctrine of repentance, very helpful.

00:20:39.120 | Everything from Ryle is very helpful in our understanding of these topics.

00:20:47.680 | And then I would especially commend to you the worksheet that was created by Brad Bigney. It's

00:20:54.160 | called "True Repentance and Its Impact." That is a worksheet that we use in our biblical counseling

00:21:03.440 | ministry here at Kindred. I think it's available for free off the church, their church's website,

00:21:11.680 | and it's just a worksheet that helps a counselee walk through the doctrine of repentance. It has

00:21:19.440 | some fill-in-the-blanks that a counselee can fill out and make practical application of this

00:21:25.920 | doctrine to their lives, and just a very helpful work. We'll cover some of the material in the

00:21:34.640 | next few minutes that's on that handout, but if you want a handout to give to a counselee

00:21:41.360 | to help them work through repentance, that would be a good one to use.

00:21:45.600 | And so, just a number of good resources on the topic of repentance. So, you'll know that this

00:21:53.520 | question really has three different elements. The first is to describe the role of repentance in the

00:22:01.840 | beginning of the Christian life. So, what is the role of repentance in conversion, the gospel call

00:22:10.240 | to repent and believe? Then you have the second element, which is to describe the role of

00:22:16.720 | repentance in continuing the Christian life. So, we begin our Christian lives by repenting of sin

00:22:24.080 | and believing in the gospel, and then we continue the Christian life as we repent on a daily basis

00:22:31.440 | and embrace Christ through faith in our sanctification. And then the third element

00:22:37.600 | of the question is to explain the importance of the doctrine of repentance for biblical

00:22:42.480 | counseling. Now, you don't have to answer the question in that order. If you want to do so,

00:22:50.080 | you're more than welcome to break up your essay into those three portions, but you don't have to

00:22:58.080 | do that. You can do a general discussion of repentance, but in some point of your essay,

00:23:04.640 | you're going to want to address the question, how would you use the doctrine of repentance in

00:23:10.480 | counseling others? Why is this doctrine so important in biblical counseling ministry?

00:23:16.880 | And so, if you pick apart the elements of the question, those would be the three

00:23:22.720 | elements that the question is looking for. Now, let me move to the next page of your

00:23:33.520 | handout here and just look at the doctrine of repentance. Wayne Grudem has given this

00:23:42.000 | definition for repentance. I believe it's an excellent one. He says that repentance is a

00:23:48.560 | heartfelt sorrow for sin, a renouncing of it, and a sincere commitment to forsake it and walk

00:23:57.280 | in obedience to Christ. So, repentance includes a heartfelt sorrow for sin,

00:24:04.080 | a renouncing of that sin, and then a sincere commitment to forsake it and walk in obedience

00:24:11.120 | to Christ. If you've been with us in our study, we looked at the three components of faith.

00:24:20.960 | There was an intellectual aspect, there was an emotional aspect, and there was a volitional

00:24:29.040 | aspect of faith. Faith understands certain truths to be relevant. Faith emotionally embraces those

00:24:40.080 | truths in application to the person's heart, and then there's a volitional aspect of faith where

00:24:46.000 | faith places one's confidence or trust in a certain person or thing. And so, those categories

00:24:55.920 | of intellectual, emotional, and volitional. Now, we'll find when it comes to repentance that those

00:25:03.360 | categories are applicable to our understanding of this doctrine as well. This isn't on your handout,

00:25:12.240 | but I'll put it up on the screen here. Repentance includes those three aspects. There is an

00:25:19.280 | intellectual understanding that sin is wrong. There is an emotional approval of the teachings

00:25:27.280 | of Scripture regarding sin, and then there is a personal decision to turn from sin and seek

00:25:35.200 | forgiveness from God. So, there's a similarity there to the three aspects of saving faith,

00:25:43.040 | intellectual, emotional, and volitional. If you look at your handout, we'll see these three

00:25:52.240 | categories being addressed by different passages in Scripture. We see the emotional aspect of

00:25:59.840 | repentance addressed in Matthew 5, verse 4, where Jesus says, "Blessed are those who mourn,

00:26:06.000 | for they shall be comforted." There is a legitimate type of mourning and sorrow in the heart of

00:26:15.680 | a sinner who understands his or her sin before holy God. It's not just the worldly sorrow of

00:26:26.480 | mourning over the consequences of sin. It is a legitimate sorrow that is really born out of that

00:26:36.320 | statement in Psalm 51, verse 5, "Against you and you alone I have sinned." It is the understanding

00:26:44.560 | that I've sinned against a holy God. It is the understanding that I violated His laws. I have

00:26:51.520 | dishonored Him, and there is a mourning. There is a sorrow that takes place in the sinner's heart.

00:26:59.840 | Notice here that not all sorrow is equivalent to true repentance.

00:27:07.040 | Saul was sorry for his sin. He said, "I have sinned," but he did not

00:27:16.560 | repent of that sin back in the Old Testament. Judas felt remorse for his sin in betraying Christ,

00:27:23.200 | but he did not repent of that sin, and so not all emotion or sorrow equals true repentance.

00:27:34.160 | There are people who feel sorry over the consequences of their sin, that they've lost

00:27:39.040 | their job, or they've lost their marriage, or they've lost their privileges, but it's not the

00:27:47.520 | true contrition of a believer who sees his or her sin as an affront against a holy God. Or as a

00:27:56.960 | believer, one is sorry for, "I have sinned against my heavenly Father who so loves me and cares for

00:28:07.280 | me," but there is a sorrow when it comes to true repentance. And Jesus actually, far from discouraging

00:28:16.400 | that type of sorrow, He pronounces a blessing upon those who mourn. "Blessed are those who mourn,

00:28:25.440 | for they shall be comforted." So you see there the emotional aspect of true repentance. You also see

00:28:35.680 | a volitional aspect to true repentance. In Luke 18 verse 13, Jesus spoke of the tax collector who

00:28:42.000 | was repentant, and it says that the tax collector standing far off would not even lift up his eyes

00:28:48.880 | to heaven, but beat his breast saying, "God be merciful to me, a sinner." So here we see both

00:28:57.520 | the emotional aspect of repentance and the volitional aspect of repentance.

00:29:03.840 | He cried out for mercy. He was broken over his sin, and back in those days, the tax collector,

00:29:15.600 | that was one of the most public and notorious of sins, to be defrauding your own people of

00:29:24.640 | finances, of money, under the authority of a Roman oppressor. And so a tax collector was not

00:29:32.400 | only viewed as a financial cheater, but also as a traitor to one's people. But here you have one who

00:29:41.520 | is a notorious sinner, at least in a public sense, and he's crying out for mercy. "God be merciful to

00:29:47.840 | me, a sinner." And Jesus contrasts that expression of repentance to the words of the Pharisee who

00:29:55.520 | said in that same passage, "God, I thank you that I am not like other men," and went on to

00:30:01.120 | list the ways that he was superior to others. So just a practical note there for counseling

00:30:09.440 | ministry. I would much rather in counseling minister to someone, a counselee, who has a

00:30:18.880 | serious and somewhat notorious sin, but who has a broken and contrite heart.

00:30:27.040 | I'd much rather minister to that person than minister to someone who may have a less

00:30:38.640 | serious sin, at least in regards to public reputation,

00:30:42.080 | but who puffs himself or herself up in pride and self-righteousness, and is so blinded

00:30:49.040 | by self-righteousness that he can't see his sin and just says, "Well, at least I'm not like other

00:30:56.320 | sinners. I know I'm a husband who needs to grow, but at least I'm not like those other husbands

00:31:02.800 | who don't even have a job or who don't even provide for their family. I know I have an anger

00:31:07.200 | problem, but at least I'm not like other people who can't get their lives right in certain areas."

00:31:14.480 | I'd much rather minister to the counselee who says, "Here is my sin, and I'm broken over my sin,

00:31:21.600 | and God be merciful to me, a sinner, and I need to grow, and I need to change," than one who is

00:31:27.760 | afflicted with self-righteousness, and part of counseling ministry is engaging in that spiritual

00:31:34.080 | battle to pray for a person's self-righteousness to be broken, and that perhaps is the most

00:31:45.280 | damaging sin of all, is to be so self-righteous in your pride that you can't see your sin,

00:31:56.000 | and you can't repent of your sin. Luke 19 verse 8 is a beautiful picture of repentance. This

00:32:06.160 | would highlight all three aspects, the intellectual, emotional, and volitional aspects of

00:32:12.720 | repentance. Verse 8 says, "And Zacchaeus stood and said to the Lord, 'Behold, Lord, the half of my

00:32:19.680 | goods I give to the poor, and if I have defrauded anyone of anything, I restore it fourfold.' And

00:32:25.760 | Jesus said to him, 'Today salvation has come to this house, since he also is a son of Abraham,

00:32:30.960 | for the Son of Man came to seek and save the lost.'" So, here's how you know a person is

00:32:39.440 | repentant. A person is repentant when you have to say to them, "That's too much. You don't need to

00:32:47.520 | restore things fourfold." I mean, restore things one-fold would be good enough, but the heart of

00:32:54.320 | true repentance is a desire to do anything that it would take to make things right before God and

00:33:01.840 | before others. And we do see that in counseling ministry, when God does this work, that a person

00:33:13.120 | goes from saying, "How little can I get away with?" to saying, "How much can I do to show that I am

00:33:21.600 | truly sorry for my sin?" John the Baptist preached a message of repentance in Luke 3, verse 8. He

00:33:30.960 | said, "Bear fruits in keeping with repentance, and do not begin to say to yourselves, 'We have

00:33:37.600 | Abraham as our father,' for I tell you, God is able from these stones to raise up children for

00:33:43.440 | Abraham. Even now the axe is laid to the foot of the trees. Every tree, therefore, that does not

00:33:48.800 | bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire." Now, watch this. John the Baptist preached

00:33:55.360 | like a biblical counselor. Or should I say that we should counsel in accordance with

00:34:03.280 | John the Baptist preaching? Because in verse 10, it says that the crowds asked him,

00:34:09.040 | "What then shall we do?" And John the Baptist didn't say to that question, "Well, as long as

00:34:16.080 | you just feel really bad about it or you feel really sorry for your sin, that's good enough

00:34:20.160 | for God." Repentance is a turning. It is a turning away from sin and a turning to God in obedience

00:34:28.800 | and faith. And so the crowds asked him, "What then shall we do?" In verse 11, he answered them,

00:34:34.960 | and he got very specific with his application. And that's very instructive for us as biblical

00:34:43.120 | counselors in training. Note there the care and the specificity that characterize John's personal

00:34:54.400 | application of the doctrine of repentance. He didn't just say, "Well, repent and do what you

00:35:00.560 | want." He got personal. Verse 11, he answered them, "Whoever has two tunics is to share with him

00:35:08.480 | who has none, and whoever has food is to do likewise."

00:35:12.480 | Tax collectors also came to be baptized and said to him, "Teacher, what shall we do?"

00:35:18.400 | Notice John gave a different set of applications to the different types of people who were coming

00:35:26.880 | to him for ministry. Tax collector said, "Teacher, what shall we do?" And John said, "Collect no more

00:35:37.840 | than you are authorized to do." Verse 13, soldiers also asked him, "And we, what shall we do?" And

00:35:44.080 | he said to them, "Do not extort money from anyone by threats or by false accusation and be content

00:35:49.920 | with your wages." So again, just talking about counseling ministry, you and I are going to

00:35:58.240 | counsel different types of people. We're going to counsel older people and younger people. We're

00:36:04.560 | going to counsel people who are more mature in the faith and people who are brand new believers.

00:36:10.720 | We're going to counsel people who are married and people who are single. We're going to counsel

00:36:15.600 | people from different ages and stages of life. And we need to learn to take this doctrine of

00:36:22.560 | repentance and make personal application that is different depending on the person whom we are

00:36:29.920 | ministering to. We need to learn not only to interpret the scriptures, but interpret

00:36:35.520 | the person who is in front of us. And that is a review of the year one training.

00:36:41.680 | The applications for each believer will be different, even though the heart of repentance

00:36:48.960 | will be the same. The heart of each believer must be brought in humility before the Lord,

00:36:55.760 | but the expression of that humility will look different depending on the person

00:37:04.320 | and depending on their unique circumstances in life. My friend Matt Shackelford is an ACBC fellow

00:37:13.680 | and he helped me with this just in conversation about counseling. And he said, "When your

00:37:21.040 | counseling is stuck, get more specific in application. When your counseling is stuck

00:37:30.400 | and you feel like you're not getting anywhere, then get more specific in your personal application."

00:37:38.480 | And that's in line with the ministry of John the Baptist who made very personal application

00:37:43.840 | of the doctrine of repentance, but had that application differ depending on the person

00:37:50.720 | in front of him. Acts 26 verse 18, Jesus said to Paul, "I am sending you to open their eyes."

00:37:59.120 | And I love this. What a beautiful picture and description of repentance. "I'm sending you to

00:38:06.320 | open their eyes so that they may turn." Note that key word there and circle that.

00:38:12.240 | "They may turn from darkness to light and from the power of Satan to God,

00:38:17.760 | that they may receive forgiveness of sins in a place among those who are sanctified by faith

00:38:26.480 | in me." So the idea of repentance is one of a turning.

00:38:31.200 | The sinner turns from wonderful truth, turns from darkness to light,

00:38:40.720 | turns from Satan to God, turns from sin to obedience to God's word,

00:38:48.800 | turns from self-reliance to a reliance on Christ. And I love how Jesus said to Paul,

00:38:57.760 | "I'm sending you to open their eyes." Their eyes must be open to see the truth if this

00:39:05.360 | turning in their lives is to take place. Now, that's just really practical,

00:39:10.240 | dear brothers and sisters in Christ. Friends, this is real practical. I pray this every time

00:39:16.880 | that I teach and I preach God's word. I pray this every time that I counsel or every time I have an

00:39:22.960 | evangelistic opportunity. "Lord, open the eyes of my audience's heart so that they may turn from

00:39:31.520 | whatever they're trusting in or clinging to in their lives and that they may turn to Christ."

00:39:37.360 | And I pray that for not only unbelievers, but I pray that for believers as well because

00:39:42.320 | believers tend to, we know, believers tend to turn back to sin, turn back to self,

00:39:49.280 | and we need to be continually reminded of the turning that needs to take place

00:39:54.960 | on a daily basis to turn away from sin and turn to Christ. And the eyes of our heart need to be

00:40:06.400 | open in that way. We cover 2 Timothy 2, verse 24. I won't belabor that point, but just note in Luke,

00:40:14.800 | the next passage there, Luke 15, verse 7, the joy of repentance, the joy of this ministry,

00:40:22.240 | which I've been trying to communicate to you, Luke 15, verse 7, "Just so I tell you,

00:40:27.760 | there will be more joy in heaven over one sinner who repents than over 99 righteous persons who

00:40:36.480 | need no repentance." And you have that language of turning in 1 Thessalonians 1, verse 9,

00:40:44.400 | "For they themselves report concerning us the kind of perception we had among you and how you

00:40:50.400 | turned," there it is again, you can circle that word again, "you turned to God from idols to serve

00:40:58.800 | the living and the true God." So Grudem writes that "repentance like faith is an intellectual

00:41:06.080 | understanding that sin is wrong, an emotional approval of the teachings of scripture regarding

00:41:11.680 | sin, a sorrow for sin and the hatred of it, and a personal decision to turn from it, a renouncing of

00:41:19.600 | sin and a decision of the will to forsake it and lead a life of obedience to Christ itself. All of

00:41:27.680 | this is the work of God in the sinner's heart." So let me open this can of worms here and see if I

00:41:39.120 | can address this question. So the question would be, what is the relationship between faith and

00:41:46.480 | repentance? You'll notice in your Bibles that sometimes the Bible says, "repent and believe."

00:41:53.440 | Sometimes the Bible simply says, "repent." Sometimes the Bible says, "repent to believe

00:42:00.080 | in the Lord Jesus Christ." Are these two different calls to salvation? Are there two different

00:42:08.880 | requirements for salvation? And I don't believe that is true. I don't believe that when the

00:42:16.160 | Bible says, "repent and believe," that it's talking about two separate requirements of salvation. I

00:42:23.200 | believe that the language of "repent and believe" is talking about two aspects of the one call

00:42:32.640 | to salvation, two sides of one coin, if you will, "repent and believe." If a person is going to

00:42:42.800 | believe in Christ, they must turn from their sin. There must be a turning from self, a turning from

00:42:51.600 | idols. If a person repents, they must turn to something. One must not only turn away from sin,

00:43:02.800 | but turn to Christ. So I don't believe "repent and believe" are talking about two separate

00:43:10.080 | calls to salvation. I believe that it's talking about two sides of the same coin. And that's why

00:43:16.640 | the Scriptures sometimes say, "repent and believe." Sometimes the Scripture says,

00:43:21.440 | "believe," which implies repentance. And sometimes the Scripture says, "repent," which implies

00:43:31.680 | believe as you turn from your sin, turn to Christ in faith. And so as John Calvin has well said,

00:43:41.920 | "Now it ought to be a fact beyond controversy that repentance not only constantly follows faith,

00:43:48.560 | but is also born of faith." J.C. Ryle has said this on the next page of your handout,

00:44:00.240 | "Wherever faith is, there is repentance. Wherever repentance is, there's always faith."

00:44:06.560 | I do not decide which comes first, whether repentance comes before faith or faith before

00:44:14.000 | repentance. But I am bold to say that the two graces are never found separate one from the

00:44:21.200 | other. Just as you cannot have the sun without light or ice without cold or fire without heat

00:44:28.800 | or water without moisture, you will never find true faith without true repentance. And you will

00:44:36.080 | never find true repentance without lively faith. The two things will always go side by side.

00:44:43.120 | I think he says it as well as it can be said. Repentance and faith are two sides of the same

00:44:52.880 | coin. So on your handout there, you see there that sometimes both repentance and faith are mentioned.

00:44:58.880 | Sometimes only faith is mentioned. Sometimes only repentance is mentioned. Repentance and

00:45:07.600 | faith are two sides of the same coin. Repentant faith is what is necessary for salvation.

00:45:18.240 | And so we work through these things and think through that in your own understanding.

00:45:26.000 | So before I get to this next slide here, let me look to some of the rest of the handout on this

00:45:37.360 | page. You see there the tension that repentance is a gift of God. As we mentioned, God grants

00:45:46.000 | repentance. And at the same time, it is the responsibility of man. So we have to live in

00:45:53.360 | that tension. We call people to repentance while understanding that God is the one who grants

00:46:02.080 | repentance. So by the way, we do need to get comfortable in counseling ministry

00:46:08.880 | in calling our counselees to repentance. Now, please be balanced with this.

00:46:16.320 | I don't recommend, at least with the counselors in our center, I don't recommend that they do

00:46:24.320 | the full John the Baptist and start calling their counselees brood of vipers. And on the first

00:46:31.200 | session, start warning them of the one who comes and who will baptize them with fire.

00:46:39.040 | There might be a counselee who needs that type of direct treatment, but I don't usually recommend

00:46:45.760 | that type of direct ministry unless you are sensing a really stubborn heart.

00:46:58.160 | You don't want every word out of your mouth to be repent, repent, repent.

00:47:02.320 | I've had this discussion with those who are training for counseling ministry,

00:47:07.120 | and some have said even, "Well, what about the prophet Nathan who came to David and said,

00:47:12.400 | 'You're the man. You have sinned. You're the man.' Isn't there a place for that in counseling

00:47:18.800 | ministry?" Just to say, "You've sinned and you need to repent." And my response is, "Well,

00:47:26.000 | make sure you read the rest of that passage. How did Nathan approach

00:47:30.000 | David and confront him on his sin?" It wasn't just, "You're the man and you're in sin." Didn't

00:47:38.480 | Nathan actually tell a story? Didn't he give an illustration of a sheep and tell this vivid story

00:47:48.480 | that would illustrate David's sin? And it was only after David really didn't get the point of that

00:47:53.360 | story that he was the one being addressed. That was when Nathan got very pointed with him and said,

00:47:59.680 | "You're the man." There's a place for dialogue and there's a place for illustrations. We cover some

00:48:09.440 | of this in year one of our training. There's a place to ask questions. Like God asked Jonah

00:48:16.320 | in Jonah 4 verse 1, "Jonah, do you do well to be angry?" There's a place to ask questions that

00:48:25.760 | would lead a counselee to reflect on their own behavior. And you probably would be much wiser to

00:48:34.480 | lead a counselee to see his or her own sin than to be constantly be the counselor who says,

00:48:43.040 | "That's a sin. Repent. That's a sin. Repent." Just reflect on that. I'm not saying there's

00:48:49.120 | not a place for that. I'm just saying that I surely would not want to see a counselor who

00:48:54.480 | in every session just simply said, "You're in sin. Repent." But with that said, there is a place for

00:49:03.280 | calling the counselee to repentance with gentleness, with kindness,

00:49:10.720 | using the various means, illustrations, questions, leading a dialogue. But we are here to

00:49:17.920 | change minds. We are praying that God would change hearts. We're not just merely engaging

00:49:23.440 | in a vent session where the person vents their emotions time after time in a counseling session.

00:49:29.360 | We are looking for heart change. And so we do want to use this doctrine in counseling ministry.

00:49:39.120 | We want our counselees to repent of sin. Now, I want to reflect on this whole idea in the time I

00:49:49.360 | have remaining here of repentance continuing through the Christian life. So I hope you're

00:49:58.320 | convinced that a person cannot become a Christian without repenting of sin and believing in Christ,

00:50:06.400 | repent and believe are the two sides of one coin. I hope you're convinced of that,

00:50:11.920 | that a person can become a Christian and then live in continual unrepentant sin.

00:50:18.640 | Part of the repentance is just the metanoia, the changing of heart and mind that sees Christ

00:50:26.160 | as so much better than sin so that the true believer still struggles with sin,

00:50:34.560 | but the true believer does not love sin in the way that he or she loved sin as an unbeliever.

00:50:42.880 | There's that work that God does in a person's heart where you see that Christ is so much better

00:50:50.960 | than the fleeting pleasures of sin. Christ is so much better than the deceitfulness of sin

00:50:57.280 | and that you simply cannot continue in sin and embrace Christ at the same time.

00:51:04.080 | And so a person begins a Christian life through repenting of sin and believing in Christ,

00:51:10.720 | but just a reflection here that repentance does continue through the Christian life,

00:51:16.800 | and I think this is illustrated in Ephesians 4 verses 22 to 24 where Paul addresses Christians.

00:51:28.560 | And he says in verse 22, "To put off your old self, which belongs to your former manner of life

00:51:36.400 | and is corrupt through deceitful desires, and to be renewed in the spirit of your minds,

00:51:42.640 | and to put on the new self created after the likeness of God in true righteousness and

00:51:50.640 | holiness." Now, watch this. We're going to see the same dynamic at work here that we saw in

00:52:01.760 | the ministry of John the Baptist. Notice that John the Baptist, he gave this general call to

00:52:07.120 | repentance. He said, "Repent for the kingdom of God is at hand." Then when they came to him and

00:52:13.120 | they said, "What shall we do?" He got very specific in his application of repentance to their lives.

00:52:20.800 | Paul is going to follow a similar pattern. He's going to introduce this general concept of putting

00:52:30.720 | off the old self and renewing your minds in the truth and then putting on the new self,

00:52:35.520 | the put off, put on dynamic that ought to characterize our lives. And then we might

00:52:42.240 | be asking, "Well, what then shall we do? How are we to put off sin and put on righteousness?"

00:52:49.440 | Paul, at that point, gets very specific in his application.

00:52:52.640 | He says in verse 25, "Put off falsehood and put on speaking truth.

00:53:02.240 | Therefore, having put away falsehood, let each one of you speak the truth

00:53:08.320 | with his neighbors, for we are members one of another." By the way, we talked about this

00:53:19.440 | in year one in marital communication. That verse means you put off using exaggerated speech

00:53:28.400 | because it's not true. The language of, "You never listen to me," or, "You always disrespect me,"

00:53:38.000 | or, "We don't have anything in common." Those are exaggerations that as an expression of repentance,

00:53:46.400 | you put off that type of speech and you put on speaking truth.

00:53:52.160 | Verse 26, "You put off sinful anger and you put on righteous anger." Paul says, "Be angry and do

00:54:02.320 | not sin. Do not let the sun go down on your anger and give no opportunity to the devil."

00:54:09.520 | Paul's meaning here is that the believer puts off sinful anger. Be angry and do not sin.

00:54:16.640 | Yet, this verse does allow for a form of righteous anger, the type of anger that does not sin.

00:54:25.440 | There is an aspect of righteous anger to our lives, although we must be very careful with that

00:54:33.520 | category of anger. We ought to be angry at false doctrine and we ought to be angry when Christ's

00:54:40.960 | name is dishonored. We ought to be angry righteously at certain sins such as abortion

00:54:49.520 | or genocide. We ought to be angry at certain things that we see in our society. A righteous

00:54:58.000 | anger that is self-controlled and that has more to do with the glory of God than personal offense.

00:55:05.040 | Paul says, "Put off sinful anger. Put on righteous anger." He says in verse 28, "Put off stealing and

00:55:13.920 | put on sharing. Let the thief no longer steal, but rather let him labor doing honest work with

00:55:19.920 | his own hands that he may have something to share with anyone in need." He says, "Put off corrupting

00:55:26.880 | speech. Put on edifying speech. Let no corrupting talk come out of your mouths, but only such as is

00:55:33.360 | good for building up as fits the occasion that it may give grace to those who hear."

00:55:38.880 | Then he says, "Put off bitterness and put on forgiveness. Let all bitterness and wrath and

00:55:49.120 | anger and clamor and slander be put away from you along with all malice. Be kind to one another,

00:55:54.400 | tender-hearted, forgiving one another as God in Christ forgave you." Now,

00:56:01.360 | just look at that list of applications for a moment and just look at this as an illustration

00:56:10.560 | of the dynamic of repentance that ought to be characterizing our lives. Would you agree if you

00:56:17.600 | looked at that passage and you look at the applications of the put off and put on dynamic,

00:56:25.280 | putting off falsehood, putting on truth, putting off anger, putting on righteous anger,

00:56:31.120 | putting off stealing, putting on sharing, putting off all corrupting speech, putting on only speech

00:56:38.800 | that builds up and edifies, putting off all these forms of bitterness, wrath, clamor, slander,

00:56:45.200 | malice, and putting on forgiveness of other sins? Would you agree with Martin Luther's statement

00:56:52.800 | that all of life is repentance? Is there anyone among us who can look at that passage and all

00:57:05.520 | the applications of the truth of repentance and say, "Well, I've kind of reached a point where I

00:57:13.120 | don't need to do this anymore. I don't need to put off and put on anymore. I've sort of been a

00:57:18.800 | Christian for 15 years now, and at year 15, I've kind of arrived where I don't need to put off and

00:57:26.320 | put on anymore. I'm living perfectly on the right side of that column, and I have no need of daily

00:57:35.120 | repentance." I'd be saying, "Are you kidding me? You just haven't studied the passage."

00:57:41.120 | All of us would look at those applications and see that we all have need of daily repentance,

00:57:48.880 | and if you need an illustration of that, just look at that last application. All bitterness,

00:57:55.360 | all wrath, all clamor, all slander, all malice. Paul says, and here's the language of repentance,

00:58:05.280 | the language of repentance, they must be put away, which refers to a decisive, definitive

00:58:12.640 | action that needs to be carried out with a sense of urgency. A person says, "I'm angry." Paul

00:58:22.320 | doesn't say, "Well, find a place to vent or find a place to let off steam." He says, "Let that anger

00:58:29.360 | be put away from you. You have a responsibility to repent of that sinful anger and to forgive

00:58:39.200 | as Christ has forgiven you, which means that you must forgive from the heart."

00:58:51.920 | All of the Christian life is repentance. Repentance continues in each of us, each of our lives,

00:59:02.720 | and where a counselor is helpful, and by the way, you can make a whole counseling ministry if you

00:59:09.840 | just master Ephesians 4. Actually, David Powelson said that if you just master the book of Ephesians,

00:59:17.600 | you can have an entire lifetime of counseling just based upon using the book of Ephesians,

00:59:23.120 | and he actually wrote a book. I think the book is Speaking the Truth in Love. He actually

00:59:29.680 | wrote a book that illustrates how you just use Ephesians in counseling, and you can address

00:59:35.680 | so many counseling issues just by mastering that one book, but even if you just mastered Ephesians

00:59:42.400 | chapter 4, and even just this passage, Ephesians 4 verses 22 to 32, how much counseling could you

00:59:49.680 | do? I mean, anyone dealing with any of these issues could be helped as you take them to the

00:59:55.600 | truth of God's Word, and then where a counselor is helpful is you get very specific based upon the

01:00:01.920 | counselee who is in front of you. You don't just say, "Well, forgive as Christ has forgiven you."

01:00:11.120 | In counseling, you say, "Bob, God's Word is calling you to forgive Bill."

01:00:18.880 | For the times where, Bill, your co-worker came and was really critical toward you in his speech,

01:00:26.720 | God is calling you to forgive him as Christ has forgiven you, and you call

01:00:36.240 | Bob or whoever you counsel, you call that person to repentance.

01:00:41.440 | Just as I close, I would just note that there is joy in

01:00:48.400 | walking on the path of obedience. There is joy in walking in newness of life. Let me ask you

01:01:01.440 | to consider who is happier, the Christian who is living in bondage to bitterness and anger and wrath

01:01:10.880 | and just stewing over the things that have been done wrong to him or her, or the person who has

01:01:18.240 | repented of those sins and is walking with Christ, a person who has pleaded with God to change and

01:01:26.080 | soften his or her heart, and who has become tenderhearted, forgiving others. This is why

01:01:31.840 | C. H. Spurgeon said, "The true evangelical repentance is food to the saintly soul.

01:01:38.720 | I do not know, beloved, when I am more perfectly happy than when I am weeping for sin at the foot

01:01:44.640 | of the cross, for that is the safest place in which I can stand. Sorrow for sin is a sweet sorrow.

01:01:53.040 | Do not desire to escape it." I think Roland Hill was right when he said that his only regret in

01:01:59.280 | going to heaven would be that he could no more repent. And so I commend to you the study of this

01:02:09.520 | topic. There's some more work there that I won't cover from 2 Corinthians 7 on distinguishing

01:02:19.680 | worldly sorrow from true repentance. Do some work on that. Read Brad Bigney's handout on that

01:02:27.440 | subject. And if you need more help on that, Heath Lambert's book, Finally Free, Chapter 2,

01:02:34.800 | has an excellent chapter on distinguishing worldly sorrow from godly repentance. And I would commend

01:02:42.960 | that chapter to you if you want more work on that subject. But I hope and pray that we will all live

01:02:52.560 | in the good of this doctrine. And by the way, when you do see your counselee repent, just affirm that.

01:03:02.160 | Just learn to tell your counselee that the fact that you are seeing your sin,

01:03:11.600 | the fact that you are seeing your need for change is the evidence of God's work in you.

01:03:17.520 | I believe that what I'm seeing in your life is the work of the Holy Spirit.

01:03:24.480 | I believe that you're a true Christian because you're seeking to repent of sin. Just learn to

01:03:30.480 | affirm. Affirm God's forgiveness. Learn to use 1 John 1, 9 that if we confess our sins,

01:03:37.520 | then he is faithful and righteous to forgive us our sins and our transgressions. And just affirm

01:03:43.840 | that in your counselee's life that I believe that on the authority of God's word that God has

01:03:49.280 | forgiven you of the sin because you are, God will not despise a broken and contrite heart.

01:03:55.680 | Just learn to, when you do see that in the people you work with, to affirm those things and to

01:04:02.720 | encourage your counselee in that way. But I do pray that we will live in the good of Psalm 32,

01:04:08.960 | verse 1, "Blessed is the one whose transgression is forgiven, whose sin is covered. Blessed is the

01:04:16.640 | man against whom the Lord counts no iniquity and in whose spirit there is no deceit." Thank you so

01:04:25.440 | much for being with us tonight on this webinar. And just I pray for each of you that God will

01:04:34.480 | bless your studies. If I can be of any help or if Jacqueline can be of any help in your studies,

01:04:41.680 | please feel free to email us at counseling@kinderchurch.org. I do look forward to

01:04:49.280 | showing you the new counseling offices and just rejoicing in what God is doing in there. And we

01:04:56.240 | need those offices to be filled. And so we are praying that God will bless each of your training

01:05:05.120 | and that He will equip you for this wonderful ministry. And we're so excited about what the

01:05:12.000 | Lord is doing. So let me pray for us and close our time together. And we will regather next

01:05:17.840 | Sunday at 5 o'clock and continue with theology exam number 18. Let me pray for us. Father,

01:05:24.400 | thank you for our time together. We do thank you for the doctrine of repentance. And we pray that

01:05:33.680 | we may learn to daily repent of our own sin, to turn from sin, and to embrace Christ by faith.

01:05:42.480 | Help us to put off the old man, to renew our minds with the truth of your Word,

01:05:49.600 | and to put on the new man, and to make application of these things to our own lives so that it is out

01:05:56.640 | of the experience of a transformed heart and life that we would lead others to experience

01:06:03.840 | that same transformation. Lord, do it work in our own hearts. Repentance is not easy.

01:06:11.440 | We pray that you would help us to repent, not only on the surface level of behavior and words

01:06:19.040 | and actions, but at the heart level, at the level of our thinking, our desires, our values,

01:06:27.280 | our treasures, what we worship and build our lives around, that we will learn to

01:06:34.640 | to turn from idolatry and from the things that we worship, and that we would turn to

01:06:42.960 | embrace Christ and worship Christ in him alone. We thank you for the purifying work of your Word,

01:06:50.880 | the work that you're doing in each of our lives. Pray that you would keep us and bless us

01:06:56.720 | in this next week and regather.

ACBC Theology Exam 17 - Doctrine of Repentance

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