Conclusion of a message delivered at the "Heart-Cry for Revival" Conference near Asheville, North Carolina, May 23-27.
The most powerful portion on repentance in the whole Bible is Second Corinthians, chapter 7. Paul is writing to the Corinthians a second letter, and he is referring here to a letter he had previously written and sent. All those who love First Corinthians have an awareness of how stern and how confrontational was that first letter. He took them to task for their lack of unity; for their elevation of the academic and the intellectual; for their abuses of the Lord’s table; for their tolerance for immorality; for their lack of understanding concerning the gifts of the Spirit and their misuse of these spiritual gifts.
After he sent the letter, he might have wished he could get the letter back. The critical thing in Paul’s mind, however, was not that they love him. The critical thing was, when they got the letter, would they read it, and if they read it, would they repent? That’s the critical thing today. Not merely that we are fully repentant, but that we carry the truth to others so that we will begin to see a wave of repentance sweep across our lands.
As you read Second Corinthians, chapter seven, you see that Paul is speaking of very urgent issues here. Note Second Corinthians 7:8-9: "Though I made you sorry with a letter, I do not repent, though I did repent: for I perceive that the same epistle has made you sorry though it were but for a season. But now, I rejoice, not that you were made sorry..." Nor does the preacher go away from a meeting full of joy because people have wept, full of joy because the sword of the Spirit has created such agony in their hearts that they are extremely uncomfortable and full of pain. No, that’s not what they rejoice about. Along with the Apostle Paul, they rejoice that although the pain comes, the healing follows, and the great work of grace comes.
Paul reminds us in verse ten that there is a godly sorrow that works repentance to salvation not to be repented of, but that there is a sorrow of the world that works death. I am convinced that multitudes in our churches know only the sorrow of the world and that leads to death. They know only a repentance still to be repented of. What an awful thing to have in your life a repentance that is so worthless that it has not only left you with the initial sins, but the repentance itself is so faulty it must be repented of. That’s where countless numbers of professed Christians are.
Marks of Repentance from 2 Corinthians 7:11
"For behold this selfsame thing, that ye sorrowed after a godly sort, what carefulness it wrought in you, yea, what clearing of yourselves, yea, what indignation, yea, what fear, yea, what vehement desire, yea, what zeal, yea, what revenge! In all things ye have approved yourselves to be clear in this matter."
Whenever a person is truly repentant, he or she can analyze with great ease and come to a decision of certainty that their repentance is genuine. Whenever someone has been entertaining a myth of repentance, supposing that myth to be true, and he comes to verse 11, he will find the absolute marks of repentance. Some of us have the tendency to think that if there are seven things called for and we are right on five of them, all is well. But I wouldn’t want to run that risk. It is not all right if you find five of the seven. All seven marks must be in place. If they are, I will know that my repentance is not to be repented of. And if we find that we have two or three or even six, then get busy with repentance to the point where all seven are yours.
When ministering with others, do not be content when they fall short of these seven marks. Part of the vast damage being done in our world today is done because we are in such haste about everything. We are so determined to get people convicted and converted all in the same moment. We don’t believe in the principle of one plowing and another planting and another cultivating and eventually the harvest comes. We want the harvest the same moment we sow the seed. It’s time we get biblical and let God do His work in His own way, so that when finally there is a harvest, it is not a harvest of tares, but a genuine harvest of the wheat of God. Let us see for ourselves what godly sorrow that has led to repentance produces.
First Mark: Earnestness. Godly sorrow produces great care: carefulness; earnestness. How earnest are you about repentance? Many people think that when a few items that pop into their heads as being wrong in their lives are dealt with, repentance is in place. There’s nothing earnest about that casual approach. When you call others to repentance, how earnest are you in the call, and how careful are you to see that they go about repentance earnestly with immense care.
Any number of times over a period of years, I would meet men who would say to me, "Did you ever meet Bertha Smith?"
"No, I never met her. Tell me about her."
"Well, Bertha Smith came here. Let me tell you what happened...."
Let me first tell you who Bertha Smith was. She was a woman who was involved in the great revival in China, and when she was forced out of China she finished up her missionary career in a neighboring country. Then when the Mission Board forced her into retirement, it happened that God didn’t force her at the same time, so she took advantage of God’s calling and she went to serious working. She began traveling around, telling the story of the great revival in China, but more than that, confronting pastors.
She would get in the face of a pastor, and she would say to him, "I want you to get serious; I want you to get earnest and careful about repentance. I want you to get a large pad and two or three pens, and you slip away into a private chamber, and you get down on your face before God. You say, ‘O God, show me my sins.’ And don’t you dare leave until God is finished."
Some men have told me that they could hardly disobey her in total. They thought that was a word from the Lord, but they thought that was silly to take a whole handful of pens. They would take a piece of paper and a pen, and they would say, "O God, go to work and show me my sins." Many a man has told me that pen after pen was used up, and pad after pad. They wrote what God showed them.
How careful have you been about repentance, how thorough? How much time have you spent alone before God? Don’t get in a rush. You’d do well to take what God has shown you in these messages into your private chamber and spend hours and hours in quiet before God. Let the work that God has begun get down to the serious business of earnestness in repentance, and you need to encourage others in the same way.
Mark Two: Clearing of Yourself, or Vindication of Yourself. What wondrous work this godly sorrow has produced in a vindication of yourself, a clearing of yourself. There are some of us who think we have come to repentance and someone charges us later with a sin. We don’t know whether it is just or unjust, or if it’s the devil himself that charges us with the sin. We may be thrown into confusion.
When one has vindicated himself, when he has cleared himself, he is no longer chargeable, not by man, not by Satan, not even by God Himself. They have become so absolutely, totally earnest about sin that they have vindicated themselves. They cannot be charged with sin because every single sin has been put on Christ, and He has stamped, "Paid in full." They are vindicated.
We have people in our churches who are a very long way from vindicated. Some pastors are holding themselves in, but they’re coping with deacons, and coping with women in the missionary society and coping with young people, and their heart is saying, "They’re not vindicated of sin." Yet rather than create an upset, rather than trouble anybody, they have been willing to let it pass. Oh, it is urgently necessary that we call people to vindicate themselves in thorough repentance!
Mark Three: Indignation. When one has come to genuine repentance, there is powerful indignation in him or her. You take some people aside, and you say to them, "I know you are guilty of this specific sin." They get very indignant. Is that what Paul is commending--those who get angry at others when confronted with sin? No! He is talking about an internal indignation against sin so that when you fall into sin, you immediately rise in indignation, in loathing, and you say, "I despise that sin; I will not live even for three minutes with that sin on my conscience. I’m bringing that sin to God straightway. I’m going to be cleansed of it immediately. I will not allow it. I hate it. I despise it. It arouses me to tremendous indignation."
Is that what happens to you when you sin--immense indignation? I fear for many of us. We can look placidly at a sin and say, "Well, I probably shouldn’t have done that, but it doesn’t really matter." Doesn’t matter? How can we speak that way when a mark of repentance is an indignation against sin?
Mark Four: Fear. Fear is indeed a mark of genuine repentance. Oh, what fear this godly sorrow has produced in you! Fear of what? Fear of going to hell? There is no doubt many would be benefited if we had a greater fear of hell. I don’t think that’s the heart of the fear commended here. Rather it is fear lest the God who gave Himself for me be grieved; fear lest some sin in me sadden His heart; fear lest someone who has heard my witness should stumble over some sin in my heart. Do you live in godly fear--fear lest your testimony be destroyed by sin?
Would to God that Moses had spent his whole life fearing God. Instead, when he came close to the end of his life, he robbed God of His glory in a demonstration of anger, and he was forced to die on the mountain and was prevented from finishing his life’s work.
I often think, "I’m not ready to die." Oh, I’m ready to die in one sense, but I’m not ready to die because I haven’t finished the work God gave me to do. I say to myself with frequency, "What if some sin should be tolerated in your life that would keep you from finishing your life’s work?" That’s not fear of hell. That’s fear of letting my Saviour down. That’s fear of disappointing my King. Are you in the grip of that holy fear?
Mark Five: Vehement desire. Paul’s fifth point is a longing, a fervency. Oh, how I long to be holy! When I was but a boy, in the church there was an archway over the pulpit, and on the archway was printed these words, "Yesterday, today and forever, Jesus Christ the same." Those words burned their way into a young boy’s heart, and somehow in the midst of all that was transpiring there, I caught the sense of the beauty of holiness, and it dawned on me that there is no beauty in all the earth like the beauty of holiness. I said, "O God, that somehow I might become a holy man of God!" And time after time after time through the years, I have had a fresh sense of the beauty of holiness. There comes an immensity of longing and desire to be holy even as my Father in Heaven is holy.
An old Gypsy Evangelist traveled this country years ago, singing everywhere he went: "Let the beauty of Jesus be seen in me; all His wonderful passion and purity. O Thou Spirit Divine, all my nature refine, till the beauty of Jesus be seen in me." Behold, what fervency! Are you in the grip of that fervency, yearning and desire for holiness?
Mark Six: Zeal. I listen to some preachers and I wonder, do they ever get warmed up about anything? How can they be so placid? We live in incredible days where zeal is considered a sin. If a zealous person comes into the average church, the congregation agrees, "Don’t worry; we’ll pull them down to our level before long," and within a week or two, they’ve brought the average convert down to their stagnant place.
Zeal! Behold what zeal! How long ought the zeal to last? No telling how long any of us will last, but even on our death bed there ought to be visible zeal. What kind of zeal marks your repentance and your church?
Mark Seven: Revenge, Avenging of Wrong. When one has come to genuine repentance, there is an effort of utmost seriousness in avenging wrong. To avenge wrong means you make wrong right. You go back through your life and you, before God say, Lord, what is there in my past life that I need to avenge, to set right? To avenge wrong is to make restitution, to go back and to right the wrong. All around the world there are businessmen in communities who say, "Don’t tell me about Christ. I don’t believe in Christ. I don’t believe in your church members. I don’t even believe in the pastor," because multitudes of professed Christians have never avenged wrong. Is there some sin in your life that must be revenged?
Is it any wonder that God doesn’t smile upon us in revival when we’ve been so careless about repentance? And even if we come clean, surely we can’t think revival is going to fall the first day we get right with God. There’s a whole church out there that needs to get right with God. Let us set our hearts not only to walk perpetually in the spirit of repentance, but to use as fully as possible the means of grace of communicating the word of God so that the whole church will know that repentance is mandatory.
It may be you have something you need to deal with right now, but I want to be honest in saying to you, a conviction I have already expressed--that the real work of God is done over a period of time. We must live in the spirit of repentance unceasingly.
"O God, we surely owe You a great debt of gratitude that You’ve been so kind, and so patient in all Your dealings with us and our people. Help us to become as serious about You as You are about us, and as careful about repentance as Christ was careful to die in our place at the right moment, and as You, Father, were careful to raise our Lord Christ from the dead at precisely the right moment. Do not let any of us escape the truth of repentance, to the eternal glory of King Jesus. Amen."
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