Of repentance and faith

This morning we are going to look at the next heading of our statement Faith titled “of repentance and faith”. This section is maybe the most practical section that we have had yet as repentance is not a noun, but a verb. It is something we do. Faith is not always a verb but closely tied. It is something we are called to exercised. And how do we do that? Repentance. And this morning, on this Mother’s Day, I want to show you why this matters for mothers. So, let’s first read our section of the statement of faith and then stand for the reading of the text. First, 

We believe that repentance and faith are sacred duties and also inseparable graces, wrought in our souls by the regenerating Spirit of God; whereby being deeply convinced of our guilt, danger and helplessness, and of the way of salvation by Christ, we turn to God with unfeigned contrition, confession and supplication for mercy; at the same time heartily receiving the Lord Jesus Christ as our Prophet, Priest and King, and relying on him alone as the only and all-sufficient Savior. 

Now let’s stand for the reading of the word of God.

“For though I caused you sorrow by my letter, I do not regret it, though I did regret it—for I see that that letter caused you sorrow, though only for a while— I now rejoice, not that you were made sorrowful, but that you were made sorrowful to repentance. For you were made to have godly sorrow, so that you might not suffer loss in anything through us. For godly sorrow produces a repentance without regret, leading to salvation, but the sorrow of the world brings about death. For behold what earnestness this very thing—this godly sorrow—has brought about in you: what vindication of yourselves, what indignation, what fear, what longing, what zeal, what avenging of wrong! In everything you demonstrated yourselves to be innocent in the matter.”

2 Corinthians 7:8-11 LSB

So what you see in the text first is Pauls mentioning of sorrow caused. How was it caused? By a letter. What Paul is referencing here is a letter he wrote to the corinthians after 1 Corinthians. He wrote to them with very specific instruction of repentance in 1 Corinthians. We understand this sorrowful second lette to have come after his visit wherin he enacted church disicpline of some sort. It seems that it was not well recieved but there were hard feelings on both sides… So this letter came with tears, and anguish in his soul. Calling them again to repentance of their sin, not just in their lack of obedience of the scriptures, but in their treatment of him.

None the less, Paul knows it caused them sorrow. And this is what he is now concerned about. He tells them, he did regret having to write it. He desired for them to repent and listen to Godly instruction the first time! You can feel the passion, the love he had for these people… Paul’s relationship with this church was not instructive only. We was not just their teacher. But 1 Corinthians 4:15 tells us that he considered himself a father. Paul didn’t want them to just obey out of mechanics. Remember that from last week? Lots of people can read the word of God and take up a new habit mentioned there. He wasn’t concerned about behavior primarily, but rather was deeply concerned about their heart. His letter caused them sorrow because they were unrepentant. But it only caused sorrow for a short time. Why? Because the sorrow they felt led to repentance. Look at verse 9. 

They had sorrow that led to repentance. Their sorrow caused them to do something, to act and obey the word of God. To do the next right thing. Verse ten tells us that… Godly sorrow produces a repentance without regret, leading to salvation. There is a time of sorrow or guilt that is actually good and fruitful. Unlike worldly sorrow which Paul says leads to death. Now. I’d like to give you six categories of sorrow. This is something that I have learned over the years that has really helped me understand my response to sin. Six categories of sorrow. This outline is not mine, but comes from the Association of Certified Biblical Counselors. It is simply a categorization of what is found in the scriptures. First, there is a common sorrow…. 

Common Sorrow

Common sorrow is found in the difficulties of life. We have disappointment in our life… many of you children play sports or some type of game with each other regularly. You don’t win all the time! And it is disappointing to lose. There is death in your life. And there is a sorrow in your soul because of these things. This is common sorrow, because there is no sin involved in this. There is sorrow, but your conscience is at peace. You feel the sadness as it relates to the situation. Now, we acknowledge that common sorrow is still under God’s sovereignty, he has purposed things in our life… even the loss of a board game… he has purposed it in our life and we must accept what God has allowed.

But then there is a second type of sorrow… 

Chosen Sorrow

If you do not submit to what God has prescribed for you, according to your role and responsibilities, you will move into what is known as, “chosen” sorrow. Chosen sorrow is grumbling and complaining which produces sorrow in your heart. The Bible says, “Do all things without grumbling or complaining” (Philippians 2:14-15). Chosen sorrow is when you are choosing to do the opposite. 1 Thessalonians says, “In everything give thanks, for this is God’s will concerning you,” but you are choosing to grumble and complain. Paul doesn’t mean that there isn’t sadness in us because of death or loss. But here is the rub… If I do not accept what God has allowed, if I do not submit to what God has prescribed according to my role and responsibility, then I can move from common sorrow and into chosen sorrow, which is sin.

If that is sin, what is it doing to your conscience… if you choose to rebel against God what is your conscience going to produce as a result? And what are you going to experience? Sorrow! That is the third category of sorrow, “conscience” sorrow.

Conscience Sorrow

Do you see the progression so far? There’s a common sorrow, then if you don’t accept God’s will, if you don’t submit to what He says, and rebel through grumbling and complaining which is chosen sorrow, which is going to produce conscience sorrow. When you have a conscience sorrow, your emotions are not just pricked, your mind and your whole system where you make choices is in motion. Conscience sorrow is when you have a crossroads in front of you… That system is going to produce one of two things in you that will change your system of belief. You might produce worldly sorrow or what will be known here as “casualty” sorrow, which is sadness that you are now consumed with. You wonder what is going to happen to you. You are consumed with how you got caught in the consequences. You are not interested in change. So that means you keep doing this grumbling, complaining, choosing to rebel against the will of God, which ultimately is going to lead you to death. We see that in 2 Corinthians 7, which is the worldly sorrow leads to death.

Casualty Sorrow

This idea of casualty sorrow can be found in Genesis after God confronted Cain. If you think about where Cain’s response came from: he killed his brother in anger. God then asked him a question and he said, “Am I my brother’s keeper?” A very arrogant and ugly attitude. He lied as God pronounced judgment on him. What is Cain’s response now?… “They are going to kill me.”

That is casualty sorrow. Cain isn’t sorrowful because he has forgotten and sinned against the goodness and loving kindness of the Lord God. He isn’t sorrowful because he has wrecked the relationship between him and his family… He is sorrowful because he is worried about himself…. About his name, his reputation, his life. That is casualty sorrow— not repentance. You have not turned from your sin and turned toward God. You are just sad about getting caught… but you’re going to stay in the sin which is going to lead you to death.

Contrite Sorrow

The other sorrow is what we call “contrite” sorrow, which is what we see in this passage. That is the godly sorrow. This sorrow means that not only am I broken over my sins, but I am ready to do what I need to do to make things right with God and to make things right with others. More on this in a minute…

Chastisement Sorrow

Now the last category of sorrow, chastisement sorrow comes as we are in repentance.  We find it in Hebrews 12, “No discipline for the moment seems joyful, but sorrowful. But afterwards it yields the peaceable fruit of righteousness.” As we repent we are being trained by the Lord that sin hurts… it sucks the life right out of you. It kills you. And like any good remedy, the process of making something right that has been wronged is hard work… but in the end, there is a peace in restoration and reconciliation. 

What Paul is dealing with in this passage is the contrast between contrite sorrow and worldly sorrow. He is glad for their sorrow because it has produced the fruit of or outcome of life rather than death. Obedience rather than rebellion. Godly sorrow can be defined as, “having grief over sin as in regards to a relationship with God.”

person is grieved over the reality that he has offended the almighty God. This person has a sense of guilt with the desire and will to turn away from that which has offended God. The emphasis is on the relationship with God, instead of the consequences of the sin. In other words, the person is sorrowful because of offending God, not because of the punishment he will get.

Sorrow, godly sorrow, leads us to repentance. Repentance is the act of changing one’s mind and making a change of action toward sin. It is not merely feeling bad and seeing sin differently. It is seeing sin from God’s perspective resulting in a change of purpose in life away from the sin.

 When someone has contrite sorrow, if they really have this, they will be driving the situation this way—They will be asking “What do I do next? Tell me what to do. How do I handle this? What do I need to do?” They are so broken and ready for change because they are being motivated by God in the sorrow. They want to make things right! Rather than having to be pushed or pulled into obedience.

Look at verse 11… he says, behold. Or LOOK… the fruit of Godly sorrow can be seen. The produce can be understood. This sorrow brought up a vindication of themselves… meaning they wanted to do anything to be made blameless in Gods eyes. What indignation… meaning they had a hatred of their sin. What fear… meaning they feared God rather than man. They were most concerned about how God saw them. What longing, or desire to be made holy. Desire to be with Christ in perfection. A desire to be saved from this body of death once and for all. What zeal… meaning a drive and a passion. An energy and a freedom comes into your heart when you repent. What avenging of wrong…. Or desire to see further justice brought on the earth for sin. Paul wrote his sorrowful letter to call out their sinful and ugly rebellion against God in order that they might be proven to be Christian’s… because Christians repent… 

Here is the christians life pattern… when convicted of sin Christian’s confess, repent, and replace. It’s so simple. Every sermon that explains the word of God calls us to this. We confess, I have sinned. We acknowledge that sin, rather than running from it. We confess with our lips, my heart loves sin, and I need to be saved from it lest it kill me. That’s where repentance comes in. We turn to the savior. Christ died to save you from sin. He died that you could come to him and find forgiveness. We turn to our savior and choose him over ourselves. And in doing so we replace the sin with righteousness. We stop doing that sin, and start doing that which pleases the Lord and shows love to my neighbor. Confess, repent, replace.  

Now, Paul tells us where this comes from. It is not from someone harping… it comes from the spirit of God. 

The spirit of God is what breaks people and can fix them of their sin. We should stop trying to be the Holy Spirit and convicting people of their sin. It is sad to see someone in outright and obvious rebellion of God. But what is my job as a pastor, what is the job or a parent, what is the job of a Christian to another Christian? Tell them the truth… Paul didn’t come to them and change their minds for them. He wasn’t even with them, but simply told them the truth in love. What caused them to hear him and repent and reconcile? God did that.

The text says, they were made to have sorrow. How? Well this is how the holy spirit works… correct them in truth and allow God to reproduce the sorrow in their life that leads to repentance. Consider John 16:5-15… it is the spirit which will convict of sin. My friends… we can lead a horse to the water but we can’t make them drink. It is a sad reality. Which is I would assume the regret Paul had. You feel like you fail someone when they choose to disobey God after you have spent so long teaching them the truth. But the reality is, they choose it. They choose a faith in themselves rather than to place their faith is God. 

If I am not willing to obey God and love others, then there is something I want more than loving God and loving others; something that gets into the worship at the heart of certain desires. Repentance is an act of the heart. A heart softened by faith. When someone believes God is valuable and worthy of my obedience, we will respond in correcting our lives to fit what the scripture is telling us. When we don’t believe God is the most valuable, we worship ourself, we keep our little crowns on as we keep pretending to be kings and queens. 

Oh my friends, how beautiful this is between true Christians. In verse 9 Paul says he rejoices that this process took place. In verse 13 he says that he himself and the other leaders who have been ministering to the Corinthian church have been comforted through this all. Because now it is clear…. Christ is in them, and they are in Christ. It is such a freeing thing to be around Christian’s. Christians love the word. It’s the healthy state of the Christian. It’s a word that encourages, refreshes, and yes at time stings. But the word of God is LIFE. There is not much that brings a greater earthly joy that to be with someone who also loves the word of God and values them. 

So I told you this could be brought back to mothers. Moms, the greatest thing you could do for your children is to give them words of life. When they sin, flying off the handle won’t save them or transform them. Guilting them with a worldly guilt and saying, “how dare you, why are you so stupid, don’t you know any better” will not help them. Passive aggressively cleaning up their mess for them or allowing them to get away with their sin will not produce life either. It will be the words of truth spoken to them that will correct them. And train them. It will be the words of truth that will refresh them and revive their soul. 

Mothers, I want to give you a gift this morning. Flowers are pretty, trinkets and other presents are fun, i hope someone cooks for you or has cooked for you this weekend. But I want to give you a gift that I hope encourages you and makes what you do all the sweeter. I want to call you to your purpose. Your purpose is to burn brightly for your house to see… While the husband is the thermostat of the home, he sets the temperature… Mom is the heating and cooling unit. It is her home! Prepared for and provided for and protected by her husband. Gifted by and covered in grace by the Lord, but it is her calling to make it what it should be.

It is a high calling that requires much of you! It is more than making food, cleaning, changing diapers, and correcting your children. It is a tough job filled with much toil and stress…. and it is never done. But when it is done by leaning on the Lord rather than your own strength… wow, what fruit you will bear is blessing. By the grace of God I am the biproduct of a mother like this. My mother confessed to me some years ago, Seth I prayed over and over that God would make you like David, a man after Gods own heart… she was and still is a deeply patient woman that loves the Lord. She didnt ridicule me. She did put up with a lot from me… but she trusted God AND She prayed for me. Now, would my faith be the same if she was simply a house cleaner… A food maker… no. She knew the pinacle of her work was my heart. It mattered most… Did you lose you temper again? Did you grumble again? Were you apathetic today? Thats not the measuring stick… You can repent of those things. The measure that matters is did you get back on your knees and ask God to help you, to strengthen you, and to protect and guide the hearts of your children….

The great prince of preachers Charles Spurgeon credits much to his mother too when he says,

“I cannot tell how much I owe the solemn words of my good mother…I remember on one occasion her praying thus: ‘Now, Lord, if my children go on in their sins, it will not be from ignorance that they perish, and my soul must bear a swift witness against them at the day of judgment if they lay not hold of Christ.’ That thought of my mother’s bearing a swift witness against me pierced my conscience…How can I forget when she bowed her knee, and with her arms about my neck, prayed, ‘Oh that my son might live before Thee!’ “

My friends.. whether you have children or not. Our task in life is to tell the truth. To scatter the seeds of truth… using the word of God to teach, to correct, to rebuke, and to train in all righteousness. And asking God to bring growth and produce much fruit from the seed which has been planted. We toil and strive in truth telling for this reason, that Christ would be known, and loved and receive all the obedience, honor, glory, and dominion now and forevermore… Amen.