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What Does Repentence Mean?


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If we are talking about how to be saved I believe repent in most of the verses means change what were thinking and believe in Christ. As far as works of faith and the Christian walk that is a different thing, a different subject all together. I think there is Two Dispensations one for earth the OC and one for Heaven and its Citizens the NC, in the NC we are in the law of the spirit of life in Christ Jesus, exactly how that outworks itself I'm not sure, but bearing fruit of the Spirit is good, because there is no law against such things.Ga 5:23 I know the OC law is summed us as:

Mt 22:37 Jesus said unto him, Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind.
Mt 22:38 This is the first and great commandment.
Mt 22:39 And the second is like unto it, Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself.

The NC is summed up thus:

1Jo 3:23 And this is his commandment, That we should believe on the name of his Son Jesus Christ, and love one another, as he gave us commandment.

So it's a different covenantal principle, one is life the other brings death, so the terms of repentance and salvation were definitely different., I'm guessing I'm preaching to the converted.

 

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Mat 12:41

The men of Nineveh shall rise in judgment with this generation, and shall condemn it: because they repented at the preaching of Jonas; and, behold, a greater than Jonas is here.

"Repentance" means the same thing it always has. The Ninevites "repented" in the hearts when they believed the preaching, BEFORE they ever did any "works", otherwise they would have ignored Jonah, kept on doing what they were doing, and suffered the destruction.. Repentance is a heart thing, not a work. Likewise, today, salvation and repentance are inseparable. The devils "believe" in God but they have never repented.

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To repent is "to think differently". My definition as it applies to salvation is;

To agree with God that I have sinned against Him, and can only be reconciled through faith in the perfect sacrifice of His Son Jesus Christ.

I think when people are told they must 'turn from sin', it can leave someone with the idea they must physically stop whatever sin they have in their life before they can be saved, which is a false gospel according to scripture. The physical act of turning from sin can only be done through the power of the Holy Spirit which we receive the moment we are saved. We are not saved by how we perform after we have believed, but by *authentic belief itself. God knows a persons heart, and needs no evidence to know that a person has believed in their heart.

 

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To repent is "to think differently". My definition as it applies to salvation is;

To agree with God that I have sinned against Him, and can only be reconciled through faith in the perfect sacrifice of His Son Jesus Christ.

I think when people are told they must 'turn from sin', it can leave someone with the idea they must physically stop whatever sin they have in their life before they can be saved, which is a false gospel according to scripture. The physical act of turning from sin can only be done through the power of the Holy Spirit which we receive the moment we are saved. We are not saved by how we perform after we have believed, but by *authentic belief itself. God knows a persons heart, and needs no evidence to know that a person has believed in their heart.

 

Exactly. And I've  also heard it put like this: "to take God's side against your own self"

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To repent is "to think differently". My definition as it applies to salvation is;

To agree with God that I have sinned against Him, and can only be reconciled through faith in the perfect sacrifice of His Son Jesus Christ.

I think when people are told they must 'turn from sin', it can leave someone with the idea they must physically stop whatever sin they have in their life before they can be saved, which is a false gospel according to scripture. The physical act of turning from sin can only be done through the power of the Holy Spirit which we receive the moment we are saved. We are not saved by how we perform after we have believed, but by *authentic belief itself. God knows a persons heart, and needs no evidence to know that a person has believed in their heart.

 

Well put. 

If it did mean 'turn from sin' that would be like saying 'keep the Law and believe in Jesus and you can be saved'.

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Mat 12:41

The men of Nineveh shall rise in judgment with this generation, and shall condemn it: because they repented at the preaching of Jonas; and, behold, a greater than Jonas is here.

"Repentance" means the same thing it always has. The Ninevites "repented" in the hearts when they believed the preaching, BEFORE they ever did any "works", otherwise they would have ignored Jonah, kept on doing what they were doing, and suffered the destruction.. Repentance is a heart thing, not a work. Likewise, today, salvation and repentance are inseparable. The devils "believe" in God but they have never repented.

'Repent' is simply a word, just as 'metanoeo' is but one word, and the plain fact would seem to be that those two words have slightly different meanings from each other, as careful reading of any decent dictionary shows,  I'll continue to use the word repent in the New Testament 'metanoeo' sense. The Niniavites repented concerning, and turned from their sins.

If, a God fearing Jew or a morally upright Gentile, had to come to faith in Jesus Christ as Saviour, then they have 'repented' of what they believed before, whether or not they need to repent about their views of their works and turn from their works would depend on what they thought about their works and what their works were before their conversion, I don't think deeds or turning from them really come into 'reconciliation' (salvation) at all, whether it be bowing to an image of Mary, bowing to a 'worshipful master', bowing to corruption, or bowing to pornographic images, although they might blind the mind and keep the lost in the dark, and a Christian will come into Judgement for any such practises or thoughts related to them.

So there are allot of different things and different type of things which people can repent (think differently) about, but as far as being reconciled to God, that is a work of God and a gift which is granted to the lost when they come to faith in Christ, so they need to repent (think differently) of their unbelief in Jesus Christ as saviour.

That is why the Gospel of John, which is the most evangelical of all books, doesn't need to use the word 'repent', because Johns Gospel has an emphasis on how to be saved. Joh 20:31

I would make the distinction of the devils who believe and a lost soul who believes as one which is possible within the scope of the word 'believe', I think the lost soul needs to believe in the 'believe -  receive - trust' sense of the word.

The Devils believe only that there is one God, but they believe and do not receive, but they believe and are in opposition.

It is of course the will of God that the Christian bears fruit and has self control, and does not continue in sin, and in that way to glorify God, but this is in no way to do with Reconciliation or Justification, but rather this is to do with thanks giving and also a love for the lost.

I think careful distinction needs to be made here in order to not cause people to fall into a works based salvation or works based sanctification such as 'Lordship Salvation' of John Mcarthur and the likes. I listened to a few hours of him promoting one of his books and discussing salvation, not a pleasant experience.

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Jonah 3:10 And God saw their works, that they turned from their evil way; and God repented of the evil, that he had said that he would do unto them; and he did it not. 

 

In light of how everyone weighed in on the meaning of repentance- see in the above verse that God repented of the evil.  How would you define repentance in this instance?

Turning from your wicked ways = Works. So, if salvation isn't of works....then when talking about salvation, those who teach we must turn from sin are wrong. Praying a prayer doesn't save you, Faith in Christ is what saves you.

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Turning from your wicked ways = Works. So, if salvation isn't of works....then when talking about salvation, those who teach we must turn from sin are wrong. Praying a prayer doesn't save you, Faith in Christ is what saves you.

Nay, nay.

We keep saying it over and over....the "turning" to God, away from sin and self,  takes place only in your heart. Matter of fact, one can be a deaf mute but their heart can still say  "God be merciful to me, a sinner". I've yet to see anyone do any kind of "work" with just their heart or mind.

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The bible is my only authority. TURNING FROM YOUR WICKED WAYS = WORKS.  Muddying up the gospel is the addition of faith + performance. Basically, you are saying that one must have a change of heart toward sin, they don't actually have to turn?  1 - that isn't what repent means in the KJV. 2 - I believe a sinner must repent (change his mind) and believe in the gospel. John 1 says we aren't saved by mans will. 

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The bible is my only authority.

Hold on there young man, why this pretension?

You already made it pretty clear that you follow a couple fellas: anderson and ken somebody of which I have never heard of either (no doubt for a reason - not worth hearing about in most cases) or they are big shot published authors so I will never have any interest in them.

Can you be a little clearer in what you are trying to say? It sounds to me like you are on the right track but perhaps not expressing it thoroughly.

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Turning from sin is work. I have done it. Have i turned from all of it? NO. Because that isn't what we must do to be saved. Acts 16:30. Salvation is free, lest any man should boast. Boasting is...."I've turned from my sin", "I have turned from drinking and got saved", "I quit this or that", you did nothing to get yourself saved but believed, something a child can do. We are all babes in Christ at the beginning and hopefully grow if we read the bible, go to church, etc. If some are saying that we must have a change in attitude toward sin as being part of the gospel.....please give me chapter and verse. Turning from sin is good, it is a daily thing, but putting it into the gospel is wrong. I believe putting "turn from sin" into the gospel will never save anyone. How would anyone ever know if they've turned enough? It puts the emphasis on ourselves and not what Jesus did on the cross. The definition of repent is really a confusing topic for christians. Thank you for listening. :) GB

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Luke 18

9And he spake this parable unto certain which trusted in themselves that they were righteous, and despised others: 10Two men went up into the temple to pray; the one a Pharisee, and the other a publican. 11The Pharisee stood and prayed thus with himself, God, I thank thee, that I am not as other men are, extortioners, unjust, adulterers, or even as this publican. 12I fast twice in the week, I give tithes of all that I possess. 13And the publican, standing afar off, would not lift up so much as his eyes unto heaven, but smote upon his breast, saying, God be merciful to me a sinner. 14I tell you, this man went down to his house justified rather than the other: for every one that exalteth himself shall be abased; and he that humbleth himself shall be exalted.

#1 False "belief", no repentence, trusting in self, and works.

#2.  Genuine faith, with repentance, trusting in God, but no works.

#3. Justified before God and READY FOR works.

 

Edited by heartstrings
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Hold on there young man, why this pretension?

You already made it pretty clear that you follow a couple fellas: anderson and ken somebody of which I have never heard of either (no doubt for a reason - not worth hearing about in most cases) or they are big shot published authors so I will never have any interest in them.

Can you be a little clearer in what you are trying to say? It sounds to me like you are on the right track but perhaps not expressing it thoroughly.

I say the bible is my authority for this reason. Some seem to be denying "turning from sin" is works. Jonah 3:10 proves this without question. Besides that...we are talking about the definition of repent, correct? i submit it is merely a change of mind. To say it is something about sin is A) God is a sinner or B: it has several different definitions. God repents more than anyone in the KJV, the NIV and NKJV take out everytime God repents...so in those bibles case...the definition of repent is changed based on the context in which the word is found. 

 

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I say the bible is my authority for this reason. Some seem to be denying "turning from sin" is works. Jonah 3:10 proves this without question. Besides that...we are talking about the definition of repent, correct? i submit it is merely a change of mind. To say it is something about sin is A) God is a sinner or B: it has several different definitions. God repents more than anyone in the KJV, the NIV and NKJV take out everytime God repents...so in those bibles case...the definition of repent is changed based on the context in which the word is found. 

 

Good post sir, thanks

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