A Season of Restoration II, Restoring Repentance

This is North Way tape number 472. This message, A Season of Restoration, Part 2, was delivered by Pastor Jay Passavant of North Way Christian Community on February 16, 1986. Matthew chapter 3. In those days John the Baptist came, preaching in the desert of Judea, and saying, Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is near. This is he who was spoken of through the prophet Isaiah, a voice of one calling in the desert, Prepare the way for the Lord. Make straight paths for him. John's clothes were made of camel's hair, and he had a leather belt around his waist. His food was locusts and wild honey. People went out to him from Jerusalem and all Judea and the whole region of the Jordan. Confessing their sins, they were baptized by him in the Jordan River. But when he saw many of the Pharisees and Sadducees coming to where he was baptizing, he said to them, You brood of vipers, who warned you to flee from the coming wrath? Produce fruit in keeping with repentance. Do not think you can say to yourselves, We have Abraham as our father. I tell you that out of these stones God can raise up children for Abraham. The axe is already at the root of the trees, and every tree that does not produce good fruit will be cut down and thrown into the fire. I baptize you with water for repentance, but after me will come one who is more powerful than I, whose sandals I am not fit to carry. He will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and with fire. His winnowing fork is in his hand, and he will clear his threshing floor, gathering the wheat into his barn and burning up the chaff with unquenchable fire. Beloved, I'm so thankful this morning for what I know that God is doing in our church. I'm thankful for the new life that is coming forth, for the people, as I look out across the congregation, that I recognize that in the last few months have come to Jesus and are beginning to walk in the fullness of his blessing. Some who have known the Lord perhaps in a roundabout kind of a way, maybe you were at one point in your life born again but wandered off. I've just been so encouraged by the number of people who are finding refreshment in God, and renewing in God. Yesterday when I came in in the morning, I had a little sense of heaviness over me, and out of the morning prayer meeting there were 21 people praying yesterday morning. I bless God for those folks that came and prepared the way of the Lord. But one young man that I have known for a while, and known of his struggles, came out and with all sensitivity, he and another brother, just sensed in me a need to pray. How wonderful it was to have a person kind of new in the things of God, and really growing in the Holy Spirit. New, you know, reach out and pray for his pastor and ask God to touch him. You see, it's that kind of ministry one to another that God is raising up here in our church. I bless him for that. It's happening in people who are getting involved in finding a place, and submitting themselves to leadership, and opening themselves to training. I rejoice in that. I don't want to say anything from this pulpit this morning that would do anything at all, other than to move you on in your walk in God. We've entered into a season of restoration. We talked last week about that, and I'm not going to review that message, except to say that God told us, if you weren't here, that we were in a period of transition. That he has encamped us, as it were, for a season to be prepared before he thrusts us into the promised land of his fulfillment for us as a people. And I was so encouraged also this week by the number of you that said, you know, God really spoke to me about that, and I am doing this particular thing for the next six weeks. We have here on this table, right in front of me, the sheets from last week. And if you weren't here, or you didn't fill out one of these sheets, just to say, Lord, I'm believing you in this way to change me over the next six weeks of restoration. Come up afterwards and pick one of these up, and either keep it yourself as a reminder, or give it to a home group leader, or one of the elders, and say, pray for me that my heart would be restored. And I was asking the Lord, well, what's next then, Lord? What's next for someone who's serious, who wants to go on and really see their hearts broken open? You know, we can spout off that little platitude of turn over the fallow ground of your heart, but what does that really mean? And I said, Lord, what do we as a people need to know in order to go ahead with this? Well, this message today, I trust, beloved, is going to help you in some of the very practical ways that you can begin to take steps of turning over the fallow ground of your heart. Fallow ground, by the way, is just a picture of soil that once produced crops, but has now grown over with weeds. How many of you have front lawns that look like that? It's just soil that has no value in producing until all that stuff on top has been turned over and the soil exposed and made ready to receive the seed. And so I said, Lord, what are we to do? What's going to happen the other 166 hours during the week from when you leave this place? The word that so obviously follows a message like last week, a word that talks about what happens in change in our hearts is the word repentance. Would you say that word with me? Repentance. Now, repentance is a word that we need to understand, but it's also a word, the power of which we need to experience. Without understanding, you may think you're experiencing something that is far from repentance. You may miss the full intent of God's word. Understanding the correct meaning of the word is important. For example, in Friday's paper, I clipped out this little article about a 38-year-old lady named Shirley McCleary of Toledo, Ohio, who was bitten at least three times Wednesday night while handling an Eastern Diamondback rattlesnake, and she died. Why did she die in a, quote, Christian worship service? Because she misunderstood the word of the Lord. And she took a scripture out of context and went ahead and put some sort of deviation of faith to that and said, well, I can handle these snakes. The Bible says if I handle one, it won't harm me. But because she didn't understand, you see, now she's dead. And so it's very important, beloved, that you understand the word or it may produce death in you, not life. And none of us want to produce death. We want to produce life. And when you think of repentance and that word, what image comes to your mind? Not long ago, I was walking in downtown Pittsburgh and I was visiting with one of the brothers for lunch, walked out of the restaurant, and right in the corner there, those of you who have worked downtown have probably seen this fellow with the classic sandwich board outfit on and walking around with tracks in his hand and he had the message on the front and the message on the back, just with this grim look. And on it was the word, what? Repent, for the end is near. Is that what you think of when you think of repentance? Maybe you think of what you see when you turn on the TV set and you see a sobbing evangelist saying, Repent. Come forward and pour out your heart before God. Or maybe in your mind, repentance harkens back to an experience you had somewhere in a little church on the other side of town with 20 or 30 people and an angry preacher in the pulpit putting up his finger and saying, Now you better repent. That's why this church is so empty, because you haven't repented. It's your fault. And on and on he goes. Condemnation. In your mind, that's what repentance means. Or maybe to you, repentance is Peter just denied Jesus for the third time and the cock crowed, just as Jesus prophesied he would. And the Bible says, and you all know that verse, he went out and wept bitterly. But do you know that all of those images are lacking, really, in what repentance from the Bible definition is all about? And I want to share with you how God, through this scripture in Matthew chapter 3, would unfold to us a full understanding of repentance that you might go on now in this season of restoration in your own heart, that you might be able to move closer to God. How many of you want that today? To be able to draw nearer to Him and hear Him. Lord, I said, what are we to do then? And these are the things that He gave me. On the outline, Roman numeral 1. Listen, this is going to surprise you. But the very first thing that the Lord said that we need to do if we're to come into true biblical repentance is to hear. Hearing is the very first thing. Now, if we're honest, church, many of us, perhaps most, do not take much time to hear from God. If you think about your day, how many of you know that you go from radio to tape player to TV set to radio, and if you think through your day, there's probably maybe 15 minutes total when something isn't on? How many of you have teenagers and know that that's true, right? But you know that we are so prone to be caught up in a fast pace and really rarely taking the time to hear God and listen to Him. That's why it's so significant that Moses, who is the prime type figure in the Old Testament of Jesus Christ, Moses, the Bible says in Exodus 33, went out to the tent of meeting. You ought to read that. It's a beautiful scripture. The Bible says that all the people watched him go out to the tent. And when he went into the tent, they, at the doorway of their own individual dwellings, bowed down in worship because they saw Moses going into the place where he was going to hear from God for them. But we in the New Covenant, we don't have to send someone else to listen, do we, church? Who gets to go? You do. You're given access just as Moses had. We're enabled to go by the blood of Jesus right into the throne room of God. That's why Jesus Himself exemplified listening, hearing from God. That's why Jesus, the Bible says in Luke 4.42, went off early before dawn to a solitary place to listen, to hear from God. Now, it's interesting to me then, if we're so hard of hearing, what did God have to do to get our attention? Now, listen, this is going to get interesting. He decided, well, these people don't hear very well, so I'm going to have to send them someone who's going to get their attention. And so, therefore, He sends John the Baptist. Now, by any description, look at Matthew 3, John the Baptist is a bit unusual. First of all, they'd never seen the God before. He lived out in the wilderness. Secondly, He put on the strangest clothes. You know, camel hair coats may be something in vogue today, but they sure weren't anything comfortable back then. And He had this strange garb on, this leather belt. You get this very rough kind of image out of this, Spartan kind of look. Then He's eating locusts and wild honey. I mean, this is a strange person. You know, when He talks, at least from what we know here, He doesn't have, hey, how you doing on His lips. It's, you brood of vipers. And I would submit to you that the reason why John the Baptist is the typological, I mean, you know, the perfect example, the paragon, if you would, of a prophet is because he needed to be unusual so people would listen. They wouldn't listen to the ordinary old Pharisee or scribe that got touched. They needed somebody that they would listen to. And I want to say to you today, it's just the same. The prophets that are really of God in our day are still unusual. Are they not? People who God has given a message to for the body of Christ, they are unusual. More times than not. Now, it may not be in their dress, but it's something in them that's just a little strange and makes you step back. And I've watched you as different ones in our body who have a prophetic call in their life come up and you just underneath, you know, I just don't, why does he have to be like that? Well, the Lord showed me he and sometimes she is like that because you're like you are. And I'm like I am. My ears get crusty too. And so they're quirky in their own kind of a way. And I'm talking about people who are submitted. I'm talking not about strange people that are off the wall. I'm talking about people in a body that God has given. And sometimes in the body of Christ at large. But they're like they are because you don't listen to, you know, somebody that's exuding mercy and love and nice things. And that's the way John the Baptist was. And beloved, he had to be that way because he wanted the people to hear that God was saying, make the path straight. Repent, be baptized. And so we need to learn what it is to hear from God. I want to say to you, don't throw out the message of the prophets just because you don't like the kind of prophet that he is. Or she is. One of the things that's so dangerous in our culture is with the TV set and the radio, if God is trying to get a message to you, it's so easy just to take that old dial and say, you know I don't really like him. It's so easy to go to a church like this one and hear something from someone that you don't like. And you say, honey, you know, I don't like Parkin and David Weiss anyhow. Let's go on down here and join this church. And God all the time is trying to get a message through, trying to communicate to you because we're hard of hearing. Oh, our ears get so encrusted, don't they? Let's really be honest. We don't listen very well. And there's no way to come into repentance without listening to God. Now let me just give one other balancing admonition here, church. Beware of the temptation to tune in on a prophet and somehow figure that he or she has the message that everybody must hear in order to be someplace that they're not. There's a lot of people going deeper and deeper into a bondage to a particular person with a particular message. And in this era, God is speaking through many. He's speaking through many. And you'll get totally consumed with one style and one kind of message through one kind of messenger. And it will be to you a distortion of the person of Jesus in your life. Now, I could be very specific here, but those of you who have ears to hear know what I'm talking about. The reason why prophets aren't pastors is because, in the end, they would crush. The reason why evangelists aren't pastors is that, in the end, they would ignore. And we need to see the wisdom of God to give us apostles, prophets, evangelists, pastors, teachers. Are you hearing me? God fitting those things together. So the first thing that we need to do as a church, beloved, in order as a people to come into repentance is to hear. And whatever it is that you're doing in response to this season of preparation, I pray that it's giving you time to hear. One person told me, I'm cutting out my lunch hour and getting along with God. Another person said, Well, I'm turning the TV set off for six weeks. I'm going to give that time. Now, that's going to produce some time to hear. And whatever you're doing, I pray it has some connection with releasing some time. Don't just say, Well, I'm going to fast three days a week and play golf or whatever. Make it useful. Give God time to speak. Now, the number two thing that we need to do, the number two step, look at your Bible, Matthew chapter 3. First of all, we see John giving the message. That's under hearing. Number two is this. The people went out to him in verse 5 from Jerusalem and Judea to hear his message. The whole region of Jordan. Number two is they confessed their sin. Now, the word to confess means, homolagao in the Greek means to say the same thing. Once you hear what God is saying, once you hear it now, will you agree with God or will you sit your feet down and say that's not right? Will you agree that God is speaking to you and saying a message that you need to hear? One of the things that's particularly noticeable about my one son, Jonathan, is he can hear but not necessarily agree. I remember more than one occasion when I've stood Jonathan up and I've tried to correct him in something and I said, Jonathan, do you hear me? I'm yelling and he's right there. Of course he doesn't. He knows what I mean. Do you hear inside? Do you perceive? Do you agree? This is it, Noah. He stands like this. Yes. Well, you know what his body is saying? I hear you on the outside but I'm not listening on the inside and this is the way I'm going to be. Eventually, his little spirit opens up and I calm down a little bit and we're able to minister. It takes both. And you see, beloved, repentance involves agreeing with God about what he is saying concerning your life. Now, this is where we're touching the definition of repentance. We have a second overhead here. You may want to jot this down. It'll help you understand what the word means. Now, the Greek word... Well, first of all, let me give you the definition of repentance. Repentance involves two things in your life. I want to urge you. Write this down. Would you? Write it down. Number one, it involves a radical upheaval of the human will. Your will is going to go through agony in order to come into repentance. And number two, it involves the ongoing process of shaping a life. Repentance is a moment and it's a process and I'm going to show you that in the scripture in just a moment. Those two ingredients are involved in every act of repentance. It isn't just going up and laying down and starting to cry. I know for a fact that many people have come up here to this makeshift altar that we have, weeping. Weeping over sin in their life and have left with a wet handkerchief and no change. I do not, in my own spirit, equate weeping with repentance. It may be part of it. And in fact, I would say many times it is. But I don't say and I don't believe for a moment that that's all that's involved. When the conviction of God comes upon us, when God finally gets us to listen, we may begin inside to weep because we realize, and I'll explain this later, what we're doing to God in that. But beloved, it isn't that alone that makes up repentance. The Greek word metanoia is actually a compound word. Noia is a form of the noun nous, which is the word for mind in the Greek. Mind. And the other word meta is just a prefix which means after. And so really, when you put those thoughts together, it means after thought or after perception. You see, repentance really has to do with what happens after you perceive what God is saying. Once he breaks in and communicates, what you do with that is repentance. You've heard it defined, I'm sure, sometimes repentance is a changing of the mind. Well, it's not just flipping the mind and saying, yeah, that's right. It's everything that happens in you after you perceive what God wants. Your mind receives it and your heart says that's right. And then you, by your will, say, I've got to do this in order to change. That's repentance. That's repentance. The most beautiful illustration to me is the prodigal son. Don't need to turn there, but let me just read to you what happened after he spent his time in the pigsty, feeding the pigs and getting hungrier and hungrier. Listen to this, Luke 15. He longed to fill his stomach with the pods that the pigs were eating, but no one gave him anything. Now listen. When he came to his senses, you see, when the Spirit of God broke in on him, when he heard, he said, how many of my father's hired men have food to spare, and here I am starving to death. I'll set out and go back to my father and say to him, Father, I have sinned against heaven and against you, and I'm no longer worthy to be called your son. Make me like one of your hired servants. We all know the story that the father runs to meet him and embraces him. You see, that's repentance. After God broke in on him, there was a radical upheaval in his human will, and then he went back and changed his course of action and submitted to his father. Now, most of us tend to equate repentance with regeneration. How many of you know that you've heard someone say, the only way to get into the kingdom of God is to repent? Right? How many of you heard that? Okay. We equate. We know that to begin a walk with Christ means that you start by repenting. The thing that some of us may not know today is that that same doorway that brings us into the kingdom is also the doorway whereby we grow in the kingdom of God. You see, repentance is also for growth. And I want to show you in the scriptures both of those things happening together. Look with me first of all. Turn here. Save your place in Matthew 3 and look at Acts chapter 11, would you? Acts chapter 11. Here is an expression of repentance unto life. Look at it with me. Now, Peter had been explaining what was taking place through the move of the Holy Spirit. And now look down at verse 18. Let's start at 17. So if God gave them the same gift as He gave us who believed in the Lord Jesus Christ, who was I to think that I could oppose God? At least He was humble, right? And when they heard this, they had no further objections and praised God, saying, Look, so then God has even granted the Gentiles repentance unto life. Now, beloved, repentance unto life is the repentance that you entered into when you first heard in your spirit the truth that Jesus Christ died for you and your sins and you turned from them. That's repentance unto life. It's worth noting that the tense of the word there, of the verb, is in the aorist tense in the Greek, which means it's a completed action. How many times do you need to repent to get into the kingdom of God? One time. When you repent, when you have that radical upheaval in your will and your life begins to change, you're in the kingdom. Now, that's repentance unto life, but look at this in 2 Corinthians 7. And by the way, do you know that this is the only place, I believe that's right, the only place in all of Paul's writings where he uses this word? I thought that was really fascinating. There is not a lot of revival preaching in the New Testament church. Why was that? Because the church was alive for those early decades and it wasn't until John had his revelation in the book that's been given that name that Jesus then called the church to repentance. You want an interesting study, just look at your Corinthians. There's not a whole lot of times repentance appears in all of the epistles. Here's one that it does and look what it says. This is a little confusing, bear with it. Paul had written a letter that had created some stir in the church at Corinth and it says in 2 Corinthians 7. Yet now I am happy, not because you were made sorry, but because your sorrow led you to repentance. For you became sorrowful as God intended and so were not harmed in any way by us. Now look at verse 10. Godly sorrow brings repentance that leads to salvation and leaves no regret. But worldly sorrow brings death. What is he saying? There is a repentance that comes at each confrontation of the things that God is saying with your will that will cause you sorrow. Godly sorrow, now listen church. Godly sorrow is what happens in you when you realize that you're hurting God. That you're grieving His Holy Spirit. That you've cut short God's purpose in and through your life. Paul said that is good. That's sorrow that does something. Those are tears that mean something. It's not worldly sorrow. Worldly sorrow doesn't produce anything. Worldly sorrow is crying when you're caught. I remember so well some years ago in my office when we were down at the open door. A person came in who had been caught shoplifting. In two minutes, you know, the Kleenexes were out and it was pouring out, the tears. And after I just listened for half an hour and just asked some questions, you know what I discovered about this person's weeping? They weren't sorry at all before God. What they were sorry about was the mess that they made of their life. And now they had the possibility of having a criminal record and all that stuff. How many of you have ever been at a funeral when you've seen all those tears, but there's no repentance there? It's the sorrow of loss. It's a worldly sorrow that produces nothing. Paul says have sorrow that's of God. Sorrow that sees that the sin that God's revealed in your life has broken off relationship. That it's limited you in your fruitfulness. That's godly sorrow that produces repentance and leads to everlasting life. You see, when David was confronted by Nathan in 2 Samuel, what a powerful story. You all know it. David had been a great victorious king and by his own lust had fallen into adultery with Bathsheba and then to top it off, murdered her husband. And he knew that he was wrong, but he went ahead and did it. That story ends in chapter 11 when Nathan the prophet, isn't that interesting, came in and said to him, you're the man, David. You ought to write this down. 2 Samuel 11, 13. Here is why, listen church, here is why God said that David was a man after my own heart. David did not start making excuses. He didn't start blaming Bathsheba for sunbathing out on the rooftop naked. He didn't blame the fact that his other wives weren't doing very well by him. David just said this, I have sinned against the Lord. A radical upheaval in the human will. And the rest of David's life, he lived out that repentance. That's what God wants of us. Number three, repentance involves hearing, it involves confessing. Number three, it involves obeying the word of the Lord. You know, too often, we just want to stop here at the altar. Last week, 75-100 people came up and said, God, I want you to change my heart. But John says so clearly here, look back in Matthew chapter 3 now. Verse 8, Produce fruit in keeping with repentance. Now it's worth turning over to Luke, the third chapter, the parallel passage. Now look at this. He says the same thing. He says, produce fruit in keeping with repentance. And then verse 10, the people in the crowd say, well, what should we do? Now listen, this is teaching. This is teaching now. What does it mean to produce fruit in keeping with repentance? He says three things. Look at it with me. Luke 3.10, What then should we do? Here's the fruit. John answered, The man with two tunics should share with him who has none. And the one who has food should do the same. Repentance involves, here it is, breaking your unselfishness. Or breaking your selfishness for unselfishness. Now, how many of you have more than one suit? Two, yes. All of us would find this particular passage in our own understanding as being very difficult, wouldn't we? So what is he really saying? He's saying, why do you have a closet full of clothes? Maybe two closets full. He's saying, look at why you have what you have. Why do you accumulate unto yourself? He's saying, break that yoke of selfishness. A fruit of repentance. And then he goes on and says in verse 12, the tax collectors came to be baptized and they said, well, what should we do? And he said, don't collect any more than you're required to. Now, we only have one tax collector in the congregation that I know about. Boy, I bet he's under heavy conviction right now. He's a dear faithful man, and so I'm sure that that's not a problem with him. But it was in those days, and you know why? You know what the tax collectors did? They were the only ones who knew what the Roman government was requiring of them. Tax collectors were Jews who'd sold out to the Romans. They were the only ones. So when the Roman government says, okay, from this segment of the population, I expect this. And from these older people, we want this much. And from these businesses. But only the tax collector knew if it was 5% or 10%. But he then could go and say, well, I know the government wants 5% from you, but I'm going to collect 8%. And where'd the other 3% go? And they were so hated by the people. We don't have any corruption in our government. No problem with that. But maybe you can identify here with this one point. Only you know what God is requiring of you. And what John is saying is, act with integrity. Be faithful to what you know God is requiring of you. Maybe only you know that God said, stop picking on that person next to you in the office. Repentance then means you hear that word and you obey it. Maybe only you know that God says, quit that incessant murmuring about your boss. Repentance means you obey that and bear fruit in keeping with that. And finally, look what he says now to the soldiers. What should we do, they ask. And then verse 14. Don't extort money and don't accuse people falsely. Be content with your pay. And I'll just say this. I think what he's saying there is, listen, you have a role in life. Fulfill it. Don't abuse it. Don't take advantage of it. And don't grumble about it. How many of you need that advice every once in a while? God's given you a role. Don't abuse it. He's given you authority. Don't flaunt it. And don't grumble about it. And God will take care of you. Those are fruits, keeping with repentance. And beloved, now let me just say. I've given you three illustrations of things to not do. I want to just say this. Repentance to me also means that you start to do one thing anew and that is to focus on Jesus. Repentance, if you begin to simply build a life of introspection saying, no, what's wrong with me? No, what do I need to change? No, God, what's the matter with me? Do you know what's going to happen to you? You are going to sink down. The enemy will ride that thing right into despair in your life. And do you know the Bible says that there is a fruit of the Spirit that gives evidence that God's at work in you? Do you know what the fruit of repentance is? Say it. It's joy. A person who is truly living in repentance is living a life of joy. Because he or she knows the release of walking in forgiveness of sins. The greatest joy I know is the joy of forgiveness. The reason why we can stand here in this platform and give glory to God and give Him praise with all of our hearts is because we know the joy of having our sins forgiven. Not because I've been a good boy this week. And I just pray with all my heart that you won't fall into the trap of seeing repentance as something you do. God does it. And it's a progressive thing in your life. Is it possible that you could live a life and not have to repent? Doesn't seem like it. But Jesus did. And what Paul fills his epistles with is know Jesus. My prayer is that you'd be consumed with the knowledge of Him. You see, so that you could move on in perfect glory and fullness. Beloved, there are so many people that have gotten off on this. Really not a lot. As much as it is that the ones who do just become so overbearing. One of our elders, I won't name him, was with a person in one of our local restaurants just not long ago. They told the story of sitting and talking about the things of the kingdom and sharing what God is doing in the church and so on. They were excited. Now listen to this. And this person next to them got up as they were finishing their breakfast and wrote down on a slip of paper like this and put it on, just didn't say anything, but put it on their table and said, Organized religion is the whore of Babylon and you're participating in her whoredom. I just had scrambled eggs here. I don't know what's going on. We're talking about loving Christ and being in the church. You see, and I appreciated the response of those brothers was to try to reach out and begin to participate in a conversation with this person. But you see, they'd gone too far. They'd gone off the deep end of searching so deeply that they lost what God wanted to do in their lives. Let me conclude quickly by saying this. The fourth thing that we need to do is to believe. To believe. We hear, we confess, we obey, and we believe. I just want to end with this one little story. I have a lot more to say, but I think I need to conclude. In the seventh chapter of Luke, there's a beautiful story. It only appears once in all the Gospels. It's a story of Simon the Pharisee and a woman not even named. Can you imagine being in the Bible and not getting your name in there? You can't even tell your grandkids, that's me. But this woman was described as a sinful woman, an adulterous woman. And she heard about Jesus going to be with Simon the Pharisee for dinner. I think that's interesting. You see, Jesus went to be with the people that didn't like him. And when he went into the house, Simon kind of just played it low key. And this woman came up to him, went up to Jesus, and weeping and sobbing because of the knowledge of her sin, she began to minister to him. The Bi