Bibliography: Finding Christ, Finding Life, Repentance
Do you know the story of John Newton?
Newton was born in London July 24, 1725, the son of a commander of a merchant ship which sailed the Mediterranean. When John was eleven, he went to sea with his father and made six voyages with him before the elder Newton retired. In 1744 John was impressed into service on a man-of-war, the H. M. S. Harwich. Finding conditions on board intolerable, he deserted but was soon recaptured and publicly flogged and demoted from midshipman to common seaman.
Finally at his own request he was exchanged into service on a slave ship, which took him to the coast of Sierra Leone. He then became the servant - a slave himself - of a slave trader and was brutally abused. Early in 1748 he was rescued by a sea captain who had known John’s father. John Newton ultimately became captain of his own ship, one which plied the slave trade.
Although he had had some early religious instruction from his mother, who had died when he was a child, he had long since given up any religious convictions. However, on a homeward voyage, while he was attempting to steer the ship through a violent storm, he experienced what he was to refer to later as his “great deliverance.” He recorded in his journal that when all seemed lost and the ship would surely sink, he exclaimed, “Lord, have mercy upon us.” Later in his cabin he reflected on what he had said and began to believe that God had addressed him through the storm and that grace had begun to work for him.
For the rest of his life he observed the anniversary of May 10, 1748 as the day of his conversion.
He continued in the slave trade for a time after his conversion; however, he saw to it that the slaves under his care were treated humanely.
By 1755, after a serious illness, he had given up seafaring forever. During his days as a sailor he had begun to educate himself, teaching himself Latin, among other subjects. From 1755 to 1760 Newton was surveyor of tides at Liverpool, where he came to know George Whitefield, deacon in the Church of England, evangelistic preacher, and leader of the Calvinistic Methodist Church. Newton became Whitefield’s enthusiastic disciple. During this period Newton also met and came to admire John Wesley, founder of Methodism. Newton’s self-education continued, and he learned Greek and Hebrew.
He decided to become a minister and applied to the Archbishop of York for ordination. The Archbishop refused his request, but Newton persisted in his goal, and he was subsequently ordained by the Bishop of Lincoln. Newton’s church became so crowded during services that it had to be enlarged.
At 82, Newton said, “My memory is nearly gone, but I remember two things, that I am a great sinner, and that Christ is a great Saviour.”
Newton’s tombstone reads, “John Newton, Clerk, once an infidel and libertine, a servant of slaves in Africa, was, by the rich mercy of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ, preserved, restored, pardoned, and appointed to preach the faith he had long labored to destroy.” But a far greater testimony outlives Newton in the most famous of the hundreds of hymns he wrote:
Amazing grace, how sweet the sound
That saved a wretch like me,
I once was lost, but now am found,
Was blind, but now I see.
In the weeks ahead, we will be looking at different aspects of the Christian faith as we move closer to Easter. These aspects are ways in which we move and act within our relationship with Christ, such as coping with temptation, continual faithfulness and promise keeping, relationships within a body of believers, forgiveness and reconciliation, and the place of humbleness and remembering in the Christian walk.
We turn our attention now towards repentance. I don’t like the word. Those with little Christian experience aren’t sure what it means. Even those with greater church experience misinterpret it and in some ways I believe rebel against it. For many there is a negative connotation to it.
I hope this evening we can clear up a few of these issues concerning this word.
The words I bring you come from Paul. He writes to the church located in Corinth. In his day Corinth is a bustling metropolis and is one of those cities that is located in the perfect place for a booming trade environment. Corinth has a lot to offer.
But Corinth also has a lot wrong with it. In the letters we have that Paul wrote to the Corinthians, we have glimpses of the uphill struggle Paul has with the Corinthian believers. The Corinthian Christians, from what we can tell, were torn between the Christian faith and the pull of the culture they lived in. First, the Corinthian Christians fought with one another, trying to best each other. And then, some of them engaged in less than Christian behaviors, immoral behaviors within the church it appears - and others tolerated it, even condoned it.
One of the catch buzz phrases around today that would describe the situation in Corinth is to say they were talking the talk, but they weren’t walking the walk.
Paul writes to correct them. Paul writes to encourage them to become faithful Christians again, striving for the ideals Christ established for us all.
So we read of Paul’s plea for such Christians to be reconciled to God. In other words, Paul calls for them to repent.
Paul calls for them to remember who Christ is, what Christ has done for each of us - dying for our sins, and to return to leading a Christ filled life.
Paul’s plea comes to climax when he begs the Corinthians not to let what Christ has done be for nothing, not to receive God’s grace in vain.
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Now notice who Paul is talking to. He is not speaking to nonbelievers who have not accepted Christ. He is addressing the proclaiming Christians of the Corinthian church.
So often, we think of repentance as something new believers do when they first accept Christ. We do hope this is true. Consciously or unconsciously, we perceive it as something we do once when we accept Christ as our Savior for the first time, but we don’t perceive repentance as something we repeat.
Once we realize our wrong ways and turn from those ways (that what repentance means - to turn), once we recognize that there is no other way but the way of the cross, there is no need for us to do that again.
Once we have started on that journey with Jesus, when we stray from the path and lose our way, we create new words to describe what takes place in our life, like ‘backsliding’. Yet the result is the same. We have left God’s presence. We have deserted the dream and vision Christ has in us in the person we can be.
We must return - repent - we must return to God’s presence. We must return to pursuing that person we can be in Jesus.
Paul wasn’t talking to seekers or new believers, Paul was addressing people who claimed Jesus as Lord and who proclaimed the Christian faith.
I think a part of our problem with the word repentance has to do with the negativity associated with it. Repentance is something we do when we’ve been wrong. Repentance is something we do when we’ve been bad.
But this is the wrong way to look at it.
Repentance is not something we do to make things right. Repentance is something we do because things have been made right for us.
Its a response, not a catalyst.
Let me see if I can give an example of what I’m talking about.
Many of you know I attend graduate school in Memphis. And perhaps you are also aware how important my grades are to me. I am half way through my second masters degree. So far I have a 4.0.
I’m not telling you this to brag on myself. I’m telling you this to tell you how I got here.
It happened in my first masters degree, at the end of my first semester.
I don’t remember what my grade point average was when I completed my bachelor’s degree. It wasn’t anything remarkable. But suddenly, I found myself completing the first couple of classes of my graduate degree and I had two A’s to show for it.
I didn’t work at it. I wasn’t even aware it had happened until I got my transcript. But when I saw them, I liked what I saw.
I liked that 4.0 beside my name on that piece of paper. It made me feel good about myself. Though I hadn’t put any effort into it before, I decided then and there to start putting effort into keeping those A’s on that paper.
The thing is, I really didn’t deserve those first two A’s I got. Let me repeat that. I want to make it clear - I really didn’t deserve those first two A’s I got. I didn’t work at it to get them. It was more like a present, like a gift of something I didn’t deserve. But the gift of those A’s has caused such a response in me that I want to strive to keep getting them.
That’s what repentance is all about.
The love of God that results in the grace we receive in Jesus isn’t something any of us deserve. But that God would love us enough that God would come down to live among us, that he would die on the cross for us, that God would use his power to raise Christ from the dead so that through him we too might have life, well it brings about an overwhelming response in us. We want to be better people because God believes in us. We want to love other people, because God first loves us. That’s what repentance is.
Yes, we sin, and we need forgiveness from God. But where our thinking goes wrong is when we believe that God’s forgiveness is contingent upon our repentance. We’ve got it backwards. God has already forgiven us. He did it 2000 years ago on Calvary. All we have to do, is accept it. Our repentance is something we do in response to God’s gift of grace, something we do when we accept God’s forgiveness. God just wants to know why we haven’t done it a long time ago.
Earlier this evening, we opened with story of John Newton. He knew the truth of the relationship between God’s forgiveness and our repentance all too well. His song we sing, “Amazing Grace,” why is it so popular? What makes it one of the world’s most beloved hymns?
Its because of the intensity of its bittersweetness that it attracts us. The bitterness we feel in the pain of our sin. We join with John in our wretchedness. We too are lost. Left in such state, there would be nothing for us to do but despair.
But the sweetness we experience in God’s grace, amazing grace, when we are found, made whole, healed, set right, given a new beginning. Like the A’s on our transcript, we wish to keep the joy we experience in the gift of God’s grace. We didn’t deserve it. We didn’t do anything to get it. But God gives it to us, just the same.
And so with joy and pleasure we repent, striving in a new way to embrace God and the life we have in him.
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One more thing about John Newton’s hymn.
In the last stanza John remarks: “through many dangers, toils and snares, I have already come.”
I am reminded of the words of Paul we have read this evening where he speaks of the many hardships he has faced and his struggle to remain faithful during those hardships. It is, in fact, the series of opposites Paul recites towards the end that made me think of John Newton’s hymn when Paul writes:
“We are treated as impostors, and yet are true; as unknown, and yet are well known; as dying, and see--we are alive; as punished, and yet not killed; as sorrowful, yet always rejoicing; as poor, yet making many rich; as having nothing, and yet possessing everything.”
I wanted to add, “I was lost, but now am found.”
It makes me wonder, if perhaps a part of the problem the Christians in Corinth had was their inability to endure during similar difficult circumstances. Perhaps when they faced hardships, rather than embracing Christ and their faith, they resorted to old ways or different way in which to deal with their problems. Maybe they gave in to the pull of the culture of Corinth. It could be that when life became difficult, the Corinthians abandoned their faith rather than rely on it. Maybe, thats where we fail, too, and often stand in need of repentance to turn back to the path God gave us to follow.
Maybe Grace is better thought of as a form of stewardship, kind of like a garden. Our repentance is our ministration in that garden of love. Its not always easy. Sometimes its painfully hard work, but when our repentance cultivates, fertilizes, and nurtures the grace God has planted within us, oh what beautiful people we grow to be! Spring is coming, Easter is on its way. May the garden of God’s grace grow and bloom within us.
In Jesus name, Amen.
