The Doctrine of Repentance

The New Testament calls this mental shift repentance, which in Greek literally means “to change your mind.” You repent whenever you change the way you think by adopting how God thinks — about yourself, sin, God, other people, life, your future, and everything else. You take on Christ’s outlook and perspective.

Repentance is an absolute, spiritual decision made in truthfulness. Its motivations are remorse for the past and responsibility for the future.

Repentance here starts with rejoicing in our salvation. It is gratitude and thankfulness for God’s holiness and mercy. It looks like compassion for our dying neighbors. Repentance is living with a passion for Jesus and a desire to see people worship him. If we can kill indifference, we will remove another barrier to transformational community.

To repent means “to turn away from our sins and toward God.”

Present-day preaching finds little place for repentance, yet without repentance there can be no regeneration.