3 Do you suppose, O man—you who judge those who practice such things and yet do them yourself—that you will escape the judgment of God? 4 Or do you presume on the riches of his kindness and forbearance and patience, not knowing that God’s kindness is meant to lead you to repentance? – Romans 2:3 -4
Illness & MLJ
Having spent a lot of time “on the shelf” recently with an extended illness, I have had the privilege of doing a lot of reading. Specifically, I have been spending a lot of time with perhaps my favorite expositor, Martyn Lloyd Jones, as I work through his commentaries on the book of Romans. I thought I would share some thoughts based on his outline of today’s text from Romans chapter 2.
Practices
Towards the end of the first chapter of Romans, Paul lists some of the sinful practices of the unrighteous, warning us that upon them the wrath of God was being revealed as He “gave them up”. This wrath of abandonment, allowed them to continue down the path they had chosen and the eternal wrath that would be their final destiny. The unrighteous began their way down this path by suppressing the truth that God had plainly revealed to them and failing to honor Him or give Him thanks. “Claiming to be wise, they became fools” (Romans 1:22).
What does a fool look like? According to the inspired Word of God, a fool exchanges the glory of the immortal God for images of His creation. Further, they practice impurity by dishonoring their bodies, and they fulfil dishonorable passions through homosexuality. Also, they are marked by evil, covetousness and malice. They are full of envy, murder, strife, deceit and maliciousness. They are gossips, slanderers, haters of God, insolent, haughty, boastful, inventors of evil, disobedient to parents, foolish, faithless, heartless, ruthless.
As if this list isn’t painful enough, Paul makes a final indictment against the foolish. “Though they know God’s righteous decree that those who practice such things deserve to die, they not only do them but give approval to those who practice them” (Romans 1:32).
Judge or Repent?
While it is easy, and dare I say “natural” to look at such a list of sins and stand in judgement of the unrighteous, Paul gives us a reality check. Instead or casting stones in a posture of superiority, we should look at the vile practices of these “fools” and examine ourselves. Are we guilty of doing the very things we are judging in others? While our pride promotes us to seats of judgement, our behavior reveals our true position. God takes our holiness seriously, and so must we.
Over the course of time, we have reduced salvation to a simple prayer of “belief”, but if we are honest with the Scriptures, we will see that the clarion call of the gospel was always one of repentance. When John the Baptist came to prepare the way for Christ, he did so by preaching the baptism of repentance for the remission of sin. When Jesus preached, He warned his audiences of the need to repent because the kingdom of God was at hand (Mt. 4:17) and if they did not repent they would perish (Luke 13:3, 5).
When the Holy Spirit descended on the day of Pentecost, Peter boldly preached the need to repent. When he was saying farewell to the elders of the church in Ephesus, Paul reminded them that his ministry was to preach the repentance that is towards God and the faith that is towards the Lord Jesus Christ. If the necessity of repentance was the first matter of priority to Christ and the early church, do we have any right to make it any less? If we “invite” people to Jesus, making promises regarding what He can do for them, without warning them of the wrath of God and the need for repentance, are we doing them any real favor?
If we agree that repentance isn’t “optional”, but is of first order of importance, we must then ask what it specifically entails.
Think Again
In Latin, the term repent simply means “think again”. Over the course of time we will hear and read certain words so frequently that we don’t take the time to consider their meanings. But if the effect of God’s kindness is to lead us to repentance, perhaps it is time that we stop and “think again” what that means. If our repentance means that much to God, we certainly don’t want to be guilty of presuming on His kindness.
In Matthew 21:28-32, Jesus tells the Parable of the Two Sons. In the parable, the father tells the first son to go and work in the vineyard. The son initially responds by saying “no” to his father, but then he repents and goes out to work in the vineyard. When the father approached his second son with the same request, this son initially said “yes” to his father, however, despite his verbal response, he failed to actually go out and work in the vineyard.
Although the first son originally said “no” to his father, he later “thought again” about his father’s request. As our Savior stated, this son repented. But this son didn’t just illustrate the Latin definition of repentance, but the Greek as well, which carries the idea of a “change of mind”. True repentance entails looking at a subject, thinking about it again, and then coming to a different conclusion: changing our minds.
Action Plan
As important as these first two steps are, they don’t entail all of what it means to repent. As we see from Jesus’ parable, repentance also involves action. As we so often hear, a man acts according to his thinking. As MLJ said, “Repentance is not something detached and theoretical and academic. Repentance does include the idea of not only a change of mind but a change of a course of action, a change in the whole direction and habit of one’s life”.
Indeed, action is an important component of repentance, but it is vital that we don’t separate it from the prior. In other words, we can’t think of repentance only in terms of actions. Again, in the words of MLJ: “We must emphasize this, for some people seem to think of repentance only in terms of actions. They think repentance means that a man stops getting drunk or being an adulterer or whatever else it may be, and begins to live a different life, but that is the end of repentance, not the beginning. The beginning is this changed attitude towards God, this new thinking about God Himself; thinking about God in terms of the scriptural revelation rather than in terms of our own ideas and our philosophies and our arguments from man to God, instead of from God to man”.
I think if we can learn anything from the Beatitudes, it is that God is concerned that our being is transformed before our actions are “reformed”.
Proper Perspectives
The Bible tells us that the natural mind is enmity against God (Romans 8:7). We see in today’s text the propensity for man to look at the kindness, forbearance and patience of God and coming to the wrong conclusion. This should not surprise us. Man seems to either not think about God at all, or when he does think about Him, he has wrong thoughts about Him. How easy it is to look at the troubles around us and question the love and kindness of God. How often do we question His character because everything doesn’t “go our way”?
For these reasons, it is important, as the first step of repentance, to stop and think about the character of God. The natural man needs to think differently about God, in a sense “reversing the effects of the Garden”. We need to see God clearly as He reveals Himself in the Bible, and most clearly in the Person of Jesus Christ. When we do so, we will see that our thoughts about God have often been wrong. Like Job, when we truly see God as He is, our only response will be to cover our mouths in fear of blaspheming His name in our ignorance (Job 40:4).
Once we change our thoughts and minds about God, we must stop and do the same about ourselves. Once we see how exalted God is, we will begin to see why the Bible can refer to us as worms. Indeed, nothing good dwells in us (our flesh). No longer will we look at our circumstances and question the love and kindness of God. Instead, we can only wonder in awe why He ever “decided” to shower us with His infinite love. Truly, we don’t deserve it.
Glorious Destiny
According to Lloyd-Jones, the person who changes his view about God and self, will then change his view about everything else.
“His whole view of life is different. Before this, his idea of life was, really, what the world is enjoying today, or what it persuades itself that it is enjoying. But the moment a man repents, he has an entirely different view of life in this world. He sees himself in the light of God and before God. He now sees life as a journey in the direction of God, not as a place into which you come to settle down and just have a so-called good time, and let yourself go, and live like an animal obeying the lusts of the flesh and so on. No! He sees man now as someone with a great and glorious destiny. Like those depicted in Hebrews chapter eleven, he sees life as a journey, as a pilgrimage. He is but a sojourner in this world, he is travelling home to God, and his whole view of life and death and of everything that happens to him becomes different. That is a part of repentance.”
Once we see our lives as a journey in the direction of God, our conduct will profoundly change. Now our actions will fall in step with our new perspectives.
Soul Agony
As our nation approaches another election, many people are talking about the soul of our country. While the people on both sides of the political aisle are pointing out the sins of the other, wouldn’t we do well to take a moment to reflect on our own souls?
No politician is responsible for the pride in our hearts. No political ideology can justify the animosity towards our “neighbors”. As badly as I want to understand (and change) those who hold contrary political views, I have to realize that is not God’s top priority. God’s kindness is meant to lead “me” to repentance. As long as I am looking at (and condemning) others, I will be less sensitive to my own sins.
How about you? How is your “sense” of your sinfulness? When was the last time you wept under conviction of your own sin? When was the last time you experienced an agony of the soul because of the consciousness of your sin before a Holy God?
If we truly want revival and reawakening, we have to once again make repentance the clarion call of the Gospel. May God forgive us for presuming on His kindness!