Based on Matthew 4:19 MEMORY TEXT: “Repent ye therefore, and be converted, that your sins may be blotted out” (Acts 3:19). There is a word that has nearly disappeared from much of our current preaching and surely from the practical life of many believers, and that word is “repent”. Many don’t like to hear the word because it implies that we are guilty and responsible for what we do. Yet if we had been standing by the river Jordan listening to John the Baptist, we would have discovered that his call was to repent. John was not the only person to call for repentance. Jesus Himself began His ministry with a call to repent. “From that time Jesus began to preach, and to say, Repent: for the kingdom of heaven is at hand” (Matthew 4:17). And that is not all. At Pentecost after the Holy Spirit had fallen on the disciples, Peter preached, “Repent, and be baptized every one of you in the name of Jesus Christ for the remission of sins, and ye shall receive the gift of the Holy Ghost” (Act 2:38). Please note that repentance is a condition for receiving the Holy Spirit. Later in the Middle Ages, God raised up a priest who would be the leader of the Protestant Reformation, and that man was Martin Luther. In order to pay for the construction of St. Peter’s in Rome, Pope Leo X commissioned a priest, Johann Tetzel, to sell plenary indulgences to the people. These indulgences gave the people full pardon for their sins. When the bearer of the indulgence later came to confession, they presented the plenary indulgence, claiming they no longer had to repent of their sins. It was for this reason that on October 31, 1517, Luther nailed 95 theses to the door of the Castle Church in Wittenberg, Germany. Notice that the first three theses explicitly speak to the matter of repentance: 1. Our Lord and Master Jesus Christ, … willed that the whole life of believers should be repentance.
2. This word cannot be understood to mean sacramental penance; i.e., confession and satisfaction, which is administered by the priests. 3. Yet it means not inward repentance only; nay, there is no inward repentance which does not outwardly work divers mortifications of the flesh. Repentance. I invite you not only to think about its meaning and importance but to experience it in a new way in your life.
| 
