Repentance, is it Important?

Hey, this is Jim Graham from the Masculine Journey Podcast, where we explore relationship instead of religion every week. Your chosen Truth Network Podcast is starting in just a few seconds. Enjoy it, share it, but most of all, thank you for listening and for choosing the Truth Podcast Network. This is the Truth Network. Welcome to Man Talk, brought to you by TAWCMN, talking and walking Christian men's ministry, where they're devoted to breaking down the walls of race and denomination and challenging men to take their God-assigned role.

Here's our hosts, Will Hardy and Roy Jones Jr., a black guy and a white guy. Well, we are back once again, Roy. Another week has passed, and so here we are talking about repentance. Repentance, is that really necessary? You know, and I think it goes through a lot of people's minds. They have that question, you know, they say, do I really need to do it if I don't know what it is? Yeah, or I'm covered by the blood, why should I repent? Exactly. Yeah, and that's a big misconception.

Absolutely, because people, we have a tendency to look for weaknesses in things, and so wherever we can find that little crack or that little avenue, that's the direction we're gonna go. Well, let's get on with it. Let's get on like a chicken bone. You're my boss, he's always kidding me about, that's all I ever eat, chicken, so you're talking my language.

I know, I eat a lot of chicken too, so yeah. So Matthew 4 17, from that time on, Jesus began to preach, repent for the kingdom of heaven has come near. And see, in another version, it says the kingdom of heaven is at hand. It's right before us, and so when we start looking at things that's happening abroad, Roy, we miss the point of being a representative of the kingdom. So if I, if I was in the world acting and responding a certain way, and God has separated me to take me out from that, then I no longer need to be thinking and acting the same way.

So you know, we're continuing. Basically, this is a continuation from last week's show, when we were talking about resolutions, and instead of making resolutions, maybe we need to repent. Well, exactly that, because you got to have a clear heart and clear conscience, right?

Absolutely. You got to be right with the Lord before you step forward. So let's talk about the definition of repentance.

All right. The repentance called for throughout the Bible is a summons to a personal, absolute, and ultimate unconditional surrender to God as sovereign. Though it includes sorrow and regret, it is more than that, and repenting one makes a complete change of direction, a 180 turn toward God. Change of mind, which leads to a change of heart, which leads to a change of direction. Right. So if our mind changes, your heart changes, your heart changes, your direction changes.

And see, that's it. Not making a 360, because if you make a 360- You're right, that's where you started it. And see, some of us, we make the 180, and then we keep going around and around and around. Instead of realizing now that God had blessed me to make that 180, I'm focused on Him.

Yeah. So let's talk about that, Will, repentance. And let's talk about the blood. Let's talk about, you know, and there's this mindset, I think, that I've witnessed in talking with people and coaching men and hearing some of the stories that, hey, I'm covered by the blood, like we talked about just a moment ago.

So all bets are off. I'm covered by the blood, so if I make a mistake, if I choose to make mistakes consciously, sin, what is the big deal? And I don't repent.

What is the big deal? Well, see, and I actually heard a young man say to me, this was like last year, and he said to me, you know, that if my sins have been forgiven past, present, future, then why do I need to ask for forgiveness? Hence, why do I need to repent if my sins are covered past, present, and future? Well, God would not have put it in there for you to continue to pray or renew your mind if you didn't have to do these things.

He put it in there because we have to do those things. And see, I like that part in the definition that you read, an unconditional surrender. In other words, we don't make bargains with God. We don't say, God, if you do this, then, you know, I'm going to keep your word over here, and I'm going to be faithful to you in this way. So what we're trying to do is we're trying to bargain with God.

And of course, that doesn't work at all. Well, in Matthew 3-8, it says, produce fruit in keeping with repentance. So if I am repenting, then that will produce the fruit that's talked about in Galatians 5, verses 22 and 23. It talks about that, the fruits of the Spirit. So when we are repentant, that means we're giving up and we're turning from the things that had us entangled or in bondage. So if you think about producing fruit, in order to produce fruit, you've got to have, you've got to be free of weeds. You've got to be free of fungus.

You've got to be free of all that. So in our world, you could almost think of the repentance as the preventive measure. And the step has to be taken in order to produce good fruit.

Exactly. And that's a daily process, because none of us go through a day without having had a bad thought, having had to let sin in some way. So it's important to repent on a daily basis, not even more frequently than that when you're talking to the Father. And you should be talking to the Father more than just one today. And if you say you haven't sinned, then according to 1 John chapter 1.

You just did. You make him a liar and the truth is not in you. That's what the Word of God says.

And you yourself are a liar. Amen. Because we know that you have sinned.

Absolutely. So when I think about repentance, it always usually comes in the context, if you think about what you typically hear repentance in, in the context of a non-believer, unbeliever being shared or witnessed to by the importance of repentance. And that's part of the step in the process, right? Back to that 180 turn when you accept the Father. You accept Jesus into your heart, start following the Father.

And then now you turn and you've made that 180 turn, which may be gradual, because not everybody moves at the same pace. The Holy Spirit's got to work on you and work in you and through you. And as you move away from all those things that once caused you to stumble, that's the context that most people think about repentance.

They don't think about it as a daily part of their life. Absolutely. You know, because one verse of scripture in 1 Corinthians chapter 5, you know, there was a situation in there where you had an individual who was in an incestuous relationship with, you know, his father's wife. And the thing about it is, is he had this relationship and the Corinthians wasn't taking action. And so Paul, God blessed through him to write this letter and say in this particular chapter that you need to separate yourself from this individual and you need to let the enemy deal with him until he repent. And then once he repent, receive him back. But then when we go over there and look at 2 Corinthians, I believe it's chapter 2 or 3, they didn't want to forgive him. He had repented. And God had to bless through Apostle Paul to write the second letter and include in there that his sorrow would be so heavy on him because he repented that no one would forgive him.

So just imagine how you felt. You were part of a congregation. You fell into sin. People heard about your sin and they know who you are. And so, you know, you went out from among the church because they didn't want you part of the church until you repented. You repented but now they don't want to have you back. Or they look at you differently once you do get back. Oh, of course, of course.

And we've talked about that off the air. And I think maybe on occasion in our program, the church, the body of Christ is the worst as it relates to the way they treat those that have fallen short. And really it's amazing because the whole essence of what our walk is about is based on forgiveness and love. Not justification or justice but love and forgiveness. Exactly.

Because if God were dishing out the justice based on our behavior versus forgiveness and grace. There would be no people on the planet. No people on the planet. Yeah.

And the way it's going, that day's a lot closer than it was yesterday. You got another one there. Yes. Let's talk about 2 Corinthians 7, 9. 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. So, you know, and repentance, I think, you know, because we had another verse here that talked about therefore if anyone is in Christ, this is 2 Corinthians 5, 17, he's a new creation, he's a new creature. Old things are passed away, behold all things have come new. So if you, and we were, since we were talking about resolutions last week and we're talking about repentance this week, see if you make something that you know you cannot keep or it's unattainable or things like that or it's through selfishness that you make it or it's through, you know, some willpower that you're trying to create from within yourself and act on, then you've already defeated.

So we shouldn't be thinking like that anymore. Our thinking must change in order for us to be the creation that God created us to be. So Will, if I'm a person listening to the program today and I'm struggling with an area of my life, whatever that happens to be, and, you know, we've talked about several of those key areas over the last several months, you know, related to purity and so forth, but if I'm struggling with something in my life and back to the 180 turn and I've got the mindset that the blood's got me covered, I ask for repentance but I go right back to the same problem the next day and the next day and the next day.

What advice do you have for me? Well, I think when a person says that they're just saying it going through motions, you know, so they're motion oriented because it makes them feel better when they say it but within there is no dependence on the Holy Spirit in order to keep them and it is the Holy Spirit that keep us. Don't be mistaken. You know, we, the third person to Godhead is active around the world and that's who we lean on. That's who we depend on because he dwells within us and so when we yield our members to him, Romans 6 16, then when we do that, then we're acting on the righteousness that the Holy Spirit represents and then we in turn manifest that representation through what we do and others see it and then as a result, they come to Christ or they want to know more. We plant a seed within them. The key is they see it in you and they see the change in you.

So think about that. So if you're one of these people that are struggling with turning loose or really turning and doing the 180 as we talked about earlier in the definition, from whatever it is that's causing you to stumble, how is that impacting your brother? The person who's watching or the person you don't even know is watching you but they see, they hear you talk one way but yet they see your actions another way. What is that doing to your witness and what is that doing for the kingdom?

It's actually hurting the kingdom because you're not walking it out like you should be walking out. And when we come back, we're going to play a clip with Dr. Tony Evans and he's going to talk about reversing things in your life. Dr. Jeff Fricke has been caring for patients in High Point for 34 years. Physical therapy such as ultrasound and spinal decompression for disc conditions such as herniation, comprehensive care for auto accident injury patients with no out-of-pocket expense. Remember affordable chiropractic on West Lexington Avenue in High Point.

Call 336-885-1987. Welcome back to Man Talk Radio where right before the break we were talking about we're going to share a clip from Dr. Tony Evans related to. Yeah, repentance and how you can reverse things in your life in reference to letting God take you from that point of despair and bringing you back to where you need to be after you repent.

And here's the clip. Throughout scripture God has prescribed a specific means that leads to the reversal of our circumstances. It's summed up in one word. It's the word repentance. When we repent, God often takes the option of changing His mind about our consequences. Now He can do that in a number of different ways. He can cancel the consequences. He can reverse the consequences.

He can limit the consequences. And He can even change us in the midst of the consequences. If you are tired of going through the repercussions of bad choices, bad decisions, sinful actions, unwise motions and movements in life, God has a solution. He regularly, in the word, calls us to return to Him. Repentance is the decision to change your mind in order to reverse your direction, to move from that which takes you and me away from God to that which will draw us back in close proximity to Him. Draw near unto me and I will draw near unto you, the scripture tells us. So God is waiting for your return, my return, our return, and on whatever level the repentance occurs, is that level that God is willing to see changes in our circumstances that we desperately need and long for once we respond to His method, which is always based on repentance. To His method, which is always based on repentance.

Praise God. And see, if you were listening, listening audience, if you were listening really, really closely, which I hope you were, when God blessed through Tony Evans here, a blessed man, by the way, but when he spoke, he was saying how things that if you didn't repent, things that were in store for you, that were going to happen to you, God can reverse that. In other words, if you repent, that thing that was waiting for you will not happen because of your repentance. I love that because it's the unseen things. It's the things we cannot see in the supernatural world that when eventually, when we start thinking about these things, they become manifested in the physical natural world.

And we talk about that quite often. If we will step in the natural, which makes the conscious decision to repent, then God will come along in the supernatural to take care of things, realign things, work your circumstances out, change your situation for you, all behind the scenes, not even knowing what's going on. And see, that's the beauty, I think, of repentance because what repentance does is it keeps, and I like this, it keeps things from not happening to you that were going to happen to you if you would have continued in your non-repentant state. Oh, that's so powerful because when we start focusing on God and things that we will never know about, I mean, as you went through growing up through your life, there are things that did not happen to you that God was working behind the scenes and they never happened to you and you never knew about them. Yeah, we had a grandmother praying for you, a mother praying for you, a father praying for you that you had no idea was praying that was keeping you covered. So draw near to him and he will do what?

Draw near to you. And he said in 1 John chapter 2 verse 15, don't love the world. Don't do the things that are in the world. He said, if anyone loves the world, the love of the father is not in him. So we can't say we love God, but yet we're still acting and thinking like the world thinks. Well, some translates to, I think if you love the world, you hate the father is basically what you're saying, right?

Yeah. Well, it's just like Jesus said, you can't love God and money, you know, mammon. So you're going to love one or you're going to love the other.

You're going to cling to one or you're going to despise the other. So that, that, yes, that works together in the sense of repentance as well. So if we think about, if you're listening today and we want to talk about repentance and you're thinking, well, what have I done in my life that I maybe haven't, haven't repented for? And I think this is one thing that, well, I don't know if you ever do this, but there's times I will go back in my mind, something that's happened or something that may went wrong or something I certainly should have repented for. Even if I, if I couldn't recall, if I had asked for forgiveness for that specifically, when it comes to mind, I, I immediately turn it back over to the father and ask for forgiveness. And I know the sins are as far from the East as from the West, but if it come to mind, I said, well, you need to clear my mind of it, father. But also if I didn't ask for forgiveness, the fact that it's here, I want to make sure that I've asked you for forgiveness. I think that's important too. If it's, if it's risen up, put it right back to bed.

Indeed. You know, Roy, I'd never shared this probably with you. So you will hear it the first time that our listening audience is hearing it, but I was on a very icy patch of road and I was on my way from work going home and it was a steep hill and you know, I was going very, very slowly, obviously because of the icy road and behind me was a pickup truck and the pickup truck was going faster than it should have been going on the icy road. And so what happened is it's, it seems like I, obviously I couldn't go anywhere because you know, I couldn't go any faster because there's cars in front of me, there's cars on the side of me and the road was very busy and it was at the end of the day, you know, people were getting off work and all of a sudden I look in the rear view mirror because I knew this truck, the truck couldn't stop. It was sliding, sliding, sliding. And it, it just, when I looked in the, in the rear view mirror, I kid you not Roy, when I looked in the rear view mirror, it looked like the hand of God just pushed that truck to the side and all of a sudden, I mean, it was eight, 10 inches a foot away from me and all of a sudden it just veered off to the right.

Amen. It just veered off to the right and into the, uh, the center lane. And when I saw that, I just immediately, I just lowered my head cause I was standing still. I couldn't move, you know, uh, as far as traffic wise and I just stood there, prayed and thank God.

Well, you know, it's interesting you say that it will share, I may have shared this, but I'll share it again right quick. Similar situation happened when I was on the way to work one morning, uh, light drizzle rain. I was driving my old pickup truck and tires were somewhat, um, you know, they were, they were, they were past inspection, but they weren't super thick and far as handling water, but it wasn't a heavy rain. And I was coming up on the own ramp onto the highway and I was basically making a turn, slight turn to my right as I was coming up the ramp, which meant the gravity pull was to the left side, right?

So as you're coming up that way, and I've talked to several of you engineers about this and interestingly enough, I broke traction and it was eight o'clock in the morning, about five or 10 minutes to eight. I mean, it was bumper to bumper, uh, four lanes wide, five lanes wide, whatever it is right there, 40 and 68 and, and broke traction. Well, what should have happened was the truck should have went right out into traffic, right?

By gravity pull. Wow. The truck did a 180. I won't say the truck, God spun the truck around and pushed me. The truck literally just pushed it right back inside the curve on the, on the ground, the dirt inside of the on ramp. Wow. It's physically impossible other than God's hand.

Indeed. And I didn't even in the truck and the truck cut off at the same time. So therefore I couldn't hit the gas and get in anymore. I mean, the truck shut off for no reason.

There was no reason for any of that happened. No reason for me to be pushed to the inside other than God for the truck to be turned off other than God's hand. Cause then I just started the truck back up, turned back up on the ramp and it wasn't until I got back on the highway that I literally, the tears just started coming down my face because it washed over me what had just happened.

Because as I started putting two and two together, I said, this was physically impossible. And it literally was the hand of God wheel. So we have a very similar story and shared experience that he pushed me, he an angel, whatever, it pushed me back off the road and imperfect. I mean perfectly slid me right back inside the curb onto the dirt out of harm's way. If I had dropped out into the highway, I would have been killed. And probably it's others killed too, because it would have been just like a pinball machine for those that don't know what a pinball machine is, but you would have been bumped by multiple cars.

It would have been bad. Others may have been killed as well. So see, these are just two examples that I'm sure our listeners out there have several examples too of how God spared you in certain situations where you have seen the hand of God. And I think when we see things like this happen, Roy, in our life, when we experiencing them, and of course it doesn't mean that you have to experience everything because our life should be built off of faith. But those things that God bless you to experience, we need to see God in it and know it's him and give him thanks for whatever it is he took you through. Because there are certain things we have to go through in order to sharpen our faith.

We talk about iron sharpening iron all the time. And if men see this happening in our life and how we are that vessel for God to use, because this verse here, Proverbs 3.7, we talk about this a lot as well. Do not be wise in your own eyes. Fear God, notice, fear God first, depart from evil. Fear God, depart from evil. So if you're fearing God, you're focusing on him, you are acknowledging him for who he is and not what you want him to be. Right, right. And that's the key. Who he is, not who you want him to be.

Exactly, exactly. And that's why we need to come with a humble heart and accepting him for who he is. And he is the almighty.

The king of kings and Lord of lords, the everlasting father, the prince of peace, the wonderful counselor, the mighty God. Amen. Hallelujah, hallelujah. Amen. I feel like preaching right now. You have been preaching. Hey, it's good to have you with us.

We are so excited. Hey, if you haven't joined our podcast, jump on and subscribe to our podcast. It's Man Talk Radio Podcast. Man Talk Radio Podcast.

Don't just stop at Man Talk because there's a lot of stuff out there you don't want to see. You go Man Talk Radio Podcast. And we would appreciate you subscribing. We thank you for listening to us. It's been our honor over this last year and a half to spend time with you.

And we just pray the very best for you in 2021. And we'll join us in another week because we're going to be talking about the events that happen at the White House. As we wrap up today's show, be assured that TAWCMM, talking and walking Christian men's ministry is building a community of men that are Christ followers with a desire to be servant leaders in their homes, communities, churches and work environments. Check out our website for upcoming events and regularly scheduled meetings. Drop us a note for topics that you would like to have us visit in the future. Thank you for joining us on Man Talk today. Visit us at www.tawcmm.com. Men walking the talk. This is the Truth Network.