Repentance Series (9 of 9) Concluding Remarks

Repentance is nearly lost in the professing church today, there are certain pockets of repentant believers who are the true Church, but by and large we live in a pagan America that has labeled herself Christian. Our churches are full of social ‘Christians’ who have no desire for repentance, no desire to die to themselves and rise with Christ, and no passion for our Lord. We have gotten to the point where patriotism is considered synonymous with Christianity and faith is defined by one’s stand on certain social issues. We live with a ‘church’ that has no definition of the term ‘Christian’ or ‘unity’, yet we preach nothing but ‘Christian unity’. The problem is not the ‘liberals’, it is not the ‘fundamentalists’, the problem is neither Calvinism nor Arminianism, the problem is you and me. We have had countless opportunities to call people to repentance, to plead with them to divorce the world and be married to Christ, yet we have let innumerable opportunities pass. We have desired to move up in the ‘church’ world, when our message of repentance would make us outcasts in Christendom. We, yes even we, fundamentalists who know God have gotten drunk on numbers, and have let pragmatism creep into our conscience. I personally have sat back after a youth event and believed it was successful based on the turnout; yet in hindsight realize that it was likely void of God’s power. I have been discouraged by meetings of various groups that were smaller than expected even though God moved powerfully in them. This type of attitude is pragmatism, and needs to be repented of, and despised by us. We must never find satisfaction in ‘playing church’!!! We must find no solace in numbers. We must find no pleasure in public perception. We must only find peace in our Triune God, and His work alone. We can have no satisfaction until He has worked repentance in us, and is working repentance in those around us. Without repentance the professing church is dead! It is nothing more than another sect of people marching to eternal destruction. Oh, that we would just be the salt of the earth, that we would not lose our savor. That we would be Holy and all together different from the world around us, that we would be a strange group of people that others look onto with wonder. Repent! Repent! Repent! Come on! Let us be wholly dissatisfied with the state of the professing church today, let us first ourselves repent, and then let us care for the professing church, let us urge and prod and plead repentance, let us preach His words that Christendom may be cleansed, and that the bride may be spotless. REPENT!!!