Repentance needed for Salvation?

No, as a Christian it his obligation to forgive you because of a 'far greater forgiveness'. Are you aware of that far greater act?.

David

 

The word for repentance is metanoia, Meta = change, Noia = mind.

I believe repentance is a work of the Holy Spirit in us. The Holy Spirit is the one that convicts us and changes us to believe that sin is wrong and we are sinners. The Holy Spirit is the one who changes our minds.

I put repentance in the catigory with being born again and sanctification. They are the same thing and are done in all believers. You can not be saved without haveing the Holy Spirit and you can not have the Holy Spirit with out Him changing your mind. So if you are saved you are repentant.

 

We can not do anything ourselfs to be saved. Repentences is done to us.

Just like you can not do anything to be born again. When you are saved you are born again, there are no step 1. 2. 3. now you are born again. The Lord saves us then He makes us born again with the Holy Spirit. The first thing He does when we are born again is change our mind about sin.

 

Here are some scripture verses for the folks who eschew repentance as part of salvation:

Mark 1:14-15 Now after that John was put in prison, Jesus came into Galilee, preaching the gospel of the kingdom of God, And saying, The time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God is at hand: repent ye, and believe the gospel"

Acts 3:19 (Peter says) Repent ye therefore, and be converted, that your sins may be blotted out ...

Acts 17:30 (Paul on Mars Hill) And the times of this ignorance God winked at; but now commandeth all men every where to repent.

As the result of Paul's call to repentance, v.34 says some believed.

Acts 20:21 (Paul to the elders) Testifying both to the Jews, and also the Greeks, repentance toward God and faith toward our Lord Jesus Christ.

Hebrews 6:1 Therefore the principles of the doctrine of Christ, let us go on to perfection; not laying again the foundation of repentance from dead works, and of faith toward God.

Luke 24:47 ..and that repentance and the remission of sin should be preached in his name....

II Cor 7:10 (Paul) For godly sorrow worketh repentance unto salvation...


Seems to me that over and over in the scriptures, repentance and faith are inextricably linked to salvation and to each other.

 

DeeJay if the Holy Spirit changes our mind then we are merely robots and nothing else. Tom provided some good Scriptures that show that it is actually us that changes our minds based on information that is given to us by the Holy Spirit, but the Holy Spirit doesn't change our mind, we are commanded to change our minds based on Truth as far as I can tell in Scripture.

Tom those are some great Scriptures that you quoted and more examples that repentance is not required in "eternal" salvation. Repentance is required for "kingdom" salvation, but those are two totally different subjects as far as Scripture is concerned.

 

I dont see it that way (being robots). I am not that much of a calvinist. I see the Holy Spirit as a convictor or sin. The Holy Spirit convincies us that sin is wrong. When we were saved he came into us and that is his job. He does not force us to change, but he does a very good job at conviction of sin.

Things that I thought were "no big deal" when I was lost. I now know are sinfull and a huge big deal. With the conviction of the Holy Spirit and reading of Gods Word I changed my mind about sin (repent).

Now obviously we are not robots with Him pulling our strings, or we would be perfict. But he does convict and convince us. The more we fight against his conviction the harder things are. The more mature of a Christian a person is the more they learn to let the Holy Spirit change their lifes.

To even turn to see that we need Christ to save us. And that we can not save ourself took conviction of the Holy Spirit. When we changed our minds (read repented) and decided that we needed Christ as our savior we were repentent.

So do we need to repent to be saved?
Well did we have to change our minds and decide that we needed Christ to save us?

Yes.

 

The answer to the first question is no. Repentance is not what saves you. Faith in the works of Christ done on our behalf is what saves us.

Not everyone needs to change their mind about whether or not they are a sinful person or not. There are a number of people that aren't saved, because they think they are too bad that God can't save them.

So not everyone sees themselves as too good for God. But irregardless of whether one thinks they are too good for God or too bad for God they must be led by the Holy Spirit to view God in the right way, but that only puts them into a position to accept the free gift of grace through faith/believe.

The answer to your second question is yes, but that's not what saves us. Eternal salvation comes when a person trusts in the substitutionary death and shed blood of Jesus Christ, the Lamb of God, for the payment of their sin debt.

Changing one's mind as to Who Jesus is and their need for a Savior only puts them in a position to be saved. It doesn't save them. Faith/believe in Jesus is the only thing that saves according to what I see in Scripture else there are contradictions.

 

I agree you dont need to repent to become saved. But when you are saved repentance is a result. That is what I have been saying all along. Repentence is not something we do on our own. It is a result of the Holy Spirit convicting us of our sins and convincing us that Christ can save us / we need Christ to save us.

I agree, and failed to mention the other half. But in both cases the person needs a change of mind. It is the conviction of the Holy Spirit that brings about that change of mind. A person either becomes convinced that they are a sinner and need Christ or the person becomes convinced that Christ can save them no matter how bad they are. Both are repentence.

I agree. Again that is what I have been getting at.

It would seem that we agree on everything, except how to phrase what we believe. How about this.

Repentence is like being born again. You dont do it, God does it in you. It is not something that you do to become saved but when you are saved it is done in you by God. Both repentance and being born again are not things you have to do to be saved but every saved person has both been born again and is repentant. Jesus said you can not enter Heaven unless you are born again, yet it is not something we do, it is done in/to us. Same thing with repentance.

 

This is the part that I disagree with. The Holy Spirit doesn't change our mind, we do. We change our minds based on the Truth that has been revealed to us by the Spirit, but it is still us that changes our mind. So repentance is not something that is done to us.

The repentance that most talk about is a repentance of sin instead of a repentance to the nature of Who Jesus is as what He has done for you.

Repentance of sin that is spoken of in the Gospel accounts is speaking to a different subject than eternal salvation.

 

If it is something I do then it CAN NOT have anything to do with eternal salvation, because eternal salvation is based ONLY on the works of Christ. If "I" doing ANYTHING comes into the equation it is not grace, but wages.

 

Although "repentance of sin" are also words basically akin to "repent of (one's) sin(s)" in that these also are not found in Scripture, I agree with J. Jump that we are the ones that change our mind. The use of the active voice, and the 'command' of "Repent,..." show that repent is not a passive 'act'. And when one 'repents', he or she is then in a state of 'repentance". Preach on Brother J.

Ed

 

I see a lot of speculation in this discussion but very little scripture.

I believe that repentence is required for salvation and the following verses say that it generally comes first.

This verse seems pretty straightforward to me.

Luk 13:5 I tell you, Nay: but, except ye repent, ye shall all likewise perish.


And also these:

Act 2:38 Then Peter said unto them, 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 3:19 Repent ye therefore, and be converted, that your sins may be blotted out, when the times of refreshing shall come from the presence of the Lord;

Act 26:20 But shewed first unto them of Damascus, and at Jerusalem, and throughout all the coasts of Judaea, and [then] to the Gentiles, that they should repent and turn to God, and do works meet for repentance.

Rev 2:22 Behold, I will cast her into a bed, and them that commit adultery with her into great tribulation, except they repent of their deeds.

This verse says to me that repentence is required more than once.

Rev 3:3 Remember therefore how thou hast received and heard, and hold fast, and repent. If therefore thou shalt not watch, I will come on thee as a thief, and thou shalt not know what hour I will come upon thee.

 

You are wrong, plain and simple. I believe you better go back and read the Lord Jesus' own words for yourself.

Look here:

"From that time Jesus began to preach, and to say, Repent: for the kingdom of heaven is at hand." -Matt. 4:17

Jesus Himself preached repentance!

 

DeaconDean you give a verse of Scripture that proves the point that I have been making and then you accuse me of being wrong. Jesus preached repentance because of the kingdom of heaven is at hand.

The kingdom and eternal salvation are not the same thing. We have to allow context to tell us what is being talked about.

It's the exact same thing for all the verses that StraightandNarrow mentioned. Those are kingdom context verses not eternal salvation verses.

Repentance is needed for the kingdom, but the kingdom ONLY comes into view AFTER eternal salvation.

 

Absolutely!

Ed

 

I basically agree here, and would add that, like these nouns, the verbs 'believe' and 'repent' are also the same two sides, in a nutshell.

Ed

 

J.Jump wrote:

Amen! Those words are not found in Scripture.

Ed

 

I know the night the Lord saved me, all I wanted was to get to Jesus and everything in my life was worthless compared to Christ.

I am not perfect, but I know that God makes a soul sorrowful or horrified over their their state of being a sinner before they get saved. No person that has truly been saved has just made a mental/scholastic turn to Christ. One must realize that he is a sinner, and this fact will burn down deep in your soul.

 

gekko wrote:

The first sentence is a nice ad hominem shot, but unfortunately sheds no real light on the subject of this thread.

As to the second, -uh where is the verse or verses that define "sanctification" as "repentant faith"? I musta' missed that one somewhere.

Ed