In this sermon, the preacher focuses on the importance of the doctrine of repentance in the Christian faith. He emphasizes that repentance is not a one-time event, but rather a lifestyle for believers. The preacher highlights that repentance is the first word of the gospel and the last words of warning from Jesus. He also acknowledges that the doctrine of repentance is rarely taught upon, but it is a crucial aspect of regeneration and necessary for believers to live a righteous life.

In our quest and study on doctrine, Great Doctrines of the Faith, we're continuing this morning. We're going to read these two foundational scriptures, and then we're going to launch into that which God would have for us this morning. Verse 16 in Romans 6 says, Know ye not that to whom ye yield yourselves servants to obey, his servants ye are to whom ye obey? Whether of sin unto death or of obedience unto righteousness, but God be thanked that you were the servants of sin, but you have obeyed from the heart that form of doctrine which was delivered you. Being then made free from sin, you became the servants of righteousness. 1 Timothy chapter 4, verse 16, Take heed unto thyself and unto thy doctrine, for and continue in them, for in doing this, thou shalt both save thyself and them that hear thee. Let's pray together. Father, just make the scriptures alive to us this morning. Lord, that we would not fall underneath the delusion of the adversary, Lord, to be dull concerning the truth that you died on the cross to give to us. Lord of hearts, Lord God, yearn for truth, biblical truth. And Father, I pray, Lord, that the fiery darts of the wicked one would be quenched this morning by the shield of faith. Lord, quicken us this morning by the Holy Ghost unto your word. Father, help us, Lord, not only to be hearers of the word of God, but doers of the word as well. And Father, that the preaching upon these great themes of the doctrines of the faith, Lord God, would not be only in our minds, but Lord, in our lifestyles by practice. Lord, help us, Lord God, by your grace to be strong and to be strengthened by, Lord, these truths of your word. Lord, give us the ability to hear, understand, and to apply these doctrinal truths to our lives. In Jesus name. Amen. We've been up on this now. This starts out week nine, talking about doctrine. And I know that the question must be poised in your mind. When will we ever finish? And the answer is when we're done. And the thing that you must realize, albeit you may become tired of hearing this, God's not tired of giving it to you. And I've made mention many times over the last nine weeks, the threat that we are facing today in American Christianity is the threat of doctrinal error, the threat of doctrinal apostasy. We see in the word of God that the warnings that the apostles were giving, the apostle Peter, John, we see Jesus warning in the last days, they're going to be those that depart from the faith. And it's not talking about leaving what is called quasi the institution of the church where people gather together. It's not that, but it's the forsaking and the abandon of doctrinal principles, doctrinal truths. And you and I are living in a generation that has altogether, especially in our country, forsaken what the church preached most powerfully less than even 100 years ago. We see new doctrines that have swept in across the land that have made a mockery of the doctrines of the word of God and have established false doctrines, doctrines of demons in the lives and the hearts of the people to whereby mankind has become a God and our God has become as mankind. Beloved, that should not be. And it is not so in true Christianity. Today, we're going to start a, I'll call it a treatise upon the doctrine of repentance. The last two weeks, we've talked about the doctrine of regeneration. And my friend, there is no regeneration apart from repentance. This is a teaching subject that is seemingly fallen asleep in the generation to which you and I are living. But it is a necessary grace, a necessary teaching upon repentance. Um, it's not popular because of the way that we view things today. We view that repentance is negative only because it has in its connotation, an indictment against us that we are sinful. And as I will speak more in, in, as this message comes along this morning, we're living in a culture to where that not only is unpalatable, it is intolerable. For you to suggest that someone is living wrong is an indictment against you. The culture that you and I live in will unleash its fury upon you. If you even in the least bit make inference to that, someone is living wrongly. Because we're living in a generation where everybody's doing what's right in his own eyes. We'll talk about that more as we go along. I'm going to read a couple of statements from some godly men about repentance. I see here and Dean said for salvation, repentance unto life is just as necessary as is faith in our Lord Jesus Christ. No center was ever pardoned while he remained in penitent, while he remained in rebellion against God and in his authority without submitting himself wholeheartedly to his lordship. This involves the realization in his heart wrought therein by the Holy Spirit of the sinfulness of sin, according to Romans 7, 13 of the awfulness of ignoring the claims of God and of defying his authority. Repentance is a holy horror and hatred of sin, a deep sorrow for it, a contrite acknowledgement of it before God and a complete here forsaking of it, a complete forsaking of sin. Now the second statement that I'm going to read is an unknown author and he said there is a radical distinction between natural regret and God given repentance. The flesh can feel remorse. The flesh can acknowledge its evil deeds and also it can be ashamed of itself. However, this sort of disgust with past actions can be quickly shrugged off and the individual can soon go back to his old wicked ways. None of the marks of true repentance that is described in 2 Corinthians 7, 11 are found in this man's behavior. Out of a list of 10 men in the Bible who said, I have sinned, we believe only five actually repented. They were David in 2 Samuel 12, 13, Nehemiah in Nehemiah 1, 6, Job in Job 42 verses 5 and 6, Micah in Micah 7, 9, and the prodigal son found in Luke 15 verse 18. I'm reading a book written by Richard Owen Roberts. If you've never heard of him, I suggest you find his books and read them or his preaching tapes and listen to them. Brother Roberts now is growing old in his 80s, I'm guessing, living in the Chicago suburbs and owning the greatest collection of Christian literature in regard to reformation and revival, but is a great preacher upon repentance. And he has a book that he has written, a thick book upon repentance that I must say is quite beneficial to the church. But in his book, he stated this, that there are a number of reasons why the doctrine of repentance is so largely neglected and is having relatively little impact upon the church and upon society. First of all, he says, there is a general disregard for biblical doctrine in the church. We've been saying that now for how many weeks? It's common to hear religious leaders say, you must not preach doctrine because it's divisive. And they will say this, that the greatest hindrance to the growth of Christianity today is the lack of unity among Christians, that we should stress against doctrine because it adds to this disunity. And Mr. Roberts says, how valid is this statement? It's certainly true that doctrinal preaching is divisive. Preaching the great doctrines of the Bible divides the sheep from the goats. And he says, without careful searching doctrinal preaching, the church becomes an assorted lot of flesh and spirit that is nearly impossible to effectively pastor. A mixture of sheep and goats are a shepherd's nightmare. Furthermore, the world cannot believe in Christ because it cannot believe in the mixed multitude of that which calls itself Christian. It has no means whatsoever of distinguishing between the sheep of Christ's flock and the goats of the world that sit side by side in the very same sanctuaries and mouths the very same religious jargon. Secondly, he says, portions of the church that still believe in doctrinal preaching have allowed themselves to become grievously negligent about the doctrine of repentance. Many who sincerely believe repentance is necessary have failed to give the doctrine its rightful place. They've sought to make converts who neither understand nor practice biblical repentance. Thus, the strength of these churches is diluted by unrepentant and unconverted persons in the membership who nonetheless, tragically, suppose themselves Christians and massive confusion and ineffectiveness are the result. Wow. This morning, we're going to launch an introductory into the doctrine of repentance. I am greatly challenged by this. And I put in my notes this morning, I got up very early just to pray and to seek God about this. I put in my notes that I fearfully and reverently trod upon the seldom traversed paths of doctrinal truths, especially the doctrine of repentance. It's a colossal and a monumental thing to talk about repentance. My friend, I am here to tell you that it is a very seldom, but yet most necessitated subject matter. It's very rarely taught upon that beloved, can there be regeneration apart from repentance? Why is it that we're afraid? Because we're influenced by culture. We don't want to speak upon subjects such as repentance because of the indictment that it insinuates. And we know that there's going to be a violent backlash against those that are speaking the truth and the truth itself holds the indictment. Beloved, let me tell you, if you ever become a preacher of repentance, the fury of culture will be released upon you. You will not be a popular preacher. You will never make it to the 700 club. Not that Tim's an unpopular preacher. They just don't know him very good because he preaches repentance. How does it not dawned on you when you watch Christian TV that none of the preachers there are preaching upon repentance? Isn't it amazing we're preaching about the benefits, preaching about those things that you can receive, things that can make your life here on earth a little bit better, but you're not going to hear anything taught about repentance. It's not popular. And I put also in this, in these notes that I'm, I painfully acknowledge that I seem to be nearly alone in this dark hour of the church seeing the necessity of this doctrinal truth that we're talking about today, except for a few other lonely pioneer type men that don't fear man, that don't cower to culture. Men like Brother Pete up in St. Louis area, men like Sam Ketcher and other pastors here at this local church. And God does have them out there established, but beloved, they are few and far between. Friend, listen, repentance unto life is a saving grace whereby a center out of the true sense of his sin and appreciation of the mercy of God in Christ that with grief and hatred of sin, turn from sin and turn to God, with the full purpose of an endeavor after absolute new obedience. Amen. Now, um, give me just a moment here. The printer, I think spit that out backwards. I'm missing a page. That's okay. I don't have to have these pages, but they do help me keep things straight. Oh, well, John MacArthur, a great preacher, the Bible said this, that the Greek word for repentance and met a nail probably didn't say that, right? That repentance is more than just regret or sorrow. It means to turn around. It means to change direction. It means to change the mind. It means to change the, the, the change, the will. It, it does not denote just any change, but it's always a change from the wrong to the right, away from sin and toward righteousness. Repentance does include sorrow for sin, but a sorrow that leads to a change of thinking, a change of desire, and also a change in the conduct of our life. That's repentance. That's repentance. And so, um, friend, um, I think the, the, the part of my notes that I was wanting to get to that I think I've lost, and I don't know where it says probably underneath my desk at the house where they spit all this out on the, on the floor. But, um, we're living in a culture that's saturated with the whole concept and thought that we ourselves are God. One of the most important things that we're going to talk about this morning that, that repentance is that we need to understand that we have a need for repentance. If there can be a no revelation of the need for repentance, then we can't even go anything past that. The need has to run before the means. Now there are means to whereby we repent, but the means never outruns the need. And then the word of God gives us a revelation that we have a need for repentance. But we are sinful. We are wicked and we are in need of repentance to turn us away by God's grace from sin and death unto God by the Holy ghost and the Jesus Christ. And repentance is a life giving grace that God gives us that God breathes into us to where we turn away from sin by the sovereign work of God in us and turn to him and away from sin and to a new life that God has prepared for us. You know, just the very insinuation again, I want to reiterate that we need to repent means there's something on the inside of us that culture doesn't want to admit. And that's why we're not hearing it. That's why we're not hearing repent for the kingdom of heaven is at hand. We're hearing about come to church, join the association, you know, let's follow after Jesus and let's get some benefits going to make our life better, to make things go smoother in our life. It never addresses the awfulness, the indignation of God set against sin and that we are sinners, that we have sinned against God. In fact, if any of us say that we have no sin, the truth is not on the inside of us, but yet we're living in a culture that's violently opposed to any indictment that there's anything on the inside of us that's not right. And then the scripture I had in the page that got lost on the notes said that it talks about how all men are right in their own eyes. And that's what we're up against in culture. Beloved culture stands violently opposed to Christianity. Any form of doctrine, my friend, that tries to acclimate itself under culture has made culture it's God and not the God of the Bible. And that's what we're up against. Beloved, the first word of the gospel is repent. The first sermon out of Jesus Christ's mouth, repent. The last words of warning is repent. And everything in between is repent. Beloved, repentance is not something that we do one time and never to do again. Beloved, repentance is the lifestyle of the Christian believer. It's the lifestyle. And it's not negative for us that are followers and lovers of Jesus Christ, because it's the grace of God unto life. It's not something that we view as a negative topic. It's something that God has blessed us with as a good and perfect gift that he gives us whereby we could turn away from wickedness and turn to him and be changed by his Holy Spirit and to live a lifestyle that's pleasing and honorable in his sight. And beloved, the reason that we're not hearing repent from the kingdom of heaven is at hand is because it is not culturally palatable. It is not politically correct. But beloved, it is biblical. It's not an option. It's a biblical mandate. The word of God says, unless you repent that you shall all likewise perish. Jesus said that in Luke 13 3. I tell you, except you repent, you shall all likewise perish. Beloved, repentance is not a divine suggestion. It's a mandate that we are to repent of our sin. And we're going to talk about this more. In the weeks to come, repentance is a grace. A grace is something that God gives. And it's not something that you work up yourself. We're going to talk about that in weeks to come. There's a lot to preaching on repentance. And I am well aware of that. I'm not making an attempt to do an exhaustive instruction period in time upon repentance that I believe that we should do it. Justice that we in this place and those that are listening abroad on the Internet should have an understanding, a hearty understanding of what biblical repentance is. We need to have a biblical understanding of the need that we have for it. And also we need to have a biblical understanding of the means that God has provided for the church, whereby we attain it and live it and walk in it. Amen. It's a grace of God all through the New Testament. You find that God granted a people repentance unto life, that God worked in them repentance. And I know that in my own personal life, and I pray in yours, that whenever you find yourself in sin, that you cry out, the Lord, give me a repentant heart. Work in me a repentance not to be repented of. Lord, work this in me by your grace to whereby there can be the powerful work of your divine repentance in my heart, whereby I can turn away from this sin and to turn to you, that I can look to you and live, that I can have this grace wrought in me, this gift functioning within me, to whereby I am grieved with a God given grief over sin, a sorrow for sin, not of the worldly type, but of the godly type, to whereby I turn away from this wicked man that I am and turn to the righteous man that Jesus Christ is, the righteous one. Friends, there's no hope of salvation without a repentant heart and a repentant life. And for us to embrace the thought that repentance is unnecessary is to grossly underestimate our own wickedness before God. It's also to grossly underestimate God's perfect holiness and also the incompatibility between the two. Beloved, the need for repentance is contrasted by God's perfection and holiness. And the revelation of our own wickedness and the sinfulness of our own heart and our own lives. We're living in a generation that is subscribing to the thought that God's perfect holiness can be bridged together with our lifestyles without repentance. And it's caused by a very faulty perception or a faulty revelation of the sinfulness of sin, the exceeding sinfulness of sin. It also, we see that they are subscribing to a participation and a fellowship with sin and an unwillingness to be separated from it. There's also a faulty understanding of God's judgment that's upon sin. There's also a faulty perception also out there of the perfection and the beauty and the holiness of God and God's abhorrence and intolerance to sin. Friend, the importance of repentance is illuminated best by the place our Lord gave to it in his ministry upon this earth. And it's best illuminated by him saying, repent for the kingdom of heaven and the very first words out of the mouth of our Lord Jesus Christ after he had entered and come out of the temptation season in the wilderness where he had had for 40 days and nights fasted and prayed and been tempted and overcome by the power of the spirit of God. And he goes into public ministry. And there's a subsequent to his baptism and by the prophet John and his filling with the spirit of God. And he launches, we see he launches in the public ministry and the very first words out of the out of the son of God's mouth in public ministry is repent for the kingdom of heaven is at hand. Repent for the kingdom of heaven is at hand. And I believe this illuminates the place that God gives repentance that when he sends his son into the into this world of wickedness and evil and the first thing that he says when he begins to speak in the minister is repent. Amen. And we're going to cover more about the means of repentance as we go along in this message. But today, friend, I want to bear down for the remaining amount of time that we have upon our need for repentance, the need that we have friend. Listen to me. I want to reiterate the means can never outrun the need, meaning the revelation concerning our need for repentance. Without that revelation, there could be no further revelation concerning the means whereby repentance is attained. And so being so, we need to establish firstly the need that we have from repentance. And then we will move on to the means whereby it is attained. Brother Roberts also said in his book, he said, the great natural gulf that exists between the creator and the created itself proudly or loudly proclaims the need that we have for repentance. Let me say that again. The great natural gulf that exists. Do you understand that we have been born separated from God, that there is an enmity between humanity, between mankind and God, that there is a breach separating to whereby there can be no correspondence, no interaction. We are dead in our sins and our natural state. And that very gulf that exists is a very loud voice that proclaims the need that we have for repentance. Amen. The changeable nature of mankind, he says, over and against the immutability of God demonstrates the propriety of repentance. Ourself aggredizing or our proud nature, it demands repentance. Our tendency to play about on the surface of eternal issues makes true repentance all the more urgent. Isn't it amazing how lightly we take eternal things? Thank you, dear. I think about this for a moment. Let's do a little self-examination. Yesterday, when you were about your business, how much time did you devote to meditating upon eternal things? And listen, we're the people of God. We're talking about eternal matters with eternal consequences or eternal blessings. How much time did we devote ourselves to in our thoughts towards yesterday as God's people, eternal things? And beloved, how much more less than that, the people of the world. And so, Brother Robert says, our tendency to play about on the surface of eternal issues makes true repentance all the more urgent. The all-seeing eye of God guarantees the impossibility of anything hiding from him, especially sin. Even our most noble efforts of religion can be nothing better than the works of death. Every failure, listen, every says every failure in repentance robs heaven of one of the joys that rightfully belongs there. I mean, that's some deep stuff. But we're thinking about this is that every failure in our repentance robs heaven because the Bible says that heaven rejoices at one center that what? That repents. And so every failure in repentance robs heaven of one of the joys that rightfully belongs there. We think about that. It's a lofty thoughts. But one of the pitfalls regarding our need for repentance, friend, is the blindness that we have concerning the magnitude of the offenses that we have committed against God's holiness and against God's perfect law, mingled together with the consequences that are ascribed to them. And we think about this. What does it take for us to see our need for repentance? Listen, what it takes is a revelation of the enormity of the offenses that are heaped upon us by not only by our action, but by our nature. And I think that's one of the lacks that we have today in modern evangelical preaching. We talk about the effect of sin and not the root of sin. You think lustful thoughts because you have a fallen, corrupt nature. And we talk, you shouldn't do this and you shouldn't do that. But beloved, how many evangelical preachers are going to the root to lay the acts of the root that your whole nature is defiled and corrupt and that that redemption and regeneration is a reversal of everything that's underneath the judgment and the curse of sin. That sin's power is broken. It's broken through Jesus Christ and repentance. Yes, it presupposes that we are sinful and that there's a mountain of sins that are heaped up against us. And the need has everything to do with what we have in us, not only by merit, not only by action, but by nature, the need of repentance. Listen, friend, for us to cultivate an understanding of the need that we have for repentance, we must be biblically minded and not culturally driven. Earlier, I talked just for a moment about the character of the culture that we live in. We all do what is right in our own eyes. That's why the true gospel is not popular in culture. The true gospel exposes the truth. What is the truth that we are evil and corrupt? What do we have in culture as a mindset that everybody's okay? I'm okay. You're okay. Oh, you're a homosexual. That's okay. That's not that's not that big of a deal. We'll accept you. We'll love you. We'll accept you as you are. We're not going to say anything against it. That's the lifestyle that you have chosen. It's right for you. Probably that's just the way you was made. It's okay. Your wiring is a little different than mine, but we're all just compatible and we'll just love one another on our way to heaven. No, on our way to hell. Listen, friend, we're living in even a political climate. We're living in a political culture. That is becoming violent against the gospel of Jesus Christ, not against religion, not against culture, religion, but against the truth. Truth sent me an email this week. That was very disturbing. Just this last week in San Diego, California, a pastor led home Bible study was shut down by the government shut down because they did not have a permit to conduct a Bible study. And the permit is $19,000. So this pastor was denied. He has not only God given, but his constitutionally afforded right to freedom of religion in our nation to hold a home Bible study and was shut down or be arrested on Poland, not in Czechoslovakia, not in Vietnam, nor Burma, but in the United States of America. Love it. We are living in a political system and a political era that's become becoming more and more violent against the Bible and the precepts and principles of the Bible because it reveals truth and beloved. Listen, God will not wink at sin. God does not accept any lifestyle as as normal. God says, I have created man to mirror my image and my image is holy. My image is pure. My image is holy, my friend, he says. Holy. And beloved, we're the people of God. And we're we're called by his name. We've been called to live by his ordinances. We've been called to live upright and godly and holy, according to the word of God. And we're living in a culture that says you can live any way you want to. But God has specific demands upon his people. And the culture that we're living in is violently set opposed to the truth of the word of God. Because we are all right in our own eyes for us to preach repentance, for us to preach the gospel. Listen to me. What kind of a gospel is this? It's the gospel of repentance. What gospel did Jesus preach? Listen, get on your knees and read through the red. He preached repent for the kingdom of heaven is at hand. Presupposing the wickedness and the idolatry of the hearts of natural born man. Living and we're living in friends. We're living in a culture that says that we are not thus. That we are all right. We are normal. This is the way. Listen, and they're putting the indictment against God. This is the way God created me. Blaming God and blaming his holiness. For mankind's woes and misery and sinfulness. The beloved afforded to be a true gospel church. We must preach repentance. For us to be true born again believers in Jesus Christ, we must live repentance. We must practice repentance. What was it that Matthew Henry said? He's going to die. I want to die in the pulpit preaching repentance or something along that line. I must say beloved that we're living in a culture and a generation. That not only has shied away from but has plainly forgotten. The first word of the kingdom, which is to repent. To be reconciled to God. I was going to read a scripture out of Malachi. Did I forget to do that? Maybe that's on the page that I forgot. I don't know how I did that. And I'll teach me not to go over my notes after it comes out of the printer, huh? All right, let's turn over to Malachi chapter three. It's not in the notes, but it was there at one time. I apologize for that. For the loss there. This is in Malachi 3-7. And this is what was going to be our introductory verse. It says, even from the days of your fathers, you are gone away from mine ordinances and you've not kept them. Return unto me and I will return unto you, saith the Lord of hosts. Ye said, wherein shall we return? God says, return to me and I will return to you. Return to me. What is repentance? Repentance is a turning to God. It's a it's a turning to God. Love it. I made mention earlier that one of the pitfalls that we have in modern Christianity. Regarding our need for repentance is the blindness that we have concerning the magnitude of our offenses that have piled up against us and against God's holiness and against God's perfect law. Paris Reedhead. I don't know if you all have ever heard of Paris. Preach a very famous sermon. Many, many years ago, in fact, probably before some of you here were born. It was called 10 shekels and a shirt. And I'm going to read a short excerpt from his sermon. And. Dealing with repentance and the need that we have concerning it and for it. Brother Paris said, what about you? He said, why did you repent? And this is word for word in the message that he preached some years ago. I would like to see some people repent on biblical terms again. George Whitefield knew it. He stood on Boston Common speaking to 20000 people. And he said, listen, sinners, you are monsters. Monsters of iniquity. You deserve hell. And and the worst of your crimes is in that criminals, though you have been. You haven't had the good grace to see it. He said, if you will not weep for your sins and your crimes against a holy God, George Whitefield will weep for you. That man would put his head back and he would sob like a baby. Why? Because they were in the danger of hell. No, because they were monsters of iniquity who didn't even see their sin or care about their crimes. What about the day and time we were living in? He said, do you see the difference? He reiterates, do you see the difference? The difference is here's somebody trembling because he's going to be hurt in hell. He has no sense of the enormity of his guilt, no sense of the enormity of his crime, no sense of his insult against deity. He's only trembling because his skin is about to be singed. He's afraid. And I submit to you that whereas fear is good office work in preparing us for grace, it's no place to stop. And the Holy Ghost doesn't stop there. That's the reason why people can't receive Christ until they've repented. And persons can repent. And that person has been convicted. And the conviction is the work of the Holy Ghost that helps a sinner to see that he is a criminal before God and that he deserves all of God's wrath. And if God were to send him to the lowest corners of a devil's hell forever and 10 eternities that he deserved all of it. And a hundredfold more, he said, because he's seen his crimes. Beloved, before we can experience repentance, before we can can delve into the means where repentance is attained, we must feel our need for repentance. Beloved, for me, it's just enough that Jesus said we need it. Jesus said we must repent, turn away from our sins, turn away and to turn into Christ. I had in the the page that was lost, I'll try to bring that page with me next week, OK, some definitions. Concerning repentance, biblically based definitions about repentance. I'll give mine here momentarily, but I thought that the definition given in the ancient document of the Westminster Shorter Catechism was was brilliant. But in every biblically based revelation. Or definition on repentance, it all deals with grieving over sin, sorrow for sin, forsaking of sin and living under Christ. Living under Christ. Listen, and it's a God wrought grace as a gift of God that works in our life. It's not something that's listen to me. It's not something that we work up in ourselves. It's something that God works in us by the Holy Spirit that we began to walk in and cooperate with. But it's God that works in us to whereby we turn away from sin, to whereby we grieve and sorrow, not over the sins that we've committed, but over the sinner that we are and the offense that it is against the justice of a holy God. Seeing our sins are as high as a mountain and that we are indeed. And in fact, sinners deserving of hell for eternity. That we must repent and to turn to Christ and for the true bonafide born again believer. Beloved, it's a grace into the life and it's a cause of celebration. And it's not a jury drudgery. Love it. If repentance to you is a jury drudgery. I am concerned about the effect of culture upon your life and where you and to where it's become something of pro of preeminence. Instead of something that is to be shunned. The culture has convinced you that you are a God and that you are okay in your present estate. And it's not true. It's not true. It is not true. But look at me. Without repentance, every one of us in this room will perish for eternity. Without repentance. The work of God's grace brought in our life whereby we turn away from sin, forsake sin, hate sin, abandon sin. Does that mean that we can never fail? Does that mean that sins that are are post repentance are not possible? No, the lifestyle of sin is abandoned. The lifestyle of sin. The temptation of sin. Will it leave us? No. From time to time, the falling short of the mark of the calling of Christ and falling into into sin. Does that make there's a true repentance? Make that an impossibility? No, but beloved, we repent. We repent by God's grace when we miss the mark. Repentance is a grace into life. I know that I'm not doing this message justice, but we will in weeks to come. The first step in repentance, friend, is the revelation of our need for it. The sense of need, my friend, is worked in us and wrought in us by a biblical revelation of our own sinfulness in light of God's holiness and God's requirements. And I'm. Forced to ask you, do you see? The slightest offense that you've committed. That is the very indictment against you that's making you a child of the devil, deserving of wrath and hell. Do you see that? Do you or have you or are you feeling the enormity, the weight? The size, the judgment of the crimes that you committed against God? David said against you and you alone have I sent against you. Sin is a violation of the holy ordinances of God. It's a sin against the character of God because the ordinances of God are stemming from the character of God. When you send, you send against his character. And have you seen that? If not, you're unrepentant. You're in your natural born condition. Underneath the wrath of God, awaiting it in the fullness of time. Friend, listen, it's imperative for us to ponder upon the magnitude of our offenses against God. I was reading through Brother Roberts book yesterday and it's steps for the unrepentant. The very first step that Brother Roberts addresses in that wonderful book on repentance that you need to spend time meditating upon and dwelling upon the magnitude of the offenses that you've committed against God. Why? Why? Because it's imperative that you see and feel the weight of your need for repentance. Otherwise, the means towards repentance is futile regarding your life. And it's important for us to ponder upon the magnitude of our offenses against God that we might feel our need for this very grace of repentance that's available to the church. The Lord came or Lord Jesus came to save this very untoward generation. The very first sermon I was mouth, repent for the kingdom of heaven is at hand. There's no saving of the untoward without repentance. And guess what? We are or have been untoward. A wicked generation, a wicked generation. There is so much. Again, the gospel is a gospel of repentance. There will be no preaching of the gospel without the preaching of the gospel of repentance. We have an amazing need for repentance. I still can't find out where that page went upon repentance. That's driving me crazy. I want to talk about the attitude of repentance. I believe that we should lay a powerful foundation. Foundation and friend, I'm asking and challenging you. If you have a negative mood or mindset concerning repentance, see where that's coming from. If you were riding your bicycle towards the edge of the Grand Canyon at night. And the park had posted a man there with a flashlight to turn you back. Would you be angry at that man? Would you be negative in your mind concerning that man? When he's only there to save you and to turn you back. Why is it then that in the generation that you and I live in. That we have such a negative mindset and mood. Concerning repentance. Whenever it's God's man standing at the edge of the Grand Canyon. The flashlight warning us to turn back because of impending destruction. You know why? Because we are greatly influenced by culture, aren't we? Even the most noble of us among us at this place in time. Have been influenced by culture. And culture says there is no Grand Canyon. And that you can ride your bike anywhere that you want to. It's your bike. God gave you this land. It's okay to ride. Don't ever say you can't ride here. Are you with me? And cultures invaded our hearts. Cultures invaded our thoughts. And God's warning us there's a Grand Canyon. Turn back. Culture says there is no Grand Canyon. Keep riding. Keep on going. But it's not a negative thing. This is a doctrine in the life. This is what we need in the church. This is the gospel of the kingdom. This is a life-saving grace. This is God's gift to us. How dare we dread it? How dare we shrink back at it? And not embrace a repentant heart. Repent of lifestyle. And the repentance our Lord has blessed us with. From those I know that think they've got done a favor by preaching repentance. We're not doing God a favor by preaching repentance. And you're not doing God a favor by repenting. Are you with me? Repentance is not for God. Repentance is for you. Amen. Returning to him that he may return to us. The whole essence of repentance is turning back to God. Turning back to God. There are other things that are associated there. Sorrow. Guilt. Regret. Remorse. Conviction. We'll talk about those in the time to come. The beloved in its simplest form. Repentance is just turning back to God. Beloved, I wanted to take just a few moments today and press upon us our need that we have for repentance. The mandate of the Lord Jesus Christ that we repent. And proceeding with the right heart and the right spirit. The right mindset. The gift of repentance. Not a horrible thing to shrink back from. Not a horrible thing that we should put our hand over our mouth when we speak it. Beloved, it's the very gift of God that we should proclaim from the pinnacles of the mountaintops. Repent from the kingdom of heaven is at hand. We should preach. We should explain. We should live. We should practice. We should live by repentance and die by repentance. It's not something that we should fear. It's something that we should embrace. The very gift of God. Very grace of God for his church. Again, I do apologize for some of the things that I had planned to say. One of the reasons that I have notes is the things that God gives me. I write those things down because my memory is not as sharp as it used to be. And sometimes I forget some of the things that really need to be said that God's given me to say. And so the notes can be a very, very good thing whenever there are line up online tutorials for the people of God. And my mind not being the sharp kind of mind that can retain them in active memory without the notes. And so I apologize for that. We're going to talk next week. I'll double check. Make sure everything's there. And we're going to go on forward and we're going to talk about this wonderful grace of repentance. And it's my prayer that you see your need of it. You see the importance of this teaching as you see the importance of biblical doctrine that you see importance in the biblical doctrine of repentance and that you yield yourself, that you give your mind, you give your understanding and not let it end here. Let it go home and research and study the scriptures and see what God would say about repentance. If you want to read some good works on repentance, I highly suggest Richard Owen Roberts book on repentance. The first word of the gospel is the name of the book. I also highly recommend Thomas Boston, one of the Puritan divines. He has a book out that's on repentance has been out for three or four hundred years now upon repentance. It's a little bit more wordy, but it's very, very powerful. It will help you. I challenge you. I encourage you to get online to some of the places you can find good books. Like rare Christian books up in Dixon, Missouri. We can. And you can get with get with Pastor Stacey. And if you want one, listen, if you commit to buy a book, commit to buy the book. You don't want to order 50 books and then have five people pay for them. And then we've got 45 books stacked over there for the next century or two. And so it's not what we want. We know we need to be a people of our word. Now, if there's if there's no distinction between the people of God and the people of the world. Why? There must be a distinction when we say we're going to do something. Let's do it. I highly suggest that if you're not familiar with reading the Puritans, I would. I would suggest that you probably get Brother Robert's book. It's probably written in a little bit more familiar way than you're used to reading. If you don't read a lot of 15, 16, 17th century literature that you get with Brother Roberts and he I mean, he's alive today and his form of writing is a little bit more conducive to our style of reading. And I know Vernon reads a lot of Puritan stuff and he's got used to. It's really wordy. And some of the you know how to read it with a dictionary. It's like a different and I read a lot of it. It doesn't make us any better than anybody. It's just. We're weird and we read those old books and. But I greatly encourage that. I think it was 1795 for that book by Brother Roberts and it's Richard Owen Roberts. It's not the Richard Roberts of Tulsa. This is a great man of God, a great revivalist that's been preaching for years and years and years. And he's a really wonderful brother in Christ. And I greatly encourage you to get that work. It's really been blessing me. And I got that at the conference. Did you get one? Shame on me if I didn't buy you one. OK, let's stand.