NEW CHRISTIANS-Basics of Discipleship-True Repentence-Part 3

Posted: 2008-02-28 19:59:00

Scripture verses referenced in this study:

Hebrews 6
Deuteronomy 8:2
Revelation 2 and 3
II Tim. 4:7
I John 1:7

God is leading us down a wonderful path!  The basic discipleship ideas in Heb. 6 include repentance from dead works.  God doesn’t want us to have a hold of the world and the flesh and what is dead.  He wants us to put that off and take what is life and have our minds renewed.  We are being renewed daily so that we might put on what is heavenly and what is life. 

In Deut. 8:2, is a continuation of thought, here, on being led out of the world.  “You shall remember all the way which the Lord your God has led you these 40 years in the wilderness, that he might humble you, testing you to know what was in your heart, whether you would keep his commandments or not, and he humbled you and let you hunger and fed you with manna which you did not know, nor did your fathers know, that he might make you know that man does not live by bread alone but that man lives by everything that proceeds out of the mouth of the Lord.”  The Lord led the people into the wilderness.  He wanted to teach them to listen to His voice, not to put their confidence in food that they see or in water that they see, in shelter or anything human by walking by sight, but they were to walk by faith and listen to the voice of God.  As they walked into the wilderness, their food began to be depleted, the water began to be depleted, they are out in the wilderness.  There is no McDonald’s around, there are no fields of corn.  Where’s the food?  They can’t walk by sight now.  It has to be you must live by every word that proceeds from the mouth of God, that God says he will take care of you.  God says that he will provide food and water.  They complained to Moses and they said, “Our food has run out, our water is running out, we are going to die of thirst here in the wilderness, it would be better for us to go back to Egypt where we had our squashes and our leeks and our onions and our fields and we could see something and know that this is our food and this is what we can depend on...we would rather be in slavery and know that we are going to be taken of."  This is hard,  walking by faith.  God humbled them and let them hunger in the wilderness.  See, this is the growing up.  God may pull little rugs out from underneath you, or he is going to take away something that you wanted, or he is going to allow something to happen that you are going to be running after toys and he is going to say that he doesn’t want you to have these toys, I am going to make you miserable hanging onto these things.  You have to let go.  You have to pray more. You have to press in.  You’ve got to not watch so much television.  All of this is a humbling of causing us to hunger and thirst that when he finally feeds us with manna or feeds us with quail or takes the water that is before us and all of the sudden we are ready to drink it and it is poison water; OH NO.  But then He sweetens it.  He will show you what is right and will provide water for you from unseen ways.  As God said to Moses, “Strike the rock and the water will come forth.”  Water will come forth from My hidden treasury.  God is saying, you’ve got to learn to walk this walk of faith and you have to learn to let go and to progress. 

In Rev. 2:26 it says, "He who conquers and keeps my works until the end, I will give him power over the nations."  You must keep his works until the end.  You must keep bearing the fruits of repentance.  John the Baptist says, "bear fruits that befit repentance."  He must keep His works until the end.  It says, "Endure until the end and you will be saved."  These are His works.  You have to do what He is telling you to do.  You have to have a relationship with Him and walk with Him and be changed by Him.  In II Tim 4:7, “I have fought the good fight.  I have finished the race.  I have kept the faith.”  This was probably Paul’s last letter.  These were, maybe, days before he was going to be martyred.  He says, “The time of my departure is near.”  I know that I am going to be put to death soon.  I know that the race is soon over for me.  I have fought the fight.  I have finished the race.  I have kept the faith.  We have to keep going until the end and repentance, as it mentions in Revelation, chapters 2 and 3, seven churches are mentioned.  To five the different churches, he says that you must repent.  He says, “I know your works.”  Verse 2:2:  “I know your works, your toil, your patient endurance.  I know that you cannot bear evil men and you have tested those who call themselves apostles but are not and found them to be false.  I know you are enduring patiently and bearing up for my name.”  This sounds like a good report, doesn’t it?  This is the Church of Ephesus.  A good report.  Jesus is saying I know your works.  I know that you are serving Me.  I know that you are true and I know that you have walked with me up until this point, but he says, “but I have this against you, verse 4, you have abandoned the love you had at first.  Remember then, from what you have fallen.  Repent, and do the works you did at first.  If not, I will come to you and remove your lampstand from its place, unless you repent.  Twice it says, there, repent.  He says, “If you do not do this I will remove your lampstand” which means I will remove your church.  Jesus never meant us to just repent at the beginning.  Bear patiently with Him, love Him, serve Him, but then come to a place where we had gotten away from Him in one area or in a few areas, or maybe in a very serious area like losing our first love.  Yes, we were still bearing patiently, Yes, we were still continuing with our church, Yes, we will still continuing with our praise services and our healing services, but something was wrong and we had to repent.  He says, ”Unless you repent, I will come and remove your lampstand.”  You have got to return.  You cannot stop anywhere on the path and think I have done enough repenting in my life.  I have come so far and there is no more need for repentance.  Yes, there is.  If Jesus comes to you and he is calling to you to enter in more deeply, to come deeper, to let go of what may be more of a childish level and come up into a more mature level, we cannot say no to Him.  He won’t let us say NO to Him.  If we say NO to him, he will make us to become hardened in our heart and if we become hardened in one area we will begin to maybe be hardened in another and slowly but surely we will become lukewarm and it cannot be.  God will not allow it.  He says I have to train you to bring you to maturity.  You have to repent from this.  This is just one of the churches.  Every church—let’s say five of them I know for sure—he says REPENT.  Look what is says to Sardis in Rev. 3:1.  He says, “I know your works, you have the name of being alive but you are dead.  Awake, and strengthen what remains and is on the point of death, for I have not found your works perfect in the sight of God.  Remember, then, what you received and heard.  Keep that and repent.  If you will not awake, if you will not repent, I will come like a thief and you will not know at what hour I will come upon you.  You still have a few names in Sardis of people who have not soiled their garments.  They shall walk with me in white for they are worthy.  He who conquers shall be clad, thus, in white.  I will not blot his name out of the Book of Life, but if you will not repent, if you will not wake up, if you will not come alive and strengthen what is on the point of death, I will blot you out of the book of life.  You must repent.  Finally, the second of the five churches, the Laodecean church.  In verse 17, he says that you are lukewarm, you are neither hot nor cold.  I will spew you out of my mouth, for you say I am rich.  I have prospered and I need nothing; knowing not that you are wretched, pitiful, poor, blind, and naked.  Therefore, I council you to buy from me gold refined by fire, that you may be rich and white garments to clothe and to keep the shame of your nakedness from being seen and suave to anoint your eyes that you may see.  You need salve from Me to anoint your eyes to see your true condition that you need to repent.  Verse 19, “Those whom I love I reprove and chasten.  So, be zealous and repent.  If you do not repent, I will spew you out of My mouth.  Behold, I stand at the door and knock.  The Lord was standing outside of His church saying, “Let Me come in and sup with you.”  He wasn’t saying, let me come in and make you a Christian.  He was staying:  You are having me be outside your church.  You are lukewarm.  You are not hot with the Spirit.  I (the Lord) is outside, trying to come in and make your church alive and make you hot and make you know that you are blind and pitiful and wretched and you need to be clothed and your eyes anointed with salve and awoken up and become hot for Me.  Let ME come in and sup with you and you with Me. 

This is the walk of repentance.  This is the repentance that is a continuing walk of true repentance.  Finally, in 1John1:7.  “If we walk in the light as He is in the light, we have fellowship with one another.”  Anyone who is backslidden does not really want to have fellowship.  They are hiding in the dark.  They are running away from God.  They know that their life is away from God.  Every one in the while they will meet somebody who is on fire and they will either be sparked into thinking, “Gee, why can’t I be on fire again.”  I know there is something wrong and I know that I am not walking in fellowship with the Lord or in the light. They will begin to fellowship again on a level of just sharing the word, thinking that maybe this is going to merit them something, but they know there is something wrong, they know that they need to repent.  But, if we walk it the light as He is in the light and we have fellowship with God and we open up our arms to God and we say, “God, look at me—I am weak.  I am lukewarm.  I want to be hot.  I have lost my first love; oh, rekindle that love.  That true confession to God.  That opening up and walking in the light.  It says, “The blood of Jesus cleanses us from all sin.”  It says in verse 9, “If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just and will forgive our sins and cleanse us from all unrighteousness. We have to open up to the Lord and confess.  We have to tell Him what we need.  We have to say, “Lord, lead me into truth.  Lead me by your spirit.”  All those who are led by the Spirit are the sons of God.  I confess my sin and I walk in the light.  I open my life to You that you might shine on me.  Lord, I want to be in fellowship with you again.  God will truly do this for you and he will take a hold of your hand and he will lead you down that path of life and he will teach you and chasten you and discipline you and that is the path of true repentance.