Bible Prophecy and Christianity

Salvation and Repentance

The Repentance That Results In Salvation

Salvation

John 3:16 “For God so loved the world, that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish, but have eternal life.

God gave His Son to die for us, to take our place in judgement. Jesus Christ came into this world to save us from the judgement we all deserve. All our sins were placed upon Him at the cross. He paid one hundred percent of the penalty that was demanded by the law of God for our sin.

The person who believes in Jesus Christ has eternal life because God gave His Son to die for us for the forgiveness of our sins. No one has eternal life because of anything they did or ever will do. Eternal life is a result of God’s gift of His own Son. A gift is free or it is not a gift. No one can buy a gift from the giver of the gift, if they try, they will only succeed in insulting the giver. God is angry at everyone who adds any requirement for receiving His free gift of eternal life, not only because a gift is supposed to be free, but because this gift cost Him so much.

The reason God gave His Son to die for us is because He loves us. God wants us to know and understand that He loves us. If we do not believe in God’s love for us, He will not accept us, but if we do believe in His love for us, He will accept us for eternity.

John 3:18 “He who believes in Him is not judged; he who does not believe has been judged already, because he has not believed in the name of the only begotten Son of God.

Because Jesus Christ has taken our judgement upon Himself, there is no longer any judgement for us if we believe in Him. The believer is not judged but the unbeliever has already been judged because of his unbelief. It cannot be made any clearer than that. Faith in Jesus Christ, and faith alone, results in forgiveness, and unbelief results in condemnation.

God has set the requirement for forgiveness at a level where everyone can reach it, but only a few people ever reach it. Most people never receive God’s forgiveness because they add some kind of requirement to receiving it; as a result, they only succeed in pushing it out of reach.

Salvation is the result of the finished work of Jesus Christ; we cannot add anything to it, if we try we will never obtain it.

Eph 2:8-9 For by grace you have been saved through faith; and that not of yourselves, it is the gift of God; not as a result of works, that no one should boast.

Salvation can only be received through believing in Jesus Christ. It is given to us as a free gift from God, we cannot earn it or pay for it. It is a grace gift, we do not deserve it, it is given to us with no strings attached. It is not the results of our works, but it is the result of the work of Jesus Christ on our behalf. We cannot boast that we have done anything at all to deserve it.

Salvation was given to us for the purpose of revealing the grace of God to us, to the praise of the glory of His grace. As a result of our salvation, God will be praised for His grace for all eternity.

Repentance

The meaning of the word repentance: is to change one’s mind or purpose, to turn around and go in the opposite direction. The word repentance in relationship to our salvation means to stop rejecting Christ and to start believing in Him.

Mark 1:14-15 And after John had been taken into custody, Jesus came into Galilee, preaching the gospel of God, and saying, “The time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God is at hand; repent and believe in the gospel.”

When Jesus said to repent and believe He meant that people must stop rejecting Him. That they must accept Him, believe in Him. He meant to turn from unbelief to belief.

We already saw that salvation is a free gift from God. It is not the result of our religion, not the result of our good works, and not the result of our turning away from sin. The only requirement for receiving salvation is faith in Jesus Christ. Salvation is a gift given to believers and only to believers.

Since no one was seeking for God and everyone was going away from God, we all needed to repent, to change our mind or purpose, to turn around and go in the opposite direction.

Before we believed in Jesus Christ, we all believed in something that was opposed to the gospel of God. Some people believed in atheism, some believed in this ism and some believed in that ism, but everyone believed in something or someone that was opposed to Christ. Therefore, to repent simply means to turn away from whatever it is that you believe and to put your faith in Jesus Christ and in Him only, to stop your unbelief and to start believing.

The Jews crucified Jesus Christ because they did not believe in Him, but they did believe in something, in their religion, in their tradition, in their good works, in some form of self righteousness, or in someone other than Jesus Christ. They had to repent, to change their mind about Jesus Christ and to believe in Him.

Acts 17:29-31 “Being then the offspring of God, we ought not to think that the Divine Nature is like gold or silver or stone, an image formed by the art and thought of man. “Therefore having overlooked the times of ignorance, God is now declaring to men that all everywhere should repent, because He has fixed a day in which He will judge the world in righteousness through a Man whom He has appointed, having furnished proof to all men by raising Him from the dead.”

We all need to repent; we all need to stop worshiping our idols. Anything that comes between us and God is an idol. Anything that we trust in is an idol. If a person says that they believe in God and yet they worship an idol they do not truly believe in God. Our hope and trust must be one hundred percent in Jesus Christ.

If we place our trust in Him plus our repentance of sin, we need to repent
If we place our trust in Him plus our good works, we need to repent.
If we place our trust in Him plus our religion, we need to repent.
If we place our trust in Him plus our commitment, we need to repent.
If we place our trust in Him plus anything, we need to repent.
If we place our trust in Him plus anyone, we need to repent.

Note: Repentance from sin is a form of works and if anyone adds works to faith, they do not have true faith.

I know I am being repetitious but I find that many people just cannot seem to grasp the true meaning of repentance. We all need to turn away from whatever we are trusting in and we need to trust in Jesus Christ and in Him only. Salvation comes from trusting, one hundred percent, in Jesus Christ. If anyone adds anything to faith, they need to repent, they need to turn away from trusting in that thing and they need to trust in Jesus Christ and in Him only.

We receive salvation when we believe in Jesus Christ.

* Bible Studies by Max Swan

Thus says the LORD, “Let not a wise man boast of his wisdom, and let not the mighty man boast of his might, let not a rich man boast of his riches; but let him who boasts boast of this, that he understands and knows Me, that I am the LORD who exercises lovingkindness, justice, and righteousness on earth; for I delight in these things,” declares the LORD. (NAS) Jer 9:23-24

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Salvation

Repentance