Well, as you know, I've been
preaching through some of the book of Hebrews for a few weeks,
quite some time now. And when I read back in Hebrews
chapter nine, this verse, Hebrews 9.27, I'll just read it to you.
I dealt with these verses last week. And it says in Hebrews
9.27, and as it is appointed unto men once to die, but after
this, the judgment. And whenever I think of judgment,
I think of mainly two things. I think of righteousness, because
that's the issue at judgment. God's going to judge the world
in righteousness. All right, that's Acts 17. We're gonna go to that passage
in just a moment. God's gonna judge the world in
righteousness. When you stand before God at judgment, when
I stand before God at judgment, the issue is do I have a righteousness
that answers the requirements, the demands of his justice? That's
the issue now. Yeah, how do I know that? Because
God's word says it. And then, thinking about that
judgment, I also think about repentance, because there in
Acts 17, 31, which says God's gonna judge the world in righteousness,
right before that, in verse 30, it says, God has commanded all
men everywhere to do what? To repent. I think about repentance. Now repentance there has something
to do with the issue of righteousness. That's what you have to understand.
But back over here in our text in 2 Peter 3, the apostle Peter
writes of the certainty of the second coming of Christ and how
believers, sinners saved by grace, are to live in the knowledge
that Christ is coming again. Now I don't know when he's coming
and you don't either. And none of these books that
you read, that you get at the bookstore that talks about what
day he's coming, they don't know either. Just pass that by. But he's coming. Could be today. Could be 100 years from now.
I don't know when he's coming. Father knows. I believe Christ
knows now. That's referring to his humanity.
That's what Peter's saying, God's coming. Christ is coming, and
here's what he's gonna do. He's coming to gather his people,
his church, God's elect unto himself. And we're gonna be glorified
together, changed in the twinkling of an eye. What a glorious, we
can't even imagine what that's gonna be like. We're too limited
here. Because our spirits are housed
in these vile bodies of death. Now, you young people don't get
offended because your physical appearance doesn't look like
what my physical appearance looks like now. I didn't always have
gray hair. Used to be black, didn't it,
Debbie? I didn't always have a... They used to call me Bird
because I was so thin, my legs were so thin. But old age catches
up and reminds us what the word of God has already told us. Who
shall deliver me from the body of this death? So he's coming
together, but he's also coming to judge the world in righteousness. And Peter in this chapter, he
deals with that. He says, now there's scoffers
who come and say, no, you're all just believing in a dream. He's not really coming. They said this, they said, the
world is just like it always has been. And Peter says, no,
the Holy Spirit tells Peter, write this to him. No, the world
doesn't stand as it was created. Man fell into sin and death. This world is cursed. And besides
that, God destroyed this world once with a flood. Spared eight
souls. It's not a lot, is it? He says, now the Lord has promised
that he will not destroy this world with a flood again. But
he's coming with a fervent heat to burn this world up. And he's
not delaying. He calls this, he says this,
look at 2 Peter chapter three, look at verse 12, look at this.
I didn't have Mark read this, and this is not part of our text,
but look at it. It says, looking for and hasting unto the coming
of the day of God. That's what he calls it, the
day of the Lord. The heavens being on fire shall be dissolved,
and the elements shall melt with fervent heat. Nevertheless, we,
according to his promise, God never fails to keep a promise.
What do we do? We look for new heavens and a
new earth. Wherein dwelleth what? Did you
see it there? What's the issue now? Righteousness. You believe in global warming?
Right there it is. Gonna burn it up. I don't believe
in it like these fake scientists are saying now. But I believe
the Lord's gonna come back and he's gonna judge the world. Now
this truth is very disturbing to unbelievers They either deny
it totally, not desiring to be held accountable at judgment,
or knowing that nothing but righteous people will be judged worthy
and inhabit the new heavens and new earth, what do they do? Well, they actually try to find
other ways to count themselves righteous. They seek to define
righteousness on their own terms. rather than God's. And that's
the very issue upon which God-given repentance stands. Now the fact is this, there's
going to be a final judgment and the only people who will
pass the test of this judgment are righteous people. There's
no doubt about that. And that's the absolute promise
of God. Now look at verse eight. He says, but beloved, be not
ignorant of this one thing, that one day is with the Lord as 1,000
years and 1,000 years is one day. God doesn't, he's not limited
or he doesn't measure time like we do. God's eternal. And that's just a concept that's
just too high above our minds to understand. But what, you
think about 1,000 years, that's a long time to us, it's a day
to God. vice versa. So in other words,
when these scoffers, these unbelievers say, well, the Lord, he's not
coming or he's not, he's delaying his coming. He says in verse
nine, the Lord is not slack. He's not slow. He's not, he's
not being hindered is actually the thought here. God's not being
hindered concerning his promise. Now, you know, that concerns
all the promises of God, but he's specifically talking about
his promise to come again, gather his people, and judge the world,
destroy this world. He's not slow concerning his
promise, as some men understand this issue of slackness or slowness. What it looks to me like. Well,
who cares what it looks to you like? But God is long-suffering, now
notice this, to us-ward, literally, toward us. Now if you wanna understand
this verse, you gotta understand who the us are. God's long-suffering toward us. Now who are the us? Well, back
in verse one, he calls them the beloved. Beloved, he says this
second epistle, beloved. In 1st Peter and in the beginning
of 2nd Peter, he calls them the elect of God who are redeemed
by the blood of Christ and made righteous in him. That's the
us. God's long-suffering. I mean,
what long-suffering means is that he's allowing time to go
on without destroying this world immediately. You know, when Adam
fell, God didn't destroy this world immediately. Now he's going
to, but let's say that if Adam fell
one day and the next day God destroyed the earth, that means
God was long suffering one day. But God has a plan and a purpose
throughout these ages, and that plan and that purpose is to glorify
himself in the salvation of his chosen people by his grace, through
the righteousness of another, the Lord Jesus Christ. And who
are those people? Us. And what does he say about the
us? Well, God is, he's long suffering toward us, not willing that any,
now who's the any here? Any of us should come to repent,
should perish, but that all all of us should come to repentance. Now that's what this verse is
teaching. This verse, this is the absolute and certain promise
of God. Not only is the Lord gonna keep his promise, he's
not even slow or reluctant to keep it. There's no delay, he's
not being hindered. Always going according to God's
plan and purpose. Everything is right on time. But now a lot of people want
to take this verse and portray God as reluctant or not desiring
to bring all of this about because he just doesn't want to condemn
anyone. He wants everybody to be saved.
Doesn't want anybody to perish. And their view of God is that
he's a sentimental deity who loves everybody, who's doing
his best to save everybody, but he can't for whatever reason. And they'll give a lot of different
reasons. One of the most common that I've heard preachers say,
false preachers, they'll say, well, he can't because he doesn't wanna step on your
dignity. He doesn't wanna cross your free
will. And he's just waiting and waiting and waiting. But that's
not the case. You know that's not the case.
That's not the God of this book. This verse is teaching that God
has a people whom he's going to save without fail, and there's
a way that he does it, and it's summarized in this phrase, that
all should come to repentance. Repentance. You know, Here's the way we as believers
should look at this. Now, we agree the Lord has not yet come
back to destroy this world. You know, there's some people
who believe he's already come back. I don't know how they get
all that, but I'm not going into that. But we know he hasn't yet
come back. I can tell you why. because he's not willing that
any of his chosen people perish, but that every one of them come
to repentance. There's some people out there whom God chose before
the foundation of the world. There's some people out there
right now, I don't know where they are. They may be in Albany. They may be in Cucamonga, I don't
know where. But some whom God has justified based upon the
righteousness of his son imputed to him, that Christ has redeemed
by the blood of the cross. There's some people out there
whom God has determined to save, the scripture says, but they've
not yet been brought to repentance. But they're going to be brought
to repentance. This is God's chosen people who've
been redeemed by the blood of Christ. You know what it takes
to bring a sinner to repentance? It takes the new birth. under
the preaching of the gospel, by the power of the Holy Spirit. It takes faith in Christ, God-given
faith in Christ. God's not willing that any of
us should perish, but that all should come to faith in Christ,
that all should be born again by the Spirit, that all should
come, and it's capstoned by repentance. Now, isn't that a pretty important
word? Think about that. Look over at 2 Peter 1 and verse
10. Now, I probably haven't given
you the title of the message yet, but it's Issues of Repentance.
I'm gonna preach several messages on this subject, and I'll tell
you why. Now look here. In verse 10 of
2 Peter 1, he says, wherefore the rather, Brethren, give diligence
to make your calling and your election sure, for if you do
these things, you shall never fail. Now, the issue that I want
to bring to the forefront here is this. How in the world can
I be sure that I'm part of that number which are called God's
elect? How can I know for sure from
the word of God that I'm part of that number who falls under
the heading of calling? I've been called. You know the
word church means called out. You know the book of Ecclesiastes? That's really a Greek translation.
Ecclesia, that's church, called out of. If you're one of God's
chosen people who have been brought to repentance, you've been called
out of the world and into the family of God. You've been called
out of the darkness and into the light. And this is what he's saying.
You say, well, I believe in the Lord Jesus Christ. I do too.
How can I know for sure that I really believe in him? And
not just saying that. You know, everybody says they
believe in Christ. Everybody says they believe in
grace. But how can I know in my own heart of hearts from the
Word of God now, not just from the preacher, but from the Word
of God, that that's talking about me? Verse nine, that all should
come to repent. Well, have I been brought to
repentance? Well, what's the first issue that's got to be
settled, folks? What is repentance? First of all, the need for repentance. Sinners need to repent. Look at Luke 13, book of Luke. It's clear that without repentance,
you know what'll happen? You'll perish. That means be destroyed. Look
at Luke 13. Now, the reason I want you to
see this is because people today have a lot of ideas and thoughts
about what repentance is and what we should be repenting of.
And mostly, it's legalism and false religion. It really is. I can tell you
right now, somebody said, well, are you sorry for your sins?
And I could say yes, but not enough. All sin. But being sorry for your sins
is not repentance. It comes under the heading of
what real repentance really is. Should we be sorry for our sins?
Yes, we should, even more than we are. And later on in a message,
I'm gonna talk more about that. But look here in verse one of
Luke 13. It says, there were present at that season, some
that told him of the Galileans. This is Christ. There's people
here where they were in the region where he was. And there's some
people came up and they talked about the Galileans whose blood
Pilate, Pontius Pilate had mingled with their sacrifices. That was
an episode in their history where they were going to bring sacrifices
according to the old covenant and Pilate for some reason, dispersed
or dispensed an army, a group of soldiers, and they slaughtered
these people. And he says, and look at verse
two, and Jesus answering said unto them, now look at this,
suppose ye that those Galileans, the ones who were slain, that
they were sinners above all the Galileans because they suffered
such things? Do you think, are you the type
of person, you see something like that happen, you say, well,
God took his vengeance out on them. They were greater sinners,
and therefore, you know, you've heard people say stuff like,
you know, I'm afraid to do that or God might strike me dead.
That's the same kind of thought process. If I do something really
bad, well, let me tell you something right now. We've already done
something really bad. and deserve nothing but condemnation.
And so Christ looks at these people and he says, do you suppose
they were greater sinners than the rest of the Galileans because
they suffered such things? And look at verse three, I tell
you nay, that means no, but except you repent, you shall all likewise
in the same way perish. You think they got what they
deserved? Well, what if you get what you deserve? That's what
he's telling them. Look on verse four. Or those
18 upon whom the tower in Siloam fell and slew them. That was
a natural disaster. That tower in Siloam fell and
killed 18 people. And he says, think ye that they
were sinners above all men that dwelt in Jerusalem? You think
they were the greatest sinners in Jerusalem and that's why that
happened to them? It reminds me of, I think it was Hurricane
Katrina that come through New Orleans, remember? And I swear,
I heard two preachers come on TV and say, well, God punished
that wicked city. Is New Orleans a wicked city?
Yes. What about Albany? Oh, good night,
we got a church on every street corner, probably one building
up right now. This is a wicked city. My friends, this is a wicked
world, filled with wicked people. And that includes us by nature. And he says in verse five, I
tell you, nay, but except you repent, you shall all likewise
perish. You see, when something like
that happens and people, they say, well, they got what they
deserve, they needed to repent. Well, what about you? What about
me? Well, it says over here that God's got a people and he's gonna bring them to
repentance. God's gonna judge the world in
righteousness by that man whom he hath ordained, and that he
hath given assurance unto all men, and that he hath raised
him from the dead. Now repent. Oh, that means stop smoking,
preacher. You ought to stop smoking if
you do. And if you do, that's not repentance. Well, he does that, he gambles,
he does this, that. You ought to stop all that, but
if you do, that's not repentance, that's just reform. How important is this thing of
repentance? Luke 15, seven, let me just read it to you. I say
in you that likewise joy shall be in heaven over one sinner
that repenteth more than over 99 just persons who need no repentance. Luke 5.32, the Lord said, I came
not to call the righteous, but sinners to repentance. Matthew
3.1, speaking of John the Baptist who preaching in the wilderness
of Judea in verse two saying, repent ye for the kingdom of
heaven is at hand. He told them later on, he told
the Pharisees in verse eight of Matthew three, bring forth
therefore fruits, meat for repentance. The Lord came along after John
was put in prison. And he was preaching the gospel
of the kingdom, and in Mark 115, here's how they defined it, saying,
the time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God is at hand. Repent
ye and believe the gospel. So what is this thing of, how
can I know I've repented if I don't know what repentance is? So here's the second point. What
is the nature of God giving? We just see the need of it. Except
you repent, you'll perish. God's long-suffering toward us,
not willing that any of us should perish, but that all should come
to repentance. You cannot count yourself in
that number until God has brought you to repentance. Well, what
is the nature of God-given repentance? Many have confused notions of
what repentance really is. Again, feeling sorry for your
sins, reformation of conduct, that's not repentance. These
things may accompany repentance, but tells us nothing of the true
meaning. In the Old Testament, the word repentance basically
is a change of heart and direction of life and walk brought about
by a change of heart. And it's a 180 degree turnaround. It's kind of like represent this
way. Somebody's walking north and they turn right around and
walk straight south. They don't veer off just a little
bit. They don't just go through a little reformation. They don't
just say a little prayer. They don't get, baptism is not
repentance. I mean, God turns them completely
around to walk the opposite of the way they're walking. And
in the New Testament, the word means a change of mind. Now, a lot of people don't want
to represent it that way because they think, well, you're just
saying repentance is just intellectual knowledge. No, it's a chain,
it's a heart work. concerning issues of salvation
and a right relationship with God by his grace in Christ. But
in the Bible, the heart includes the mind, folks. It's not just
this preacher's point here. This is not the heart that's
being spoken of. With the heart, man believeth
under righteousness. Is that talking about this organ
here? Well, no, you know that. The heart is the mind, it's the
affections, it's the will. What you desire, what you like,
what you don't like, what moves you, what motivates you. It's
the conscience. You know what the conscience
is? That's how you judge things. That's how you judge yourself.
Did I do right? Did I do wrong? That's the courtroom of the heart.
It's the inner man, inner woman. Not what you necessarily are
on the outside. That's what repentance is. Let
me give you these things about repentance. Number one, repentance
is a gift given by the power of God to all his elect. It's a gift. Repentance is a
God-given and God-worked change of mind. It's God who changes
our mind by the Holy Spirit in his word. It's the product of
the new heart that God gives us in the new birth. Because
if left to ourselves, if left to our own natural hearts and
desires, we will not repent. 1 Corinthians 2.14, the natural
man, that's man born in sin naturally, will not receive the things of
the Spirit of God, neither can he know them, they're spiritually
understood. And that includes repentance.
In order for me to repent or for you to repent, God, we have
to be born again by the Spirit. If you're not born again by the
Spirit, you don't have eyes to see what you're to repent of.
You may think you know. If you don't have ears to hear,
oh, Ezekiel over in, and let me just read this to you, this
is Ezekiel 36. Listen to what God says concerning
the new covenant. The future. He says in verse
26 of Ezekiel 36, he said, a new heart also will I give you. The
new heart is the gift of God. It's radical spiritual search.
It's a heart transplant, isn't it? A new spirit will I put within
you. That's new life, new knowledge.
I will take away the stony heart out of your flesh. The stony
heart is the unbending, stubborn, stiff necked heart. that will
not repent. I'm gonna take that out of you,
he said. And I'll give you a heart of flesh. Not sin, not flesh
is sin, it's pliable, it's submissive, it's repentant, it's the penitent
heart. That's what he says, I'm gonna
give this to you. In Acts chapter five and verse
30, The apostles were saying, the
God of our fathers raised up Jesus, whom you slew and hanged
on a tree, talking to the Pharisees. Him hath God exalted with his
right hand to be a prince and a savior and for to give repentance
to Israel and the forgiveness of sins. If you have repentance, if you
have been brought through, that's a gift from God. That's number
one. If you're gonna understand the nature of repentance, it's
a gift from God, just like faith. Faith is a gift of God. And that's
the second thing. Repentance comes with God-given
faith. You can't have faith without
repentance or repentance without faith. As some preachers say,
it's like a sheet of paper. It's got two sides. You can't
split it up and say, well, I've only got one side. You gotta
back side. Repentance and faith come together. So it's a product of God-given
faith. Faith, listen to this, faith
is the revealed knowledge that God gives us in his word that
we cannot deny. That means conviction. If you
hear something that's true and you don't believe it, you don't
have faith. But when God sends his spirit to convince us We're
convicted and repentance is the change of mind because of that
knowledge revealed unto conviction. Faith is knowledge, agreement
and trust in Christ. It's not biblical to say one
has faith but has not repented nor that one has repented but
no faith. Now why is this so? Well look, here's the third thing.
Repentance is a new way of judgment based on God's judgments in his
word. It's a new way of judging who
God is and what he requires. Again, look at that passage in
Acts 17. Here's Paul, the apostle, preaching
unto these Athenian philosophers the unknown God, a God you don't
know. I'm preaching to you a God that
you don't know. And he talks about the God of
creation. And he comes down to it in verse
30, talking about how The Gentiles were ignorant of all these things
because they didn't have the law. And verse 30, he says, the
times of this ignorance God winked at. In other words, God did not
immediately destroy them. He just looked over them. But
now commandeth all men everywhere to repent. All right, what's
the basis? What's the issue of this repentance?
Look at verse 31. Because he hath appointed a day in the which
he will judge the world in righteousness. And what is God's standard of
righteousness? By that man whom he hath ordained,
there's a man whom God has ordained to be the standard of righteousness.
Who is that man? Whereof he hath given assurance
unto all men in that he hath raised him from the dead. That's Christ. That's where righteousness is,
in Christ. Christ's righteousness is the
entire value, the worth. Somebody says, how much are you
worth? You go to count your assets. You go to your bank account.
Well, how much is Christ worth? Righteousness. Perfect righteousness. No sin. And that's what he's saying.
That's how God's gonna judge this thing. When you come to judgment, what
is going to be your standard that you're going to plead? If
it's anything but the righteousness of Christ freely imputed, you
need to repent. That's right. Well, wait a minute. I gave my heart to Jesus. I got
baptized. I'm trying to be the best person
I can be. I'm trying to be the best daddy, the best mama, the
best worker, the best friend that I can be. I've given my tithes. I've not
missed a service. What? I was baptized. You need to repent. You understand
where I'm going? What? You need to repent or perish. You see, in repentance, our judgment
of ourselves and our sins changes. What I used to highly esteem,
Luke 16, 15, that which men highly esteem is an abomination to God.
What do men and women highly esteem? Morality, church going,
dedication. Should we go to church? Yes,
where the gospel's preached. Should we be sincere? Yes. Should
we be moral? Yes. But that's not my righteousness. And if I think it is, I need
to repent. You see what I'm saying? The
gospel is the revelation of the righteousness of God. And anything
short of Christ's righteousness is sin in God's sight. I'm gonna
show you that next week in various scriptures. How can I stand before God at
judgment and pass the test. And if you believe that it's
anything but Christ righteousness imputed to you, you need to repent. That's the issue. Now you may
have a lot of other problems in your life that you need to
change or you need God to help you to change. But my friend,
until you're brought to repentance on these very issues of salvation
and a right relationship with God, based upon the merits of
the blood of Christ, his righteousness imputed, you have not yet been
brought to repentance. Isn't that right? What do I do,
preacher? Get on your knees and pray to
God. Change my heart. Repent. And that's the capstone of the
new birth. Yes, I believe in Jesus. How
do you know? Because He's my all in all. He's my only righteousness.
His death secured my entire salvation unto glory. And when I stand
before God, I'm not gonna talk about what I've done or what
I didn't do or what He enabled me to do. I'm gonna talk about
Christ and His value, His merit. I'm gonna say, what can wash
away my sins? Nothing but the blood. This is
all my hope and plea, this is all my righteousness. The only
ones who can sing that line and mean it are those whom God has
brought to repentance. And we're gonna say a lot more
about repentance in the coming weeks, but you think about these
things, all right?