Considering the Grace of Repentance

Sinclair Ferguson has a booklet called The Grace of Repentance.  Since I read just about everything he writes, I was compelled to buy and read it. It is an interesting booklet. In some ways it was not what I expected.

The first (very short) chapter is called A Monk’s Tale which focuses on Luther and the first of his 95 Theses which triggered the Reformation. The church was in dire shape as Rome relied on indulgences for the latest building project. It was not hard for the average person in the pew to be confused about the gospel. It was obscured by the use of indulgences and the sacramental theology of the church. That theology taught penance as an act to provide satisfaction for our sins. This was different from repentance. Luther recaptured the notion that Jesus was calling us to a lifetime of repentance.

Ferguson then has a chapter explaining Biblical Repentance. Some of the phrases the Old Testament uses are “circumcision of the heart” and “breaking up fallow ground”.  The most commonly used Hebrew word simply means “return” and conveys the idea of turning around and returning to the Lord. When we sin, we stray from His side to pursue our own pleasure. Repentance is the return to God. We turn, not primarily due to fear of consequences, but due to the promise of grace offered to us in the gospel. We do recognize that sin is a violation of the covenant and places us under God’s just condemnation as non-Christians and His just discipline as Christians.

The first of the New Testament words also emphasizes the idea of turning around or turning back. The second word is about regret. The third word has the idea of a change of mind, and a resulting change of lifestyle. We repent, Ferguson notes, focused on a Person, not merely a promise. That promise has been fulfilled by the Person.

“Faith alone is the instrument by which Christ is received and rested on as Savior. Justification is by faith, not by repentance. But faith (and therefore justification) cannot exist where there is no repentance. Repentance is as necessary to salvation by faith as the ankle is to walking.”

Here Ferguson relies on Herman Bavinck, though he often relies on Calvin, in discussing the elements of repentance. Those elements include a new attitude toward sin, self, and God. Ferguson briefly communicates the biblical understanding of justification.

Ferguson then gives us a biblical Case Study by the name of David. He works his way (briefly) through Psalm 51. He works through the various words used for sin to give us a better understanding of a biblical view of sin- self-assertiveness, twistedness, failure, and evil. He then moves, via the Psalm, to the effects of sin- guilt, defilement, folly and self-deceit, and the danger of condemnation. He closes the chapter with the plea for mercy.

(True repentance) “arises in the context of our union with Jesus Christ, and since its goal is our restoration into the image of Christ, it involves the ongoing practical outworking of our union with Christ in his death and resurrection- what Calvin calls mortification and vivification.”

The longest chapter is called A Medieval Threat. In some ways the chapter seems out of place. In some ways it seems out of character for Ferguson. He sees evangelicalism returning to some of the same errors that crippled the church prior to the Reformation. For instance, the altar call is the evangelical equivalent of penance, televangelists are like small screen Tetzels, the reduced emphasis on the Word for pageantry and experience. It is rare for Ferguson to write like this, which is what makes its presence so much more important. He sees some serious problems, and we would be wise to listen.

The booklet ends with two (very) short chapters, The Way Back and What Shall We Do?. Both focus on the need for the church to repent, particularly the leadership of the church. So we see that Ferguson does not want us to merely think about repentance in the abstract. He wants us to think about our own need to repent if we have slid back into medieval patterns. This is a short booklet worth reading.