As I read The Marrow of Modern Divinity a few things have become clearer to my mind. One of those is the difference between Repentance unto Life (as the Westminster Confession of Faith calls it) at conversion and the on-going repentance of a Christian. This distinction is what The Naked Gospel by Farley doesn’t recognize.
There is a difference between repentance during conversion in which one moves from the covenant of works into the covenant of grace and after conversion respecting the law of Christ. Fisher touches on some of the realities at play here:
“… when believers in the Old Testament did transgress God’s commandments, God’s temporal wrath went out against them, and was manifest in temporal calamities that befell them as well as others. Only here was the difference, the believers’ temporal calamities had no eternal calamities included in them, nor following of them; and the unbelievers’ temporal blessings had no eternal blessings included in them, and their temporal calamities had eternal calamities included in them, and following of them.”
So, for believers earthly blessings are a foretaste of eternal blessings. Both are earned by Christ and his merits, not ours. Because of Christ’s merit and satisfaction, we are not condemned for our sin. But because God loves us He disciplines us when we break the law of Christ (Hebrews 12). It is restorative and not punitive, designed to produce a harvest of righteous character in us. We repent, not because we’ve lost our salvation but because we have disobeyed our Father.
Cavman Considers 