Does Repentance Come After Conversion?

Hi Bro. Jesse, Repent ye therefore, and be converted, that your sins may be blotted out, when the times of refreshing shall come from the presence of the Lord;. The teaching that repentance is not necessary for salvation is a false gospel. The evidence is in the absence of the Holy Spirit in the life of the so called 'converted.' Christ came to save us from our sin and not in our sins. Men are not saved from hell until they are first saved from sin. Here are some good quotes from Finney;The Bible teaches that sin is forgiven when it is repented of, but never while it is persisted in. The Bible teaches that the grace of God can save us from sin -- from the commission of sin, or can pardon when we repent and put away sin; but it never teaches that sin can be forgiven while it is persisted in.The impression of many seems to be, that grace will pardon what it cannot prevent; in other words, that if the grace of the gospel fails to save people from the commission of sin in this life, it will nevertheless pardon them and save them in sin, if it cannot save from sin.Now, really, I understand the gospel as teaching that men are saved from sin first, and, as a consequence, from hell; and not that they are saved from hell while they are not saved from sin. Christ sanctifies when he saves. And this is the very first element or idea of salvation, saving from sin. "Thou shalt call his name Jesus," said the angel, "for he shall save his people from their sins." "Having raised up his Son Jesus," said the apostle, "he hath sent him to bless you in turning every one of you from his iniquities."Let no one expect to be saved from hell, unless the grace of the gospel saves him first from sin.God Bless,-Robert

It saddens me that we even have to argue points like this within the Church. The call to preach repentance along with forgiveness of sins is all over the New Testament; John, Jesus, and the Apostles all did it, so should we; Then opened he their understanding, that they might understand the scriptures, And said unto them, Thus it is written, and thus it behoved Christ to suffer, and to rise from the dead the third day: And that repentance and remission of sins should be preached in his name among all nations, beginning at Jerusalem.(Luke 24:45-47)In Christ,Ron

1. Repentance as an event takes place before regeneration. Then Peter said unto them, Repent, and be baptized every one of you in the name of Jesus Christ for the remission of sins, and ye shall receive the gift of the Holy Ghost. (Act 2:38 KJV)2. Repentance as a disposition takes place after regeneration.I will also save you from all your uncleannesses: and I will call for the corn, and will increase it, and lay no famine upon you. And I will multiply the fruit of the tree, and the increase of the field, that ye shall receive no more reproach of famine among the heathen. Then shall ye remember your own evil ways, and your doings that were not good, and shall lothe yourselves in your own sight for your iniquities and for your abominations. (Eze 36:29-31 KJV)It may be that the friend's pastor is of 'reformed persuasion'. Calvinists generally believe that everything begins with regeneration, and that a person cannot repent until they are born again. I DO NOT believe this but it may well account for the some of the confusion?

The teaching that repentance is not necessary for salvation is a false gospel. The evidence is in the absence of the Holy Spirit in the life of the so called 'converted.' Christ came to save us from our sin and not in our sins. Men are not saved from hell until they are first saved from sin. Here are some good quotes from Finney;

The Bible teaches that sin is forgiven when it is repented of, but never while it is persisted in. The Bible teaches that the grace of God can save us from sin -- from the commission of sin, or can pardon when we repent and put away sin; but it never teaches that sin can be forgiven while it is persisted in.

The impression of many seems to be, that grace will pardon what it cannot prevent; in other words, that if the grace of the gospel fails to save people from the commission of sin in this life, it will nevertheless pardon them and save them in sin, if it cannot save from sin.

Now, really, I understand the gospel as teaching that men are saved from sin first, and, as a consequence, from hell; and not that they are saved from hell while they are not saved from sin. Christ sanctifies when he saves. And this is the very first element or idea of salvation, saving from sin. "Thou shalt call his name Jesus," said the angel, "for he shall save his people from their sins." "Having raised up his Son Jesus," said the apostle, "he hath sent him to bless you in turning every one of you from his iniquities."

Let no one expect to be saved from hell, unless the grace of the gospel saves him first from sin.

WELL SAID!

A sinner has all the constititional faculties that he needs to repent of his sins. A sinner is capable of repenting of his sins, which is why God commands him to and blames him if he doesn't. Jesus rebuked sinners for not repenting, which implies that they were capable of doing so.

With the ability to repent, sinners are still unwilling to repent. Their problem is not constitutional but moral. Therefore they need the Holy Spirit to influence them to do so. The Spirit takes the truth of Jesus Christ, who vicariously died as our substitute, and presents it to their mind. This truth influences them to repent, so that they are born again by the Word of God. Regeneration is through revelation.

Regeneration is not a constitutional change, since sinners already have the ability to obey God and are therefore without excuse. Men are given the ability to obey God at creation.

Regeneration is a moral change, when the Spirit of God brings a man to the point where he choices to repent of his sins, because of the influence of the Gospel on his heart and mind. At conversion the Spirit makes us willing to do what God at creation made us capable of doing.

The Bible says that whoever is born of God does not commit sin and whoever does righteousness is born of God. This shows how being born again, or regenerated, is not a constitutional change but a moral change. A person is born again when they decide to repent and believe, under the influence of the Holy Spirit. We do not repent and believe after we are born again or regenerated. We are born again or regenerated when we repent and believe.

Repentance is not something that God can do for us. Repentance is our own choice. That is why Jesus rebuked the cities who didn't repent. It wasn't God's fault that they were impenitent. They could have chosen to repent but refused to do so, thus the rebuke. But while repentance is our own choice, which God cannot do for us, it is God who influences us to repent. Through instruction God grants us repentance. We never would have repented on our own. It is only because of the work of the Holy Spirit in our lives that we have chosen to repent of our sins.

The definition of Biblical repentance means a change of mind that results in a change of action. That change of mind can ONLY be granted by God (Acts 11:18). That change can only occur when a person is regenerate, so God changes the unregenerate mind and gives man the ability to turn from sin. Repentance is a gift from God as is the obedience of faith. Hope this helps. God bless.

I think that it is significant that "Repent..." is the first recorded word preached by John the Baptist and Jesus in the New Testament. It is a call to action, so even though God needs to grant us the capacity to repent, it still requires us to use our free will in a conscious response.

PassingThru

I believe that it is simultaneous. Repentance and conversion are two sides of the same coin.

Paul was touched first. He was on his way somewhere when God made himself known.

THEN he had a choice to repent.

Only God really knows, but belief (faith) and repentance must be either simultaneous, or the former precedes the latter. Once cannot repent unless one believes in God.

Without God, the sinful man is happy living in his natural worldly environment. Without God, he would be content and would have no reason to repent.

I think it is not wise to say in a four step box how God converts a man. Jesus said "repent and believe"

Some may have faith preceded their repentance, others may have it at one moment, others may have faith first only to repent later, maybe a minute after faith maybe an hour i dont know.

One thing we know, one must repent and believe in order to be saved, and as everything it is a gift from God. And my personal conviction is a gift can be rejected, neglected and so on. But in what sequence it all comes down to, i think we could find testimonies from all over the theological camp with various sequences.

But it may be good to define what we meen by repentance? In my saving moment i turned towards God as my only hope in everything, i had little knowledge or thoughts on eternity at that moment, only life and the situation I was in. Some call that repentance, i chose to believe what he had done for me, and later when walking home, had a very powerful "born again" experience, had the testimony of the Spirit within me, i chose to stop living in some sins that i knew could not live in anymore, that was also a kind of repentance, and it continued for several days, the spirit showing me to get rid of music, language and words i used, and many many other things, that to was repentance and that i still do today.

So i think we need to define repentance, i think it is heresy to say one need to stop sin as a action before one can be born again. I dident. But my heart was in such a state that if any one had convinced me i could be saved from cut my hand off, i would do that, i would have done anything to be "saved" from what i had become.

If that is faith or repentance or both at the same time i know not, I just know Christ became my all that evening.

So i am a bit cautious of people trying to set up a "system" how it works out, Gods ways are not ours. Not as in how Christ saves us, the transaction and the guilt blotted out and how we can have forgiveness, but how the "process" of regeneration is played out.

The apostle Paul was on his way to kill christins when God just stopped him... he had not a single fiber of a thought of either repentance or faith.

Spurgeon had several weeks of agony and anguish of his sins before placing his faith in the Lord, i would call those weeks a form of repentance leading up to conversion.

I think when God see our lives, he has all knowledge, he paints a picture that will lead to "perfect" repentance for each and everyone of us.

There is something about man that always compels him to theorize, to exact, to neatly and logically boil everything down to a precise and irrefutable formula. This is precisely why the atheisists cannot accept God; but before we critique them, we need to know that this quest for "formulaic evidence" is also why there are so many sects and factions, denominations and debates among [i]us[/i] on the other side of the wall too.

One side of the wall wrangles over God's existence, and utilizes empirical science (or lack of) to ostensibly prove yea or nay; the other side uses the same logic and mindset to endlessly wrangle over the logistics of how God functions within His Government. For both sides - for the believer and unbeliever alike - obviously, there can never be any resolve as long as the endeavor remains to confine God's sovereignty to some formulaic package the finite mind of man can process.

Whether it be the occurence of Holy Spirit Baptism or the Born-Again experience, man has always sought to take it apart like a transmission engine in order to get an understanding of how it all runs (or how to prime it so that it will). If we can explain what comes first, then obviously we can break the rest down too. The Pentecostals have done this regarding the Baptism in the Holy Spirit; others have gone to great lengths in breaking down man's moral obligations, capabilities, restrictions, ad nauseum to the point that the mystery of the new Birth is no longer a mystery, but something to be categorized, hypothesized, legitimized.

I have found that the more I deign to understand in the salvific workings of God, the more I come to the inexorable conclusion that [i]I know absolutely nothing save that salvation comes through faith alone in Christ.[/i] To go any further than this (as to what comes first, etc.), to me, is to venture into a realm God has purposefully left "dark" or "in part", and I find much inconclusiveness, strife, havoc and commotion with each step I take as result. To me, it's like stepping into a dark room and claiming to know the way as you knock down chairs and bark your shin on the coffee table.

Which is what most theology debates amount to, in my opinion.

Brother Paul

Actually today i began a minor "study" or rather i would call it a search, to find out more about regeneration, not how it works out but more what happends after.

And it was a thrilling one i must say, even tho i am not finisched yet to see what Christ has done for us, rather then "how" he has done it is to me a much more worthy conversation, just noting down verses earlier to see the contrast from self to spirit, old man to new man , made alive in him, dead to resurrected, to be a slave to sin to be seated in heavenly places, from a present jerusalem to a heavenly Jerusalem.

and when i was coming to the wellknown verses "christ in me" , i was so struck by the discussions myself had had so many times, cal vs arminianism etc. How much energy in thought and effort i have laid on that, only to see what Paul says, what matters is a new creation....

that is what matters, but we so turn emphasis on "how". But the only thing that matters is a new creation, created by HIM, in HIM and for HIM to be transformed into HIM predestined to become like HIM just those 40 verses i noted down just was shining with brightness of that paper to me how easy we put emphasis on other things then what is the thing that matters.

ad how God have dumbfounded the wise to make all that available to any man through faith in Christ....

Who hath delivered us from the power of darkness, and hath translated us into the kingdom of his dear Son: (Col 1:13 KJV)

It doesn't matter whether we have been circumcised or not. What counts is whether we have been transformed into a new creation. (Gal 6:15 NLT)

Therefore if any man be in Christ, he is a new creature: old things are passed away; behold, all things are become new. (2Co 5:17 KJV)

I could write a book, thousands of volumes, and still how can you describe the greatest miracle that can take place since creation of the earth? God creating a new man out of an corrupt and evil man, haters of God, and giving such men, by his grace and transformation a chance to once somewhere in eternity to sit on his throne and reign with him?

its just so beyond comprehension what God has done, you cant understand it fully, yet we try figure it out.

That we would more realize what is ours once we have been regenerated, i feel after this search like there are an infinity of blessing to lay ahold of by faith in HIM. How i came into that, in what sequence matter not as much anymore, He purchased me, a divine transaction from old man to a new man.

i am just rambling on , just wanted to share some of my encouraged thoughts from seeing this today.