iii. The Conditions of Entering the Kingdom.
*' Repent ye, and believe in the gospel."
Our Lord here commands the two things which are required for salvation. " Except ye repent," He says elsewhere, " ye shaU all perish." And St. Paul declares that without faith it is impossible to please God. Eepentance is that which makes us look within ourselves ; faith is that which makes us look out from ourselves. And not only must both faith and repentance be there, but they must also be there in proportion. A balance must be maintained between them. If repentance is strong while faith is weak the result is restlessness and dissatisfaction.
1 A. L. Lilley.
ST. MARK 8i
There is the sense of sin, but there is no assurance of the mercy of God in Christ. Again, if faith is strong, or seems to be strong, while there has been no true repentance, there may be a false confidence that all is well, a blind trust, a blind security.
^ Those who have a faith which allows them to think lightly of past sin, have the faith of devils, and not the faith of God's elect. Those who say, "Oh, as for the past, that is nothing; Jesus Christ has washed all that away " ; and can talk about all the crimes of their youth, and the iniquities of their riper years, as if they were mere trifles, and never think of shedding a tear, never feel their souls ready to burst because they should have been such great offenders — such men who can trifle with the past, and even fight their battles o'er again when their passions are too cold for new rebellions — I say that such who think sin a trifle, and have never sorrowed on account of it, may know that their faith is not genuine. Men who have a faith which allows them to live carelessly in the present, who say, " Well, I am saved by a simple faith," and then sit on the ale-bench with the drunkard, or stand at the bar with the spirit-drinker, or go into worldly company and enjoy the carnal pleasures and the lusts of the flesh, such men are liars; they have not the faith which will save the soul. They have a deceitful hypocrisy ; they have not the faith which will bring them to heaven.^
1. Repentance. — "Eepent ye." With these words Christ commenced His Galilean ministry. The first demand He made on men was the demand for repentance. When He sent out the Twelve on their missionary journey through the country towns and villages, it was to preach " that men should repent." When He gave His last instructions to His disciples before He was taken up, He explained to them that it was in accordance with the Scriptures that " repentance . . . should be preached in his name unto all the nations."
^ In the present day we do not sufficiently realise the necessity for repentance. To some extent we have even forgotten what repentance means. We read the great classical outpourings of the contrite soul — the Psalms, or the Confessions of St. Augustine, or the Imitation of A Kempis, or John Bunyan's Grace Abounding — and they appear to us almost hysterical. The language of the broken spirit stirs in us no response. We cannot bring ourselves to pray, as Lancelot Andrewes used in agony to pray, " O Lord,
^ 0. H. Spurgeou. ST. MARK — 6
82 THE GREAT TEXTS OF THE BIBLE
help Thou mine impenitence; and more and more bruise, and wound, and pierce, and strike my heart ! " ^
What is Eepentance ?
1. The first element in penitence, St. Bernard has declared, is "regret for what is past." And this is the characteristic, perhaps, that first and most strikingly arrests attention. The whole literature of penitence is blotted with tears of sorrow. Its pages are red with the shame of the saints. Its great word is Feccavi. " 0 my God, my transgressions are very great, very great my sins." " I acknowledge my faults, and my sin is ever before me." " 0 my God ! 0 God infinitely good ! How canst Thou bear with a sinner like me ? " This ache, this grief, this self-accusing sorrow seems inseparable from repentance. Even on those who know themselves forgiven, even on those who have " washed their robes, and made them white in the blood of the Lamb," there falls the dark shadow of a wasted past, the sadness of knowing that they are not what they might have been.
Yes, Thou forgive st, but with all forgiving Canst not renew mine innocence again:
Make Thou, 0 Christ, a dying of my living, Purge from the sin but never from the pain !
^ A well-known preacher once began his sermon by saying that he should that day choose seven texts, but pledged himself that all the seven should contain only three words. Those three words were, " I have sinned." And, unless we deceive ourselves and the truth is not in us, those words in their most solemn and crushing force ought often to be on the lips of every one of us. But the Bible shows us how often they may be used and yet not mean repentance. Pharaoh said, " I have sinned," in mere terror, and hardened his heart the moment the judgment was removed. Achan said, " I have sinned," like some criminal on the scaffold who confesses only when the consequences of his iniquity stare him horribly in the face. Balaam said, "I have sinned," but still went on in spite of the drawn sword of the angel, dazzled by the disastrous gleam of Balak's gold. Judas said, " I have sinned,"' but in him it was only despair and remorse as he flung down in the temple the accursed pittance for which he had sold his soul. Saul said, "I have sinned," but only to return to his ' F. Homes Duddeii.