1. What is the link between faith and repentance? True repentance ends in believing, and true faith begins in repentance.
It is quite remarkable that Mark (Mar_1:15) should tell us, in the first chapter of his Gospel narrative, that the Lord Jesus Himself began to preach, saying, “Repent ye, and believe the gospel.”
Our Lord’s primary gospel message was a call to repentance, and faith in the gospel. And these two things are inseparably linked. Paul told the Ephesian elders that his testimony both to Jews and to Greeks was “repentance toward God, and faith toward our Lord Jesus Christ” (Act_20:21) — another mark of the, inseparable link.
McCheyne used to say: “Never get rid of your soul’s anxiety except by looking unto the Lord Jesus. If you get rid of your anxiety in any other way, it may never return.” A solemn word of warning To drown anxiety in pleasure, to dull sensibility by the hardening influence of continuance in sin, may lead to the loss of all anxiety, but, alas, because of a petrified spiritual nature. But if you lose it by coming to the Lord Jesus, then you will know what Peter (2Pe_1:19) means by the words, “Till the day star arise in your hearts”—not a reference, I take it, to the second coming, but to the rising of the Lord Jesus Christ over the horizon of the believing soul. [Note: A. T. Pierson, Foundation Truths, 29.]
2. Our Lord makes repentance and faith the principal conditions of entrance into the Kingdom, and the major stress seems to be placed upon faith. The fact that where the two are named in conjunction repentance stands first is no token that it has a logical priority. The order followed in the Gospel statements may be regarded as the homiletical order. Under certain conditions the preacher may very properly begin with insisting upon the need of repentance. Still in the logical order faith is prior to repentance. It is the positive side of the total transaction of which repentance is the negative. The latter is the turning away from the soiled and imperfect. But no one gains any effective incentive to this turning away except through an appreciative vision of something better. He must perceive and give at least initial assent to a higher ideal in order to motive and strength for parting from the lower. Now this initial assent, or inner movement toward self-committal, is faith begun. The positive force, or motive-power, is thus with faith, and repentance is logically secondary.
In repentance, there is a change of mind, heart, and will concerning sin; condemnation takes the place of approval, aversion of delight, resistance of indulgence. In Christian repentance sin is judged with the mind of Christ, hated with His heart, and withstood by His will. We must think of God as Father, and man as child, to see the horror and heinousness, shame and curse of sin as disturbing this kinship and kindness, even as Christ saw. We must love goodness and God in some measure as Christ loved to detest and abhor sin as we should. We must be as dependent on and submissive to God in Christ as He was as Son to His Father, if our will is to get the Divine direction of antagonism to sin. In brief, Christ Himself must change our mind, heart, and will concerning sin, if we are to repent. But this means that repentance is impossible without the faith which makes the grace of Christ ours, by which God’s truth, love, holiness, take the place of sin in us as guiding principle, constraining motive, and commanding purpose. This grace brings us God’s light, love, life, so that we become sharers in the Divine nature.
Sorrow for sin, not simply on account of its evil consequences to the transgressor, but on account of its intrinsic hatefulness as opposed to divine holiness and love, is practically impossible without some confidence in God’s mercy. It is the Cross which first makes us truly penitent (cf. Joh_12:32-33). Hence all true preaching of repentance is implicitly a preaching of faith (Mat_3:1-12; cf. Act_19:4), and repentance toward God involves faith in the Lord Jesus Christ (Act_20:21; Luk_15:10; Luk_15:24; Luk_19:8-9; cf. Gal_3:7). [Note: A. H. Strong, Systematic Theology, 835.]
Repentance and faith must go together to complete each other. I compare them to a door and its post. Repentance is the door which shuts out sin, but faith is the post upon which its hinges are fixed. A door without a door-post to hang upon is not a door at all; while a door-post without the door hanging to it is of no value whatever. What God hath joined together let no man put asunder; and these two He has made inseparable—repentance and faith. [Note: C. H. Spurgeon, Sermons, No. 2073.]
3. Since repentance and faith are but different sides or aspects of the same act of turning, faith is as inseparable from repentance as repentance is from faith. That must be an unreal faith where there is no repentance, just as that must be an unreal repentance where there is no faith. Yet, because the one aspect of his change is more prominent in the mind of the convert than the other, we are not hastily to conclude that the other is absent. Only that degree of conviction of sin is essential to salvation which carries with it a forsaking of sin and a trustful surrender to Christ.
Never will Christ enter into that soul where the herald of repentance bath not been before Him. [Note: Bishop Hall.]
Old Mr. Dodd, one of the quaintest of the Puritans, was called by some people “Old Mr. Faith and Repentance,” because he was always insisting upon these two things. Philip Henry, remarking upon his name, writes somewhat to this effect—“As for Mr. Dodd’s abundant preaching repentance and faith, I admire him for it; for if I die in the pulpit, I desire to die preaching repentance and faith; and if I die out of the pulpit, I desire to die practising repentance and faith.” Some one remarked to Mr. Richard Cecil that he had preached very largely upon faith; but that good clergyman assured him that if he could rise from his dying bed, and preach again, he would dwell still more upon that subject. No themes can exceed in importance repentance and faith, and these need to be brought very frequently before the minds of our congregations. [Note: C. H. Spurgeon, Sermons, No. 2073.]
