Producing the Fruit of Repentance

INTRO: Part of the love walk Pastor Dave has been sharing with us is Holiness and Purity…love and purity go hand in hand. We’re going to look at repentance today, that leads to purity and holiness…and the fruit that it produces.

Let’s face it: The bible isn’t filled with stories of God making people happy, but of making people HOLY!  (Not an anti-faith message) Holiness produces happiness (notice how miserable we are when in sin?)

The key to walking in true holiness unto God is understanding what repentance is and isn’t…

A)   It ISN’T: Feeling sorry (I felt sorry for being a drug addict/alcoholic every day of my life, wanted to change but couldn’t. Prisoners are sorry (that they are in prison!) Charles Finney: “If repentance is feeling sorry, hell is full of repentant people”. Feeling sorry isn’t enough to turn a person’s life around.

B)    It IS: One definition – to turn (from sin to God, never turning back). Another (I like): Changing the way that we think about God and about sin…realigning our feelings and actions…choosing to hate sin and love God!

Repentance is not lip service, it is seeing the blackness of our sin, and saying to God, “I see how much pain I’ve caused you. Because of my sin, I was one of the ones who helped drive the nails into your flesh and bones.”

It’s only when we see that our sin COST HIM HIS BLOOD…that we can turn away from ourselves and willingly live to please God.

Matthew 3:8 “Bring forth therefore fruits meet for repentance:”
Acts 26:20 – (Paul speaks of them proving their repentance by their deeds)

Repentance has to come from the HEART – Then it produces a CHANGED LIFE, tangible evidence to God, to us, and to those around us that we have truly repented.

So how does true repentance occur? A work of the Holy Spirit…why…because we are blinded by our sin, and we think we are a lot better than we are.

EX: Daddy gets saved, & I’m mad (exposed something inside of me I didn’t think I had…I was ok being the righteous son of an unrighteous father, but when the roles reversed, I got in pride).

When I realized this, it lifted a burden that I had carried for years…I truly love my dad now! We tend to want to whitewash our sins, hide them in a little corner of our heart & hope no one ever finds them!

We need to understand the difference between conviction and condemnation

A)   Condemnation leads to depression, discouragement, fear, doubt and unbelief…

B)    Conviction leads to repentance. (New believers say “So many areas I’m failing in, I don’t feel saved, etc…counselor may say, “Oh, that condemnation is from the devil, you receive that forgiveness by faith”. BIG difference between faith and pretending!

GOD KNOWS YOU! I used to walk all around repenting…”Oh Lord, you know I don’t want to lie, make the devil stop…finally one day I was so weary of exercising so much “faith”, and reading the bible that I fell on my bed crying and said “God, what is it with me??” He said…”You’re a sinner”…I said, yeah I know, I’m a sinner saved by grace”…and He said, “No, YOU’RE A SINNER, YOU NEED TO REPENT!”. Gulp Now when I have sinned, I call myself what I am…LORD, I’M A LIAR! A DIRTY LIAR! (Jim Carrey)

Do you understand the conviction of the Holy Spirit, or do you mistake it for the devil condemning you…binding and shouting, and the whole time God is trying to shine the Light into the little dark corners of our heart.

David had some insight into this Psalm 32:3-5 (Read)

THE HOLY SPIRIT WANTS TO CONVICT US SO WE CAN REPENT AND BE RESTORED. THE DEVIL WANTS TO DEMORALIZE US AND ULTIMATELY DESTROY US.

The difference is simple: The Holy Spirit is always SPECIFIC…He says “Quit yelling at your kids” or “You need to pray more”…The devil is GENERAL in his accusations…He says things like “You’re a terrible parent and a lousy, prayer-less Christian. Why don’t you just give up?” *(It’s important to know who’s talking to us so we can have the right response)

God doesn’t accept excuses for sin (Saul)…where do we get the idea He does? The only thing He accepts is REPENTANCE. There won’t be a third option on Judgment Day (yes, no, or best excuse)

God wants us to be clean so he can pour Rivers of Living Water thru us.
EX: getting a drink of water – 1^st thing you do is make sure the glass is clean. If not, the water loses its purity. Same thing with us…the Holy Spirit can’t be poured into this world through an unclean vessel.

We’re taught to clean up our BEHAVIOR…emphasis is placed on outward appearance, the part of us that others see. A lot of us look all bright & shiny on the outside, and the inside is full of crud! The Holy Ghost looks IN THE HEART…that’s where HE is going to dwell!

NEW WINESKINS
God is not going to put His precious anointing into someone who is walking in sin, or in an old “religious” way of thinking…Luke 5:36-39

Joel 2
v. 1-11 speaks of the day of the Lord in Judgement
v. 12 – 17 REPENTANCE, FAST (thanx Pastor)
v. 18 – 27 speaks of RESTORATION

v. 28 – 32 speaks of THE OUTPOURING

Notice there is a sequence of events here? We like to claim the outpouring (popular verse) without taking hold of the context of this whole passage. Repentance ALWAYS comes before RESTORATION and OUTPOURING (2 important words in Joel 2…THEN and AFTERWARD).

NOTICE that all throughout Joel 2…it’s HIS people, Blow the trumpet in ZION, let the priests WEEP…repentance is for God’s people, it’s not just a pre-salvation word!

Acts 2
We have just seen, outside of Jesus dying on the cross, the second greatest thing that has happened in the history of mankind…when God decided that He would put His Holy Ghost into anyone that desired Him.

God has given us the same power, anointing, glory, wisdom and overcoming power that Jesus walked in while here on earth (not enough words to describe it!).

v. 1-13 The infilling
v. 14-37 Peter’s sermon (love Peter, so much like me…Jesus just restored Him, and then he asked, well, what about him Lord? We see him here FULL of power and authority…a different man!)

v. 38-39 REPENTANCE…then the infilling

I used to make the mistake of using repentance as just another tool to get something from God (the anointing, forgiveness)…we don’t repent to do anything but acknowledge how we have trampled the Blood under our feet, and sinned against one that loves us so much!

All those things follow repentance, but it isn’t why we do it! (Like one of my kids saying they’re sorry cuz they know they’re gonna get ice cream)

Most of the time our philosophy is that we’ve sinned against man (horizontal repentance)…while it does affect those around us, it is GOD who we have sinned against!

EX: David broke every commandment when he sinned against Bathsheba, but he said “I’ve sinned against You and You only Lord”…the prodigal son, first thing he said was “I’ve sinned against heaven”.

If we don’t understand that our sin is primarily VERTICAL, we’ll merely exercise superficial, experimental and horizontal repentance and fall away when tribulation, temptation and persecution comes.

Psalm 30:5 – For His anger is but for a moment, His favor is for a lifetime; weeping may last for the night, but a shout of joy comes in the morning.

JOY COMES IN THE MORNING…and peace, and the other fruits of the Spirit. ALL of it comes as a result of a repentant heart and a righteous lifestyle. Fruit doesn’t “appear” all of a sudden…you’ve got to cultivate, water, fertilize and prune…if the process is done right. You get some fruit.

The fruit of the Spirit comes thru the process of repentance. We cultivate our hearts…plow them up, make them soft by repentance. The Holy Spirit waters, tends and brings fruit…a harvest of righteousness!

(Read from Utmost for His Highest)