I grew up in the church and around the church.
This culture has shaped many words in my life. Salvation, sanctification, holiness just to name a few. One word often heard when listening to a street preacher or sitting in chapel - is the word REPENT!
REPENT...it means someone who was living in sin and turned their life around.
Luke chapter 7 helps define the word REPENT.
Luke shares this - the tax collectors believed but the Pharisees and Teachers of the law did not believe. Why?
The tax collector - who was considered by the Jewish people to be lower than DOGS! They were outcast, no good, betrayed their country because they took taxes for Rome.
They get it! BUT the Pharisees (who had given their life to studying the law) did not get it.
Luke shares with us this detail - the tax collectors, prostitutes and the roman soldiers all were baptized by John but the Pharisees and the Teacher of the law were not!
The difference is what John baptized people into! A baptism of repentance - for the forgiveness of sin. There it is....our word...REPENTANCE!
Repentance is the Greek word: META-NOIA
Made up of two words- META - meaning AFTER
NOIA meaning THOUGHT
So repentance is an after-thought. In order to have an after-thought we have to have a before thought.
Jesus chose to be baptized by his cousin John, as a matter of fact we know they argued about it.
John didn't want to baptize Him. Jesus needed to be baptized, not for the forgiveness of sin as He was the perfect one, but because he was embracing the new thought that came into His life.
He stepped into being the Messiah and was no longer going to be a carpenter.
Do you see it? Repentance does not always have to do with sin or radical turn around. It is a lifestyle of embracing the new and letting go of the old.
The tax collector knew they needed it.....
The prostitute knew they needed it......
The roman soldier needed it....
The religious of the day did not, or at least they thought they did not, so they missed it.
REPENT! A good message to share but an even better life to live!
