Friends: God’s grace is with us even when we don’t know it … and it makes one think.  Blessings to all, Bob

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Spirituality Column #976

July 29, 2025

Common Christianity / Uncommon Commentary

Acts of Repentance, Part 3

By Bob Walters

“Do not conform to the pattern of the world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind.” – Paul, Romans 12:2

I smoked cigarettes for 13 years and quit January 1, 1994.  It was the year I would turn 40 years old in May, and through the end of 1993 I had made up my mind that I wanted to see my two young sons (then ages 6 and almost 2) grow up.

Telling no one, I simply didn’t smoke on January 1, and then the next day and the next and by mid-month a few people noticed.  But to them I said only, “Shhh…;” I was “doing it on my own.” Now 31-and-a-half cigarette-free years later, I’m still around to see Eric, 37, and John, 33, thriving and raising their families.  Mission accomplished.

I would not meet Jesus until 2001, and on reflection shortly after being baptized it occurred maybe I did not truly “do it on my own.” Proud as I had been of my own will in quitting, maybe the Holy Spirit, even years earlier, may have provided a strength I did not truly possess. Btw, it was Eric, 13, who, in August 2001, suggested we go to church.

Great friend and now deceased minister Russ Blowers called this potentially holy gambit “prevenient grace” – a term from Luther (or Calvin) – meaning that Jesus is watching out for us even before we acknowledge it. That made sense then, and even moreso as I’ve grown in faith to believe God, Jesus, and the Spirit always pursue us.

I bring this up not because I necessarily conquered my own sin or, more likely, my own stupidity, but because my mind changed and then my actions changed. Whether or not smoking cigarettes even qualifies as a sin – coach Bob Knight famously called smoking “stupid and harmful” – I hold up the discipline it took to quit smoking with a nod of thanks to the hand from above that I now believe saw me through it.

My point is to encourage us to read the Bible and truly look for all the places where it is the renewing of the mind, the change of heart, the thinking, and the attitudinal “turning around” that seals our faith in Christ. We become obedient not out of guilt, hopefully, but out of love fired by knowing the truth of Jesus.

Any English dictionary one picks up defines “repent,” initially, as to be sorry, feel guilty, or to “express sincere remorse or regret for something we’ve done.” I certainly get that, but I wouldn’t limit it only to sin. Let’s include all laments, like the things I’ve done in life that made me embarrassed, humiliated, or created self-inflicted trouble (like losing my temper over something silly). Not doing dumb stuff surely improves our lives.

The “pattern of the world” is at odds with seeing repentance first as a thinking exercise. Not to be cynical, but a person who feels guilty or shamed is far easier to control than a person whose heart, soul, and mind live with Jesus as Lord and Savior.

But action must accompany renewal.  Pharisee Nicodemus (John 3) had a pretty good idea who Jesus really was but could not break the chains of the Law. Paul may well be the greatest example of repentance in the Bible, with his mind and behavior changing from avenging Pharisee to sacred apostle and preacher, dying for Christ.

We see Philip in Acts 8 helping the traveling Ethiopian official who was reading scripture but didn’t understand, presumably, the prophecy of the Messiah Christ. He was ready to grow, his repentance magnified by understanding what Philip told him.

Each of us can repent and grow every day, strengthening our divine relationship, expanding our knowledge, and conforming not to the world, but to Christ. It’s not an act.

Walters (rlwcom@aol.com) believes in free will (how else can one truly love?), God’s help, Jesus’s witness, and the Spirit’s intervention. Renewed thinking is the key.

Friends: The book of Acts can be a real mind-changer about repentance. If you know, you know.  Blessings, Bob

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Spirituality Column #975

July 22, 2025

Common Christianity / Uncommon Commentary

Acts of Repentance, Part 2 

By Bob Walters

“… God has granted even the gentiles repentance that leads to life.” – the apostles, after Peter presents the Gospel to gentiles at Cornelius’s house. – Acts 11:18

Continuing last week’s theme of repentance being more about changing our minds than changing our manner, the Bible becomes a very different book when we read the word “repent” and think “grow my faith” rather than just “fix my sins.”

I will argue all day long that the purpose of Jesus on the cross was not primarily to forgive sins, although it did that; remember, Jesus also spoke of forgiveness prior to the cross.  But forgiveness was unlocking a door to a greater heavenly purpose: restoring humanity’s broken relationship with a loving God. That was Jesus’s mission.

Forgiveness is a necessary condition of salvation because man’s sins resulted in God’s curse.  Sin broke our perfect relationship with God, but it was a relationship God’s love required He restore.  So here comes Jesus, teaching us about God, covering our sins, cleansing our lives, healing our brokenness – something we cannot do ourselves – and leading us toward salvation.

Our true repentance is knowing Jesus is Lord, eternal Savior, and the Son of God.  Our faith in His truth is our transport to salvation, by which we enter His Kingdom. We know it by the Holy Spirit and God’s Word the Bible: hope lighting our path forward.

I can change my behavior all day long, feel guilty about past sins all day long, do good deeds all day long, even read my Bible all day long. Until we understand and confess who Jesus really is, we remain a behavioral case, not a salvation case. 

Repentance – renewing our minds – is the key to God’s Kingdom, which I firmly believe we catch glimpses of on this side of eternity.  When we obey God’s commands, renew our minds in Christ, and realign our behaviors with God’s love, we don’t change God; we change our lives. These are the “works” we see in faith. God’s grace is our joy.

The Bible verse above is the capstone, if you will, of the story of gentile centurion Cornelius and apostle Peter in Acts 10 and 11. This line, “repentance that brings life,” is the other apostles’ response to Peter’s description of the Holy Spirit coming down into Cornelius’s guests who heard Peter describe Jesus to them, saying, “everyone who believes in him receives forgiveness of sins through his name” (Acts 10:43).  These gentile pagans “renewed their minds” in Christ, and gifts of the Spirit poured into them.

This is noteworthy because it is where Peter and the other “apostles and brothers” (Acts 11:1) realize that salvation is not only for the Jews, but for everyone: for whoever renews their mind by recognizing and believing in Jesus. Notice the Spirit arrived (Acts 10:45) when they believed, not when their behavior changed.   

Christian testimonies are replete with outward, world-witnessing behavioral changes. Sometimes we put down the sinful behavior first; often faith reorders priorities away from overt sin. The plain old fear of God – and the desire to be a witness for His Kingdom – is for me a comforting, life-guiding guardrail. It is our hearts that matter.

It is easy to read or hear “repent” and think, “I better shape up and clean up my act because I’m a sinner.”  Good idea! Break a bad habit, atone for wrongs, start a good habit, and pursue virtue; you’ll feel better. But, repent in faith that leads to life and joy.

I crave Christian fellowship because in that fellowship of the repentant and the redeemed is the vision of the relationship God wants to have with us … and with me.

That, for now, is life in Christ.

Walters (rlwcom@aol.com) quit smoking long before he found Christ. Just sayin’.

Friends: Renewed thinking is the work of repentance, and faith is the main point. Blessings, Bob

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Spirituality Column #974

July 15, 2025

Common Christianity / Uncommon Commentary

Acts of Repentance, Part 1

By Bob Walters

“Produce fruit in keeping with repentance.” – John the Baptist, Matthew 3:8

In June our church began a sermon series on the book of Acts, Luke’s historical tale of the founding of the church, the Apostle Paul, and the calling of many believers.

With beaucoup time on my hands between school terms (our MCA summer is May 23 to August 12) and realizing it had been a while since I read through the entire 28 chapters of Acts, it seemed a good time to re-edify myself.

So, over a couple of recent, leisurely afternoons, I slowly read through Acts and noticed a theme particularly close to my heart, or rather my mind: the theme of repentance.  Real repentance is more than apology-laden, works-driven, turn-your-life-around behaviors so shortsightedly sufficing as repentance among otherwise dedicated Christians. We miss the main point – faith – if we try only to behave better and sin less.

What repentance actually is – what John, Jesus, Luke, Peter, Paul, and others are teaching and calling for – is not merely the physical game of performance but the mental game of faith. Repent, or in the Greek, metanoia, means “renewing of the mind.”

Ancient Jews were required to perform in accordance with the law. In the Old Testament when we see the word “repent” it refers more to truly thinking like a Jew in terms of believing in, trusting, and knowing the One True God, not merely the act, practice, and law of obeying God’s numerous Hebrew-specific commands.

Bring the truth of Jesus into the picture with the presence of the Holy Spirit, and when Peter answers the crowd in Acts 2:38 saying, “Repent, and be baptized,” he’s not just saying, “behave better and sin less.” Peter is saying, “Start thinking like a Christian instead of a Jew.”  He is saying: Jesus fulfils the law and is the Messiah Son of God, deliverer of our salvation through his death and resurrection. Salvation is now by faith.

And what is faith?  Faith is a thinking exercise and an emotional experience. True repentance forces us – graciously – to an understanding of God’s forgiveness and love, and Jesus’s mission of salvation. Repentance is a re-ordering of our priorities that truly shows up in our behavior, but not merely new behavior that masks an unchanged heart.

People will see our repentant faith in our outward conduct.  We will know our faith in our inward peace.  God already knows our faith because He knows our hearts.

What struck me in reading Acts is how often “repent” in its various forms appears: 10 times, and also another 14 times in Luke’s gospel. Luke thus provides 24 of the New Testament’s 57 word references to “repent.” Luke was on to something.

Traditionally considered a Greek-educated gentile from Antioch, Luke would have known Greek and Greek philosophy well.  He is often thought to have directed his Gospel to the Greeks who knew little of Judaism … but a lot about thinking. 

In Luke’s revelation, Jesus supersedes all human thought with a previously unknown truth and a Godly relationship bursting into all humanity.  John the Baptist berates the Pharisees (Matthew 3:8) for not understanding salvation in Christ, while Luke educates Greeks on the One True God who defenestrates worldly pagan gods.

In Acts 2:38, Peter promises forgiveness and the “gift of the holy Spirit.” That gift is the fruit – “the fruit of the Spirit” – that John the Baptist prophesies. Those fruits of the Spirit, such as love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control (Paul in Galatians 5:22-23), are the gifts of repentance.

We act better – and feel better – because we think better.

Walters (rlwcom@aol.com) reaffirms that we are saved by faith, not works. More next week.

Friends: Thomas Jefferson's wrote the Declaration of Independence but had no direct hand in writing the U.S. Constitution or Bill of Rights. Yet his brief words on religion and the First Amendment in 1803, taken out of context in 1947, have crippled public Christianity for nearly a century.  Column below.  Blessings, Bob

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Spirituality Column #973

July 8, 2025

Common Christianity / Uncommon Commentary

Declaring Truth, Part 4   

By Bob Walters

“Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof …” – First Amendment, Bill of Rights, U.S. Constitution

No thanks to an out-of-context 1947 U.S. Supreme Court decision, Everson v. Board of Education, American culture since has marched down the wrong road of what Thomas Jefferson was actually saying about government and religion in his January 1, 1802 letter to the Danbury (Massachusetts) Baptist Association. He was for religion, not against it.

After he cites the First Amendment clause above, we all know the next line of Jefferson’s letter: “… thus building a wall of separation between Church and State.”

Jefferson, then America’s third president, through his political career had been highly active in church affairs, education, and scriptural study. In my school years I remember learning that of all the geniuses and courageous folks who brought forth on this earth the United States of America, Jefferson was a safe bet as the smartest, the most widely read, a stalwart statesman, and a polymath of talent, wisdom, and philosophical depth.

But having grown up in these modern, secular times, we have lost an accurate translation of the religious issues confronting the American colonies and the nascent American state in the 1600s and 1700s. In fact, today we have it backwards.

In simplest terms, read what James L. Adams wrote in his 1989 book, Yankee Doodle Went to Church: “Jefferson’s reference to a ‘wall of separation’ between Church and State’ … was not formulating a secular principle to banish religion from the public arena. Rather he was trying to keep government from darkening the doors of Church.”

We do not today have an appreciation for what a mess religion was early in America when politics was directly involved. And we are not talking about a modern Right to Life march or evangelical political action. We’re talking about the days when churches were established by the state; when Christian denominations fought each other and a majority denomination in a state could sanction other churches and persecute their members.

The Roman Catholic church largely controlled the politics of Europe until the Protestant Reformation in 1517. Continental kings and princes then fought wars over which sect would dominate. England flipped back and forth in the 1500s between monarchs favoring Rome, then its own Anglican church, then Rome again, and back to Anglican.

The non-Anglican Bible believers – think, the Pilgrims – were chased out of England by government sanctioned oppression, as were the Catholics. Freedom of religion was something the American colonies offered, and people emigrated in droves from the religious persecutions and wars across the Atlantic.  As early American local and regional governments formed, “religion” was corrupted. Massachusetts was for the Puritans who chased out the Baptists; Virginia was Anglican, that hated the Calvinists.  Each colony had a favored Christian sect that harassed other Christians in a tyranny of the majority.

That is the issue Jefferson and early America faced and sought to overcome. That is what the “establishment” of religion clause means, as Jefferson in fact led the charge as Virginia’s governor (1779-1781) to dis-establish the Anglican Church from Virginia law.

The “free exercise” of religion was not to be prohibited: we’ve had that backwards for the better part of a century. After the 1947 ruling, the 1960s saw the removal of the Bible and prayer from schools, and fathers from low income homes.  How’s that working out?

Jefferson’s Christian faith evolved in his later years – some say downward – but he wasn’t an atheist or a deist, and never wavered in his belief in Jesus’s teachings. He also never wavered in his certainty that Christian ethics were required to nurture freedom and virtue in a new nation of people solemnly endowed by their Creator with unalienable rights.

Walters (rlwcom@aol.com) read and recommends The Jefferson Lies by David Barton. Also, for a little more background on the Supreme Court machinations of the 1960s, see columns #860 (5-8-23), Responsible Faith and #930 (9-9-24), No Time for Sheep.