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

--- --- ---

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.