Which is true?

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Permalink Reply by David Velasquez on June 22, 2010 at 10:56pm

I think "repentance" is primarily something for unbelievers. It is changing from a mindset that does what "I" want, to deciding to live for what God wants. Of course we go thru minor attitude and mindset changes thruout the christian life that we cud call "repentance", but primarily the bible uses it for people who are lost, or christians have fallen back into serious sin (i.e. sin as a lifestyle).

Confession consists of 3 parts
1. Admitting what we did
2. Regretting what we did (wish we cud change the past and plan to change the future)
3. Taking responsibility for what we did. I.e. Not saying it was someone elses fault.

I think confession is more a practice for christians who already have a relationship with god. In fact i think confession is just the act of honesty within a relationship that keeps us from isolating ourselves from god. Whereas repentance is turning back to God from complete ( or semi complete) alienation from god. So we start a relationship thru repentance, we maintain it thru confession. C.C.

1 john 1:9 "if we confess our sins we will be forgiven".

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Permalink Reply by Leonard T on June 23, 2010 at 5:59am

Terry,

Both A and B are true in as much as we understand how sin affects us and the working of God in our lives. Let me explain. When we are saved (born-again) we go through repentance and receive Jesus as our Savior. He then changes us, seals us and indwells us. We are given a new family name. We receive positional holiness and righteousness. Positional in that we are these things in and through Jesus. This great change, new birth, cannot be undone and thus we do not come to repentance to maintain our salvation or to be resaved. Yet, we as believers still fail and fall into sin, even if but a single sin we become contaminated by it and left unconfessed it begins to taint us and cause us to become less and less usable for the glory of God. We need to confess our sins, be cleansed, so that the glory of God may shine through us. There are two great illustrations regarding this. One is from the Bible and the other using simple items.

1) In John 13 Jesus prepares to wash His disciples feet. Peter bucks at the idea and Jesus responds with the following statement, "(JN 13:10) Jesus answered, 'A person who has had a bath needs only to wash his feet; his whole body is clean. And you are clean, though not every one of you.'" This whole concept has to be understood in its cultural setting. During this era of time many towns had a bathhouse in the center of town. You would travel there and take your bath. Afterwards you would walk home down the dusty streets. Upon arriving at home the person does not need to bathe again, but simply to wash the dust from the road off of their feet. This is a great picture of the saved walking through this sin tainted world. We do not need another bath, but we do need to clean the dust off of our feet.
2) God changes us at salvation so that we can worship Him and that He might reflect Himself in us for Him and others to see His light shining from us. Picture us as a mirror and the light of God reflecting off that mirror after salvation. The reflection is clear and pure as long as the mirror is clean. Picture sin as sand. As we sin sand begins to accumulate on the mirror. If the mirror does not get cleaned off and as more sand (sin) is built up on the mirror the light of God becomes less and less visible until the light is fully blocked out. The mirror is still a mirror, but cannot be used for what it was designed to be used for. In order for the mirror to be used again the sand must be wiped off (confession). When we confess our sins to God He wipes away the sand and we become useable again.

Lord Bless,
LT

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Permalink Reply by RoyW on July 12, 2010 at 7:23am

Terry,

I am curious why you asked this question. My initial response would be that neither of your hypotheses is true. Are you really wondering?

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Permalink Reply by Terry Duncan on July 12, 2010 at 8:00am

I like to see what others would say. I am not into argumentation.

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