At first glance, it
is difficult to imagine how repentance can be “false” in any sense of the word.
Are we implying that the hundreds or thousands that come forward during an altar
call may not really have repented after all? Could a church member who has been
serving faithfully for the last thirty years be unsaved? The answer to these
questions is “YES AND MORE!”.....more in that, EVEN some pastors and christian
leaders may themselves be unregenerate. Let us turn to the Word of God for some
answers....
LIFE OF KING
SAUL
First of all, I
would like to use the life of King Saul to illustrate this “principle” of false
repentance. Take a look at the figure below....
The first recorded “sin”
of King Saul was when he offered up the burnt offering instead of waiting for
Samuel to do so (1 Sam 13:9, 13). There was no record of any “repentance” even
after Samuel’s rebuke in 1 Samuel 13:13,14. The second time King Saul sinned was
when he spared King Agag and the best of the latter’s sheep and flocks against
God’s explicit command (1 Samuel 15:3, 9). Now, the most interesting and
important point in this study of King Saul’s life is in his own confession of
the three words-“I have sinned”. You will notice that he said this not only once
but TWICE! (1 Sam
15:24; 1 Sam 15:30). Any right-thinking person would interpret this as
REPENTANCE but
read on and you will see that King Saul did not actually truly repent at all.
Remember as the WORD
OF GOD says, repentance
must be accompanied by deeds (not words only)....
Matt 3:8 8 Produce fruit in keeping with
repentance. (NIV)
Acts 26:20 “...also, I preached that they
should repent and turn to God and prove their repentance
by their deeds.” (NIV)
Emphasis Mine
To continue on the
story of King Saul’s Life, take note that the Holy Spirit left him as recorded
in 1
Samuel 16:14 (primarily
because he did not truly repent) and immediately an evil spirit afflicted him
(there is no such thing
as a spiritual vacuum- see also Matt 12:45). His life after this followed a
downhill path- he tried
to kill young David, killed eighty-five of the Lord’s priests through the
hands of Doug the Edomite
(1 Sam 22:18), consulted the witch of Endor (1 Sam 28:8) and finally
committed suicide. To sum
it up, the saga of King Saul is one of a man who did not truly repent but
showed outward signs of
“apparent" or "false” repentance. He even “wept aloud” (1 Sam 24:16)
when told of how David
spared his life. King Saul's life is in sharp contrast to the life of King David
who after he had
sinned, showed true and lasting signs of repentance (2 Samuel 12:13 and also see
later part of David’s life and writings in the Psalms).
LIFE OF JUDAS
ISCARIOT
The life of Judas
Iscariot shows a fairly similar trend as that of King Saul. John Chapter 12
verse 6 tells us
that Judas was the treasurer of the group and at the same time stole from the
money bag (thus
betraying the trust given to him). It is quite an amazing fact that Judas, who
havingpersonally
sat under the teaching of our Lord for three years and having witnessed
countless miracles done by Jesus, still did not find room in his heart to repent
from this “love of money”.
1 Tim 6:10-11 10 For the love of
money is a root of all kinds of evil. Some people, eager for money, have wandered from
the faith and pierced themselves with many griefs. 11 But you, man
of God, flee from all this, and
pursue righteousness, godliness, faith,
love, endurance and
gentleness. (NIV) Emphasis mine.
There are two
points to emphasize from the Scriptures above. Firstly that “the love of money”
causes some to wander from the faith and in the case of Judas Iscariot to
totally abandon his faith. Secondly TAKE NOTE that Verse 11 above COMMANDS (NOT
REQUESTS) us to FLEE FROM THE LOVE OF MONEY. Money by itself is inanimate but
the “Love of Money” stems from a spiritual source and pursues us (hence the
admonition to flee from it).
Continuing on
the story of Judas, we find that his failure to repent finally caused SATAN to
enter him and he went on to betray Jesus for thirty pieces of silver (thirty
pieces of silver was’nt much money even in those days and the sad fact is that
he (Judas) betrayed the Son of God and no ordinary man for this amount). Matthew
Chapter 27 verses 3 and 4 goes on to say that Judas was “seized with remorse
(not repentance)” and even returned the money (a counterfeit form of
restitution). Like King Saul, he said those three words “I HAVE SINNED”
(CONFESSION WITHOUT TRUE REPENTANCE-an extremely subtle form of deception). Some
hard-core criminals may also say the same words in prison but when released,
continue on to pursue their life of crime. That Judas did not truly repent (and
turn to God) is evidenced by the fact that he finally “hung himself”. Suicide is
a terrible crime to oneself and it is the process of one destroying God’s temple
(1 Cor 3:16,17) without any recourse at all to
repentance. No suicide victim can enter heaven and a pastor or minister should
bear this in mind when asked to conduct the funeral service of a suicide victim.
Contrast the story of Judas Iscariot with that of Peter. Peter denied Jesus
three times (he did it out of fear and not for pecuniary gain) but he truly
repented and God restored him. In fact, Jesus had already prophesied that Peter
would be restored....
Luke 22:32 32 But I have
prayed for you, Simon, that your faith may not fail. And
when you have
turned back, strengthen your brothers." (NIV) Emphasis mine
Notice from the
above verse that Jesus told Peter “When you have turned back.....”. The New King
James version translates it as “When you have returned to me...” True repentance
always turns one away from sin back to God. It is interesting to note that there
was no record of Jesus praying for Judas Iscariot personally.
Lastly, in summary
let us turn to one New Testament Scripture....
2 Cor 7:10 10 Godly sorrow brings
repentance that leads to salvation and leaves no regret, but worldly sorrow
brings death. (NIV)
2 Cor 7:10 10 For godly
sorrow worketh repentance to salvation not to be repented
of: but the sorrow of the world worketh death. (KJV) Emphasis Mine
The
above verse clearly shows that there are two kinds of sorrow- Godly sorrow and
Worldly sorrow. The former leads one to repentance and then to a SALVATION THAT
NEED NOT BE REPENTED OF (See the KJV version). In other words, there is such a
thing as a false salvation which needs repentance again. Worldly sorrow with all
its crying and tears and “I have sinned” declarations can only lead to spiritual
death. Worldly sorrow emanates from the soul and is primarily an emotional
response whereas the Godly sorrow which leads to TRUE repentance is an act of
will. Since the Holy Spirit is instrumental in the process of True Repentance,
it follows that False Repentance (essentially a deceptive process), draws its
inspiration from the demonic
realm. I trust that you will
be able to see now that there are many so-called christians (and also pastors
and christian leaders) whose lives do not bear the fruits of true repentance. If
they do not bear the fruits of true repentance, then they can only bear the
fruits of FALSE REPENTANCE and its ultimate consequence- spiritual and very
likely, eternal death. Pray that this would not be the end-result.
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