By the necessity of repentance is meant the need that a sinner has of it, as that which is indispensably requisite for him. A sinner must either repent or perish. He acts most unjustly, as well as unreasonably, if he continue impenitent. Besides, he is under infinite obligations to repent. Now true repentance is necessary, or indispensably requisite, chiefly on the following accounts:
1. It is necessary because the Lord in His holy law has peremptorily required it.
It is one of the duties required in the first commandment of the moral law.* It is more expressly commanded, both in the Old Testament and in the New. "Thus saith the Lord God, Repent and turn yourselves from your idols; and turn away your faces from all your abominations" (Ezek 14:6). God now commandeth all men every where to repent (Acts 17:30). True repentance then is necessary for it is peremptorily commanded by the Lord. It is a duty from the performance of which no individual can plead an exemption; an exercise which on no account whatever can be dispensed with. All are commanded to repent, and therefore all are bound, in obedience to the Divine command, to exercise true repentance. This high command was often repeated, not only by the ancient prophets and John the Baptist, but by our Lord Jesus Himself and His apostles.
2. True repentance is indispensably requisite because all have sinned.
All men are sinners, and therefore all need repentance. A sinner cannot be saved from the love, power, and practice of sin in any other way than by being enabled to repent of sin. He cannot serve the Lord acceptably, except he turn from all iniquity to Him. Nor can he have communion with Him but in proportion to the degree of his repentance for having sinned against Him. The law as a covenant of works condemns every sinner who is under it; and consequently it can justify no one who has but in a single instance transgressed it. The unnumbered multitude of a sinner's transgressions, though it cannot add to the certainty, yet will add to the greatness of his condemnation, and should therefore add to the depth of his repentance. Could a man be found who had but in a single instance failed to yield perfect obedience, even such a man would need repentance. He could not be saved without it. How necessary then is repentance for that sinner whose iniquities are more in number than the sand on the sea-shore!
3. To repent of sin is needful, because all the children of Adam have destroyed themselves by sin.
"O Israel, thou hast destroyed thyself" (Hosea 13:9). "Return unto the Lord thy God; for thou hast fallen by thine iniquity" (Hosea 14:1). The dreadful curse of the violated law is denounced against the impenitent sinner. "The wrath of God abideth on him" (2 Peter 2:3). Death in all its extent closely pursues him. Everlasting destruction awaits him. His judgment lingereth not, and his damnation slumbereth not (John 3:36). That great and terrible God, whom he has times and ways without number insulted, is at once the Witness, the Judge, and the Avenger of all his crimes. The sinner cannot hide so much as one of his transgressions from God's omniscient eye. He cannot resist His infinite power, nor endure His fiery indignation. Can his hands be strong, or can his heart endure when this most tremendous sentence shall sound in his ears: "Depart from me, ye cursed, into everlasting fire, prepared for the devil and his angels" (Matt 25:41)? These are the words of Him who hath said, "Heaven and earth shall pass away, but my words shall not pass away." Now except the sinner repent, he shall inevitably and eternally perish under the endless execution of that unspeakably dreadful sentence. After his hard and impenitent heart he treasures up unto himself wrath against the day of wrath (Rom 2:5). Ah! secure sinner, you have departed far from the Lord; your soul is pledged that you will return to Him by repentance. But if you return not, your precious pledge is lost-irrecoverably lost. The all-important matter is brought to this point-Repent, or perish for ever. How shall you be able to grapple through all eternity with almighty vengeance, with overwhelming wrath, not only of God, but of the Lamb (Isa 33:14)? This gracious and compassionate call is now addressed to you, "Repent, and turn from all your transgressions; so iniquity shall not be your ruin" (Ezek 18:30).
4. True repentance is necessary because God has pledged his faithfulness, that He will execute the tremendous sentence of His violated law upon all who live and die impenitent.
"Except ye repent," says the Lord Jesus, "ye shall all perish." Without evangelical repentance, salvation is impossible; damnation is inevitable. "God is angry with the wicked every day. If he turn not, he will whet his sword; he hath bent his bow and made it ready" (Psa 7:11,12 & 9:17). "Hath he said and shall he not do it? or hath he spoken, and shall he not make it good" (Num 23:19)? If the sinner then do not turn from his sins by sincere repentance, God has pledged His faithfulness that he shall perish. Either his iniquities or his soul must go. To turn to the Lord or to burn in the fire of His fierce indignation are the awful alternatives. Happy should the impenitent sinner be if his transgressions would part from him at the grave, but they shall lie down with him in the dust (Job 20:11). Happy would he be if they should lie down with him there and never rise again. But God has said that He "shall bring every work into judgment, with every secret thing" (Eccl 12:14). Nothing can be hid from the omniscient Judge. Nor is He capable of forgetting the least insult that the impenitent sinner ever offered to His glorious majesty. As God is true and cannot lie, the finally impentitent sinner shall spend all eternity, in "the lake which burneth with fire and brimstone." "The smoke of his torment, shall ascend up for ever and ever." If there is any meaning in words, if any idea of eternal torments can be conveyed by human language, then the wicked "shall go away into everlasting punishment" (Matt 25:46). "Consider this, ye that forget God, lest he tear you in pieces, and there be none to deliver" (Psa 50:22).
5. To repent of sin is indispensably requisite because God's determination to execute upon impenitent sinners the awful sentence of His violated law is highly just and reasonable.
Every sin, because it is committed against the infinite Majesty of heaven, is objectively an infinite evil. But an infinite moral evil justly deserves an infinite natural evil, or in other words, an infinite punishment. And as a finite creature is incapable of suffering an infinite punishment, except in an infinite, or which is the same, an eternal duration, it is just, it is reasonable that the punishment of the finally impenitent should be eternal. God's resolution then to execute this most dreadful punishment upon such a sinner is most equitable and reasonable. Besides, every sinner who persists in impenitence excuses himself, and by excusing himself, he condemns God. "Wilt thou," said the Lord to Job, "disannul my judgment? Wilt thou condemn me, that thou mayest be righteous" (Job 40:8). Why does the sinner transgress the law of God, if he does not account it too strict? Does he say that he has not transgressed it deliberately, but only through inadvertence? Then why does he not repent? His vindication of his continuance in sin implies at once an unjust censure of the law of God, as incompatible with his happiness, and an injurious censure of the justice of God in condemning sinners to eternal punishment. Now, should the Lord save the sinner who thus persists in condemning Him, He would seem to plead guilty to the charge. Every hope which a sinner cherishes of salvation in impenitence proceeds on the blasphemous supposition that God, in order to favour an impenitent rebel, will consent to His own dishonour. Except a sinner then in the exercise of true repentance be disposed from his heart to say with Daniel, "O Lord, righteousness belongeth unto thee; but unto us confusion of faces... because we have sinned against thee" (Dan 9:7), he must become a sacrifice to the injured honour of the law and the justice of God. Nothing can be more equitable, nothing more reasonable.
6. True repentance is needful as an evidence of saving and justifying faith in the heart.
The exercise of evangelical repentance is one of the fruits, and therefore one of the evidences, of that faith which purifies the heart, and works by love. Although the principle of faith and the principle of repentance are in the moment of regeneration implanted in the soul together and at once, yet the exercise of faith in the order of nature, goes before the exercise of true repentance. "They shall look upon me whom they have pierced, and they shall mourn for him" (Zech 12:10). It is true, none begins to exercise saving faith, but a penitent sinner; that is, one who has the principle of true repentance, as well as that of saving faith, in his heart. Still, however, the exercise of faith, which is a cordial trust in redeeming mercy, precedes the exercise of that repentance which is spiritual and acceptable to God through Jesus Christ. The latter is one of the native fruits and evidences of the former; and therefore it is necessary as such. The exercise of true repentance always follows the acting of true faith.
7. Evangelical repentance is necessary also as a means of attaining a comfortable sense of judicial pardon of sin, and as an evidence of having received it.
Saving faith, from which all true repentance proceeds, completes in its first exercise our union with Christ, in whom we cannot but be justified. Although the first exercise of true repentance, then, is not in order of nature prior to the pardon of sin in justification, yet that exercise is indispensably requisite to the comfortable sense of this pardon. It is necessary also as an evidence of a man's having received this forgiveness of sin. If he is not exercising evangelical repentance, his pretensions to faith and to justification by faith are vain. He can have no true sense, no real intimation of the forgiveness of his sins; nor can he have any sure evidence of his being in a state of justification. "I will sprinkle clean water upon you, and ye shall be clean: from all your filthiness, and from all your idols, will I cleanse you" (Ezek 36:25). "That thou mayest remember, and be confounded, and never open thy mouth any more because of thy shame, when I am pacified toward thee for all that thou hast done, saith the Lord God" (Ezek 16:63).
8. The exercise of true repentance is indispensably requisite in order to receive God's paternal pardon, and so to be delivered from His chastisement for sin.
By paternal pardon is not meant that forgiveness of all sin which forms a part of justification, but that fatherly pardon which consists in a believer's deliverance from the guilt which he is daily contracting, by sinning against God as his God and Father, namely, the guilt which renders him liable to the painful effects of paternal displeasure. Now, the frequent exercise of true repentance, as well as of faith, is necessary to his reception of this pardon; and therefore, it must precede his reception of it. As the believer is, by his sins of infirmity, daily contracting this guilt, so the daily exercise of faith and repentance, is necessary to the daily removal of it. For although faith and repentance do not give the smallest title to deliverance from this guilt; yet the frequent exercise of them is a necessary means of that deliverance. If the true Christian does not exercise them daily, he suffers this guilt to accumulate upon him; which will expose him to some of the dreadful effects of paternal displeasure. Accordingly, the Lord gave this invitation to His ancient people: "Return, thou backsliding Israel, saith the Lord, and I will not cause mine anger to fall upon you; for I am merciful, saith the Lord, and I will not keep anger for ever. Only acknowledge thine iniquity, that thou hast transgressed against the Lord thy God" (Jer 3:12,13). The apostle John also says, "If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins, and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness" (1 John 1:9).
9. The exercise of true repentance is necessary, in token of gratitude for the spiritual blessings and temporal good things bestowed on believers.
All blessings whether spiritual or temporal, have been forfeited by sin, and yet the Lord daily loads His people with benefits. These mercies and the gracious manner of conferring them, are strong ties and powerful inducements to the daily exercise of evangelical repentance. "Despisest thou," says the apostle, "the riches of his goodness and forbearance and longsuffering; not knowing that the goodness of God leadeth thee to repentance?" (Rom 2:4). The multiplied favours which God vouchsafes to the unregenerate, and those especially which He daily confers on believers, tend to melt their hearts into ingenuous sorrow and contrition for their innumerable sins against Him, and by His grace to constrain them, to turn to love and obedience. All true believers are grateful to the Lord for the gifts of His bounty, and above all, for the blessings of His grace; and in proportion as they are so, they are impelled to the exercise of that repentance which arises from faith working by love.
10. Such repentance is indispensably requisite for it is an essential part of that great salvation, which the Lord Jesus has bought and dispenses to His people.
Instead of being a condition upon which salvation is suspended it is a part of salvation; of that whole salvation, which is bestowed as an absolutely free gift on sinners infinitely unworthy of it. It is an essential ingredient in that everlasting salvation with which Israel shall be saved in the Lord Jesus; and at the same time an appointed means of bringing that salvation to perfection. It is a necessary part of true holiness in its commencement and progress in the soul, and a necessary mean of attaining its consummation. Hence it is called "repentance to salvation not to be repented of" (2 Cor 7:10), and "repentance unto life" (Acts 11:18). Without it as a part of salvation from the power and practice of sin, or as a branch of evangelical holiness, no man shall see the Lord (Heb 12:14). According to the Westminster Larger Catechism it is included in sanctification (Question 75). Indeed it is absolutely impossible for adult persons ever to die to sin in sanctification without a true sense of sin, godly sorrow for it, hatred of it, and self-loathing because of it. Equally impossible is it for them to live to righteousness otherwise than by turning sincerely from the love and practice of all iniquity to the love and practice of universal holiness. Without the exercise of true repentance, then, a man can have no sure evidence, either of regeneration or of sanctification. All who are sanctified exercise evangelical repentance daily in proportion to the degree of their sanctification. And they exercise it, not that it may give them the smallest title to salvation, but that, being itself a part of salvation, it may be an evidence to their consciences that their salvation is begun and gradually advancing. So much for the necessity of evangelical repentance.
From what has now been stated it is plain that impenitence under the gospel is absolutely inexcusable. It cannot admit the smallest shadow of excuse. If the works of creation and the dispensations of providence to mankind in general are sufficient to leave the very heathens without excuse (Rom 1:20), how much more shall the calls and warnings, not only of creation and providence, but of the express Word of God render sinners who hear the Gospel inexcusable if they repent not! Sinner, whatever expedients you may employ for preserving the life of your lusts, and for keeping yourself from the unpleasant exercise of repentance, they will be but figleaf-coverings before the omniscient and righteous Judge of the world. If you say, "I am not able to repent," this will be no excuse; for true repentance is a part of salvation, offered and promised in the Gospel, and the offer and promise are directed to you (1 John 5:11; Pro 1:23; Acts 2:38,39). If you say, "I cannot believe those offers and promises with application to myself," neither will this be accepted as an excuse, for the offer and promise of faith to believe them are also addressed to you (Rev 22:17; Matt 12:21; Heb 4:1). Trust in Christ Jesus then, upon the ground of the offer, for the grace of true repentance; and in the faith of the promise, attempt frequently the exercise of it.
Does my reader say, "I see, at least in my own case, no need of repentance?" Ah! you seem to be one of that generation "that are pure in their own eyes, and yet is not washed from their filthiness" (Prov 30:12). You deny your crimes, instead of bewailing and confessing them, saying, "I have done no wickedness" (Prov 30:20). If you had but once, and that in the smallest instance, failed to yield perfect obedience to the holy law of God you could not but need repentance. It would be your duty, and without it your salvation would be impossible. How needful then must repentance be for you whose iniquities are in number more than the hairs of your head! I do not imagine that it is only those whose abominations are exposed to every eye that need repentance. It may be you have been restrained from doing things which are accounted base in the sight of men; and possibly, you so overrate the external regularity of your conduct as to suppose that you have no cause for godly sorrow or self-loathing, and that you are injured much by being called to the exercise of true repentance. Or perhaps self-pleasing thoughts of your own supposed rectitude hold such firm possession of your mind that you cannot believe it to be proper for one of your fair character to feel shame and sorrow for his sins, or to seek for such a change of heart as is requisite to the exercise of true repentance. But consider, I intreat you, that a charge of great and aggravated disobedience stands in full force against you. The Scripture has concluded all under sin, and you in particular. True repentance, therefore, is as needful for you as if your iniquities were open and glaring. It is as necessary for you as it was for the self-righteous Pharisee in the parable (Luke 18:11,12).
You are a sinner, and therefore, except you repent, you shall perish. The sinner who lives and dies impenitent shall surely be punished with everlasting destruction. Though signal judgments of a temporal nature do not pursue every impenitent sinner, yet eternal punishment will. Let him be who he will, if he is a sinner, he must either repent or perish. Be he a greater or a lesser sinner, he must be a penitent sinner, else it had been good for him if he had never been born. Either his sin or his soul must yield. Either he must turn from all iniquity or burn through all eternity in the fire of God's fierce indignation. He has it from the mouth of the Saviour Himself, in most plain and peremptory terms that except he repent, he shall perish (Luke 13:3,5). Heaven and earth shall pass away, but His words shall not pass away. The finally impenitent sinner, then, shall certainly continue through all eternity in the lake that burns with fire and brimstone.
The Lord has established as sure a connection between true repentance and life eternal, as between impenitence and eternal death. This is His gracious invitation to sinners, "Repent, and turn from all your transgressions; so iniquity shall not be your ruin" (Ezek 18:30). All denunciations of Divine wrath are summonses to repent; and they have always this clause implied in them, "Except ye repent." It is not falling occasionally into sins of infirmity, but continuing impenitent in sin, that ruins multitudes to whom the Gospel is preached (John 3:19). God in Christ is now on a throne of mercy. He stretches out His golden sceptre of peace and invites the chief of sinners to come near and touch it. And should not the revelation of mercy, and the offer of an indemnity, touch the heart of rebels and constrain them to relent? Should not bowels of mercy, and offers of pardon draw them? If they cordially believe, and by faith receive out of the fulness of Christ the grace of evangelical repentance, they shall certainly be saved. No true penitents shall go to hell. Heaven will be the place of their eternal abode. They who turn from all their iniquities, and return to God now, shall for ever be with Him in His holy place on high.\
Are all unregenerate sinners commanded to repent? It is then the law as a covenant of works, or as the law of creation, under which they are, that requires true repentance, from them. It is true that the law in its federal form knows no place for repentance and makes no provision for exercising it acceptably. It contains no promise of strength with which it may be exercised. But as, supposing the revelation and offer of a Saviour in the Gospel, the law as a covenant obliges sinners to believe in him; so, supposing the descendants of Adam to have sinned, the same law obliges them to repent or turn to the Lord (It requires them to repent or return to God; but not to seek life by their repentance). The law as a covenant indeed does not expressly and absolutely call for true repentance; yet hypothetically and virtually it calls for it. It commands all unregenerate sinners to repent; and as a rule of duty, it enjoins all true believers to renew the exercise of repentance. The repentance of a believer is called evangelical repentance because it flows from faith in Jesus Christ as offered in the Gospel, and because it is exercised under the influence of the covenant of grace, and according to the law as a rule of life.
What has been stated requires me to exhort the unregenerate sinner speedily to repent. You have sinned against the Lord, times and ways innumerable. O repent then, and turn from all your iniquities to Him. Repent without delay. To-day, whilst you hear His voice, harden not your heart. Persist no longer, go on no further in your impenitence. One step more may set you beyond a probability of ever returning to the Lord (Luke 14:24). If you delay but an hour longer, the great and terrible God whom you presume to insult by your continuance in sin may lay you under judicial strokes, and swear in His wrath that you shall never enter into His rest (Prov 29:1). If you put God off to-day, He may put you off to-morrow. God has promised everlasting salvation to the penitent; but he has not promised so much as tomorrow to the negligent. If you fail to improve the present hour of grace, He may refuse to favour you with another. If you turn off His hand of mercy to-day, His hand of avenging justice may seize you before to-morrow. You have no absolute certainty of enjoying even the shortest time to come. Consider, O secure sinner, that your innumerable provocations must be viewed, either with tears of penitential sorrow, or in endless torments. If you have committed but a single sin, and die without evangelical repentance, your precious soul is lost for ever. O attempt, before it be too late, the exercise of true repentance. Attempt it in the way of trusting in the Lord Jesus for righteousness and strength. Look unto Him, and be saved from your inability to repent.
To enforce this exhortation, consider seriously what sin is, and what punishment it deserves. Consider also the command of God, which obliges you, and His multiplied mercies bestowed on you, which bind you in point of gratitude to repent. Remember that you must die, you know not how soon. Your death is certain, and true repentance is necessary that you may die well. Consider the judgment seat of Christ, before which you must appear. There your state for eternity shall be determined according to your deeds done in the body. Knowing then the terror of the Lord, be persuaded to repent. "God shall bring every work into judgment, with every secret thing, whether it be good, or whether it be evil" (Eccl 12:14). Your aggravated sins may drop out of your memory, but none of them can be erased from the book of God's remembrance (Hos 13:12). Think on the wrong which you have done to God by your great transgressions. You have wronged Him by acting in opposition to His nature and His will, by despising His dear Son, by grieving His Holy Spirit, and by trampling on the Divine authority of His holy law.
Consider seriously the dreadful sufferings of the Lamb of God, and see how loudly they call upon you to repent. How tremendous must be that indignation of God against sin, which is written with the blood of His dear Son shed for the remission of the sins of many! Will you continue any longer in sin, when such dreadful indignation against it appears? How terrible did sin appear on Calvary, where the inexorable justice of God seized and pierced His dearly beloved Son with the sword of infinite vengeance! There our adorable Surety was set up as a mark for the arrows of Divine indignation. Amazing spectacle! The infinite darling of the Father enduring the awful fierceness of His infinite wrath! Do you ask, What was the cause of this? It was the iniquities of the elect imputed to Him. O will you not then abhor and forsake sin? When the Lord Jesus, was enduring the infinite punishment due for sin, the earth quaked, the rocks rent, the graves were opened, and the sun was darkened; and will you remain unmoved, and impenitent? Behold, how He loved you! He so loved you as with infinite willingness to lay down His life for you. And will you not so love Him, as to hate and bewail, and forsake your sins for Him? O pray that His great love in dying for you may constrain you to die to sin.
Is true repentance so necessary, as has been shown? It is inexpressibly dangerous, then, to delay it even for a moment. To delay repentance is infinitely perilous; for the present moment may be your last. Your continuance in sin is a re-acting of all your former crimes, with new aggravations. It strengthens the corruption of your nature, hardens your heart, and so renders evangelical repentance the more difficult. It provokes the Lord to deny you grace to repent. During four thousand years, Scripture records but a single instance of true repentance in dying moments. Consider that the longer you continue impenitent, the more is spiritual death advancing upon you. Every sin alienates you more from the life of God, and removes you a step further from Him. And in what can this terminate but in eternal separation from Him? A state of sin is a state of wrath, in which destruction compasses a man about on every side. "He that believeth not the Son shall not see life; but the wrath of God abideth on him" (John 3:36). To have remained in Sodom on the day in which it was to be consumed would have been dangerous; but to remain a moment longer in the state of wrath is much more perilous. Who would not leave without delay the house that is already on fire? And will you venture to remain another hour in the state of impenitence? Whilst you continue in this inexpressibly dreadful state, there is but a step between you and eternal death. All the security that you have in this condition is but the brittle thread of life, which may be broken by the slightest touch; and then your precious soul shall drop into the place of unutterable and endless torment. "The wicked shall be turned into hell" (Psa 9:17).
The least postponement of true repentance is a risking of eternal happiness or misery on the continuance of a life which may in a moment be taken from you, truly a self-destructive course. It is directly contrary to the calls of the Gospel, which are not for tomorrow but for today. "Today, if ye will hear his voice, harden not your hearts" (Heb 3:7,8). The calls of the Gospel to faith and repentance require immediate compliance. They do not allow you time to deliberate whether you will believe and repent or not. To delay compliance is to refuse it; and to refuse it is inexpressibly dangerous. "Behold, now is the accepted time; behold, now is the day of salvation" (2 Cor 3:2).
How lamentable is the condition of that sinner who delays true repentance! Ah! sinner, you are under a spiritual distemper of the most inveterate kind, and are in imminent danger of eternal death. The compassionate Physician comes to you , offers you an effectual remedy, and intreats you to receive it. You do not peremptorily refuse; but you delay. In the meantime your disease is increasing, and eternal death is advancing with sure steps. "Your judgment lingereth not, and your damnation slumbereth not." Yet you still delay. Ah, deep infatuation! Ah, destructive madness! Tears of blood are not sufficient to bewail it. Poor slothful sinner! You do not consider the amiable excellence of Christ, the value of your immortal soul, the worth of precious time, the weight of infinite and endless wrath, nor how very near your destruction may be. Destruction is ready at your side. You are exposed to the most dreadful surprise. And oh, how horrible, how overwhelming must it be to be past hope, before you begin to fear!-never to awake from your sinful security till you begin to lift up your despairing eyes in torment! Alas! you do not consider how utterly unable you are to ward off the impending, the fatal blow. Can you, a worm of the dust, stand before the omnipotent Jehovah, whose vengeance is intolerable, whose indignation will burn to the lowest hell, and whose patience may wear out, ere you awake from your lethargy? "Can thine heart endure, or can thine hands be strong, in the days that I shall deal with thee? I the Lord have spoken it, and will do it" (Ezek 22:14). Ah! you do not consider that if patience retire from the field, avenging justice will succeed in its room; and then, you security shall issue in unutterable and eternal torment. Ah! the folly, the sinfulness, the danger, of delaying repentance toward God!
What has been said, respecting the necessity of evangelical repentance administers reproof to those believers who suffer themselves on any pretence to delay the renewed exercise of it. As spiritual sloth remains in a great measure in believers, so it is productive of delays. When their graces are not in exercise, and communion with God in their duties is not enjoyed, sloth so prevails in them as to make them put off from time to time, the direct exercise of faith and repentance (Song 5:2,3). Often do they resolve to try the state of their souls and to search what evidences of union with Christ they have, but still the sluggish heart draws back and the solemn trial is delayed. Sometimes the believer delays resolutely to forsake some secret idol that mars his communion with God. Again and again he resolves to renounce and mortify it, but he delays from one time to another to execute his purpose (Psa 66:18). And thus he suffers it to lie as a corroding worm at the root of his fruitfulness and comfort. He delays also some particular duty which he is persuaded the Lord calls him to perform. He often resolves to attempt it, but still one thing or another interposes, and the performance of it is put off till a more convenient time.
In a word, he is convinced that it is far from being an easy thing to die well. He resolves therefore through grace to labour to attain actual preparation for that solemn event. But like the foolish virgins, who, while the bridegroom tarried, all slumbered and slept (Matt 25:5), he delays till some future opportunity the all-important work. Now to such a dilatory Christian I must say, "What meanest thou, O sleeper? arise, call upon thy God, if so be that God will think upon you that you perish not" (Jonah 1:6). The longer you delay, do you not find yourself the farther from your purpose? Does not your backwardness to spiritual exercise increase upon you the more? Is not that the way to come to poverty? Shall not the idle soul suffer hunger? Have not you sometimes awaked like Samson, and found your spiritual strength gone when you had most occasion for it? May not opportunities of doing good soon be taken from you, or you from them? And will not the work of actual preparation for death be the harder, the longer it is delayed? When death is approaching, you shall have less ability, greater opposition, and yet more work to do, than otherwise you should have. Are not you then much to be blamed for deferring any of your duties, and especially the frequent exercise of faith and repentance?
It administers reproof also to the unregenerate sinner who delays repentance. How much are you, O secure sinner, to be blamed for deferring work so necessary as that of repentance to salvation! You are under the dreadful curse of the violated law. The wrath of that great and terrible God, whom you have times without number insulted, abides on you. The wrath to come is ready to seize and overwhelm you and yet you delay repentance. You continue still in the love and practice of sin. "How long wilt thou sleep, O sluggard? When wilt thou arise out of thy sleep?" Your answer apparently will be, "Yet a little sleep, a little slumber, a little folding of the hands to sleep" (Prov 6:9,10). But why do you sleep securely in impenitence, when you know not what a day may bring forth? Why do you not begin without the least delay to prepare by true repentance for happy eternity?
It may be you resolve to repent when you shall have more leisure than now, or when you shall be old. But how can you be certain that you shall attain old age? Is it not as likely that the Lord, whose wrath you are continuing to provoke, may say, "Thou fool, this night thy soul shall be required of thee" (Luke 12:20). The time of your life is but as a day-a short day-and you have much work to do. A great part of your day is past already; and will you sleep on, till the night come when no man can work? Will you thus risk the salvation of your immortal soul upon an absolute uncertainty? Is it old age, the very dregs of your time, that you resolve to devote to God? But ah! what certainty can you have that an infinitely holy God will accept these at your hand? "If ye offer the blind for sacrifice, is it not evil? and if ye offer the lame and sick, is it not evil? offer it now unto thy governor; will he be pleased with thee, or accept thy person? saith the Lord of hosts" (Mal 1:8). Suppose you should be spared till you become old; there are few, very few, who get grace to repent acceptably when they grow old. Some indeed, as is represented in one of our Lord's parables, were called effectually at the eleventh hour (Matt 20:6). But these were not the same persons that were standing idle either at the third, or sixth, or ninth hour. Be not emboldened then to delay true repentance, because some were called at the eleventh hour.
If men, from their earliest years, live under a pure dispensation of the gospel, and yet spend their best days in the love and service of sin, it is God's usual way to leave them, when they are old, under blindness of mind and hardness of heart. "His bones are full of the sin of his youth, which shall lie down with him in the dust" (Job 20:11). The Lord may, indeed, in the case of few individuals, depart from the usual tenor of his procedure. But ah! it is a desperate adventure for a sinner to presume upon this. I intreat you, then, to trust without delay in the great Redeemer for grace to repent; and in the faith of pardoning mercy, as well as of renovating grace, resolutely to attempt the exercise of it. O delay it not a moment longer lest you sleep the sleep of death, of eternal death. "Evil pursueth sinners." If it overtake you in unbelief and impenitence, the smoke of your torment shall ascend up for ever and ever (Rev 14:11). The Father of mercies, the God of all grace, who hath spared you till now, with infinite compassion still invites you; and the Lord Jesus stands with open arms ready to embrace you. He complains that you will not come to Him, that you may have life; affirms with an oath, that He hath no pleasure in the death of a sinner; and with the tenderest compassion adds, "Turn ye, turn ye, why will ye die?" O! do not disregard such admonitions, such compassions, such invitations, such expostulations; but upon the warrant of the Gospel-offer, trust in the Lord Jesus for that repentance to salvation, and that forgiveness of sins, which He is exalted to give to all who cordially trust in Him (Acts 5:31).
The following directions how to attain evangelical repentance I would now offer to the impenitent sinner.
1. Look upon it as the gift of Christ, and trust that your iniquities were laid on Him, and that He was pierced for them (Zech 12:10). Trust also in Him for true repentance, and in God through Him, for pardoning mercy and renewing grace. You should attempt believing, in order to the exercise of evangelical repentance, and should rely on the grace of God in Christ for the renovating influences of His Holy Spirit.
2. Choose God in Christ for your covenant-God and portion, and then you will be both disposed and encouraged to return to Him. To return to God as the Lord your God is the essence of evangelical repentance.
3. Be frequent and importunate in prayer to Him for the gift of true repentance, saying with Ephraim, "Turn thou me, and I shall be turned; for thou art the Lord my God" (Jer 31:18). Pray in faith for the performance of this absolute promise to you; "A new heart will I give you, and a new spirit will I put within you; and I will give you an heart of flesh" (Ezek 36:26).
4. Endeavour to see sin in its own hateful colours, to see what an evil and bitter thing it is (Jer 2:19). To see the sin of your heart and life in its exceeding sinfulness and odiousness would be a means of making you flee from it with deep abhorrence. And if you would discern spiritually the hateful deformity of sin, consider the infinite majesty and holiness of God which are insulted by sin, the good things which impenitent continuance in sin deprives you of, the dreadful evils to which it exposes you, the infinite wrath of God which awaits you if you live and die impenitent, and the infinite obligation under which you lie to keep all His commandments.
5. Study to see and to be suitably affected with the deep depravity or sin of your nature, as well as with the innumerable transgressions of your life; and call yourself every day to a strict account for your sins of omission and commission on that day; and that, in order to see what great reason you have to repent of them.
6. Meditate frequently and attentively on the awful anguish, and astonishing death of the Lord Jesus, that you may see the exceeding sinfulness of sin, and the everlasting punishment which the sinner deserves.
7. Dwell much on the thoughts of death and of judgment to come. Consider seriously how uncertain is the continuance of your life in this world. Be assured that if death surprise you in unbelief and impenitence, you are for ever undone. Think also of the awful tribunal of that righteous and inexorable Judge, whose eyes are as a flame of fire, before which you must appear; where every finally impenitent sinner shall, according to the demerits of his deeds done in the body, be sentenced to everlasting punishment. O! how tremendous, how overwhelming will be the sentence pronounced on the impenitent: "Depart from me, ye cursed, into everlasting fire, prepared for the devil and his angels" (Matt 25:41)! O consider this, and by faith and repentance flee speedily from the wrath to come.