In the first place, I am to consider the sources or springs of true repentance.

1. The exercise of true or evangelical repentance flows from the work of the Holy Spirit in regeneration and sanctification.

God has exalted Christ "with his right hand to be a Prince and a Saviour, for to give repentance to Israel, and forgiveness of sins" (Acts 5:31). The Holy Spirit, as the Spirit of Christ, implants the principle of it in the heart in regeneration and converts this principle into a habit in sanctification. True repentance is not the work of nature but of grace; not of a man's own spirit but of the Spirit of Christ. As it is the office of the Mediator to give repentance, so He gives it to his elect by performing these promises to them: "I will take away the stony heart out of your flesh, and I will give you an heart of flesh" (Ezek 36:26); "I will pour upon the house of David, and upon the inhabitants of Jerusalem, the spirit of grace and of supplications: and they shall look upon me whom they have pierced, and they shall mourn for him" (Zech 12:10). True repentance, which is an evangelical contrition of heart and a fixed resolution of spirit to turn from all sin to God, is wrought in the soul by the Spirit of Christ. The Spirit being given without measure to Christ, He, in the day of His power, communicates the same Spirit to His elect, who by His almighty operation breaks their hearts from and for sin, and converts them from sin to holiness. This is the primary source from which spring a true penitent's views of the malignity of sin, and his feelings of regret for it. They all result from the gracious influences of the Holy Spirit. It is His peculiar province as the Convincer of sin and misery, and the gracious Comforter to implant in the soul that holy principle, and to excite and regulate all its exercise. In producing and strengthening the habit, and in directing the exercise of this grace, the Holy Spirit commonly employs His blessed Word. He makes use of His law to break the hard heart, and of His Gospel as a fire to melt it into godly sorrow for sin. "Is not my word like as a fire? saith the Lord; and like a hammer that breaketh the rock in pieces?" (Jer 23:29). Thus, the awakened sinner is on the one hand driven by the law, and on the other kindly drawn by the Gospel to the exercise of sincere repentance.

2. Meditation on or consideration of such subjects as tend by the Holy Spirit to produce and increase in the heart evangelical repentance is one of the springs of it.

Multitudes remain impenitent for want of consideration. The Lord says, "I hearkened and heard, but they spake not aright: no man repented him of his wickedness, saying, What have I done?" (Jer 8:6). Impenitence is in a great degree the effect of the extenuating notion of the exceeding sinfulness of sin. Repentance, therefore, must spring from a deep consideration and a true sense of its infinite malignity and demerit. It flows from deep and affecting meditation on the majesty and glory, the holiness and justice, the authority and law, the threatenings and judgments of God, and on His just severity against the angels who sinned, against Adam and all his posterity, against Sodom and Gomorrah, the nations of Canaan, and the Jews, in the final destruction of their city and temple, and in the continued dispersion of their nation. These awful examples of His inexorable justice and tremendous fury show us what is His judgment of the exceeding sinfulness of sin, and of the dreadful punishment which awaits the impenitent sinner. And they are left on record that they may direct us to judge of the sin of our nature and of the transgressions of our life, as God judges. And we may be sure "that the judgment of God is according to truth" (Rom 2:2).

The exercise of true repentance flows in an eminent degree from a deep and affecting meditation on the doleful anguish and amazing death of the Lord Jesus, our adorable Surety. When we seriously consider who He was, for whom He suffered, and what He endured, we cannot but perceive God's infinite and irreconcilable abhorrence of all iniquity. Here we see that, rather than leave sin unpunished, or permit angels and men to be ignorant of His infinite detestation of that abominable thing, He would deliver up His only begotten Son, in whom His soul delighted, to the most direful anguish, agony, and death. Here we perceive that the fiery indignation of God against sin does not proceed from the smallest defect of love to sinners as His creatures, but from that infinite abhorrence of sin, which arises from a full view of its infinite malignity, and contrariety to the holiness of His nature and law. It is, then, from spiritual and heart-affecting views of the Lamb of God bearing our sins and carrying our sorrows that the exercise of evangelical repentance immediately flows. We behold in the glass of the holy and righteous law, and especially in that of the Redeemer's unparelleled sufferings, what an evil thing and bitter sin is (Jer 2:19). It is not only their love of sin, but their false apprehensions of the evil and demerit of it that make sinners persist in cleaving to it. Were they to contemplate, under the enlightening influences of the Holy Spirit, the infinite malignity and desert of the sin of their nature, and of the aggravated transgressions of their life, they would flee from them with horror. Were convinced sinners but to consider seriously the heinousness of their innumerable sins, the afflictions and warnings, the counsels and reproofs, the mercies and deliverances, the light and knowledge, the obligations and vows, against which they have sinned, their eye would affect their heart, and their repentings would be kindled together (Hosea 11:8).

3. The exercise of evangelical repentance springs from a true sense of sin.

A genuine sense of sin consists of an affecting sight, and a painful feeling, not only of the hurtfulness and danger, but also of the deformity and hatefulness of sin (Ezek 36:31). When the Holy Spirit strikes home the doctrine of the law upon the conscience, the consequence is that the sinner is instructed, and then he smites upon his thigh (Jer 31:19). A true sense of sin includes an affecting sight or discernment of it by the enlightened mind. "My sin," says the Psalmist, "is ever before me" (51:3). No sooner are the eyes of a sinner's understanding opened than he begins to see the exceeding sinfulness of sin in his heart and life. He sees his innumerable provocations, and discerns that malignity in sin which he never saw before. He sees, and is deeply affected with the sight of his great transgressions against an infinitely holy and gracious God. The holy law as a looking-glass is held before his eyes, and he therein discerns his pollution and deformity. And now that he has begun to see, he searches every corner of his heart, and every period of his life, which were before neglected as the sluggard's garden, and multitudes of secret abominations are set in the light. His mouth is stopped, and his sins at length have found him out (Num 32:23). A true sense of sin also includes such a consciousness or conviction, as is a painful feeling of it. Now that the sinner is spiritually alive he has not only spiritual sight, but spiritual feeling. He begins to feel the sores of his diseased nature. The sin which sat lightly on him before becomes now a burden too heavy for him (Psa 38:4). It is such a burden on his spirits, as sinks them; on his head, as it is impossible for him to discharge; and on his back, as bows it down. "I am bowed down greatly," says the Psalmist, "I go mourning all the day long" (38:6). Accordingly, when the awakened sinner is coming to Christ, he is described as one who has a heavy burden upon him (Matt 11:28). "Take with you words, and turn to the Lord: say unto him, Take away all iniquity"- Hebrew : "Lift off all iniquity as a burden" (Hosea 14:2).

A true sense of sin is an affecting sight and feeling, especially of the exceeding sinfulness or malignity of sin. It is a sense not only of our evil doings but of the evil of our doings; not only of our sin but of the exceeding sinfulness of our sin; and not merely of things which are in themselves sinful but of the iniquity even of our holy things. The true penitent has a deep and affecting sense of the evil that cleaves even to his best performances (Isa 64:6). Of all evils, he concludes that sin is the greatest, and of all sinners, he often thinks that he himself is the chief. He sees and feels that the innumerable evils which compass him about are the weightiest of burdens, the heaviest of debts, the foulest of stains, and the worst of enemies. He has a true sense of the evil of sin in reference to himself (Rom 6:21), and of the evil of it with respect to God. He sees that it is the very opposite of the infinitely holy and amiable nature of God in Christ (Hab 1:13). The true penitent loves God supremely, and therefore his sins are a heavy burden to him. He loathes himself because he has walked contrary to the holy Lord God, and thereby insulted, reproached, and provoked Him (Lam 5:16). He sees also that sin is contrary to that law of God which is holy, to that commandment which "is holy, and just, and good" (Rom 7:12). Discerning the perfect equity and purity of God's law, the penitent sees the great evil of every transgression of it (1 John 3:4). He sees the sinfulness of sin likewise, with respect to Jesus Christ. He has an affecting discovery of it as the procuring cause of the unparalleled sufferings of his Redeemer (Zech 12:10). The doleful anguish and excruciating death of the Lamb of God are comments on the evil and demerit of sin, which the penitent reads with deep attention. The dying agonies and groans of that Saviour who loved him and gave Himself for him rend his heart, and afford him the most affecting view of the evil of sin. Hence, he has such a true sense of the sinfulness of his sin, as is an abiding source of evangelical repentance.

4. A spiritual apprehension of the pardoning mercy of God in Christ is one of the springs of true repentance.

Without the exercise of saving faith, or the apprehension of the mercy of God in Christ, there may be a sense of sin but not a true sense: there may be a sense of sin as hurtful to the sinner himself (Gen 4:13), but not a sense of it as hateful to an holy God (Hab 1:13). To apprehend the mercy of God in Christ, is to exercise the faith of His pardoning mercy. It is to rely by faith on the surety-righteousness of Jesus Christ for a right to pardon and acceptance as righteous in the sight of God, and to trust in His redeeming mercy. Accordingly the Psalmist says, "I have trusted in thy mercy" (Psa 13:5). And, again, "I trust in the mercy of God for ever and ever" (Psa 52:8). Such a knowledge of sin as is produced only by the law may result in slavish fear and worldly sorrow but it is the faith of redeeming mercy alone, as revealed and offered in the Gospel, that paints iniquity in such hateful colours as to make the penitent ashamed and confounded. A deep sense of sin, indeed, may proceed from the faith of the law, but a true sense of it must arise from the faith both of the law and of the Gospel. The faith of redeeming mercy is a spring of true repentance, and that by which the exercise of it is influenced and regulated. Though the graces of faith and repentance are, in respect of time, implanted together and at once; yet in order of nature, the acting of faith goes before the exercise of true repentance. The sinner then must cordially believe or trust in Christ for pardon, in order to exercise evangelical mourning for sin, and turning from it unto God. True repentance is very pleasing to God, "but without faith it is impossible to please him" (Heb 11:6). To trust firmly in the Lord Jesus, both for pardon and purification, is that which, under the sanctifying influences of the Holy Spirit, will be most effectual to melt down the heart into repentance. It is when sin is contemplated by the believer as a base and criminal outrage against the Father of mercies, and his own God and Father, that a sense of the malignity of it is deeply impressed on his heart. And it is this affecting persuasion that, by his innumerable sins, he in particular pierced the dear Redeemer; or, that the Redeemer was wounded for his transgressions, and bruised for his iniquities-it is this, I say, that melts his heart into godly sorrow and penitential mourning for his aggravated crimes (Zech 12:10). It is evident then that the exercise of true repentance flows from the acting of unfeigned faith in a crucified Redeemer, and in the mercy of God through Him, and that, in proportion as the acting of faith is frequent and lively, the exercise of repentance will be deep and spiritual.

These things, though they do not merit evangelical repentance, yet are the springs from which the exercise of it flows.

Is a true sense of sin one of the springs of evangelical repentance? Then it is manifest that the unconvinced sinner is not only an impenitent, but an unregenerate sinner. Reader, if ever the Holy Spirit has regenerated you, He has given you a spiritual sight and painful feeling of the sin of your nature and of the transgressions of your life. He has brought home to your conscience the precept and penalty of the Divine law as a broken covenant. The consequence has undoubtedly been that you have been truly convinced, not only of your sin, but of the malignity of your sin; not only of your evil doings, but of the evil of your doings; not merely of doings which are in themselves sinful, but of the iniquity even of your holy things; and not only of their desert of punishment, but of everlasting punishment. If you never had in any degree this sense of sin, you have never exercised true repentance. Perhaps you have been trying to wash away your sins with the tears of a legal repentance, but without this sense of sin you have not exercised that repentance which is the consequence of having washed them away in the blood of the Lamb.

Hence also it is plain that legal convictions of sin, and legal terrors of conscience, are not true repentance. They are sometimes introductory to the exercise of it, but they form no part of that exercise. These are but like unripe fruits. They must be ripened by the warm sun of Gospel-influence, before he who has them can exercise in the smallest degree evangelical repentance. Or rather, they may be compared to the blossoms which appear before, and differ in kind from the fruit. They often fall off, or go up as dust, and no fruit of true repentance follows. The first fruits of the second death are, alas! often mistaken by many for the pangs of the second birth. And therefore, if the reader has ever had them, he should examine well whether he has experienced a deliverance out of them; if his soul has renounced itself for justification and for sanctification; if he has come to the Lord Jesus Christ and Him only, both for justifying righteousness, and for sanctifying grace (Isa 45:24); and if his heart has been melted and grieved for his innumerable sins, because they have been committed against God in Christ, as a gracious God and Father (Jer 31:18). This is the harbour at which they arrive, who come rightly out of those frightful depths. But alas! many plunge to and fro in them for a time, and land again on the same side at which they went in.

Does the exercise of evangelical repentance spring from the faith of pardoning mercy? The proper way then of dealing with the hard heart to bring it to true repentance is to press the sinner to believe in Jesus Christ for pardoning mercy and sanctifying grace. This, under the influences of the Holy Spirit, is the way to soften and melt the heart and to dispose it willingly to exercise genuine repentance. The impenitent sinner should be exhorted to imitate those fowls, which first fly up, and then dart down upon their prey; first, to soar aloft, by trusting in the redeeming mercy of God in Christ, and then, to come down in the exercise of evangelical humiliation. "They shall look upon me whom they have pierced, and they shall mourn for him" (Zech 12:10). Unbelief or distrust of pardoning mercy hardens the heart, and removes it farther and farther from God; whereas the spiritual faith of pardon touches the rebel's heart and makes it relent.

From what has been said, we may learn what a true sense of sin is. It is such a spiritual sight and feeling of sin as arises from the faith of pardoning mercy; and is such a sense of the malignity and deformity of sin as makes the penitent conclude that of all evils it is the greatest. He sees the evil of sin not only with respect to himself but with regard to God, and Christ, and the Holy Spirit. It is a distinct sense of the particular evils of the heart and life. "Against thee, thee only have I sinned," says David, "and done this evil in thy sight" (Psa 51:4). It is a real, and not an imaginary sense of sin; and so it surpasses a merely rational conviction of sin, as far as that sense of the bitterness of gall, which is attained by tasting it, goes beyond that which is got by the bare report of it (Jer 2:19). It is also an abiding, a permanent sense of iniquity, "Mine eye," says the afflicted church, "trickleth down, and ceaseth not, without any intermission" (Lam 3:49). The removal of a plague put an end to Pharaoh's consciousness of sin, but in the true penitent the wound is deep, and so the sense is abiding. In a word, it is lively and operative. The eye of the true penitent affects his heart, and when the heart is suitably affected, it excites all the powers of the soul to action. There is a sense of sin, which discovers itself in nothing but indolent wishes, and fruitless complaints. But a true sense of it stimulates the penitent to immediate and diligent endeavours.

Hence also it is evident that it is the duty of every sinner to attain without delay a true sense of sin. For this purpose meditate frequently on such subjects as tend to beget and increase in your heart a deep sense of the odiousness and demerit of sin. Impenitence is greatly the effect of extenuating notions of the infinite malignity of transgression; whereas repentance flows from a true sense of its malignity and odiousness. Meditate also on the dreadful anguish and ignominious death of the Lamb of God, when he made Himself an offering for sin. In these you may see plainly that God's abhorrence of sin is so inexpressibly great, that He would sooner deliver up His only begotten Son, in whom His soul delighted, to the most dreadful agony and excruciating death, than leave it unpunished. To contemplate Gethsemane and Golgotha is, under the influences of the Holy Spirit, eminently conducive to evangelical repentance. Consider, too, that how light soever your crimes may sit on your spirit, they are a heavy burden to the Spirit of God. "Behold," says Jehovah, "I am pressed under you, as a cart is pressed that is full of sheaves" (Amos 2:13). The lighter that your sin lies upon your mind, the more grievous it is to the Holy Spirit of God. And if you do not sincerely repent of it, He will ease Himself of that burden, by pouring out upon you the fury of His great indignation (Isa 1:24). Consider, I entreat you, that without an affecting sense of the hatefulness of sin, there is no humiliation; that without humiliation, there is no true repentance; and that without such repentance, it will be impossible for you to escape the wrath to come (Luke 13:3). Study then in dependence on promised grace, and that without delay, to obtain a true and a deep sense of the exceeding sinfulness of your sin (Rom 7:13).

From what has been said it is obvious that you ought also to use all the appointed means of attaining evangelical repentance. The Lord has appointed various means, and commanded you to use them. Employ them all, therefore, and instead of depending on them, or relying on your use of them, trust that the Lord Jesus will render them effectual. If you sincerely desire to repent, you will manifest your sincerity by using with diligence all appointed means.

Meditate seriously then on the sin of your nature, heart, and life, and especially on the exceeding sinfulness of it. "Remember from whence thou art fallen, and repent" (Rev 2:5). Consider your ways. "I thought on my ways," says David, "and turned my feet unto thy testimonies" (Psa 119:59). Survey minutely your inclinations and thoughts, your words and actions, even from your earliest years. Put to yourself seriously such questions as these: What have I been intending and pursuing all my days? What has been the rule of my conduct? the maxims of men, or the Word of God? the customs of the world, or the example of Christ? What has the supreme love of my heart been fixed on? Have I given to Christ, or to the world, my strongest desires and warmest attachments? Has it been my habitual intention to please God, or to please myself? Has it been His glory that I have aimed at in every pursuit, or my own gratification, wealth or honour? Is it in heaven or upon earth that I have chiefly been aiming, to lay up treasures for myself? Has God in Christ been the delightful subject of my frequent meditation and conversation? or have I regarded religious thoughts and converse as insipid and wearisome? Have I been out of my element when employed in the delightful work of prayer and praise, of reading and hearing the glorious Gospel? And have I found more pleasure in licentious mirth and trifling conversation? Have I kept the Sabbath, and with holy reverence frequented the sanctuary of the Lord? or have I profaned His Sabbath, and poured contempt on His ordinances? And have I relied for all my right to eternal life on the surety-righteousness of Jesus Christ, and trusted cordially in Him for all His salvation? or have I relied for a title to life partly on my own works, and trusted in Him for a part only of His salvation?

Propose with impartiality these questions to yourself, and suffer conscience to return a faithful answer, in order that you may so discern your self-deformity, as to abhor yourself, and repent in dust and ashes. When you use the means, believe the promises of true repentance (Ezek 36:31; Psa 22:27). Upon the warrant of their being directed in offer to you, apply and trust and plead them. To believe the promises and yet not to use the means is presumption; and to use the other means and yet not to employ the principal mean of trusting Christ and the promise is self-righteousness.

When you are employing the means of evangelical repentance, be constantly on your guard against every hindrance to the exercise of it. Inconsiderateness, the not apprehending the mercy of God in Christ, slothfulness, the love and cares of the world, prejudices against the exercise of faith and the practice of holiness, and presumptuous confidence, are some of them. As these are powerful obstructions to the habit and exercise of true repentance, be always on your guard against yielding to any of them. In the faith of the promise, and with importunate supplication for the Spirit of grace, labour to mortify them.

In conclusion, it may justly be inferred from what has been advanced that it is not sound doctrine to teach that Christ will receive none but the true penitent, or that none else is warranted to come by faith to Him for salvation. The regenerated sinner must first by faith embrace Christ, and apprehend the pardoning mercy of God in him before he can exercise true repentance. Accordingly, the invitations of the Gospel to every sinner who hears it are these: "Let him that is athirst, come. And whosoever will, let him take the water of life freely" (Rev 22:17). "Come ye, buy and eat; yea, come, buy wine and milk without money and without price" (Isa 55:1). The evil of that doctrine is that it sets needy sinners on spinning repentance, as it were, out of their own bowels, and on bringing it with them to Christ, instead of coming to Him by faith to receive it from Him. It also tends to prevent convinced sinners from attempting to come to Christ, as it teaches them to keep aloof from Him, till they be assured that they have true repentance to bring with them. For a sinner cannot lawfully come to the Saviour till he is sure that he has a present warrant to do so. If Christ will receive none but him who is satisfied that he has genuine repentance, then no one else is invited or commanded to believe in him; for surely, he who is invited and commanded to come to Christ will be welcome to Him. Besides, if none be invited but the true penitent, then impenitent sinners are not bound to come to Christ; for none is warranted or bound to come to Him, but he who is invited. And if a sinner who is not invited nor commanded does not come, he cannot be justly blamed for not coming; for where no law is, there is no transgression. The truth is that every sinner who hears the Gospel is both invited and commanded to believe in the compassionate Saviour, and every one who cordially believes in Him will, in consequence, exercise evangelical repentance as a part of that salvation for which he trusts in Him.