Online Bible 1995 March/ROM-1025.iso/olb/gill/d_500.lzh/D_522.TXT

Text File | 1994-08-24 | 7KB | 132 lines

5~o9~                                     OF REPENTANCE TOWARDS GOD.                                                           Boos: I.

prehensions, stand in no need of repentance, and there-
fore Christ says, I am not come to call the righteous, but
sinners to repentance, Matt. ix. 13. see Luke xv.
Now, 1. All men are sinners, all descending from
Adam by ordinary generation; all his posterity being
seminally in him, and represented by him when he
sinned, sinned in him, and they both have his sin im-
puted to them, and a corrupt nature derived from him;
and so are transgressors from the womb, and are all
guilty of actual sins and transgressions; and so all
stand in need of repentance, even such who trust in
themselves that they are righteous, and despise others
as less holy than themselves, and think they need no
repentance: yet they do; and not only they, but
such who are in the best sense righteous need daily
repentance, since they are continually sinning in all
they do..       2. Men of all nations, Jews and Gen-
tiles, are the subjects of repentance; for all are
under sin, under the power of it, involved in the
guilt of it, and liable to punishment for it, and God
has commanded all men everywhere to repent, Acts
xvii. 30. During the time of John the Baptist, and
of our Lord's being on earth, the doctrine of repent-
once was only preached to the Jews; but after the
resurrection of Christ he gave his apostles an instruc-
tion and order that repentance and remission of sins
should be preached in his name among all nations, be-
ginning at Jerusalem, Luke xxiv. 47. in consequence
of which the apostles first exhorted the Jews and then
the Gentiles to repent, and particularly the apostle
Paul testified both to the Jews, and also to the Greeks,
repentance towards God, as well as/az?h towards our
Lord Jesus Christ, Acts xx. 21.              3. Men are only
subjects of repentance in the present life; when this life
is ended, and the gospel-dispensation is over, and
Christ is come a second time, the door of repentance
as well as of faith will be shut, and there will be no
place found for it; no opportunity nor means of it;
nor any subjects capable of it; as for the saints in hea-
ven they need it not, being entirely without sin; and
as for the wicked in hell, they are in utter despair, and
not capable of repentance unto life, and unto salvation
not to be repented of, and though there is weeping
and wailing there, yet no repentance; hence the rich
man in hell was so solicitous to have Lazarus sent to
his brethren living, hoping, that by means of one that
came to them from the dead to warn them of the place
of torment, they would repent, as well knowing they
never would if not in the present life, and before thev
came into the place where he was; and therefore re-
pentante is not to be procrastinated.
IV. The Author, and cause, and means of repent-
ance.. -1. The Author and efficient cause of it is
not man himself, but God; then hath God also granted
repentance to the Gentiles, Acts xi. 18. it is not in the
power of man to repent of himself, for he is by nature
blind, and has no sight and sense of sin; his under-
standing is darkened with respect unto it, aud he is
darkness itself till made light in the Lord; and until
he has a sight and sense of sin he can never truly re-
pent of it; Iris heart is hard and obdurate, his heart is
an heart of stone, and he cannot really repent of sin
nntil that stony heart is taken away, and an heart of

flesh is given; and whenever he becomes sensible of
his need of repentance, he prays to God for it, saying,
Turn thou. me, and I shall be turned: nor do exhorta-
tions to repentance suppose it in the power of man to
repent of himself; since these are only designed to
bring him to a sense of his need of it, and of his ob-
ligation to it, and of his impotence to it of himself
through the hardness of his heart, and to direct him to
seek it of God, who only can give it; for, 2. Though
God may give men space to repent, yet if he does not
give the grace of repentance, they never will repent.
Thus he gave space to the old world, threatened with a
flood, which some think is meant by the one hundred
and twenty years allowed them, when the long-suffer.
ing of God waited in the times of Noah, while the ark
was preparing, but without effect; sO Jezebel, or An-
tichrist, is said to have space given her to repent of her
fornication, and she repented not, Rev. ii. 21. and this
God sometiines gives to the children of men to show
his sovereignty, that he will have mercy on whom he
will have mercy, and give repentance to whom he
pleases; and for the sake of his elect, not willing that
any of them should perish, but that they should all
come to repentance, and therefore his long-suffering
towards them is salvation; and this also he sometimes
gives to show his forbearance of the vessels of wrath,
and to leave them iuexcusable. Nay,--3. Though
some men have the means of repentance, yet grace
not being given them of God they repent not; the
word, unless artended with power, is ineffectual; the
most severe judgtnents inflicted on men are iusuffi-
cient, as the plagues on Pharaoh, whose heart was the
worse and more hardened tinder them, Exod. xi. 10.
and though the children of Israel were smitten with
famine, with the pestilence, and with the sword, yet
.they repented not, nor returned unto the Lord, Athos
iv. 6---11. so the fourth and fifth vials poured forth on
men, which will scorch and fill them with pains and
sores, instead of repenting of their deeds they will blas-
pheme the God of heaven and his name, Rev. xvi. 8--
11. And on the other hand, the greatest instances of
mercy and goodness to men, and singular deliverances
wrought for them, which should, arid one would think
would, lead men to repentance, and yet they do not,
Rum. ii. 4, 5. Rev. ix. 20, 21. yea the most powerful
and awakep. ing ministry that a man can sit under, has
no influence on the minds of men to bring them to re-
penlance, without the power and grace of God; such
as was the ministry of John the Baptist, who was the
voice of one crying in the wilderness, preaching in a
1oud, vehement, and powerful manner, the baptism of
repentance; and yet though some publicans and har-
lots believed, the Pharisees repented not afterwards
that they !night believe, Matt. xxi. 32. our Lord spake
as one having authority, yet few believed; and many
cities where he preached, and mighty works were done
by him, yet repented not; and ff one was to rise fi'om
the dead, and describe all the happiness of the blissful
state of the saints in heaven he was capable of, or paint
all the horrors of the damned in hell, it would have no
effect, neither to allure nor frighten to repentance, or
bring men to it, without the exertion of powerful and
efficacious grac% Luke xvi. 3l.---- 4. The sole effi-