Faith and Repentance

Reformed theology teaches that one is justified - declared righteous in God's sight - by faith alone. However, a problem arises when faith is not correctly understood.

The Bible explicitly teaches that there are types of faith that do not save. In the "Parable of the Sower (Matthew 13)," we learn about two groups of people who receive the Gospel even with joy, but trouble, persecution, the worries of life, and the deceitfulness of richness come, and this faith dies off. James, in his letter, talks about a faith without works. This faith is dead and can't save anyone.

For this reason, it was never part of the Reformed teaching that one can be saved by a faith that is only a mental assent to certain truths. Now, don't get me wrong; it's an essential component of true saving faith to know the truth of the Gospel, believe it to be true, and personally trust in Jesus Christ for salvation.

Now, if faith is a total reliance on Jesus for salvation, one cannot claim to have this type of faith if the fruit of this reliance is not present in his life. As John Calvin once wrote, "It is therefore faith alone which justifies, and yet the faith which justifies is not alone." As we learn all throughout the Holy Scriptures, some of the necessary fruits of this faith are repentance and the earnest pursuit of holiness. True faith is a repentant faith.

If the Christian life is a life lived by faith, then it is also a life of repentance. And we repent with the bold belief that God is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness (1 John 1:8-10). My Christian friend, God is faithful not only to forgive us but to cleanse us. Jesus died on that cross not only for the forgiveness of our sins but to present us as holy and blameless and above reproach before God (Colossians 1:22).

Do you want to find someone who truly believes the Gospel? Seek for a contrite heart, a repentant faith. Find someone who does not give up repenting, trusting that one day, as Jesus promised, we will be made holy as He is.

Nino Marques