If you read carefully, you may have noticed that some form of the word "repent" has now appeared in two of Lance's eNewses.
And, stunner of all stunners, the R word appeared today in an article sent out by an ERC staff member who, in my opinion, has strenuously avoided introducing the concept of repentance in the past when it absolutely should have been core to his teaching.
In addition to these mentions of repentance in official CGGC writings, you should know that, with increasingly frequency, in private communications, CGGC people who want any association with me to be kept on the QT have been writing to me and expressing their conviction that the CGGC needs to practice repentance.
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I'm actually becoming fearful that repentance may soon emerge as a new CGGC fad. I'm fearful, because repentance can be done wrongly and, in fact, most often in the history of the church, it has been done wrongly and has led to disaster.
As the ESV translates him, Paul says, "For godly grief produces a repentance that leads to salvation without regret." (2 Cor. 7:10a) From this it can be understood that what Paul next refers to as "worldly grief" produces death. (As I read it, the grief that is generating interest in repentance in the CGGC these days is worldly grief.)
Just a few quick surface thoughts about repentance, as I have come to understand it.
1. As I read the New Testament, repentance takes three different forms. As I read Lance and the ERC staffer, they speak of repentance in only one of those three forms. In my opinion, the two other ways to repent are a much more pressing need for the CGGC.
2. The aversion to repentance that has marked today's CGGC up to the beginning of the Finley era has actually been out of the norm even for institutional, parish-priest dominated Christendom Christianity.
The truth is that institutionalistic parish priests have normally embraced the idea of repentance but have perverted the Word's call to genuine repentance by turning the heart-rending, life-altering act of repentance that God demands into a ritual of some form.
Institutionalists and parish priests absolutely groove on ritual.
Here quickly are two examples of God's call for repentance being ritualized by the institutional church:
The Roman Catholic church's sacramentalizing of "Confession" paired with the doing of acts of penance in place of repentance.
And, the practice, still common among many conservative Protestants, of expecting that a convert either respond to an altar call or recite some version of a "sinners' prayer."While, for some people, genuine repentance may take place in either of these contexts, they are, at their core, merely outward actions used by institutionalists to ritualize a genuine spiritual act.
3. As I read the New Testament, the act of calling for repentance is one that the Holy Spirit entrusts specifically to apostles, prophets and evangelists and not to shepherds and teachers.
My sense is that unless CGGC mountaintoppers rediscover the two lost forms of repentance--and practice them themselves first--our institutional, shepherd mafia-dominated leadership culture will attempt to issue a call for repentance in the CGGC and, because these people have no gifting from the Spirit, they will do it badly, wrongly and, in fact, sinfully. The call will fail and prove to be nothing more than yet another failed CGGC fad.
4. Our mountaintoppers are going to have to repent and, in the process, relinquish their control of the institution and beg the Spirit to move and to empower men and women of His choosing to call for repentance in the way He leads them.
If you pray for revival in the CGGC, therefore, pray that the people who lead the institution will experience genuine godly grief and that that grief will produce in them a repentance that leads to salvation without regret.
Until recently, I despaired that the godly grief, repentance, salvation thing would happen on the CGGC mountaintops. These days, I do have the smallest hope.
We must repent.
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