Repentance
Repentance was mentioned very early in Christ's ministry (Mark 1:13 I.V.; 1:15 K.J.V.) As a principle of the Gospel, repentance is inseparably tied to faith. We usually place faith as the prerequisite and repentance next in line, but they are both aspects of the same necessary experience. While the emphasis in faith is on our personal attitude toward God, repentance deals with our attitude toward sin. Sin is the human act of knowingly defying or disobeying God's wishes for us in order to serve our own agendas. God overlooks ignorant sinning until we can be more properly informed. But willful rebellion by an informed person brings eternal consequences, unless it is genuinely repented of during our lifetime. So long as we remain committed to sinful acts, we are not even considering repentance as the necessary remedy, and we are like pirate ships at war with the legitimate shipping of the high seas. When we are won to a change of mind by the overtures of divine love, we do not seek pardon only because piracy does not pay, but because we have come to hate it. We now see sin from the viewpoint of God. We must realize that man is invariably self-centered until a way can be found to show him that his long-term goals are best served by a better life-pattern. That change of viewpoint is only achieved by sincere repentance, which carries within it a strong mortification at having earlier displeased God.