WILLIAMS MISSION

Evening Star, Issue 23015, 21 July 1938, Page 9

WILLIAMS MISSION

Speaking last night in the Church of Christ, North-east Valley, on the subject of ‘ Repentance,’ Mr Williafns said that of all acts for man repentance is the most divine. In dealing with the nature of repentance he said that it is the fruit of shame. The first step is a recognition of sin. Jesus reminded the Pharisees that the publicans and prodigals were entering the Kingdom of God before them. The Pharisees were dead in the supercilious consciousness of no sin. They were typified by the Pharisee who thanked God that he was not as other men. After having rejected authority and cast off restraint in a life of riotous living, the prodigal suddenly came to himseif. He realised that unless there is restraint and aspiration in life man is not his true self. Ho is not as God intended him to be. Following upon this recognition ho made the resoluI tion to try again, but a resolution is i not enough in itself, for it may be nothing better than a good intention. The ! will must be touched more strongly 1 and expressed in reformation. This reformation is the fruit and proof of , change or conversion, which Jesus said j is essential to entrance into the Kingj dom of God. Conversion is not a pro- ; cess of being changed by an outside ac- . Live force while we ourselves are pasI sive, it involves action both from withf in and without. We must surrender to God, lay our hearts open to Him, and t resign our wills to His that he may , enter in and act in us and with ns. In 5 the meeting of God’s initiative with t man’s, and in tho union of God’s j spirit and man’s, both change and are changed. This is tho rebirth on whicli 3 Jesus insisted for entrance into the - Kingdom. Restitution is an essential 1 part of tho reformation which follows, and is a fruit of conversion. |

Salvation is sometimes spoken of as reconciliation. To reconcile means to take away a barrier which separates. There is nothing in God whch separates Him from us. His love towards us is eternal and unchanging. Man therefore must change and remove the barrier which exists in him. God has set before us the passion of His Son to win in us the response of repentant love. His Cross does not save us as something outside of our lives. Through it divine- and human love must meet, and with it-in'.the heart, life must be built upon it and around it. Repentance is the response of faith and love to the Cross of Christ. We are driven by shame for our sin and drawn by love to salvation.