Jesus made it clear that loving God must begin within, and then it is to be manifested without. Out of a good heart flows good things. Out of a resilient inner faith there can be a life of service and good works. And that is true of evil works as well.
Jesus taught us that evil actions and speech are first found in an evil heart. For example, he said it is in the heart that evil thoughts arise, and the mouth simply gives expression to them. As he put it in Matthew 15:18-20: “But what comes out of the mouth proceeds from the heart, and this defiles a person. For out of the heart come evil thoughts, murder, adultery, sexual immorality, theft, false witness, slander. These are what defile a person.”
But to say this does not mean that we are only to focus on the internal, and not worry about externals. No, the Christian lives out his inner faith. He demonstrates his inward faith and commitment to Christ by his outward actions. James spoke to this when he said that our faith is made manifest by our works (see James 2:14-26).
Two somewhat unrelated things that I happened to read and listen to today both speak to these truths. The first was an old John Piper book that I was revisiting. I quite enjoy Piper, and I have around 40 of his books. Back in 2006 he released What Jesus Demands of the World (Crossway).
It was republished mostly the same, but with a new title and some other minor changes in 2023: All That Jesus Commanded (Crossway). So if you have the earlier volume, you need not buy the second one (I happen to have both). The book looks at 50 commands that Jesus gave to his followers in the gospels.
The first command he discusses is “You must be born again.” The second one is “Repent.” Here is part of what he says about this second demand:
The first command of Jesus’ public ministry was, “Repent.” He spoke this command indiscriminately to all who would listen. It was a call for radical inward change toward God and man.
What Is Repentance?
Two things show us that repentance is an internal change of mind and heart rather than mere sorrow for sin or mere improvement of behavior. First, the meaning of the Greek word behind the English “repent” (metanoeo) points in this direction. It has two parts: meta and noeo. The second part (noeo) refers to the mind and its thoughts and perceptions and dispositions and purposes. The first part (meta) is a prefix that regularly means movement or change. In view of the way this prefix regularly functions,’ we may infer that the basic meaning of repent is to experience a change of the mind’s perceptions and dispositions and purposes.
The other factor that points to this meaning of “repent” is the way Luke 3:8 describes the relationship between repentance and new behavior. It says, “Bear fruits in keeping with repentance.” Then it gives examples of the fruits: “Whoever has two tunics is to share with him who has none, and whoever has food is to do likewise” (Luke 3:11). This means that repenting is what happens inside of us. Then this change leads to the fruits of new behavior. Repentance is not the new deeds, but the inward change that bears the fruit of new deeds. Jesus is demanding that we experience this inward change.
He continues:
Sin: An Assault on God
Why? His answer is that we are sinners. “I have not come to call the righteous but sinners to repentance” (Luke 5:32). What was Jesus’ view of sin? In the parable of the prodigal son, Jesus describes the son’s sin like this: “He squandered his property in reckless living . . . [and] devoured [it] with prostitutes” (Luke 15:13, 30). But when the prodigal repents he says, “Father, I have sinned against heaven and before you. I am no longer worthy to be called your son” (Luke 15:21). Therefore, throwing your life away on reckless living and prostitutes is not just humanly hurtful; it is an offense against heaven—that is, against God. That’s the essential nature of sin. It’s an assault on God.
We see this again in the way Jesus taught his disciples to pray. He said that they should pray, “Forgive us our sins, for we ourselves forgive everyone who is indebted to us” (Luke 11:4). In other words, sins that God forgives are compared to the ones people commit against us, and those are called debts. Therefore, Jesus’ view of sin is that it dishonors God and puts us in debt to restore the divine honor we had defamed by our God-belittling behavior or attitudes. Later we will see how that debt gets paid by Jesus himself (Mark 10:45). But for us to enjoy that gift he says we must repent.
Repenting means experiencing a change of mind so that we can see God as true and beautiful and worthy of all our praise and all our obedience. This change of mind also embraces Jesus in the same way. We know this because Jesus said, “If God were your Father, you would love me, for I came from God” (John 8:42). Seeing God with a new mind includes seeing Jesus with a new mind.
All That Jesus Commanded: The Christian Life according to the Gospelsby Piper, John (Author)
He concludes the chapter this way: “This is the command of Jesus to every soul: Repent. Be changed deep within. Replace all God-dishonoring, Christ-belittling perceptions and dispositions and purposes with God-treasuring, Christ-exalting ones.”
The second thing that spoke to this was an old video recording of R. J. Rushdoony (1916–2001), that my friend Doug Groothuis had just posted online. The brief video features a discussion about Christian dominion. In it Rushdoony defined what he meant by the term. He was then asked, ‘When you speak of exercising dominion, can you draw a distinction between that and being dictatorial?’ Rushdoony replied this way:
Yes, there is a distinction between the exercise of dominion and being dictatorial. Our Lord called attention to the distinction: he said, ‘the Gentiles love to Lord it over people but it shall not be so among you – he who is greatest among you let him be servant of all’. So that we are ministers of Christ. We serve. We try to meet human needs in the Lord, and we try in every way to be faithful to God by fulfilling his law word, and love is the fulfilling of the law – it is putting the love of God into force, and the love of man is manifested by being faithful to God. That is something very different from using an army and a police force to tell people this is the way you should act.
The distinction you see is very ably set forth in the quarrel between two religions. Paul said when he was speaking of the chosen people, ‘he is a Jew who is one inwardly,’ and then he went on to say that ‘the true Israelite or Jew is the one who is by faith a son of Abraham’. Now Muhammad took those very words of Paul to oppose Christianity. He said he is a Muslim who is one outwardly. Only outward compliance, keeping a few rituals and then a coercive order – that’s all.
Islam doesn’t care what’s in your heart as long as you maintain a few simple forms, whereas our faith doesn’t operate that way. God requires that it begin with regeneration and the gift of the Spirit and then the extension of that into every area of life. The dominion the Lord has over us we are to manifest in our lives over every area where he has called us, and that does not mean acting like Muhammadans and saying externals will satisfy God. We work from inside out. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XOaqOLkX4Bo
Yes, he was quite right to contrast Islam with Christianity in this regard. One is all about externals, while the other is about what happens inside of a person, and how that translates into outward actions. Most religions are focused on our works, on what we do, and so on.
Christianity is about placing our faith and trust in what God has done for us. A life changed by this inner faith and repentance will be seen on the outside, and the world will know that something has happened in our lives. So faith leads to works, acts of service, love of neighbour, and so on.
There can be no real loving actions for God apart from this inward transformation of mind, heart and soul. But if there are no works or outward fruit to be found in those who claim to be his disciples, then we can ask if there has ever been an inner change brought about by saving faith and repentance and the work of the Spirit.
