repentance Archives - Make No Provision

“Repent, Because” | Matthew 4:17

by Alan Sharpe September 5, 2022

If you repent today because a sexual sin has broken your fellowship with God, set your eyes on the future. Repent because the kingdom of God is at hand.

by Alan Sharpe September 5, 2022

Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand.
Matthew 4:17

When you turned to Jesus for salvation, which direction were you looking? You likely had your eyes fixed on your past. You looked back at your history of sinning against the Lord, and repented of it. Your goal was to leave your past behind you. That’s what repentance is all about—a fresh start, one that begins with a new way of thinking. Biblical repentance, after all, is literally a change of mind. To repent means to think differently, to reconsider one’s thoughts and beliefs. In view is a 180-degree turn away from sin towards the Savior.

But the motivation for repentance isn’t only your past, is it? When Jesus started His earthly ministry, He commanded men and women to repent because of the future. “Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand,” He said. In other words, have a change of mind because something glorious is comi

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Consequences

Quit Porn in Three Words | John 5:14

by Alan Sharpe August 17, 2022

Jesus doesn’t expect you to continue looking at porn any more than He expected the healed man from the Pool of Bethesda to continue in his sin.

by Alan Sharpe August 17, 2022

Afterward Jesus found him in the temple, and said to him, “See, you have been made well. Sin no more, lest a worse thing come upon you.”
John 5:14

One of the reasons I left Celebrate Recovery is that I never faced consequences for my sexual sin. Brothers like me, caught up in the sin of habitual porn use, would attend the meetings week after week, being pure one week, falling into sin the next, but nothing ever happened. Actually, something happened. We received a “First Time Attender” blue chip each time we reset our sobriety clock to one day of sobriety. This was not the biblical model for dealing with a brother who was living in sexual sin, so I left.

What I never heard at Celebrate Recovery meetings were those simple words of Jesus: “Sin no more.” Jesus said them to the woman caught in adultery (John 8:11), and he said them to the ma

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Consecration

“It’s heart-rending work, giving our dearest lusts a bill of divorce.” || Jonathan Edwards

by Alan Sharpe August 12, 2022

Our lusts are many and violent. Sin is naturally exceeding dear to us; to part with it is compared to plucking out our right eyes.

by Alan Sharpe August 12, 2022

Can't Masturbate with a Clear Conscience? Thank God. | Romans 14:23

And Ruth said, Intreat me not to leave thee, or to return from following after thee: for whither thou goest, I will go; and where thou lodgest, I will lodge: thy people shall be my people, and thy God my God.
Ruth 1:16

Our resolutions to cleave to and follow those that are turning to God, and joining themselves to his people, ought to be fixed and strong, because of the great difficulty of it. If we will cleave to them, and have their God for our God, and their people for our people, we must mortify and deny all our lusts, and cross every evil appetite and inclination, and forever part with all sin.

But our lusts are many and violent. Sin is naturally exceeding dear to us; to part with it is compared to plucking out our right eyes. Men may refrain from wonted ways of sin for a little while, and may deny their lusts in a partial degree, with less difficulty; but ’tis heart-rending work, finally to part with all sin, and to gi

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Sanctification

“Resurrection of the spirit follows mortification of the flesh.” || Johann Arndt

by Alan Sharpe July 22, 2022

Under the exercise of repentance, therefore, the old Adam, with his corruptions, dies within us.

by Alan Sharpe July 22, 2022

man lost in a complex maze, surreal concept

Repentance, or true conversion, is the work of the Holy Spirit, under the influence of which, man, through the law, acknowledges his sin, and the wrath of God provoked against it; and earnestly mourns over his offences; and then, understanding, through the Gospel, the grace of God, by faith in Christ Jesus, he obtains the remission of his sins. By this repentance, the mortification or crucifying of the flesh, and of all carnal lusts and pleasures, is carried on; together with the quickening of the spirit, or the resurrection of the new man in Christ. Under the exercise of repentance, therefore, the old Adam, with his corruptions, dies within us; and Christ lives in us, by faith (Gal. 2:20); for we must be aware that these two are inseparably connected. The resurrection of the spirit follows the mortification of the flesh; and the quickening of the new man, destroys and annihilates the old man; the ruin of the one, is the life and resurrection of the other. “Though our outward man perish, yet the inward man is renewed day by day.” 2 Cor. 4:16. We are, therefore, enjoined to “mortify our mem

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Judgment

Porn During the Week But Prayer on Sunday Doesn’t Work | Jeremiah 7:9-10

by Alan Sharpe June 15, 2022

When you continue in sexual sin during the week that grace may abound on Sunday, you make Christ the minister of sin.

by Alan Sharpe June 15, 2022

Porn During the Week But Prayer on Sunday Doesn't Work | Jeremiah 7:9-10

Will you steal, murder, commit adultery, swear falsely, burn incense to Baal, and walk after other gods whom you do not know, and then come and stand before Me in this house which is called by My name, and say, ‘We are delivered to do all these abominations’?
Jeremiah 7:9-10

No amount of church attendance or profession of faith will profit you if you refuse to repent of watching porn. No amount of religious observance or good works will benefit you if you refuse to amend your ways. This is the message that the prophet had for the people of Israel in his day, and it’s the message that he has for you and me today when it comes to sexual sin.

The words that Jeremiah speaks here are the words that God gave the prophet to speak. These are the words that God commanded Jeremiah to proclaim. They are phrased in the form of a rhetorical question, that is, a question asked in order to create a dramatic effect or to make a point rather than to get an an

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Accountability

To Quit Porn, Change Your Mind | 2 Corinthians 12:20-21

by Alan Sharpe May 9, 2022

Paul is not concerned about finding sexual sin in the church as much as he is afraid of finding believers who haven’t repented of their sexual sin.

by Alan Sharpe May 9, 2022

To Quit Porn, Change Your Life | 2 Corinthians 12:20-21

“For I fear lest, when I come, I shall not find you such as I wish, and that I shall be found by you such as you do not wish; lest there be contentions, jealousies, outbursts of wrath, selfish ambitions, backbitings, whisperings, conceits, tumults; lest, when I come again, my God will humble me among you, and I shall mourn for many who have sinned before and have not repented of the uncleanness, fornication, and lewdness which they have practiced.”
2 Corinthians 12:20-21

Is your challenge pornography? Or is it repentance? Are you struggling against sexual immorality? Or are you struggling against repentance? Is you problem that you can’t quit? Or is it that you won’t quit?

When you read the New Testament letter of 1 Corinthians, you discover that the church at Corinth had all manner of problems. The church members were suing each other in court. Some members were claiming spiritual superiority over others in th

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Obedience

To Quit Porn, First Discover Your Big Why | 1 Kings 18:21

by Alan Sharpe March 22, 2022

I waited 30 years to discover a strong enough motivation to quit porn. Please don’t follow my example.

by Alan Sharpe March 22, 2022

To Quit Porn, Find Your Big Why | 1 Kings 18:21

“And Elijah came to all the people, and said, ‘How long will you falter between two opinions? If the LORD is God, follow Him; but if Baal, follow him.’”
1 Kings 18:21

If you want to quit pornography and masturbation, discover your Big Why. Find your reason, your motivation, your incentive for quitting sexual immorality once and for all. Just make sure it’s a big enough reason. Without a solid motivation for quitting, you are likely to return again and again to your sexual sin. I speak from experience.

I looked at pornography for the first time in 1971 and for the last time in the winter of 2021. I know the month and I know the year because 2021 marked my 30th anniversary as a Christian. I was converted in the summer of 1991 after a miraculous series of events that proved the reality of God’s working in my life. That July I repented of my sins, trusted Christ as my Savior, and asked God to forgive me based on the sacrifice, burial and resurrecti

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Obedience

No Condemnation. But No More Sexual Sin, Either. | John 8:1-11

by Alan Sharpe January 12, 2022

Jesus demands that you confess your sexual sin and then forsake it. “No condemnation” is always followed by “sin no more.”

by Alan Sharpe January 12, 2022

If you listen to enough sermons about the woman caught in adultery and her encounter with Jesus, you might think that the only lesson to be learned is that Jesus doesn’t condemn sinners. But you would be only partly right. Which means, of course, that you would also be partly mistaken.

You read about the encounter in John’s gospel, chapter eight. The scribes and Pharisees bring to Jesus a woman taken in adultery, caught in the very act. They say the woman should be stoned to death. Jesus stoops down and writes something on the ground. He then stands, and says to her accusers, “He that is without sin among you, let him first cast a stone at her” (John 8:7). Those that hear His words are convicted by their conscience, and file out. They leave the woman alone with Jesus. Jesus then stands up and asks the woman, “Where are your accusers? Has no one condemned you?” She replies, “No one, Lord.” And then Jesus replies with those immortal lines, “Neither do I condemn you; go and sin no more” (John 8:11).

T

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Sanctification

“Godly sorrow and true faith transform a man.” || Johann Arndt

by Alan Sharpe December 10, 2021

Sad experience teaches us continually, that our whole nature, body and soul, is polluted with every kind of sin, vice, and corruption.

by Alan Sharpe December 10, 2021

Godly sorrow and true faith thoroughly change a man; that they crucify the flesh, effect an entire transformation in the soul, and beget, through the Holy Ghost, a new life. Lest, however, this should be a mere theoretical knowledge, devoid of life and practice, God has been pleased to set before us his own Son, not only as a ransom and a Mediator, but also as a mirror of perfect godliness, and as a most finished pattern of the new man, who is regenerated after the image of God. In him, the fleshly Adam, the corrupt nature, never reigned; but the blessed God alone. Him it hath pleased God to set forth before our eyes, that, contemplating him and his righteous life, we might be daily more and more renewed after his image.

Sad experience teaches us continually, that our whole nature, body and soul, is polluted with every kind of sin, vice, and corruption. These are the works of the devil appearing in the carnal man; and it is principally in the depraved and perverted will, that these diabolical operations are most visibly discern

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Judgment

Porn and the Point of No Return | Revelation 9:21

by Alan Sharpe December 9, 2021

Pornography is a type of sexual immorality that gets progressively more sinful. Don’t assume you can continue for long on the path of sexual sin without facing divine judgment.

by Alan Sharpe December 9, 2021

The sin of watching pornography is not static, but progressive. The sinful images you look at today will no longer stimulate you in a few months. You will require images that are progressively more vile, more wicked, to satisfy you. The longer you watch pornography, the deeper you descend into the pit of sin, and the harder it is to climb out. Assuming you ever do climb out.

Just consider the people who are alive at the end of the age, when God brings His judgment upon the earth. You read about them in the New Testament book of Revelation. God brings hail and fire that destroys most plant and aquatic life. God darkens the sun and moon. God sends a plague of demonic locusts that torture those who are unsaved. And God sends an army of horsemen who kill a third of humanity.

And what do you suppose is the response of those still left alive on earth after all of these divine judgments? The Apostle John tells us.

“But the rest of mankind,
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