Pastor Kelly Sensenig's View of Repentance

I just read the Middletown Bible Church article on Repentance that a friend of mine linked me to and had some questions about.[1] Overall, I would say that the article was mostly good, although I can see how it would raise some questions in a person's mind in regards to forsaking sinful living for salvation. The main statement in the article that I thought was unclear was in the quote by Pastor Kelly Sensenig, when he said:

"When you repent you will think differently and possess a different attitude about God, Jesus Christ, salvation, your own life of sin, and need for salvation. You will reconsider your ways of faulty reasoning and sinful living and realize that these things offend God's truth and holiness and must be released from your life and forsaken. Repentance speaks of a reversal of a person's attitudes and convictions. It speaks of an inward turning from what a person used to believe or think about God, Jesus Christ and themselves. To repent is to alter one's way of looking at life; it is to take God's point of view instead of one's own....Repentance is when a person changes their thinking about whatever is keeping them from expressing faith in Christ. [Pastor Kelly Sensenig, Except Ye Repent, p. 3]."

Personally, I would not explain repentance the way that Sensenig did, particularly when he said that to "repent" involves realizing that your "sinful living...must be released from your life and forsaken." I would say that depending on the context, that could be part of Christian repentance (e.g. see Revelation chapters 2-3), but not part of the Gospel. In other words, that is part of sanctification, not justification. So that's where I think Sensenig is unclear on biblical saving repentance: he makes it sound like an unsaved person has to agree to "forsake" their "sinful living" up-front for salvation. To me, that's the same thing as "Lordship Salvation"! Or to put it in the form of a question: how is that any different from "Lordship Salvation"? It's not! The confusing part about it is that although Sensenig says that he disagrees with "Lordship Salvation," yet his explanation of repentance is sometimes (as in this instance) the same as the Lordship view of it!

 

I would take what Sensenig says about repentance "with a grain of salt" (i.e. to believe only part of something, or to view it with skepticism), or to put it another way: be ready to spit out some seeds! In other words, recognize that, at times, Sensenig is clear on the meaning of repentance, but at other times, not so clear.

 

 

Reference:

 

[1] See the article titled "Repentance" in the Terms of Salvation series on the Middletown Bible Church website (www.middletownbiblechurch.org/salvatio/termsrep.htm).