Ideas about the Kingdom of the Heavens around us and the unity of believers in Christ within it
As the parable of the two sons in Matthew 21:28-32 shows, repentance is merely changing our minds so that we start to do what the Father asks. Repentance does not require remorse, payment of a penalty, or even in all cases a spoken apology, and the forgiveness that it produces cannot be sold.
Matthew 5:6 and 5:8 speak of the state of hungering and thirsting for righteousness, which leads to purity of heart because God satisfies the hunger. The result of purity of heart is being able to to “see” God, to perceive his presence and work, even in the present time.
Only beggars qualify to enter the Kingdom of the heavens around us, where God is king and his power supplies. The self-sufficient are disqualified by their own inability to fully trust in God while trusting in themselves.
To enter God’s kingdom, moment by moment, I must repent of my claims of ownership of my own life. Instead, I must be willing to do things His way, even if it is His will that I crash and burn in this world. He is reality. His unseen Kingdom will one day be seen, and it will eventually be obvious to everyone that His reward is more real than anything in this world.
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Salvation cannot happen without repentance. But this repentance isn’t remorse, it is changing my mind, turning from my own works and my other idols and turning to the true God. It is never really present without a change in the way I live. But my new way of life does not come from me, but from God who has prepared it for me and lives it through me.
Both John the Baptist and Jesus preached that repentance is required now, because God’s kingdom is now all around us. But the focus of that required repentance was right treatment of each other, not religious works.
“Repentance” is a decision to change one’s outlook and way of life and leads to changed behavior. It is NOT the same as remorse, regret, contrition, guilt, shame, or feeling sorry for the consequences of an act.