{"collection":"chr","html_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/browse/chr/ecf/003/0030712.htm","path":"chr/ecf/003/0030712.htm","source_url":"https://sacred-texts.com/chr/ecf/003/0030712.htm","text":"Chapter IV.\u2014Repentance Applicable to All the Kinds of Sin. To Be Practised Not Only, Nor Chiefly, for the Good It Brings, But Because God Commands It.\nTo all sins, then, committed whether by flesh or spirit, whether by deed or will, the same God who has destined penalty by means of judgment, has withal engaged to grant pardon by means of repentance, saying to the people, \u201cRepent thee, and I will save thee;\u201d 8440 and again, \u201cI live, saith the Lord, and I will (have) repentance rather than death.\u201d 8441 Repentance, then, is \u201clife,\u201d since it is preferred to \u201cdeath.\u201d That repentance, O sinner, like myself (nay, rather, less than myself, for pre-eminence in sins I acknowledge to be mine 8442 ), do you so hasten to, so embrace, as a shipwrecked man the protection 8443 of some plank. This will draw you forth when sunk in the waves of sins, and will bear you forward into the port of the divine clemency. Seize the opportunity of unexpected felicity: that you, who sometime were in God\u2019s sight nothing but \u201ca drop of a bucket,\u201d 8444 and \u201cdust of the threshing-floor,\u201d 8445 and \u201ca potter\u2019s vessel,\u201d 8446 may thenceforward become that \u201ctree which is sown beside 8447 the waters, is perennial in leaves, bears fruit at its own time,\u201d 8448 and shall not see \u201cfire,\u201d 8449 nor \u201caxe.\u201d 8450 Having found \u201cthe truth,\u201d 8451 repent of errors; repent of having loved what God loves not: even we ourselves do not permit our slave-lads not to hate the things which p. 660 are offensive to us; for the principle of voluntary obedience 8452 consists in similarity of minds.\nTo reckon up the good, of repentance, the subject-matter is copious, and therefore should be committed to great eloquence. Let us, however, in proportion to our narrow abilities, inculcate one point,\u2014that what God enjoins is good and best. I hold it audacity to dispute about the \u201cgood\u201d of a divine precept; for, indeed, it is not the fact that it is good which binds us to obey, but the fact that God has enjoined it. To exact the rendering of obedience the majesty of divine power has the prior 8453 right; the authority of Him who commands is prior to the utility of him who serves. \u201cIs it good to repent, or no?\u201d Why do you ponder? God enjoins; nay, He not merely enjoins, but likewise exhorts. He invites by (offering) reward\u2014salvation, to wit; even by an oath, saying \u201cI live,\u201d 8454 He desires that credence may be given Him. Oh blessed we, for whose sake God swears! Oh most miserable, if we believe not the Lord even when He swears! What, therefore, God so highly commends, what He even (after human fashion) attests on oath, we are bound of course to approach, and to guard with the utmost seriousness; that, abiding permanently in (the faith of) the solemn pledge 8455 of divine grace, we may be able also to persevere in like manner in its fruit 8456 and its benefit.\nComp. Ezek. 18:30, 32.\n659:8441\nThe substance of this is found in Ezek. xxxiii. 11.\n659:8442\nCompare 1 Tim. i. 16.\n659:8443\nComp. c. xii. sub fin. [Ut naufragus alicuius tabul\u00e6 fidem; this expression soon passed into Theological technology, and as \u201cthe plank after shipwreck\u201d is universally known.]\n659:8444 659:8445 659:8446 659:8447 659:8448\nPs. 1:3, Jer. 17:8. Compare Luke xxiii. 31.\n659:8449 659:8450 659:8451 660:8452 660:8453 660:8454\nSee ref. 1 on the preceding page. The phrase is \u201cas I live\u201d in the English version.\n660:8455\n\u201cAsseveratione:\u201d apparently a play on the word, as compared with \u201cperseverare,\u201d which follows.\n660:8456","title":"Ante-Nicene Fathers, Vol III: Tertullian: Part III: Repen...","type":"page"}