In this series of posts we explore four paradigm shits that can awaken churches to a new experience of spiritual health and power. In this post we explore the nature of corporate repentance.
One thing they don’t teach you in seminary is how to lead your church to repentance. You may discern that your church has issues of which it needs to repent, but become totally frustrated when considering how to do it. Furthermore, our culture has become so individualized that we have little concept of how to repent as a people. Does every person in a congregation need to repent, for a church to repent? Is a critical mass required? Let’s say if 70% of a church repents, does that pass muster with God?
Corporate repentance requires more than passing a congregational vote. God holds entire churches accountable for their sin, just as He held the nation of Israel accountable for its sin. If you have any doubts, review the seven letters to the churches in Rev. 2-3. There you discover that most of the churches in Asia – Minor received calls to repentance as local bodies of believers.
Assuming a church has discerned Jesus’ assessment of their ministry, a Solemn Assembly provides the biblical context for God’s people to make things right with Him. The Old Testament contains the accounts of several Solemn Assemblies. The most detailed one occurred in Ezra 9-10. There we discover various aspects of such a gathering: an opportunity for renewed hope, the chance to right wrongs, the opportunity to reconcile with God, renewal of a covenant, symbolic and real acts of repentance and a fresh outpouring of God’s grace.
But we also see a delegation of responsivity by the congregation to the leaders to repent on their behalf. The people declare, “Let our leaders represent the whole assembly” (Ezra 10:14). We call this delegated power to act before God, mediatorial authority.
The New Testament illustrates this same authority to act in God’s name. In Acts 13 we see church leaders use their mediatorial authority as they lay hands on Paul and Barnabus for their first missionary journey. We also see mediatorial authority displayed in Acts 6 where the apostles use the authority of their office to commission the first deacons.
As Dr. Kenneth Quick explains in his book, Healing the Heart of Your Church, mediatorial authority allows church leaders to act and speak to make things right with God through corporate confession and restitution to injured parties on behalf of the congregation. Mediatorial authority also allows church leaders to stand in the place of previous leaders and repent on their behalf. We call this specialized aspect of mediatorial authority – identification repentance.
The great leaders of the Old Testament demonstrate how identification repentance works. Daniel, Ezra, and Nehemiah each take responsibility for their fathers’ sins as if they were their own. They plead for the Lord’s forgiveness as if they had been a part of the evil that got Israel in trouble when, in fact, they had nothing to do with it (See Ezra 9:5-15; Dan. 9:1-20; Neh. 4:1-7). We also see David fulfilled this important function on Saul’s behalf in 2 Sam. 21.
One of my favorite verses in the Solemn Assembly held in Ezra’s day carries important significance for ours. “But now for a brief moment grace has been shown from the Lord our God . . . that our God may enlighten our eyes and grant us a little reviving in our bondage. . .” (Ezra 9:8).
If your church wants to see spiritual awakening, it must own that it fails to sufficiently impact our culture with salt and light. It must honestly assess its ministry and discern what Jesus is saying to your church. Finally, it must confess its corporate sins and repent of the same. Then we have hope of a “little reviving in our bondage.” We can see a fresh experience of God’s grace on our congregation. The kind of grace that renews the spirit of your church and draws people in a broken and divisive culture to the Savior.
Rev. Mark Barnard serves as President of Blessing Point Ministries which helps churches experience breakthrough moments in ministry that can transform their impact for the kingdom of God. He is the author of The Path of Revival – Restoring Our Nation One Church at a Time.
Repentance, as evidenced by confession and change, is an incredibly important part of local church reconciliation and recovery arising out of systemic dysfunction, conflict and relational ill-health. It is not only an individual necessity but it is also a corporate one which Blessing Point has emphasized so well. Your article is excellent!
Great to hear from you, Peter. Thank you for the encouragement.