Matthew 3:8 Bring forth therefore fruits meet for repentance: And it ought not to be a mere partial sorrow; but it should permeate the entire constitution of man. You have most likely seen water falling in drops from a rock. There it is dropping — dropping — dropping, summer and winter, during many a century; — but the rock remains a rock still. There are many who shed tears which seem to be those of repentance, but whose hearts remain as hard as an adamantine rock. Their tears are those out of a rock — a rock that never crumbles. True repentance dodos with man as the furnace with the metal. There is the metal cast into the furnace; and there it is heated and melted so as to be shaped and coined according to will. The whole of man should be completely melted by repentance, so as to be purged of all the cross of sin and be remodelled by the plastic influences of God's Spirit, and made to bear anew the Divine image. (R. Hughes.) Parallel Verses KJV: Bring forth therefore fruits meet for repentance: |
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