First, [that] faith is distinguished from repentance.
First, [that] faith is distinguished from repentance.
§ 50. (I) “Faith is distinguished from repentance (Mark 1:15; Acts 20:21). Therefore it is not a part of repentance.”
We respond. (1) Bellarmine contends that faith is prior to repentance and prepares for it. But in these passages faith is set after repentance; how, then, does he claim that faith is a preparation [dispositio] prior to repentance here?
(2) Thus we say that in these passages the word “repentance” is used purely for contrition, the first part of repentance, and in this sense and respect it is correctly distinguished from faith antithetically, as the second part of it.
(3) But when repentance is used in the very broad sense, then faith must be said to be included as a part by necessity, since the forgiveness of sins, peace of conscience, righteousness, and eternal life are not received except by means of faith in Christ (Acts 10:43; Rom. 5:1). How, then, can true saving faith in Christ be excluded from the essential parts of repentance when, with respect to faith alone, repentance is said to be a work unto life and salvation? When faith is absent the contrite heart is destitute of consolation and peace. Contrition and confession acknowledge and flee an angry God; satisfaction produces a false confidence in our own works. Faith, therefore, is necessary to those who are truly and salutarily repentant: the faith which embraces the promises of the Gospel and the benefits of Christ, which teaches one how to flee from the angry to the placated God, which invites one from the throne of justice to the throne of mercy promised for the sake of Christ and in Christ. It is faith which sees through the dark storm of death and hell and which recognizes God as both He who abandons and who receives, as both persecutor and helper, as both condemner and savior.