Repentance

of his definition of sin as God-displacement. A further cause may link to the model’s Augustinian roots where finding God within us de-emphasises finding God in others. Such views can offer an explanation as to why Hughes does not develop a theology regarding how God may be mediated through the Church, other people and the world in general. A further factor is the consequence of classical evangelicalism (Hughes’ formative context) and its over-emphasis on the God–self relationship at the expense of the God–neighbour relationship.

Repentance is an important biblical concept. The most common term for repentance shub in the Old Testament occurs over a thousand times, and is translated ‘repent’ or ‘repentance’, however, most commonly in the New International Version it is ‘turn’ or ‘return’. A second term is naham which expresses both a cognitive and affective component – sorrow, lament, grief and a change of mind. In view here is a turning from evil and a turning to good. Volf defines the process as a profound moral and religious turnaround. The inclusion of ‘religious’ helps keep the biblical context of relationship to God as opposed to any turnabout. Of critical importance theologically is the turning to God, which by definition involves turning away from evil. In the Old Testament, this call to turn is largely found in the prophets and applied to Israel corporately, and so can be understood in terms of the covenant obligation to reflect God.

In the New Testament, the call to repentance becomes individual, yet universal via the Church’s call to mission (Matt. 28:18–20). Both Mark (1:15) and Matthew (4:17) start Jesus’ public proclamations with the call ‘Repent’. The key Greek word for repentance is metanoia, which Dunnet claims has two senses – a change of mind and an affective sense of remorse or regret. Adams, however, focuses exclusively on the cognitive when defining repentance, arguing that affective elements will be part of the overall experience, but are in fact a consequence to rethinking our attitudes and behaviours. His definition emerges from his understanding of the Greek term metanoia. He states:

There’s nothing in the word metanoia about sorrow; indeed it does not mention the emotions at all. That is not to say that true repentance will not lead to sorrow, but the word itself carries no such connotation.129

Verbrugge agrees with Adams’ rendering of metanoia, but asserts that the overall experience will involve an emotion of (amongst others) joy. This is because repentance is linked to the promise of new life. Verbrugge further helps us grasp the broad Scriptural presentations of the concept of repentance by making clear that whilst the grouped words, metanoeo and epistrepho occur only six times in Paul’s letters and none in John’s writings, the central idea is conveyed via different imagery. Paul uses several terms: ‘in Christ’, ‘dying and rising’, ‘new creation’, ‘putting on the new self’. John uses ‘new birth’, ‘passing from death to life’, ‘darkness to light’, and the ‘victory of truth over falsehood’, and ‘love over hate’.

Whilst there are different interpretations of the key Greek word metanoia, the broader biblical evidence points to a more holistic process than merely a change of mind, although how we delineate the concept and its consequences is crucial in this respect. Repentance is not merely a cognitive measure, but is represented in Scripture as involving the whole person (Matt. 3:8 and Mark 10:21). We can conclude then that repentance is at the heart of a Christian world-view of health, as it is foundational to the gospel of salvation (Hebrews 6:1). This expectation is part of the tension of the ‘now’ and ‘not yet’ – the ‘end-time’ fullness already in process of becoming present reality. Thus for Paul and the initial recipients of Romans, salvation and life were virtually synonymous. In its broadest sense, the power of God for salvation (Rom. 1:16) is used to refer to both justification and sanctification. It follows that the rest of Romans expand upon these concepts one from the other; chapters one to five explain the need for and means of obtaining our justification, chapters six to eight and twelve to fifteen, the experience of sanctification. Hill refers to the relational dynamics of salvation righteousness as both establishing us (justifying) and equipping us as covenant partners, with the power to relate in a manner which reflects God as righteous, ie God both forgives and is in the ongoing business of converting (transforming). Dunn crystallises Paul’s

thoughts regarding the phrase ‘the power of God for salvation’ as denoting: ‘a force that operates with marked effect on people, transforming them… and providing a source of energy to sustain that qualitatively different life.’130

If notions of transformation are implicit in salvation (albeit there are differing views as to how much change can be expected in this life), then the means of bringing about such change is, for Paul, located in offering oneself to God in acts of worship, coupled with a renewing of our minds. Indeed, the exhortations found in Romans 12:1–2 are pivotal in the structure of Paul’s letter and are founded upon the previous eleven chapters. Admittedly, the biblical connection between doctrine and daily living is to be expected, given the context of a Jewish world-view. Jesus thus taught: ‘Now that you know these things, you will be blessed if you do them’ (John 13:17). Paul, in other letters, also often follows a doctrinal exposition with an ethical exhortation (Eph. 4:1; Col. 3:5). Commenting on Romans 12:1–2, Barth also emphasises the ‘now’ element of these exhortations: ‘Our conversation is about men living in the world of nature and of civilisation; and, moreover, we ourselves are also men living of necessity from minute to minute a quite concrete life.’131

The exhortation ‘offer your bodies’ (Rom. 12:1), is in context used to mean person, our whole selves, not just in individual isolation but in concrete relatedness within the world. Thus it is through our bodiliness that we relate to others and express the life that is in us; either imaging God and so reaping life and health, or distorting this image in sinful patterns which ultimately lead to pathology and eternal death. In this way, Paul’s exhortation to ‘offer our bodies’ can be seen as an invitation to reconfigure the patterns of relationships which have previously shaped our identities. From this viewpoint a ‘turnaround’ in transforming ourselves is therefore synonymous with transforming relationships. This offers a theological means by which we may make sense of Hughes’ statement quoted at the beginning of this chapter: ‘All spiritual/ psychological problems have a relational component.’132

Due in part to the tension of the ‘already’ and the ‘not yet’ context of God’s kingdom in which we live, the call to be transformed is not without resistance and struggle, as the world exerts a continual pull to mould us into its patterns of relatedness and subsequent identity. From a Pauline perspective, the means

by which we may enter, endure, and triumph over such a struggle is by the continual ‘renewing of our minds’ (Rom. 12:2). The term ‘renewal of minds’ to Paul has a dualistic connotation; it includes one’s body (relationships to the world as discussed earlier) as there is no body/mind dualism in Paul’s thought.

In the counselling context a central facet of living in wholeness involves the ‘renewing of our minds’. The importance of the impact a person’s uniquely individual thinking has on their health is generally agreed among Christian and non-Christian approaches alike. Developmentally, from age four to five, a person will be able to construct beliefs about themselves that markedly differ from the evaluation of others, for example, how popular we are. In narrative therapy terms, the repetitions of destructive relational patterns are regarded as arising out of family generated ‘myths’ or ‘scripts’ or ideas about the self and the world. This perspective is helpful in pointing out the context within which we need to understand pathology or health. The family, for instance, can foster what might be regarded as realistic and healthy ‘scripts’ or the converse.

For Christians, this kind of insight links healthy personality to ‘true family’ or ‘community’, and in particular openness to the person or persons within such corporate structures who set the agendas that foster true identity. Most helpful in this regard is a model of imago Dei which focuses on Christ as ‘fully human’, whose pattern we can internalise and imitate. As McFadyen puts it:

In Christian tradition, Christ is the concrete history wherein God’s call and human response are present together. His individual identity... together with the content of his communication therefore has a normative status133

Thus, Christ is the agent who makes our transformative salvation realisable in concrete ‘here and now’ relatedness and gives rise to the general declaration of John 10:10, ‘I have come that they may have life, and have it to the full.’ The imagery used of a shepherd and his sheep has the connotation. This includes the notion of God’s provision of care and safety as he looks after ‘his sheep’; which stands in contrast to the ‘thieves and robbers’ (v1). The implicit challenges of experiencing health are introduced elsewhere through