Quite often the connections between repentance and salvation is not what religion assumes and tells you it means. Here Paul writes

“For godly sorrow worketh repentance to salvation not to be repented of: but the sorrow of the world worketh death.” (2 Corinthians 7:10 (KJV)

What does sorrow and repentance have to do with a salvation, and why would anyone consider repenting of this salvation?

First, we must recognize that there are different kinds of salvation mentioned in the Pauline epistles, as seen below.

• Paul wrote about the salvation of our souls in Eph. 2:8-9.
• He also spoke about … his physical salvation from prison (cf. Ex. 14:13). “For I know that this shall turn to my salvation through your prayer, and the supply of the Spirit of Jesus Christ, (Philippians 1:19 (KJV)
• Additionally, he advised Timothy that if he would continue in Pauline doctrine he would “save” himself from the misery that always comes from not continuing in Pauline doctrine! (I Tim. 4:16).
• There is also the salvation from despair that the hope of the Rapture gives (Rom. 8:23,24), and the Rapture itself is called a salvation in Rom. 13:11).

And, the salvation in our text, 2 Corinthians 7:10, is yet another kind of salvation. In the context, Paul says he made the Corinthians sorry “with a letter” (2 Cor. 7:8), i.e., that is in his first epistle to them, in which he rebuked them for not disciplining the unrepentant man living in fornication cf. (I Cor. 5).

The leaders in Corinth then “sorrowed to repentance” about this (II Cor. 8:9). The word repentance here simply means to ‘have a change of mind’; they changed their mind about allowing the fornicator to continue in their midst. This “saved” them from the dangerous leavening effect that his presence would otherwise have among them, and so their godly sorrow worked repentance to salvation, a salvation Paul assured them they would not regret or repent of later.

This also worked another kind of salvation among them, one similar to the salvation Paul references in I Corinthians 5:5, where he speaks about the fornicator and tells them, “To deliver such an one unto Satan for the destruction of the flesh, (so) that the spirit may be saved in the day of the Lord.”

In context, we know that delivering the man to Satan meant putting him out of the assembly (v. 2,13). Letting him wallow in sin might destroy his flesh, but... it would bring him back to the Lord, and “save” him from a loss of rewards at the Judgment Seat (I Cor. 3:15).

The Corinthians would likewise be saved from such loss by their obedience to Paul's instructions. Their sorrow worked this kind of repentance to salvation as well, another salvation they would not regret, of course, for no one at the Judgment Seat will ever repent of having done the right thing.

Adapted from Ricky Kurth of the Berean Bible Society