"The hard work of Christian growth, therefore, is to think less of
ourselves and our performance and more of Jesus and his performance for
us. Ironically, when we focus mostly on our need to get better, we
actually get worse. We become neurotic and self absorbed. Preoccupation
with our effort instead of with God's effort for us makes us
increasingly self-centered and morbidly introspective
Again, think of it this way: sanctification is the daily hard work of
going back to the reality of our justification. it's going back to the
certainty of our objectivity secured pardon in Christ and hitting the
refresh button a thousand times a day. Or, as Martin Luther so aptly put
it in his Lectures on Romans, "To progress is always to begin again." Real spiritual progress, in other words, requires a daily going backwards."
Jesus + Nothing = Everything p. 95
Showing posts with label Sanctification. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Sanctification. Show all posts
Friday, March 9, 2012
Wednesday, December 14, 2011
How To Stop Being Neurotic And Self-absorbed
Ironically, what I’ve discovered is that the more I focus on my need to
get better the worse I actually get–I become neurotic and
self-absorbed. Preoccupation with my performance over Christ’s
performance for me actually hinders my growth because it makes me
increasingly self-centered and morbidly introspective–the exact opposite
of how the Bible describes what it means to be sanctified.
Sanctification is forgetting about yourself. “He must increase but I
must decrease” (John 3:30)
properly describes the painful sanctification process. “Decreasing”
is impossible for the one who keeps thinking about himself. In Mere Christianity,
C.S. Lewis reminded us that we’ll know a truly humble man when we meet
him because “He will not be thinking about humility: he will not, in
fact, be thinking about himself at all.” When we spend more time
thinking about ourselves and how we’re doing then we do about Jesus and
what he’s done, we shrink. As J.C. Kromsigt said, “The good seed cannot
flourish when it is repeatedly dug up for the purpose of examining its
growth.”
Tullian Tchividjian
Tullian Tchividjian
Wednesday, August 31, 2011
Why Christians grow so slowly in their faith
In his Thoughts on Religious Experience, Archibald Alexander
asked why we grow so slowly as Christians. First, he rounded up the
usual suspects: “The influence of worldly relatives and companions,
embarking too deeply in business, devoting too much time to amusements,
immoderate attachment to a worldly object,” etc. But then he drilled
down further and asked why these things get such a hold on us, “why
Christians commonly are of so diminutive a stature and of such feeble
strength in their religion.” He proposed three reasons:
1. “There is a defect in our belief in the freeness of divine grace.” Even when the gospel is acknowledged in theory, he wrote, Christians depend on their moods and performances rather than on Christ alone. Then, in our inevitable failure, we become discouraged, and worldliness regains strength with nothing to counteract it. “The covenant of grace must be more clearly and repeatedly expounded in all its rich plentitude of mercy, and in all its absolute freeness.”
2. “Christians do not make their obedience to Christ comprehend every other object of pursuit.” We compartmentalize our lives, and Jesus becomes a sidebar to the more compelling things of every day, like making money. “The secular employments and pursuits of the pious should all be consecrated and become a part of their religion.” That way, our work Monday through Friday is no distraction from Christ but more activity for Christ.
3. “We make general resolutions of improvement but neglect to extend our efforts to particulars.” Rather than be satisfied that we haven’t sinned hugely on any given day and therefore we must be doing okay as Christians, we should be strategizing for specific, actionable, new steps of obedience on a daily basis.
Archibald Alexander, Thoughts on Religious Experience (Edinburgh, 1989), pages 165-167.
Ray Ortlund
1. “There is a defect in our belief in the freeness of divine grace.” Even when the gospel is acknowledged in theory, he wrote, Christians depend on their moods and performances rather than on Christ alone. Then, in our inevitable failure, we become discouraged, and worldliness regains strength with nothing to counteract it. “The covenant of grace must be more clearly and repeatedly expounded in all its rich plentitude of mercy, and in all its absolute freeness.”
2. “Christians do not make their obedience to Christ comprehend every other object of pursuit.” We compartmentalize our lives, and Jesus becomes a sidebar to the more compelling things of every day, like making money. “The secular employments and pursuits of the pious should all be consecrated and become a part of their religion.” That way, our work Monday through Friday is no distraction from Christ but more activity for Christ.
3. “We make general resolutions of improvement but neglect to extend our efforts to particulars.” Rather than be satisfied that we haven’t sinned hugely on any given day and therefore we must be doing okay as Christians, we should be strategizing for specific, actionable, new steps of obedience on a daily basis.
Archibald Alexander, Thoughts on Religious Experience (Edinburgh, 1989), pages 165-167.
Ray Ortlund
Tuesday, August 23, 2011
Gospel-Driven Sanctification
In light of the recent discussion regarding the nature of Christian
growth and sanctification (see my last post), I thought I would re-post
the helpful quote below from Sinclair Ferguson. In it, he reminds us
that any piety and pursuit of holiness not grounded in, and driven by,
the gospel will eventually run out of gas–that imperatives minus
indicatives equal impossibilities:
Tullian Tchividjian
The first thing to remember is that we must never separate the benefits (regeneration, justification, sanctification) from the Benefactor (Jesus Christ). The Christians who are most focused on their own spirituality may give the impression of being the most spiritual but from the New Testament’s point of view, those who have almost forgotten about their own spirituality because their focus is so exclusively on their union with Jesus Christ and what He has accomplished are those who are growing and exhibiting fruitfulness. Historically speaking, whenever the piety of a particular group is focused on OUR spirituality, that piety will eventually exhaust itself on its own resources. Only where our piety forgets about us and focuses on Jesus Christ will our piety be nourished by the ongoing resources the Spirit brings to us from the source of all true piety, our Lord Jesus Christ.Dr. Ferguson reminds us that the secret of gospel-based sanctification is that we actually perform better as we grow in our understanding that our relationship with God is based on Christ’s performance for us, not our performance for him.
Tullian Tchividjian
Wednesday, June 15, 2011
Work Hard! But In Which Direction?
Yesterday my good friend Kevin DeYoung blogged about the need to “make every effort” in the Christian life. He rightly noted that “effort” is not a four-letter word and that throughout the New Testament we are told that growth in godliness requires exertion. He writes:
There is no question that Christian’s are to “work out our salvation with fear and trembling” (Phil. 2:12) and that the sanctification process will be both bloody and sweaty. After all, daily Christian living is daily Christian dying. Jesus likened the pain of Christian growth to “gouging out an eye” and “cutting off a hand”–indicating that growth in godliness requires parting with things we initially think we can’t do without.
There does seem to be some question, though, with regard to the nature and direction of our efforts. And at the heart of this question is the relationship between justification and sanctification.
Many conclude that justification is step one and that sanctification is step two and that once we get to step two there’s no reason to go back to step one. Sanctification, in other words, is commonly understood as progress beyond the initial step of justification. But while justification and sanctification are to be clearly separated theologically, the Bible won’t allow us to separate them essentially and functionally. For example, citing 2 Peter 1:5-7, Kevin refers to the list of character traits that mark a Christian–faith, virtue, knowledge, self-control, steadfastness, godliness, brotherly affection, and love. Notice, though, what Peter goes on to say in v.9:
Similarly, in Colossians 1:9-14 Paul says: You will grow in your understanding of God’s will, be filled with spiritual wisdom and understanding, increase in your knowledge of God, be strengthened with God’s power which will produce joy filled patience and endurance (v.9-12a) as you come to a greater realization that you’ve already been qualified, delivered, transferred, redeemed, and forgiven (v.12b-14).
Sanctification is a grueling process. But it’s NOT the process of moving beyond the reality of our justification but rather moving deeper into the reality of our justification. If sanctification could be likened to our responsibility to swim, justification is the pool we swim in. Sanctification is the hard work of going back to the certainty of our already secured pardon in Christ and hitting the refresh button over and over.
A couple chapters after Peter exhorts us to “make every effort” he succinctly describes growth in 3:18 by saying, “But grow in the grace and knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.” Growth always happens “in grace.” In other words, the truest measure of our growth is not our behavior (otherwise the Pharisees would have been the godliest people on the planet); it’s our grasp of grace–a grasp which involves coming to deeper and deeper terms with the unconditionality of God’s justifying grace. It’s also growth in “the knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.” This doesn’t simply mean learning facts about Jesus. It means growing in our love for Christ because of what he has already earned and secured for us and then fighting to live in a more vital awareness of that grace.
The reason this is such an important theme in the New Testament is because every temptation to sin (going all the way back to the Garden of Eden) is a temptation to disbelieve the gospel–the temptation to secure for myself in that moment something I think I need in order to be happy, something I don’t yet have: meaning, freedom, validation, cleansing, forgiveness, a sense of identity, worth, value and so on. Bad behavior, therefore, happens when we fail to believe that everything we need, in Christ we already have; it happens when we fail to believe in the rich provisional resources that are already ours in the gospel. Conversely, good behavior happens when we daily rest in and receive Christ’s “It is finished” into our rebellious regions of unbelief (what one writer calls “our unevangelized territories”) smashing any sense of a self-aggrandizing and narcissistic need to secure for ourselves anything beyond what Christ has already secured for us. As A.W. Pink put it, “Repentance is the hand releasing those filthy objects it had previously clung to so tenaciously while faith is extending an empty hand to God to receive His gift of grace.”
This is why when Jesus was asked in John 6:28, “What must we do to be doing the works of God?” he answered, “This is the work of God, that you believe in him who he sent.” What? That’s it? According to Jesus, yes! Actively, our work is to daily battle the root of all sin: unbelief (Calvin said that Christians are in perpetual conflict with their own unbelief). Passively, our work is to receive and rest in his work for us which is a terribly painful thing because we are all seasoned “do-it-yourselfers.” As it was with Martha in Luke 10:38-42, so it is with us: we just have to be doing something. We can’t sit still. Achieving, not receiving, has become the mark of spiritual maturity. It is much harder to rest in his promise of grace than it is to make a list and try to live by it. With this in mind, Martin Luther wrote, “To be convinced in our hearts that we have forgiveness of sins and peace with God by grace alone is the hardest thing.”
Jesus was getting at the root of the problem when he answered what he did in John 6:28 because justification alone kills all of our self-salvation projects that fuel all of our bad behavior and moral failures (Read Romans 6:1-14). Sanctification, therefore, involves God’s attack on our unbelief—our self-centered refusal to believe that God’s approval of us in Christ is full and final. It happens as we daily fight (with blood, sweat, and tears–”making every effort”) to receive and rest in our unconditional justification. As G. C. Berkouwer said, “The heart of sanctification is the life which feeds on justification.” It is in this context that I’ve said before how sanctification is the hard work of getting used to our justification.
So, going back to Philippians 2:12, when Paul tells us to “Work out your own salvation with fear and trembling” he’s making it clear that we’ve got work to do—but what exactly is the work? He goes on to explain: “For it is God who works in you, both to will and to work for his good pleasure” (2:13). As is often, and rightly, said: We work out what God has worked in. Well, what has God worked in and what are we therefore to work out? God works his work in you—which is the work already accomplished by Christ. Christ’s subjective work in us is his constantly driving us back to the reality of his objective work for us. Sanctification feeds on justification, not the other way around. This is why in his Lectures on Romans Martin Luther wrote, “To progress is always to begin again.” Real spiritual progress, in other words, requires a daily going backwards. We are to work at fighting the sin that so easily entangles us and robs us of our freedom by fleeing to the finished work of Christ every day.
Sanctification, as someone once put it, is not something added to justification. It is, rather, the justified life.
Tullian Tchividjian
It is the consistent witness of the New Testament that growth in godliness requires exertion on the part of the Christian. Romans 8:13 says by the Spirit we must put to death the deeds of the flesh. Ephesians 4:22-24 instructs us to put off the old self and put on the new. Ephesians 6 tells us to put on the full armor of God and stand fast against the devil. Colossians 3:5 commands us to put to death what is earthly in us. 1 Timothy 6:12 urges us to fight the good fight. Luke 13:24 exhorts us to strive to enter the narrow gate.Kevin rightly affirms the fact that the Christian life is not effortless–”let go and let God” is not biblical. Sanctification is not passive but active. My concern here is to add to what Kevin wrote and identify the direction of our effort.
There is no question that Christian’s are to “work out our salvation with fear and trembling” (Phil. 2:12) and that the sanctification process will be both bloody and sweaty. After all, daily Christian living is daily Christian dying. Jesus likened the pain of Christian growth to “gouging out an eye” and “cutting off a hand”–indicating that growth in godliness requires parting with things we initially think we can’t do without.
There does seem to be some question, though, with regard to the nature and direction of our efforts. And at the heart of this question is the relationship between justification and sanctification.
Many conclude that justification is step one and that sanctification is step two and that once we get to step two there’s no reason to go back to step one. Sanctification, in other words, is commonly understood as progress beyond the initial step of justification. But while justification and sanctification are to be clearly separated theologically, the Bible won’t allow us to separate them essentially and functionally. For example, citing 2 Peter 1:5-7, Kevin refers to the list of character traits that mark a Christian–faith, virtue, knowledge, self-control, steadfastness, godliness, brotherly affection, and love. Notice, though, what Peter goes on to say in v.9:
For whoever lacks these qualities is so nearsighted that he is blind, having forgotten that he was cleansed from his former sins.In her book Because He Loves Me, Elyse Fitzpatrick rightly says:
One reason we don’t grow in ordinary, grateful obedience as we should is that we’ve got amnesia; we’ve forgotten that we are cleansed from our sins. In other words, ongoing failure in our growth is the direct result of failing to remember God’s love for us in the gospel. If we fail to remember our justification, redemption, and reconciliation, we’ll struggle in our sanctification.In other words, remembering, revisiting, and rediscovering the reality of our justification every day is the hard work we’re called to do if we’re going to grow.
Similarly, in Colossians 1:9-14 Paul says: You will grow in your understanding of God’s will, be filled with spiritual wisdom and understanding, increase in your knowledge of God, be strengthened with God’s power which will produce joy filled patience and endurance (v.9-12a) as you come to a greater realization that you’ve already been qualified, delivered, transferred, redeemed, and forgiven (v.12b-14).
Sanctification is a grueling process. But it’s NOT the process of moving beyond the reality of our justification but rather moving deeper into the reality of our justification. If sanctification could be likened to our responsibility to swim, justification is the pool we swim in. Sanctification is the hard work of going back to the certainty of our already secured pardon in Christ and hitting the refresh button over and over.
A couple chapters after Peter exhorts us to “make every effort” he succinctly describes growth in 3:18 by saying, “But grow in the grace and knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.” Growth always happens “in grace.” In other words, the truest measure of our growth is not our behavior (otherwise the Pharisees would have been the godliest people on the planet); it’s our grasp of grace–a grasp which involves coming to deeper and deeper terms with the unconditionality of God’s justifying grace. It’s also growth in “the knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.” This doesn’t simply mean learning facts about Jesus. It means growing in our love for Christ because of what he has already earned and secured for us and then fighting to live in a more vital awareness of that grace.
The reason this is such an important theme in the New Testament is because every temptation to sin (going all the way back to the Garden of Eden) is a temptation to disbelieve the gospel–the temptation to secure for myself in that moment something I think I need in order to be happy, something I don’t yet have: meaning, freedom, validation, cleansing, forgiveness, a sense of identity, worth, value and so on. Bad behavior, therefore, happens when we fail to believe that everything we need, in Christ we already have; it happens when we fail to believe in the rich provisional resources that are already ours in the gospel. Conversely, good behavior happens when we daily rest in and receive Christ’s “It is finished” into our rebellious regions of unbelief (what one writer calls “our unevangelized territories”) smashing any sense of a self-aggrandizing and narcissistic need to secure for ourselves anything beyond what Christ has already secured for us. As A.W. Pink put it, “Repentance is the hand releasing those filthy objects it had previously clung to so tenaciously while faith is extending an empty hand to God to receive His gift of grace.”
This is why when Jesus was asked in John 6:28, “What must we do to be doing the works of God?” he answered, “This is the work of God, that you believe in him who he sent.” What? That’s it? According to Jesus, yes! Actively, our work is to daily battle the root of all sin: unbelief (Calvin said that Christians are in perpetual conflict with their own unbelief). Passively, our work is to receive and rest in his work for us which is a terribly painful thing because we are all seasoned “do-it-yourselfers.” As it was with Martha in Luke 10:38-42, so it is with us: we just have to be doing something. We can’t sit still. Achieving, not receiving, has become the mark of spiritual maturity. It is much harder to rest in his promise of grace than it is to make a list and try to live by it. With this in mind, Martin Luther wrote, “To be convinced in our hearts that we have forgiveness of sins and peace with God by grace alone is the hardest thing.”
Jesus was getting at the root of the problem when he answered what he did in John 6:28 because justification alone kills all of our self-salvation projects that fuel all of our bad behavior and moral failures (Read Romans 6:1-14). Sanctification, therefore, involves God’s attack on our unbelief—our self-centered refusal to believe that God’s approval of us in Christ is full and final. It happens as we daily fight (with blood, sweat, and tears–”making every effort”) to receive and rest in our unconditional justification. As G. C. Berkouwer said, “The heart of sanctification is the life which feeds on justification.” It is in this context that I’ve said before how sanctification is the hard work of getting used to our justification.
So, going back to Philippians 2:12, when Paul tells us to “Work out your own salvation with fear and trembling” he’s making it clear that we’ve got work to do—but what exactly is the work? He goes on to explain: “For it is God who works in you, both to will and to work for his good pleasure” (2:13). As is often, and rightly, said: We work out what God has worked in. Well, what has God worked in and what are we therefore to work out? God works his work in you—which is the work already accomplished by Christ. Christ’s subjective work in us is his constantly driving us back to the reality of his objective work for us. Sanctification feeds on justification, not the other way around. This is why in his Lectures on Romans Martin Luther wrote, “To progress is always to begin again.” Real spiritual progress, in other words, requires a daily going backwards. We are to work at fighting the sin that so easily entangles us and robs us of our freedom by fleeing to the finished work of Christ every day.
Sanctification, as someone once put it, is not something added to justification. It is, rather, the justified life.
Tullian Tchividjian
Tuesday, May 3, 2011
Romans 12: Imperatives in View of God’s Mercies
The “therefore” at the start of Romans 12 can be taken to mean, “the exhortations that follow in light of Romans 1-11.” Paul writes, “I appeal to you therefore, brothers, by the mercies of God.”
So because of the great doctrines of creation, righteousness, depravity, faith, propitiation, justification, union with Christ, sanctification, glorification, election, divine freedom, therefore, by God’s mercy and grace we can receive and respond to the following imperatives:
So because of the great doctrines of creation, righteousness, depravity, faith, propitiation, justification, union with Christ, sanctification, glorification, election, divine freedom, therefore, by God’s mercy and grace we can receive and respond to the following imperatives:
- present your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable to God
- Do not be conformed to this world, but
- be transformed by the renewal of your mind
- you [ought] not to think of himself more highly than he ought to think, but
- think with sober judgment,
- let us use our gifts that differ according to the grace given to us
- Let love be genuine.
- Abhor what is evil;
- hold fast to what is good.
- Love one another with brotherly affection.
- Outdo one another in showing honor.
- Do not be slothful in zeal,
- be fervent in spirit,
- serve the Lord.
- Rejoice in hope,
- be patient in tribulation,
- be constant in prayer.
- Contribute to the needs of the saints and
- seek to show hospitality.
- Bless those who persecute you;
- do not curse those who persecute you.
- Rejoice with those who rejoice,
- weep with those who weep.
- Live in harmony with one another.
- Do not be haughty, but
- associate with the lowly.
- Never be wise in your own sight.
- Repay no one evil for evil, but
- give thought to do what is honorable in the sight of all.
- If possible, so far as it depends on you, live peaceably with all.
- Never avenge yourselves, but l
- leave it to the wrath of God. . .
- if your enemy is hungry, feed him;
- if he is thirsty, give him something to drink
- Do not be overcome by evil, but
- overcome evil with good.
Thursday, March 3, 2011
Why Christians Don't Change
Richard Lovelace claims the main reason Christians do not change is a failure really to grasp God's grace:
"Christians who are no longer sure that God loves and accepts them in Jesus, apart from their present spiritual achievements, are subconsciously radically insecure persons....Their insecurity shows itself in pride, a fierce defensive assertion of their own righteousness and defensive criticism of others....They cling desperately to legal, Pharisaical righteousness, but envy, jealousy and other branches of the tree of sin grow out of their fundamental insecurity."
Richard Lovelace, Dynamics of Spiritual Life, 211-212
"Christians who are no longer sure that God loves and accepts them in Jesus, apart from their present spiritual achievements, are subconsciously radically insecure persons....Their insecurity shows itself in pride, a fierce defensive assertion of their own righteousness and defensive criticism of others....They cling desperately to legal, Pharisaical righteousness, but envy, jealousy and other branches of the tree of sin grow out of their fundamental insecurity."
Richard Lovelace, Dynamics of Spiritual Life, 211-212
Friday, January 28, 2011
The Fifty Fruits of Pride: A Self-Diagnostic
1. Want to be Well Known or Important (Isaiah 14:13-15; James 3:13-16; Romans 12:6)
4. Draw Attention to Myself (Proverbs 27:2)
The Fifty Fruits of Pride: A Self-Diagnostic
- “I am selfishly ambitious. I really want to get ahead and make a name for myself. I want to be someone important in life. I like having a position or title. I far prefer leading to following.”
- “I am overly competitive. I always want to win or come out on top and it bothers me when I don‟t.”
- “I want people to be impressed with me. I like to make my accomplishments known.”
a. Clothes or jewelry you wear.
b. Vehicle you drive.
c. Furniture you own.
d. House you live in.
e. Place you live.
f. Company you work for.
g. Amount of money you earn.
h. Food you eat.
i. How spiritual you are.
j. What you look like (physical appearance).
k. What you have accomplished.
l. What you know.
m. Where you went to school.
n. Who you know.
o. What your background is.
b. Vehicle you drive.
c. Furniture you own.
d. House you live in.
e. Place you live.
f. Company you work for.
g. Amount of money you earn.
h. Food you eat.
i. How spiritual you are.
j. What you look like (physical appearance).
k. What you have accomplished.
l. What you know.
m. Where you went to school.
n. Who you know.
o. What your background is.
- “I like to be the center of attention and will say or do things to draw attention to myself.”
- “I like to talk, especially about myself or persons or things I am involved with. I want people to know what I am doing or thinking. I would rather speak than listen. I have a hard time being succinct.”
The Fifty Fruits of Pride: A Self-Diagnostic
Tuesday, November 9, 2010
Done and Doing, Being and Becoming
For by a single offering he has perfected for all time those who are being sanctified (Hebrews 10:14).
In one act of triumphant death, Jesus offered himself up for sin. In that one act of triumphant death, he has perfected, completed, finished for all time, continually, forever, those who are being sanctified, in process, still being formed into his image. The Greek literally reads, “the ones being sanctified” and I think a helpful paraphrase is, “the folks God is still working on.”
It means that Jesus is done with us, and he is still doing with us. It means we already are, and we are still yet to be. It is positional sanctification and progressive sanctification mixed together and shadowed over by the cross of Christ.
Practically this means:
1. In the midst of my muddling through life and falling on my face, I need to remember that I have been perfected, finished, completed by the sacrifice of Christ for me.
2. In the midst of reveling in the finishing of my salvation, my perfection in Christ, I must still push “further up and further in” and seek personal holiness.
Question: Which side of the spectrum do you need to remind yourself of most?
Danny Slavich
In one act of triumphant death, Jesus offered himself up for sin. In that one act of triumphant death, he has perfected, completed, finished for all time, continually, forever, those who are being sanctified, in process, still being formed into his image. The Greek literally reads, “the ones being sanctified” and I think a helpful paraphrase is, “the folks God is still working on.”
It means that Jesus is done with us, and he is still doing with us. It means we already are, and we are still yet to be. It is positional sanctification and progressive sanctification mixed together and shadowed over by the cross of Christ.
Practically this means:
1. In the midst of my muddling through life and falling on my face, I need to remember that I have been perfected, finished, completed by the sacrifice of Christ for me.
2. In the midst of reveling in the finishing of my salvation, my perfection in Christ, I must still push “further up and further in” and seek personal holiness.
Question: Which side of the spectrum do you need to remind yourself of most?
Danny Slavich
Saturday, October 30, 2010
Sin Neutralizers: things we do to neutralize our wrongs
Sin demands a response. And it will get one. The question is not, “Will I respond to sin?” You will. I will. The real question is, “How will I respond to sin?” Sin, like gravity, is one of those unalterable laws: it happens and, therefore, I must interact with it. It is not that we are helpless, or that we are victims of sin, at least not for the Christian. Similar to gravity, we can respond in wise and beneficial ways to our fallenness. God has given us the answer to our sin problem as well as the power to overcome sin’s realities. Because of Christ we do not have to be overcome by the vicissitudes of sin. We can become the Gospel-centered, Gospel-motivated, and Gospel-empowered aggressors and, most assuredly, it is up to us as to how we respond to the things we do wrong.
Excuse – This is probably my most-oft-used tactic to neutralize my sin. My old friend Adam used this back in the Garden of Eden and I have found it to be a tempting response when I do something dumb. The downside, for those who have to live with me, is that it is frustrating to them because it is not really a solution at all. It does not get rid of my sin. It merely ignores or maybe, better said, turns my sin into some kind of ambiguous 18% gray gibberish that leaves everyone feeling a big awkward because they know that I have not sufficiently and biblically responded to what I have done wrong. Sin remains and my family and friends have to live with the big pink elephant in the room. When I resort to excuses rather than taking responsibility for my actions, life can only clunk along.
Justify – There are times when I will compare myself to others, which is part of the process that I use to talk myself into thinking that my sin is not as bad as some people’s. This, also, does not remove my sin, but only temporarily neutralizes it. Typically when I go into a self-justifying mode, it is because I think that I deserve better than what I have. Justification is a form of anger that comes from an angry heart that says, “I will get what I want regardless of what it costs or who I hurt in the process because I deserve to be happy.”
Usually the justifying persons have not been able to deal with their personal disappointments in life. They have talked themselves into being a victim of this or that and because of what has happened to them, they have reasoned that they deserve better. And when they sin, in the process of getting whatever they feel they deserve, they justify their sinful actions because they have convinced themselves that they have been unnecessarily hurt and should be rewarded. It is a cycle that leaves many casualties.
Alleviate – Typically people who seek to alleviate their sin have a different kind of sensitivity to their sin. Their sense of morality is more inward focused rather than the Justifier or the Excuser, who tend to point to externals as to why they do what they do. While the Excuser and the Justifier know the difference between right and wrong, they are not as introspective about their sin.
The way this practically works out for the Excuser and the Justifier is that their response to sin is to blame others while the Alleviator chooses to punish or blame himself/herself. This is their version of self-atonement, or how they seek to pay for their sin. Here is a short list of self-atoning, self-punishing responses to sin: drugs, sex, over-eating, excessive TV watching, spending money, vacations, clothes, medication, anger, cutting, woe is me and other self-loathing remarks.
These responses are intended to help the Alleviator in at least three ways: (1) There is a hope for comfort through these responses; (2) There is a feeling of “payment” for sin; (3) And there is a distraction from guilt. None of these responses accomplish the intended goal of removing the sin.
Blame – “If you lived with the woman that I live with, you would be doing what I am doing also.” “If you knew my dad, you would not be so self-righteous about what I am doing.” These are just two of the many variations that we use to neutralize our sin. Sadly, my list is quite long. Blaming becomes just another wrong reaction that never solves the real issues that need to be dealt with. The core issue with the blaming persons is self-righteousness. They find it very difficult to admit that they have done wrong. They are too in love with themselves to say that they made a mistake. Though they are aware of their sin, they choose to place their sin on someone or something else. A response to sin is required and they choose to respond by saying some version of, “It’s not really my fault.”
Man-Centered Sin Neutralizers
As I have reflected on the wrong ways in which I have responded to the things I have done wrong over the years, I have come up with at least four wrong responses to sin. Here they are:Excuse – This is probably my most-oft-used tactic to neutralize my sin. My old friend Adam used this back in the Garden of Eden and I have found it to be a tempting response when I do something dumb. The downside, for those who have to live with me, is that it is frustrating to them because it is not really a solution at all. It does not get rid of my sin. It merely ignores or maybe, better said, turns my sin into some kind of ambiguous 18% gray gibberish that leaves everyone feeling a big awkward because they know that I have not sufficiently and biblically responded to what I have done wrong. Sin remains and my family and friends have to live with the big pink elephant in the room. When I resort to excuses rather than taking responsibility for my actions, life can only clunk along.
Justify – There are times when I will compare myself to others, which is part of the process that I use to talk myself into thinking that my sin is not as bad as some people’s. This, also, does not remove my sin, but only temporarily neutralizes it. Typically when I go into a self-justifying mode, it is because I think that I deserve better than what I have. Justification is a form of anger that comes from an angry heart that says, “I will get what I want regardless of what it costs or who I hurt in the process because I deserve to be happy.”
Usually the justifying persons have not been able to deal with their personal disappointments in life. They have talked themselves into being a victim of this or that and because of what has happened to them, they have reasoned that they deserve better. And when they sin, in the process of getting whatever they feel they deserve, they justify their sinful actions because they have convinced themselves that they have been unnecessarily hurt and should be rewarded. It is a cycle that leaves many casualties.
Alleviate – Typically people who seek to alleviate their sin have a different kind of sensitivity to their sin. Their sense of morality is more inward focused rather than the Justifier or the Excuser, who tend to point to externals as to why they do what they do. While the Excuser and the Justifier know the difference between right and wrong, they are not as introspective about their sin.
The way this practically works out for the Excuser and the Justifier is that their response to sin is to blame others while the Alleviator chooses to punish or blame himself/herself. This is their version of self-atonement, or how they seek to pay for their sin. Here is a short list of self-atoning, self-punishing responses to sin: drugs, sex, over-eating, excessive TV watching, spending money, vacations, clothes, medication, anger, cutting, woe is me and other self-loathing remarks.
These responses are intended to help the Alleviator in at least three ways: (1) There is a hope for comfort through these responses; (2) There is a feeling of “payment” for sin; (3) And there is a distraction from guilt. None of these responses accomplish the intended goal of removing the sin.
Blame – “If you lived with the woman that I live with, you would be doing what I am doing also.” “If you knew my dad, you would not be so self-righteous about what I am doing.” These are just two of the many variations that we use to neutralize our sin. Sadly, my list is quite long. Blaming becomes just another wrong reaction that never solves the real issues that need to be dealt with. The core issue with the blaming persons is self-righteousness. They find it very difficult to admit that they have done wrong. They are too in love with themselves to say that they made a mistake. Though they are aware of their sin, they choose to place their sin on someone or something else. A response to sin is required and they choose to respond by saying some version of, “It’s not really my fault.”
A Real Bad Side Effect
The problem with all four of these attempts to neutralize sin is that they harden the conscience. Conscience (co-knowledge) is that inner voice that acts as our moral thermostat. It tells us when we have done wrong. However, when we choose any of the responses that I have described above as a “solution” to sin, a layering-of-our-conscience-effect begins to take place, which in the long-run will de-sensitize us to God’s conviction in our lives. And once our conscience becomes so hardened (layered) we then become morally dysfunctional, not able to discern or respond to right and wrong.God-Centered Sin Neutralizer
There is only one way to respond rightly to sin. That is the Gospel, the person and work of Jesus Christ. God gave us the one and only response to sin in His Son. Rather than us choosing to slave through various man-centered responses to sin, God judged His Son on the cross and only asks us to accept His judgement of His Son as the final right answer to the sin problem.Application Question
- If you tend to choose any of the four wrong options above, what is it about the Gospel that is difficult for you to grasp and apply?
- Are you regularly accepting full responsibility for your sinful choices and appropriating God’s Gospel to your life on a daily basis? If not, why not?
- Do you need some help in practically applying the Gospel to your life? Will you talk to your pastor about your struggle?
Monday, October 25, 2010
It’s Okay to Pass This Test
You may have heard these words in a sermon. Maybe you’ve handed them off to others. Perhaps they’ve rung a spiritual alarm in your heart. They come from the Apostle Paul in 2 Corinthians 13:5: “Examine yourselves, to see whether you are in the faith.”
This exhortation is often used to motivate careful self-examination–to see if we really believe in Christ, to see if we are actually walking with the Lord, to test if we are genuine disciples or phony hypocrites.
And there is a time for this kind of self-examination. The Sermon on the Mount (the end of chapter 7 especially), the woes on the Pharisees (Matt. 23), and the seven letters of Revelation (Rev. 2-3) come to mind. But self-examination becomes a problem when we don’t believe were allowed to pass the exam. Some Christians turn introspection into annihilation. And some of our heroes don’t always help. There is a strand in some Puritan divines–and I love those dead guys as much as anyone –that so delineates all the sins on our sinny sin sins that we scarcely feel it possible to call ourselves Christian. Pound away with the law, but don’t hammer out the faith.
The thing we often miss with 2 Corinthians 13:5 is that Paul expects the Corinthians to pass the test. He is writing to defend his apostleship, and the chief ground for his defense is the Corinthians themselves. They want proof that Christ is speaking through weak little Paul (v. 3). He offers their lives as proof. The Corinthians ought to test themselves to see whether they are in the faith because Paul knows Jesus Christ is them, so they will not fail the test (v. 5b). Consequently, Paul will not fail their test (v. 6).
So go ahead and encourage one another to examine the heart. Let’s be honest and see if we are in the faith. Let’s test whether or not Christ is in us. But as we put our “in-Christness” to the test let’s not forget it’s okay to give ourselves a passing grade. To God be the glory.
Kevin DeYoung
This exhortation is often used to motivate careful self-examination–to see if we really believe in Christ, to see if we are actually walking with the Lord, to test if we are genuine disciples or phony hypocrites.
And there is a time for this kind of self-examination. The Sermon on the Mount (the end of chapter 7 especially), the woes on the Pharisees (Matt. 23), and the seven letters of Revelation (Rev. 2-3) come to mind. But self-examination becomes a problem when we don’t believe were allowed to pass the exam. Some Christians turn introspection into annihilation. And some of our heroes don’t always help. There is a strand in some Puritan divines–and I love those dead guys as much as anyone –that so delineates all the sins on our sinny sin sins that we scarcely feel it possible to call ourselves Christian. Pound away with the law, but don’t hammer out the faith.
The thing we often miss with 2 Corinthians 13:5 is that Paul expects the Corinthians to pass the test. He is writing to defend his apostleship, and the chief ground for his defense is the Corinthians themselves. They want proof that Christ is speaking through weak little Paul (v. 3). He offers their lives as proof. The Corinthians ought to test themselves to see whether they are in the faith because Paul knows Jesus Christ is them, so they will not fail the test (v. 5b). Consequently, Paul will not fail their test (v. 6).
So go ahead and encourage one another to examine the heart. Let’s be honest and see if we are in the faith. Let’s test whether or not Christ is in us. But as we put our “in-Christness” to the test let’s not forget it’s okay to give ourselves a passing grade. To God be the glory.
Kevin DeYoung
Monday, October 18, 2010
A Former Slave-Trader’s Sanctified Self-Assesment
John Newton: “I am not what I ought to be. . . . I am not what I wish to be. . . . I am not what I hope to be. . . . Yet . . . I am not what I once was . . . and by the grace of God I am what I am.”
D. A. Carson: “That encapsulates Christian sanctification in pithy statements better than anything I know.”
D. A. Carson: “That encapsulates Christian sanctification in pithy statements better than anything I know.”
Thursday, October 7, 2010
A Few Thoughts on N. T. Wright's After You Believe
Earlier this year the bishop’s After You Believe: Why Christian Character Matters was released, joining Simply Christian and Surprised by Hope to form a trio of semi-popular pieces straightening out what Wrights deems in need of adjustment in current Protestant Christianity.
After You Believe is an exposition of Christian virtue:
This is not a review but three brief comments after reading the book--a strength, a weakness, and a note on Wright more broadly.
First a strength.
N. T. Wright has helped a generation of believers shed an adolescent view of a boring future afterlife floating about in disembodied ethereal existence, and mature into the wonderful biblical vision of God’s coming restoration of Eden and renewal of this world, ruled by a redeemed humanity of incorruptible though fully 'trans-physical' bodies, of which Jesus himself is the first installment. (Who knew Randy Alcorn and N. T. Wright would find in one another such a vocal ally?) As with much of his writing, Wright helpfully incorporates into this book on virtue the biblical vision of a renewed and restored cosmos, a word in season to us all and a revolution for some.
This clarity on the solid and substantive future awaiting believers is one piece of a larger strength of Wright’s, that of putting the whole Bible together. He reads and expounds all of Scripture with the first two and last two chapters always in mind, connecting the dots for us to see where and how history began and where and how it is headed. Wright clarifies, for example, how God is currently on a mission to restore (not leave behind) this earth (we English-speakers could have gotten this from Bavinck a hundred years ago had we known Dutch!), or how the New Testament fulfills the Old and the Old prepares for the New. Even here, of course, discerning readers will want to exile some of Wright’s intercanonical suggestions; but there is much to gratefully receive.
Second, a weakness.
After You Believe eviscerates the heart of healthy Christian cultivation of virtue. Indeed, large swaths of the book, including the opening chapters, contain nothing specifically Christian. In this book, biblical labels often cover pagan substance.
That's a strong statement, and it is dangerous and difficult to generalize, and I am certainly reading Wright with my own theological framework, and there are undoubtedly out-of-balance elements in my own theological outlook, and I bless God for all Wright has taught me. But his is a castrated view of Christian virtue and will prove correspondingly fruitless. The center, the engine, the key--pick your metaphor, I'm talking about the gospel of grace--is missing.
I’ve mentioned before on this blog that there seems to be something of a gospel recovery currently underway in the Christian West. By this I have in mind not only recovery of what the gospel is doctrinally but also recovery of how the gospel helps us functionally. Wright’s book is a striking example of the kind of thinking that lacks this renewed emphasis (an emphasis being rediscovered, not discovered, today). After You Believe is a good and godly attempt to ignite authentic Christian living that nevertheless fails to provide the crucial resource for such living. Divorced from gospel grace, strenuous moral activity--even when done in an effort to depend on the Spirit, which is imperative--can only make us smug in success or fearful in failure.
To be sure, I have my own very particular view about where virtue comes from. In short, I believe the Christ-clinging, self-divesting faith that justifies us is the faith that sanctifies us. To speak in Sanders-ese, I believe in covenantal charism: get in by grace, stay in by grace. I believe we have very little awareness how law-marinated our hearts really are, and how our fears and anxieties and short-temperedness and envy are simply the fruit of this, and how the great task of the believer is to re-believe each day the shocking, even scandalous, freeness of God's favor, because of and in communion with his Son. More to say but I move on to keep this brief.
Wright wants his readers to cultivate virtue-producing habits; he expounds the threefold moral triad of faith, hope and love; he reminds us of the ninefold fruit of the Spirit; he helps us recover the neglected significance of the Holy Spirit; he draws on long and venerable ethics traditions tracing back to Aristotle. Well and good. The problem is not what is here but what's not. Nowhere are we exposed to the New Testament’s teaching that the gospel of God’s grace in Jesus, the same gospel that got us off the runway at conversion and which will land us in the pearly gates at death, is the heart of what keeps us moving forward in the air in the meantime—as indicated, for instance, in 2 Peter 1, the very passage most clearly concerned with the cultivation of virtue (arete, vv. 3 and 5).
The very title articulates the error: After You Believe. After? Isn't the Christian life the beginning of sustained and ever-deepening belief? I understand--the point of the title is simply to address what happens after conversion. Fair enough. Yet the title does reinforce the false and unhelpful and widespread assumption that one believes in Christ at conversion and then moves on to the hard work of virtue-cultivation.
Third, a general comment.
Wright continues, to his own self-professed dismay, to prove a uniquely polarizing figure. A clump of Christians on one end of evangelicalism have knee-jerk suspicion simply in finding Wright’s name on the cover; a clump on the other end receives the words of Wright as one (very small) step shy of holy writ. There is wisdom, however, in neither overcautiously resisting everything nor greedily gulping down everything but rather (as with any writer) swallowing the meat and spitting out the bones.
Corinthian factionalism is in our blood today no less than the mid-50’s A.D. 'I am of Cephas,' 'I am of Paul,' 'I am of Apollos'--'I am of Wright,' 'I am of Piper,' 'I am of Barth,' 'I am of _______.' But all things are ours. Learn from them all, filter it through Scripture, be wise as serpents and innocent as doves, blend humble love with conviction-fueled courage, and emerge helped. Let's be mature in our thinking (1 Cor 14:20).
There is much that is insightful and illuminating in After You Believe. Far better, though, to give a young believer zealous to cultivate character and virtue is Luther’s Treatise on Good Works or Walther Marshall’s The Gospel Mystery of Sanctification or volume 4 of Bavinck’s Reformed Dogmatics or Berkouwer’s Faith and Sanctification or Gerhard Forde's Justification by Faith or Mike Horton’s The Gospel-Driven Life or Tim Chester’s You Can Change or anything by Jerry Bridges or Bryan Chapell or Paul Tripp.
It is grace that changes us.
Dane Ortlund
After You Believe is an exposition of Christian virtue:
My contention in this book is that the New Testament invites its readers to learn how to be human [in a way] which will both inform our moral judgments and form our characters so that we can live by their guidance. The name for this way of being human, this kind of transformation of character, is virtue. (18)The dominant refrain throughout the book is that Christian virtue is a matter of forming habits, habits that lead to character transformation.
Virtue is what happens when wise and courageous choices have become 'second nature.' (21)
This is not a review but three brief comments after reading the book--a strength, a weakness, and a note on Wright more broadly.
First a strength.
N. T. Wright has helped a generation of believers shed an adolescent view of a boring future afterlife floating about in disembodied ethereal existence, and mature into the wonderful biblical vision of God’s coming restoration of Eden and renewal of this world, ruled by a redeemed humanity of incorruptible though fully 'trans-physical' bodies, of which Jesus himself is the first installment. (Who knew Randy Alcorn and N. T. Wright would find in one another such a vocal ally?) As with much of his writing, Wright helpfully incorporates into this book on virtue the biblical vision of a renewed and restored cosmos, a word in season to us all and a revolution for some.
This clarity on the solid and substantive future awaiting believers is one piece of a larger strength of Wright’s, that of putting the whole Bible together. He reads and expounds all of Scripture with the first two and last two chapters always in mind, connecting the dots for us to see where and how history began and where and how it is headed. Wright clarifies, for example, how God is currently on a mission to restore (not leave behind) this earth (we English-speakers could have gotten this from Bavinck a hundred years ago had we known Dutch!), or how the New Testament fulfills the Old and the Old prepares for the New. Even here, of course, discerning readers will want to exile some of Wright’s intercanonical suggestions; but there is much to gratefully receive.
Second, a weakness.
After You Believe eviscerates the heart of healthy Christian cultivation of virtue. Indeed, large swaths of the book, including the opening chapters, contain nothing specifically Christian. In this book, biblical labels often cover pagan substance.
That's a strong statement, and it is dangerous and difficult to generalize, and I am certainly reading Wright with my own theological framework, and there are undoubtedly out-of-balance elements in my own theological outlook, and I bless God for all Wright has taught me. But his is a castrated view of Christian virtue and will prove correspondingly fruitless. The center, the engine, the key--pick your metaphor, I'm talking about the gospel of grace--is missing.
I’ve mentioned before on this blog that there seems to be something of a gospel recovery currently underway in the Christian West. By this I have in mind not only recovery of what the gospel is doctrinally but also recovery of how the gospel helps us functionally. Wright’s book is a striking example of the kind of thinking that lacks this renewed emphasis (an emphasis being rediscovered, not discovered, today). After You Believe is a good and godly attempt to ignite authentic Christian living that nevertheless fails to provide the crucial resource for such living. Divorced from gospel grace, strenuous moral activity--even when done in an effort to depend on the Spirit, which is imperative--can only make us smug in success or fearful in failure.
To be sure, I have my own very particular view about where virtue comes from. In short, I believe the Christ-clinging, self-divesting faith that justifies us is the faith that sanctifies us. To speak in Sanders-ese, I believe in covenantal charism: get in by grace, stay in by grace. I believe we have very little awareness how law-marinated our hearts really are, and how our fears and anxieties and short-temperedness and envy are simply the fruit of this, and how the great task of the believer is to re-believe each day the shocking, even scandalous, freeness of God's favor, because of and in communion with his Son. More to say but I move on to keep this brief.
Wright wants his readers to cultivate virtue-producing habits; he expounds the threefold moral triad of faith, hope and love; he reminds us of the ninefold fruit of the Spirit; he helps us recover the neglected significance of the Holy Spirit; he draws on long and venerable ethics traditions tracing back to Aristotle. Well and good. The problem is not what is here but what's not. Nowhere are we exposed to the New Testament’s teaching that the gospel of God’s grace in Jesus, the same gospel that got us off the runway at conversion and which will land us in the pearly gates at death, is the heart of what keeps us moving forward in the air in the meantime—as indicated, for instance, in 2 Peter 1, the very passage most clearly concerned with the cultivation of virtue (arete, vv. 3 and 5).
The very title articulates the error: After You Believe. After? Isn't the Christian life the beginning of sustained and ever-deepening belief? I understand--the point of the title is simply to address what happens after conversion. Fair enough. Yet the title does reinforce the false and unhelpful and widespread assumption that one believes in Christ at conversion and then moves on to the hard work of virtue-cultivation.
Third, a general comment.
Wright continues, to his own self-professed dismay, to prove a uniquely polarizing figure. A clump of Christians on one end of evangelicalism have knee-jerk suspicion simply in finding Wright’s name on the cover; a clump on the other end receives the words of Wright as one (very small) step shy of holy writ. There is wisdom, however, in neither overcautiously resisting everything nor greedily gulping down everything but rather (as with any writer) swallowing the meat and spitting out the bones.
Corinthian factionalism is in our blood today no less than the mid-50’s A.D. 'I am of Cephas,' 'I am of Paul,' 'I am of Apollos'--'I am of Wright,' 'I am of Piper,' 'I am of Barth,' 'I am of _______.' But all things are ours. Learn from them all, filter it through Scripture, be wise as serpents and innocent as doves, blend humble love with conviction-fueled courage, and emerge helped. Let's be mature in our thinking (1 Cor 14:20).
There is much that is insightful and illuminating in After You Believe. Far better, though, to give a young believer zealous to cultivate character and virtue is Luther’s Treatise on Good Works or Walther Marshall’s The Gospel Mystery of Sanctification or volume 4 of Bavinck’s Reformed Dogmatics or Berkouwer’s Faith and Sanctification or Gerhard Forde's Justification by Faith or Mike Horton’s The Gospel-Driven Life or Tim Chester’s You Can Change or anything by Jerry Bridges or Bryan Chapell or Paul Tripp.
It is grace that changes us.
Dane Ortlund
Tuesday, September 21, 2010
The Process of Sanctification?
The two images below are taken from Wayne Grudem’s section on sanctification in his Systematic Theology. The first graph is as it appears in the book and the second as it appears in my copy (my thanks is due to Chris Green, vice-principal of Oak Hill College, who taught me that it is good to write in books, even if my writing is practically illegible). Can you spot the difference?
The first graph represents the way I used to think about Christian life. I had been saved from slavery to sin at conversion; with great gratitude for what Christ had done, I struggled on in the strength of the Holy Spirit and the word to grow in holiness; at death I thought I’d finally be made perfect in holiness. My life was shaped by wanting to be what I wasn’t yet but would be. I now realise that this way of thinking brings about joyless obedience and a nagging sense of guilt.
The true gospel is represented in the second graph. At conversion I was sanctified by Christ (1 Cor 1:2). I am already graciously made perfect, justified, righteous, holy in his eyes. I now look back to the cross with gratitude and forward to glory (1 Peter 1:3-5). The rest of my life is shaped by wanting to be what I already am.
HT: Neil Robbie
The first graph represents the way I used to think about Christian life. I had been saved from slavery to sin at conversion; with great gratitude for what Christ had done, I struggled on in the strength of the Holy Spirit and the word to grow in holiness; at death I thought I’d finally be made perfect in holiness. My life was shaped by wanting to be what I wasn’t yet but would be. I now realise that this way of thinking brings about joyless obedience and a nagging sense of guilt.
The true gospel is represented in the second graph. At conversion I was sanctified by Christ (1 Cor 1:2). I am already graciously made perfect, justified, righteous, holy in his eyes. I now look back to the cross with gratitude and forward to glory (1 Peter 1:3-5). The rest of my life is shaped by wanting to be what I already am.
HT: Neil Robbie
Wednesday, September 1, 2010
What's the Key to Healthy Christian Growth in Godliness?
That’s the question I asked a handful of thoughtful men of God last week. Responses below.
Please understand: I explicitly asked our brothers to keep it to a single, short sentence. Of course, whole volumes could be (and have been!) written addressing this question (here’s my favorite). So we gladly receive these wise statements remembering that sanctification is not a math problem. There is no formula. Every answer below needs a hundred footnotes. Point taken. The purpose of this exercise is not to provide an opportunity to nit-pick but to re-center, refresh, encourage, spur on, help one another.
Thabiti Anyabwile: ‘If then you have been raised with Christ, seek the things that are above, where Christ is, seated at the right hand of God.’ (Col. 3:1)
Mike Bullmore: I believe the key to healthy Christian growth in godliness is a deep life in the Word of God (Psalm 1:1-3) in which we are encountered by Christ, the Living Word (John 5:39-40, Col. 3:16), in whom we find all the fullness of God himself (Col. 1:19, 2 Cor. 1:20, and a hundred other verses).
Justin Buzzard: Trusting and enjoying God as your Father, living as his son/daughter, on account of Christ's work.
Graham Cole: The key is to treasure Jesus Christ, for that will be where your heart is.
Jonathan Dodson: Growth in godliness is not character-centered but Christ-centered, a constant expression of repentance and faith in the person and work of Jesus.
Lyle Dorsett: Radical, unreserved love for Jesus Christ manifested in obedient intimacy.
Zack Eswine: Jesus. Mercy. Tears. A friend. Time.
Sean Lucas: The key to healthy Christian Growth is to live out the reality of your union with Christ.
Doug Moo: The constant, disciplined practice of reminding ourselves who we are in Christ.
Steve Nichols: Self-determination is a myth.
Eric Ortlund: The key to healthy (un-Pharisaical, un-ugly) Christian growth is the thing you believed when you first became a Christian, which delivers you into that deep rest and rightness and OK-ness before God, and which exposes sin as counterfeits which can’t match Christ’s righteousness.
Gavin Ortlund: The key to healthy Christian growth in godliness is experiencing the grace and glory of God as revealed in Jesus Christ.
Ray Ortlund: Applying the interruptive ‘But now’ of Romans 3:21 to my heart.
Darrin Patrick: We must have an increasing sense of our unworthiness before God by ourselves and an increasing sense of our own acceptance from God in Christ.
George Robertson: The key to healthy Christian growth in godliness is faithful attention to gospel preaching
Tim Savage: Having the strength to comprehend what is the breadth and length and height and depth of Christ in us (cf. Eph. 3:18)
Tom Schreiner: The key to growth is trust in God, and faith comes from hearing God’s word.
Steve Smallman: I’ve become convinced from Scripture and experience that personal spiritual growth is rooted in participation in a healthy church; personal growth comes from community growth.
Colin Smith: A lively sense of all that Christ is for us and all that is ours in Him
.Sam Storms: Healthy Christian growth in godliness doesn’t primarily come from trying harder but from enjoying more; or again, pleasure in God is the power for purity in life.
Justin Taylor: The key to healthy growth in godliness is to seek and to enjoy fellowship with the Father, in union with Christ, through the power of the Spirit, in accordance with the Word, with the body of Christ.
Joe Thorn: I believe the key to healthy growth in godliness is the cultivation and exercise of Scripture-saturated prayer by which we express and experience our dependence on, joy in, and work through Jesus Christ.
Carl Trueman: The key to healthy growth in godliness is to be an active, serving member of a local church where the gospel is preached and the eldership care about nurturing the congregation as outward-looking, humble servants of Christ.
Bruce Ware: Growing knowledge of and love for God, particularly as revealed in Christ and through the Scriptures, that re-structures one’s mind and enflames one’s heart, resulting in increasing transformation into Christ-like character.
Jared Wilson: As pat as the answer may sound, the key to healthy Christian growth in godliness is submissive study of the Scriptures.
Bob Yarbrough: Hard work in response to Christ’s cross.
Good answers, brothers! Thought-provoking and helpful. Thank you for serving us in this way. (My own response would be something like: Resolutely enjoying our full and free justification from God in Christ, in the shadow of which all the beckoning functional justifications of the world lose their vice-like grip on our hearts.) God grant us grace to move forward with the glad abandon of faith in September 2010 as never before.
Dane Ortlund
Please understand: I explicitly asked our brothers to keep it to a single, short sentence. Of course, whole volumes could be (and have been!) written addressing this question (here’s my favorite). So we gladly receive these wise statements remembering that sanctification is not a math problem. There is no formula. Every answer below needs a hundred footnotes. Point taken. The purpose of this exercise is not to provide an opportunity to nit-pick but to re-center, refresh, encourage, spur on, help one another.
Thabiti Anyabwile: ‘If then you have been raised with Christ, seek the things that are above, where Christ is, seated at the right hand of God.’ (Col. 3:1)
Mike Bullmore: I believe the key to healthy Christian growth in godliness is a deep life in the Word of God (Psalm 1:1-3) in which we are encountered by Christ, the Living Word (John 5:39-40, Col. 3:16), in whom we find all the fullness of God himself (Col. 1:19, 2 Cor. 1:20, and a hundred other verses).
Justin Buzzard: Trusting and enjoying God as your Father, living as his son/daughter, on account of Christ's work.
Graham Cole: The key is to treasure Jesus Christ, for that will be where your heart is.
Jonathan Dodson: Growth in godliness is not character-centered but Christ-centered, a constant expression of repentance and faith in the person and work of Jesus.
Lyle Dorsett: Radical, unreserved love for Jesus Christ manifested in obedient intimacy.
Zack Eswine: Jesus. Mercy. Tears. A friend. Time.
Sean Lucas: The key to healthy Christian Growth is to live out the reality of your union with Christ.
Doug Moo: The constant, disciplined practice of reminding ourselves who we are in Christ.
Steve Nichols: Self-determination is a myth.
Eric Ortlund: The key to healthy (un-Pharisaical, un-ugly) Christian growth is the thing you believed when you first became a Christian, which delivers you into that deep rest and rightness and OK-ness before God, and which exposes sin as counterfeits which can’t match Christ’s righteousness.
Gavin Ortlund: The key to healthy Christian growth in godliness is experiencing the grace and glory of God as revealed in Jesus Christ.
Ray Ortlund: Applying the interruptive ‘But now’ of Romans 3:21 to my heart.
Darrin Patrick: We must have an increasing sense of our unworthiness before God by ourselves and an increasing sense of our own acceptance from God in Christ.
George Robertson: The key to healthy Christian growth in godliness is faithful attention to gospel preaching
Tim Savage: Having the strength to comprehend what is the breadth and length and height and depth of Christ in us (cf. Eph. 3:18)
Tom Schreiner: The key to growth is trust in God, and faith comes from hearing God’s word.
Steve Smallman: I’ve become convinced from Scripture and experience that personal spiritual growth is rooted in participation in a healthy church; personal growth comes from community growth.
Colin Smith: A lively sense of all that Christ is for us and all that is ours in Him
.Sam Storms: Healthy Christian growth in godliness doesn’t primarily come from trying harder but from enjoying more; or again, pleasure in God is the power for purity in life.
Justin Taylor: The key to healthy growth in godliness is to seek and to enjoy fellowship with the Father, in union with Christ, through the power of the Spirit, in accordance with the Word, with the body of Christ.
Joe Thorn: I believe the key to healthy growth in godliness is the cultivation and exercise of Scripture-saturated prayer by which we express and experience our dependence on, joy in, and work through Jesus Christ.
Carl Trueman: The key to healthy growth in godliness is to be an active, serving member of a local church where the gospel is preached and the eldership care about nurturing the congregation as outward-looking, humble servants of Christ.
Bruce Ware: Growing knowledge of and love for God, particularly as revealed in Christ and through the Scriptures, that re-structures one’s mind and enflames one’s heart, resulting in increasing transformation into Christ-like character.
Jared Wilson: As pat as the answer may sound, the key to healthy Christian growth in godliness is submissive study of the Scriptures.
Bob Yarbrough: Hard work in response to Christ’s cross.
Good answers, brothers! Thought-provoking and helpful. Thank you for serving us in this way. (My own response would be something like: Resolutely enjoying our full and free justification from God in Christ, in the shadow of which all the beckoning functional justifications of the world lose their vice-like grip on our hearts.) God grant us grace to move forward with the glad abandon of faith in September 2010 as never before.
Dane Ortlund
Wednesday, August 25, 2010
Ditches on the Path to Godliness
I see two opposite dangers Christians face when thinking about growth in godliness. These tendencies are like ditches on the side of the road. Many veer into one because they are so concerned to avoid the other.
On one side is the dreamy danger. These Christians idolize their heroes. They are idealistic about how fast they’ll grow. They underestimate the reality of indwelling sin and are unrealistic about how maturity actually takes root. They expect too much too soon and feel too spiritual for effort.
On the other side of the road is the disbelieving danger. These Christians have no heroes. They are cynical about growth in godliness. They underestimate the reality of the Holy Spirit and figure the use of appointed means is a waste of time. They expect nothing of the Bible, prayer, and the Spirit’s sanctifying work, and nothing is what they get.
In contrast to these two dangers, those on the path of holiness realize that growth is possible and it is also hard work. Sanctification is God’s power working through our exertion–rooted in knowledge, sustained by hope, made possible by faith.
Kevin DeYoung
On one side is the dreamy danger. These Christians idolize their heroes. They are idealistic about how fast they’ll grow. They underestimate the reality of indwelling sin and are unrealistic about how maturity actually takes root. They expect too much too soon and feel too spiritual for effort.
On the other side of the road is the disbelieving danger. These Christians have no heroes. They are cynical about growth in godliness. They underestimate the reality of the Holy Spirit and figure the use of appointed means is a waste of time. They expect nothing of the Bible, prayer, and the Spirit’s sanctifying work, and nothing is what they get.
In contrast to these two dangers, those on the path of holiness realize that growth is possible and it is also hard work. Sanctification is God’s power working through our exertion–rooted in knowledge, sustained by hope, made possible by faith.
Kevin DeYoung
Saturday, July 24, 2010
Why Talk about the “Heart” When the Bible Says It’s Unknowable?
Question 8 of 15 from the Q&A in David Powlison’s essay, “I Am Motivated When I Feel Desire,” Seeing With New Eyes: Counseling and the Human Condition Through the Lens of Scripture.
8. Is it even right to talk about the heart, since the Bible teaches that the heart is unknowable to anyone but God? (1 Sam. 16:7; Jer. 17:9)
No one but God can see, explain, control, or change another person’s heart and its choices. There is no underlying reason why a person serves a particular lust rather than God; sin is irrational and insane. And there is no therapeutic technique that can change hearts. But the Bible teaches us that we can describe what rules the heart and speak the truth that convicts and liberates. Effective biblical ministry probes and addresses why people do things, as well as what they do. Jesus’ ministry continually exposed and challenged what people lived for, offering himself as the only worthy ruler of the heart.
For example, 1 Samuel 16:7 says that man judges by externals while God judges the heart. Yet a few verses earlier, we are told that Saul visibly disobeyed God for a reason: he feared the people and listened to their voice, instead of fearing God and listening to him (see 1 Sam. 15:24). His motives are describable, even if inexplicable. There is no deeper cause for sin than sin. Jeremiah 17:9 says that the human heart is deceitful and incomprehensible to any but God, but the same passage describes how behavior reveals that people trust in idols, themselves, and others, instead of trusting in God (see Jer. 17:1-8). Scripture is frank to tell us the causes of behavior: interpersonal conflicts, for example, arise because of lusts (see James 4:1-2). If anger and conflict come from a lust, the next and obvious question is, “What do you want that now rules you?”
To search out motives demands no subtle psychotherapeutic technique. People can tell us what they want. The Israelites grumbled—a capital crime—when they had to subsist on boring food. Why? They craved flavor: fish, cucumbers, melons, leeks, onions, and garlic (see Num. 11:5). Later they grumbled when they got thirsty and no oasis appeared. Why? They craved juicy foods, or foods that demanded irrigation: grain, figs, vines, pomegranates, and water (see Num. 20:5). In each case the craving reflected their apostasy from God and expressed itself in visible, audible sins. When we see the God-substitutes that claim our affections, then we see how good and necessary the grace of Jesus is in subduing hijackers and retaking the controls.
No one but God can see, explain, control, or change another person’s heart and its choices. There is no underlying reason why a person serves a particular lust rather than God; sin is irrational and insane. And there is no therapeutic technique that can change hearts. But the Bible teaches us that we can describe what rules the heart and speak the truth that convicts and liberates. Effective biblical ministry probes and addresses why people do things, as well as what they do. Jesus’ ministry continually exposed and challenged what people lived for, offering himself as the only worthy ruler of the heart.
For example, 1 Samuel 16:7 says that man judges by externals while God judges the heart. Yet a few verses earlier, we are told that Saul visibly disobeyed God for a reason: he feared the people and listened to their voice, instead of fearing God and listening to him (see 1 Sam. 15:24). His motives are describable, even if inexplicable. There is no deeper cause for sin than sin. Jeremiah 17:9 says that the human heart is deceitful and incomprehensible to any but God, but the same passage describes how behavior reveals that people trust in idols, themselves, and others, instead of trusting in God (see Jer. 17:1-8). Scripture is frank to tell us the causes of behavior: interpersonal conflicts, for example, arise because of lusts (see James 4:1-2). If anger and conflict come from a lust, the next and obvious question is, “What do you want that now rules you?”
To search out motives demands no subtle psychotherapeutic technique. People can tell us what they want. The Israelites grumbled—a capital crime—when they had to subsist on boring food. Why? They craved flavor: fish, cucumbers, melons, leeks, onions, and garlic (see Num. 11:5). Later they grumbled when they got thirsty and no oasis appeared. Why? They craved juicy foods, or foods that demanded irrigation: grain, figs, vines, pomegranates, and water (see Num. 20:5). In each case the craving reflected their apostasy from God and expressed itself in visible, audible sins. When we see the God-substitutes that claim our affections, then we see how good and necessary the grace of Jesus is in subduing hijackers and retaking the controls.
Friday, July 23, 2010
How Do I Know If a Desire Is Inordinate Rather than Natural?
Question 7 of 15 from the Q&A in David Powlison’s essay, “I Am Motivated When I Feel Desire,” Seeing With New Eyes: Counseling and the Human Condition Through the Lens of Scripture.
7. How can you tell if a desire is inordinate rather than natural?
By their fruits you know them. Human motivation is not a theoretical mystery; there is no need to engage in introspective archaeological digs. Evil desires produce bad fruits that can be seen, heard, and felt (James 1:15; 3:16). For example, a father who wants his child to grow up to become a Christian reveals the status of that desire by whether he is a good father or a manipulative, fearful, angry, suspicious father. In a good father, the desire is subordinate to God’s will that he love his child. In a sinful father, the desire rules and produces moral and emotional chaos. Similarly, a wife who wants to be loved reveals the status of that desire by whether or not she loves and respects her husband. Visibile fruit reveals whether God rules or lust rules.
It is a serious mistake to engage in introspective “idol hunts,” attempting to dig out and weigh every kink in the human soul. The Bible calls for a more straightforward form of self-examination: an outburst of anger invites reflection on what craving ruled the heart that our repentance might be intelligent. The Bible’s purposes are “extrospective,” not introspective: to move toward God in repentant faith (James 4:6-10) and then to move toward the one wronged by anger, making peace in repentance, humility, and love.
Justin Taylor
7. How can you tell if a desire is inordinate rather than natural?
By their fruits you know them. Human motivation is not a theoretical mystery; there is no need to engage in introspective archaeological digs. Evil desires produce bad fruits that can be seen, heard, and felt (James 1:15; 3:16). For example, a father who wants his child to grow up to become a Christian reveals the status of that desire by whether he is a good father or a manipulative, fearful, angry, suspicious father. In a good father, the desire is subordinate to God’s will that he love his child. In a sinful father, the desire rules and produces moral and emotional chaos. Similarly, a wife who wants to be loved reveals the status of that desire by whether or not she loves and respects her husband. Visibile fruit reveals whether God rules or lust rules.
It is a serious mistake to engage in introspective “idol hunts,” attempting to dig out and weigh every kink in the human soul. The Bible calls for a more straightforward form of self-examination: an outburst of anger invites reflection on what craving ruled the heart that our repentance might be intelligent. The Bible’s purposes are “extrospective,” not introspective: to move toward God in repentant faith (James 4:6-10) and then to move toward the one wronged by anger, making peace in repentance, humility, and love.
Justin Taylor
Thursday, July 22, 2010
Does Each Person Have One “Root Sin”?
Question 6 of 15 from the Q&A in David Powlison’s essay, “I Am Motivated When I Feel Desire,” Seeing With New Eyes: Counseling and the Human Condition Through the Lens of Scripture.
6. Does each person have one “root sin”?
With good reason, the Bible usually refers to the “lusts” (plural) of the flesh. The human heart can generate a lust tailored to any situation. Again John Calvin powerfully described how cravings “boil up” within us, how the mind of man is a “factory of idols” [Calvin, Institutes, ed. Battles, 65, 108]. We are infested with lusts. Listen closely to any person given to complaining, and you will observe the creativity of our cravings. Certainly one particular craving may so frequently appear that it seems to be a “root sin”: love of mammon, fear of man and craving for approval, love of preeminence or control, desire for pleasure, and so forth, can dictate much of life. But all people have all the typical cravings.
Realizing the diversity in human lusts gives great flexibility and penetration to counseling. For example, one lust can generate very diverse sins, as 1 Timothy 6:10 states: “The love of money is a root of all sorts of evil.” Every one of the Ten Commandments—and more—can be broken by someone who loves and serves money. The craving for money and material possessions is an organizing theme for symptomatic sins as diverse as anxiety, theft, compulsive shopping, murder, jealousy, marital discord, a sense of inferiority or of superiority compared to others, sexual immorality that trades sex for material advantage, and so forth.
On the flip side, a single behavioral sin can emerge from very different lusts. For example, sexual immorality might occur for many different reasons: erotic pleasure, financial advantage, revenge on a spouse or parent, fear of saying no to an authority, pursuit of approval, enjoyment of power over another’s sexual response, the quest for social status or career advancement, pity for someone and playing the savior, fear of losing a potential marriage partner, escape from boredom, peer pressure, and so forth. Wise biblical counselors dig for specifics. They don’t assume all people have the same characteristic flesh, or that a person always does a certain thing for the same reasons. The flesh is creative in iniquity.
Justin Taylor
6. Does each person have one “root sin”?
With good reason, the Bible usually refers to the “lusts” (plural) of the flesh. The human heart can generate a lust tailored to any situation. Again John Calvin powerfully described how cravings “boil up” within us, how the mind of man is a “factory of idols” [Calvin, Institutes, ed. Battles, 65, 108]. We are infested with lusts. Listen closely to any person given to complaining, and you will observe the creativity of our cravings. Certainly one particular craving may so frequently appear that it seems to be a “root sin”: love of mammon, fear of man and craving for approval, love of preeminence or control, desire for pleasure, and so forth, can dictate much of life. But all people have all the typical cravings.
Realizing the diversity in human lusts gives great flexibility and penetration to counseling. For example, one lust can generate very diverse sins, as 1 Timothy 6:10 states: “The love of money is a root of all sorts of evil.” Every one of the Ten Commandments—and more—can be broken by someone who loves and serves money. The craving for money and material possessions is an organizing theme for symptomatic sins as diverse as anxiety, theft, compulsive shopping, murder, jealousy, marital discord, a sense of inferiority or of superiority compared to others, sexual immorality that trades sex for material advantage, and so forth.
On the flip side, a single behavioral sin can emerge from very different lusts. For example, sexual immorality might occur for many different reasons: erotic pleasure, financial advantage, revenge on a spouse or parent, fear of saying no to an authority, pursuit of approval, enjoyment of power over another’s sexual response, the quest for social status or career advancement, pity for someone and playing the savior, fear of losing a potential marriage partner, escape from boredom, peer pressure, and so forth. Wise biblical counselors dig for specifics. They don’t assume all people have the same characteristic flesh, or that a person always does a certain thing for the same reasons. The flesh is creative in iniquity.
Justin Taylor
Is “Lusts of the Flesh” Terminology Practical?
Question 5 of 15 from the Q&A in David Powlison’s essay, “I Am Motivated When I Feel Desire,” Seeing With New Eyes: Counseling and the Human Condition Through the Lens of Scripture.
5. Is the phrase “lusts of the flesh” useful in practical life and counseling?
Apply the term to twenty-first-century experience, redeeming the evasive language people substitute. People frequently talk about what they want, expect, wish for, desire, demand, need, long for. Pop psychologies typically validate these needs and longings as neutral givens. Little do people realize that much of the time they are actually describing sinful usurpers of God’s rule over their lives: inordinate desires, lusts of the flesh, cravings. They just aren’t interpreting their experience rightly.
For example, listen to children talk when they are angry, disappointed, demanding, contrary: “But I want. . . . But I don’t want to. . . .” In our family we began teaching our children about the “I-wantsies” before they were two years old. We wanted them to grasp that sin was more than behavior. For example, analyze any argument or outburst of anger and you will find ruling expectation and desires that are being frustrated (James 4:1-2).
The language people typically use day to day gets you into the details of a person’s life, but it usually comes with a distorted interpretation attached. Wise counseling must reinterpret that experience into biblical categories, taking the more pointed reality of “lusts, cravings, pleasures,” and mapping it into the the “felt needs” that underlie much sin and misery. The very unfamiliarity of the phrase is an advantage, if you explain it carefully and show its relevance and applicability. Behavorial sins demand a horizontal resolution—as well as vertical repentance. But motivational sins have first and foremost to do with God, and repentance quickens the awareness of relationship with the God of grace.
Justin Taylor
5. Is the phrase “lusts of the flesh” useful in practical life and counseling?
Apply the term to twenty-first-century experience, redeeming the evasive language people substitute. People frequently talk about what they want, expect, wish for, desire, demand, need, long for. Pop psychologies typically validate these needs and longings as neutral givens. Little do people realize that much of the time they are actually describing sinful usurpers of God’s rule over their lives: inordinate desires, lusts of the flesh, cravings. They just aren’t interpreting their experience rightly.
For example, listen to children talk when they are angry, disappointed, demanding, contrary: “But I want. . . . But I don’t want to. . . .” In our family we began teaching our children about the “I-wantsies” before they were two years old. We wanted them to grasp that sin was more than behavior. For example, analyze any argument or outburst of anger and you will find ruling expectation and desires that are being frustrated (James 4:1-2).
The language people typically use day to day gets you into the details of a person’s life, but it usually comes with a distorted interpretation attached. Wise counseling must reinterpret that experience into biblical categories, taking the more pointed reality of “lusts, cravings, pleasures,” and mapping it into the the “felt needs” that underlie much sin and misery. The very unfamiliarity of the phrase is an advantage, if you explain it carefully and show its relevance and applicability. Behavorial sins demand a horizontal resolution—as well as vertical repentance. But motivational sins have first and foremost to do with God, and repentance quickens the awareness of relationship with the God of grace.
Justin Taylor
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