“Preaching the Gospel to Yourself”

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I’m joining in the “Reading Classics Together” at Challies‘ place, and the book currently under discussion is The Discipline of Grace by Jerry Bridges.

I wasn’t able to discuss last week’s chapter due to family activities with loved ones from out of town, but its title was “The Pharisee and the Tax Collector.” Tim summed it up nicely here, but I’ll just say, if anyone has any shred of hope in their own goodness, this chapter will trounce that idea. We think we’re ok, like the Pharisee, because we don’t do any of the “really bad,” obvious sins like murder, adultery, etc., but we overlook our “refined” sins like pride, envy, and the like. But sin is sin. And even the good we do is shot through with wrong motives and lack of faith.

It could actually be a depressing chapter, even for one who has known those truths for years. But it is necessary to remind ourselves of those things in order to see the need for God’s grace, not just for salvation, but for daily living that pleases Him.

The title of the current chapter is “Preach the Gospel to Yourself.” My former music pastor once said that the gospel is not just the first step of the Christian life, but it is the hub of the wheel that everything else in the Christian life connects to and emanates from. Bridges says “The gospel is for believers also, and we must pursue holiness, or any other aspect of discipleship, in the atmosphere of the gospel” (p. 46).

Bridges then thoroughly discuss Romans 3:19-26, bringing out the gospel truths that “no one is declared righteous before God by observing the law,” “there is a righteousness from God that is apart from the law,” “the righteousness of God is received through faith in Jesus Christ,” “this righteousness is available to everyone on the same basis because we have all sinned and fall short of the glory of God,” “all who put their faith in Jesus Christ are justified freely by God’s grace,” “this justification is ‘through the redemption that came by Christ Jesus,'” and “God presented Jesus as a sacrifice of atonement, through faith in His blood.” Those phrases are all sections of the chapter that he then discusses in more detail.

One important distinction he makes is that between “justification and mere pardon. A pardon is excusing an offense without exacting a penalty, “such as when a president or governor pardons someone even though they are guilty. “In God’s plan of justification, however, justice is not violated by a gratuitous pardon of the convicted sinner. Rather, justice has been satisfied; the penalty has been fully paid by the Lord Jesus Christ” (p. 56).

“It is not our contrition or sorrow for our sin, it is not our repentance, it is not even the passing of a certain number of hours during which we feel we are on some kind of probation that cleanses
us. It is the blood of Christ, shed once for all on Calvary . . . that cleanses our consciences and gives us a renewed sense of peace with God” (p. 58).

“To preach the gospel to yourself, then, means that you continually face up to your own sinfulness and then flee to Jesus through faith in His shed blood and righteous life. It means you appropriate again, by faith, the fact that Jesus fully satisfied the law of God, that He is your propitiation, and that God’s holy wrath is no longer directed toward you” (p. 59). Just as in salvation we depended on Jesus’s goodness and righteousness rather than our own, so we do every day of our Christian lives as well, rejoicing that our sins are forgiven and we face no condemnation since we are in Christ.

This does not mean we do not pursue holiness. Much of the latter part of the book discusses holiness. It’s not that once we’re forgiven, we sit back, relax, and live however we want til we get to heaven. Rather, out of love for God and gratitude to Him, we should be even more motivated to pursue holiness. But we need to remember “when you set yourself to seriously pursue holiness, you will begin to realize what an awful sinner you are. And if you are not firmly rooted in the gospel and have not learned to preach it to yourself every day, you will soon become discouraged and will slack off in your pursuit of holiness” (p. 60).

On a side note, I have to admit, before reading this chapter, the phrase “preach the gospel to yourself every day” grated on me a bit. Not that I didn’t believe its truths, even before reading here, but we have such a tendency to operate by catch-phrases: I kept seeing and hearing this brought up in the face of any problem or situation. Yes, if someone has financial or marital or other problems, we do apply the truth of the gospel to it and operate on the basis of the forgiveness wrought for us in Christ. But as Wendy Alsup often says, the gospel affects everything, but the gospel isn’t everything. We apply the gospel and operate from its base, but we go on to learn the whole counsel of God and apply it to our lives as well.

This chapter is very beneficial. I would even venture to say it is the key chapter of the book. More discussion of it is here.

Book Review: Safely Home

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In Safely Home by Randy Alcorn, Ben Fielding is on the fast track to becoming CEO of Getz International. To increase the company’s business with China, Ben’s boss wants him to spend a few weeks there and suggests Ben stay with his old college roommate, Li Quan, to get a feel for what the “common man” in China might need from their business.

Ben has been in China many times before, is familiar with much of the culture, even speaks fluent Mandarin, but he has never looked up his old roommate. He is uncomfortable doing so now. Quan had come to college in America an atheist and became a Christian while here: Ben was a professing Christian in college, but his business goals have usurped everything else in his life. But, being put on the spot by his boss, he has little choice but to go and see Quan.

Ben is shocked that his brilliant roommate, who as a student had been asked to stay on at Harvard as  history professor, is living in such poverty. When he begins to learn about house churches and persecution of Christians, he is disbelieving, having fallen for the public relations hype fed to American businessmen and officials. But the more time Ben spends in China with Quan, the more his eyes are opened, not only to the true situation there, but also to the needs of his own heart.

Interspersed with Ben and Quan’s story are glimpses into the heavenlies as Alcorn interprets it, the great “cloud of witnesses,” the King’s care, watchfulness, and preparation for His own.

The story was inspired by Ron DiCianni’s beautiful print Safely Home, depicting a martyr being greeted home by his Savior, an angel waiting to the side with the new arrival’s white robe, the nations of earth visible below.

Knowing a couple of people who have worked in China, I do know that true Christians have to meet “underground,” have to be very careful about their words, actions, and even e-mails, and they can lose their jobs or be arrested for their faith.

We have it so relatively easy in America, we forget the hallmark of many Christians through the ages has been suffering and martyrdom. This book is a wake-up call, and it was a rebuke to me over the “little things” that I get grumbly about or the ways I fail to stand. In myself I know I don’t have it in me to face what some Christians do. But they would say they don’t either: their Savior helps them, as He will us as we walk for Him. We just need to remember that, in a world that hates Him, we often need to make a choice whether we’ll play it safe here, or do what we ought to and take the consequences; temporary safety and ease here, or being joyously welcomed Safely Home there.

A couple of my favorite lines from the book:

From the King: “They don’t understand that I am not only at work here, preparing a place for them, but I am at work there, preparing them for that place” (p. 313).

“The hands and feet of the only innocent man became forever scarred so that guilty people would not have to bear the scars they deserved” (p. 375).

My only little teensy criticism was that the story seemed a little more message-driven rather than story-driven. All writers are conveying a message, of course, and craft stories around the truths they wanted to convey or portray. It’s just a little more obvious here. But that may just be my impression — the reviews I looked through didn’t mention that, so it’s obviously not a drawback.

I do not only recommend but encourage the reading of this book.

(This review will also be linked to Semicolon‘s Saturday Review of Books.)

Listening to God

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I just saw this today at The Good Life, and it really speaks to something I’ve been pondering recently. It’s from God’s Wisdom in Proverbs by Dan Phillips, which I haven’t read, nor do I know much about Dan Phillips, but I appreciate this quote:

“Listen” does not mean, here or anywhere else in Scripture, to harken to a subjective, mystical, murmury, semi-revelatory inner voice of God. God has no intention of turning our attention within ourselves, of urging us to seek after holy hunches and vaporous mumblings inside our own deluded hearts. He categorically condemns such orientation (Prov. 28:26; Jer. 17:9). God knows all too well that dense foolishness is “original factory equipment” in our fallen minds, thanks to Great-Great-Grandad Adam (Prov. 22:15).

No, God is not speaking of our listening to the inscrutable mumblings of some spirit, as if it were His Spirit. Rather, here and everywhere God is urging us to listen to the Word of God (cf. 1:23, 33; 16:20; contrast 28:9). The content makes this unavoidable. Solomon means the wise man to listen to the words he is writing. Internal, lowgrade, spiritual “sweet nothings” would have been far from the inspired king’s mind.
~Dan Phillips
God’s Wisdom in Proverbs

Friday’s Fave Five

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Welcome to Friday’s Fave Five, hosted by Susanne at Living to Tell the Story, in which we can share five of our favorite things from the last week, a wonderful exercise in looking for and appreciating the good things God blesses us with. Click on the button to learn more, then go to Susanne’s to read others’ faves and link up your own.

It has been a great week. Here are some of the highlights:

1. Jeremy (oldest son) has been home for the week! We celebrated his birthday on Wednesday. As I have said before, Skype and Facetime help a lot to keep us in touch, but it is not the same as having him here in person.

2. Time off. My husband was able to take the week off and Jason and Mittu half the week, so we’ve been able to do some fun things together. It’s been a nice combination of just hanging out and talking, playing games, and going on a few outings.

3. Help with meals. Of course, even if everyone else is on vacation, Mom still has kitchen duty. But Mittu prepared a couple of meals and we ate out for a few, so I got a bit of a vacation, too.

4. An outing in Gatlinburg/Pigeon Forge. We went to the Ripley’s Aquarium of the Smokies, walked around some of the shops, and ate dinner at the Applewood Farmhouse Restaurant and Grill.

5. A good Samaritan. Just as we finished up at the restaurant last night and were preparing to trek homeward, our car wouldn’t start. Jim found someone willing to jump the battery and help us on our way. I’m thankful that’s all the problem was (I had already been mentally running through the need to get a tow truck, rent a car to get home, and then figure out how and when to get back to pick the car up) and that someone was willing to help.

Because of much of the above, I haven’t been around to visit other blogs much this week, or often I have read but not commented. But I know you understand. 🙂

Happy Friday!

Happy Birthday, Jeremy!

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His birthday was actually yesterday, but I didn’t have much chance to get to the computer yesterday. 🙂

All in all I think he had a good day. We’ve been enjoying his week home very much, though it is going too fast!

One who has influenced my life

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Annette at This Simple Home and Dorie at These Grace Filled Days have teamed up to create Together on Tuesdays as “a casual way to meet and connect with other women” over the summer. They’ve created a schedule of topics to discuss in order to get to know one another better, and the topic for this week is someone who has influenced our lives.

I could name several, but one who has had a significant impact is Mrs. C. I had become a Christian as a teen-ager, and my family was mostly unsaved. On Sunday mornings I would take my younger sisters to Sunday School and church with me, but otherwise I went by myself. My church was my second home, and I think of that time as my childhood in the Lord. The church folks were wonderful to me.

During my sophomore year of college, a new family moved to our area and began attending our church. I met them when I came home for the summer. On Father’s Day several of us were asked to give testimonies about our fathers. I don’t remember what I said except that, with my father being unsaved, there was something missing from our relationship, and I began to give testimony instead to God as my heavenly Father. (If I were to give a similar testimony today I would also emphasize that the Lord had taught me to respect my parents, even when they did things that did not invite respect, and more than that, to love them, and that godly love is the greatest testimony and influence to them.)

Afterward this new family, the C. family, spoke to me. They told me if I ever needed someone to talk to, I should feel free to call them. I warned them that I would take them up on that offer. :) At some point they invited me to their home for dinner, and our relationship just grew from there until I began to think of them as my spiritual family.

I don’t think they took me “under their wing” with a view to teach, to instruct, to be an example — I don’t think they saw me as a ministry or a project. I think they were just extending love. But just seeing the example of a godly Christian home was such a tremendous influence on me. I had always, in all my childhood imaginings of what I wanted to be when I grew up and alongside those other aspirations, wanted to be a wife and mother. After I became a Christian I wanted to have a distinctively Christian home. And in the C. household I saw that lived out. I saw the father’s firmness and headship of his family. I saw the children, though normal and not perfect, sinless children, love and respect their parents. I saw a loving cheery atmosphere. But most of all I saw Mrs. C. — her merry heart, her loving submission to her husband, her gentleness with her children, her creativity and industriousness in her home, her servant’s heart at church, and her interest and care for me. She was the same sweet, cheery, helpful, outreaching person in every venue. I began calling her “Mom” (not to replace my mom — I loved my mom dearly — but in a way different from my mom) and her daughter, who was a few years younger and who happened to look like me, and who later was my maid of honor, my sister. To this day she is “Mom C.” Though Mr. C. passed away several years ago, I still keep in touch with Mrs. C. She remembers all of my family’s birthdays and our anniversary.

I don’t know what I would be and what my home would be without her example and influence. I am thankful for her and I love her dearly.

The winner…

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of my blog anniversary give-away of Not By Chance: Learning to Trust a Sovereign God by Layton Talbert is Amy at Hope Is the Word!

I want to say a heartfelt thank-you to all who posted very kind comments there. I was not anticipating that. My heart was very touched and blessed. You all really make blogging a joy and I feel so blessed that anyone reads anything here.

Backyard fun

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The Together on Tuesdays topic last week was backyard fun, but I didn’t post because we don’t have much of a back yard now and haven’t spent much time out there in ages, except when my husband grills food.

But over the next few days, some backyard fun from earlier days came to mind.

I’m not sure how old the boys were when they wanted a treehouse. Just buying lumber from a commercial store was beyond our means at that time, but somewhere Jim found a place with a bunch of old wooden pallets, and he asked for them, took them apart, sanded them, and built a treehouse, compete with trap door. To my chagrin, it doesn’t look like we have any photos of it. But they and the neighbor kids spent hours out there.

I found a couple of other photos of their backyard activities:

These little scooters were all the rage at one time.

They pulled each other around in the wagon, and this time it looks they cooled off by adding water. 🙂 (The boys are mine, the girls are neighbors).

There was a little rise at the back of the property that allowed just enough of a thrill for small boys when it snowed to sled down or use an inner tube, or in a pinch, a flattened cardboard box.

Once my husband built a teepee for them.

I think a few times they camped out in the back yard.

We had a sandbox for several years, and when we got the dog, she was always someone to play with in the backyard. They blew bubbles, played ball, constructed mazes out of big cardboard boxes. They had a kiddie pool at one time.

And the trampoline was a big hit, but the pièce de résistance was when Jim put together some PVC piping and punched holes in it to make a sprinkler for the trampoline:

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You’d think the water would have made it slippery, but it actually slowed down the bounciness some. It combined running through the sprinkler with jumping on the trampoline. And it looks like it made a handy water fountain, too.

I had always wanted a swing set, and we never had one, but I don’t think they missed out. 🙂 They associated swings and slides with the park which we visited often in those days.

I enjoyed this trip down memory lane. Thanks, Annette and Dorie, for the prompt!

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Thy words were found, and I did eat them; and thy word was unto me the joy and rejoicing of mine heart: for I am called by thy name, O LORD God of hosts.
Jeremiah 15:16

It is the spirit that quickeneth; the flesh profiteth nothing: the words that I speak unto you, they are spirit, and they are life. John 6:63

May you find joy and life as you partake in His Word today.

Friday’s Fave Five

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Welcome to Friday’s Fave Five, hosted by Susanne at Living to Tell the Story, in which we can share five of our favorite things from the last week, a wonderful exercise in looking for and appreciating the good things God blesses us with. Click on the button to learn more, then go to Susanne’s to read others’ faves and link up your own.

Here are some favorites from the last week:

1. Jeremy’s coming home today! For a whole week!

2. Jesse’s job. Jesse hadn’t found work this summer except for a man from church who called him on an as-needed basis. But this man recently had an opening come up for more regular work and offered it to Jesse, and the hours are flexible so it will fit around his college classes .

3. Sleep. I usually wake up once or twice in the night and usually have no trouble going back to sleep. But for the past few weeks whenever I’d wake up, I’d be awake for an hour or so. That provides a nice time to pray or think, but then it makes me sleep later or else drag through the next day. This week has been more back to normal and has felt so good.

4. Kind comments on my sixth blog anniversary post. Almost made me cry!

5. God’s help — every day! But specifically in a situation last week. The ladies’ newsletter for church needed to be printed out by Friday, and I didn’t find out til Tuesday that the lady who writes up the testimonies and information for our “Getting to Know You” section for new ladies wasn’t going to be able to do that this time. It’s a highlight of the newsletter so I hated to leave it out, but wasn’t sure I could find someone who would be willing to share their testimony and such in such a short time frame. We usually “introduce” two ladies per newsletter and I was hoping to at least have one — but God provided two! And for a number of reasons I didn’t get to actually working on the newsletter until Thursday, though I had been thinking and planning what to do before that. Yet, by God’s grace, it was done by Friday afternoon. (I debated whether to go into all that or just say “God really helped me in a pinch this week,” but then I decided it may be an encouragement to you in your ministries.)

Bonus: Our pastor’s message last Sunday from Romans 16, where Paul lists a number of people who ministered in various ways other than what we think of as the “main” ones of teaching and preaching. He discussed some of those people as well as some of those folks in our church and ended with “interviewing” a lady from our church who teaches English in a closed country and has various ministry opportunities. That was a blessing to me.

Have a great weekend!