Oh Taste and See that the Lord is Good!

"The man whose soul is “growing” takes more interest in spiritual things every year. He does not neglect his duty in the world. He discharges faithfully, diligently, and conscientiously every relation of life, whether at home or abroad. But the things he loves best are spiritual things. The ways, and fashions, and amusements, and recreations of the world have a continually decreasing place in his heart. He does not condemn them as downright sinful, nor say that those who have anything to do with them are going to hell. He only feels that they have a constantly diminishing hold on his own affections, and gradually seem smaller and more trifling in his eyes. Spiritual companions, spiritual occupations, spiritual conversation, appear of ever-increasing value to him. Would any one know if he is growing in grace? Then let him look within for increasing spirituality of taste."

J.C. Ryle, Holiness

HT: Kevin DeYoung

Unselfishing Ourselves

“Our self-abnegation is thus not for our own sake but for the sake of others. And thus it is not to mere self-denial that Christ calls us but specifically to self-sacrifice, not to unselfing ourselves but to unselfishing ourselves. Self-denial for its own sake is in its very nature ascetic, monkish. It concentrates our whole attention on self—self-knowledge, self-control—and can therefore eventuate in nothing other than the very apotheosis of selfishness. At best it succeeds only in subjecting the outer self to the inner self or the lower self to the higher self, and only the more surely falls into the slough of self-seeking, that it partially conceals the selfishness of its goal by refining its ideal of self and excluding its grosser and more outward elements. Self-denial, then, drives to the cloister, narrows and contracts the soul, murders within us all innocent desires, dries up all the springs of sympathy, and nurses and coddles our self-importance until we grow so great in our own esteem as to be careless of the trials and sufferings, the joys and aspirations, the strivings and failures and successes of our fellow-men. Self-denial, thus understood, will make us cold, hard, unsympathetic—proud, arrogant, self-esteeming—fanatical, overbearing, cruel. It may make monks and Stoics, it cannot make Christians.”

B. B. Warfield, “Imitating the Incarnation,” in The Person and Work of Christ (Grand Rapids, 1970), page 574.

HT: David Powlison

Tell Me Something New, Devil!

"When I awoke last night, the Devil came and wanted to debate with me; he rebuked and reproached me, arguing that I was a sinner. To this I replied: 'Tell me something new, Devil! I already knew that perfectly well; I have committed many a solid and real sin. Indeed there must be good honest sins–not fabricated and invented ones–for God to forgive for His beloved Son’s sake, who took all my sins upon Him so that now the sins I have committed are no longer mine but belong to Christ.'"

Martin Luther

HT: Justin Taylor

He Who Grows in Grace

‎"He who grows in grace remembers that he is but dust, and he therefore does not expect his fellow Christians to be anything more. He overlooks ten thousand of their faults, because he knows his God overlooks twenty thousand in his own case. He does not expect perfection in the creature, and, therefore, he is not disappointed when he does not find it. When our virtues become more mature, we shall not be more tolerant of evil; but we shall be more tolerant of infirmity, more hopeful for the people of God, and certainly less arrogant in our criticisms."

C.H. Spurgeon

A special thanks for Michael McClain for bringing this quotation to my attention.

Crooked Things

"In every disciple's life there are crooked things, unpleasant and unwelcome, which God uses to test us, strengthen us, humble us, correct us, teach us lessons, further our self-knowledge, repentance, and sanctity, shield us from greater evils, and thus bring us blessing, grievous as at first sight the crooked things seem to be."

J.I. Packer

Gospel-shaped Lenses

Do you have Gospel-shaped lenses through which you view the body of Christ? Do you look for evidences of God's grace in others? I was listening to Pastor Mark Driscoll discuss 3 types of people who are in the church: positives, negatives, and neutrals. My endeavor is to expand on this concept a bit and challenge you to assess how you view the body of Christ.

Positives are people who have a gospel mind-set about the church. They see other believers through a lens of grace, mercy, and forgiveness. Positives are for the body of Christ and default to trusting and giving the benefit of the doubt to others. In other words, Positives look for and expect the Holy Spirit's work in other people. Positives do not overlook your sin, nor are they unrealistically optimistic. Rather, they are those who are looking for the grace of God in your life. Positives are those who confront you for sin, but always in the context of seeing evidences of grace in your life. They do not keep a record of wrongs over time that they hang over your head and threaten to end your relationship over. Instead, Positives keep a record of God's grace in your life in an effort to always pursue reconciliation. Positives expect grace to prevail and the Holy Spirit to win the war with the flesh!

Neutrals are people who are still growing in their understanding of the gospel, but have not become strongly rooted in a gospel mind-set. Neutrals are not defined as those looking for sin in others, nor are they looking for evidences of grace. Neutrals may be emphasizing either of these aspects depending on the company they are keeping. If Neutrals are spending time with and being influenced by Positives, then they tend to see evidences of grace in others. If Neutrals are spending time with and being influenced by Negatives, then they tend to see sin and failures in others. Neutrals lack the gospel maturity to dismiss slanderous reports they hear about others and often give ear to gossip. Neutrals are the largest group of people in the church and they will tend to follow the culture of the church.

Negatives are people who have either an over-developed sense of human depravity or an under-developed sense of sanctifying grace, or both. Of course, a negative would rightly point out that since humanity is deeply wicked they could hardly be over-developed in their sense of human depravity. However, I would contend that they wrongly assume "total depravity" means men are as wicked as they can be, rather than they are fallen in every faculty. Further, I would argue they really do have an under-developed sense of sanctifying grace. Negatives are those who are expecting sin to trip others up and who notice it as soon as it happens. Negatives default to believing bad reports they hear about brothers. Negatives share those same bad reports with other people. Negatives see the sin in brothers far more than they see the evidences of grace. Negatives are quick to accuse and slow to defend. They are quick to assume the worst and slow to give the benefit of the doubt. Negatives are not people who expect the gospel to change others over time. They are those who keep records of wrongs. Negatives are those who are keeping a record of sin over time in order to present a full case to you of your sins and why they can no longer maintain a relationship with you. Negatives suffer from the fundamental flaw in their functional theology that the flesh will defeat the Spirit and that sin will conquer grace!

Now, I want to challenge you to assess whether you are a Positive, Neutral, or Negative. I spent a good portion of my life as a Negative. By the grace of God, I eventually moved from that mind-set through neutrality to being a Positive. I want to include a self-assement for determining where you fall with regard to these categories in two important relationships in your life:

Your Marriage (assuming you are both Christians)

1. Do you assume the best or worst about your spouse? When your spouse does something that looks remarkably similar to a past sin or failing, do you jump to the conclusion that they are in fact sinning in this manner again, or do you expect it may be just a misunderstanding?

2. Do you have an easier time listing marital irritations, sins your spouse has committed and failures in their lives; or do you have an easier time listing evidences of God's grace in changing them?

3. Would your spouse report that you are generally expressing thankfulness for the way God is working in their life; or that you are generally disappointed and nagging them about the ways in which they are failing? Ask them!

4. Would your friends say that your speech about your spouse reflects your thankfulness for what God is doing, or your complaints about what is lacking? Ask them!

Your Church Leaders (assuming they are Christians:))

1. Do you assume the best or the worst about your leaders? When your church leaders do something that looks remarkably similar to a past sin or failing, do you jump to the conclusion that they are in fact sinning in this manner again, or do you expect it may be just a misunderstanding?

2. Do you have an easier time listing bad decisions, sins leaders have committed and failures in their lives; or do you have an easier time listing evidences of God's grace in changing them?

3. Would your church leaders report that you are generally expressing thankfulness for the way God is working in the church, or that you generally seem disappointed and complain to them about the ways in which the church could be better? Do your pastors get a knot in their stomach when they see an email from you in their inbox, or do they anticipate great encouragement? Ask them.

4. Would your friends say that your speech about your church leaders reflects your thankfulness for what God is doing, or your complaints about what is lacking? Ask them.

5. Are you often participating in and entertaining gossip about leaders at your church, or are you known for not tolerating it? If others in the body feel comfortable telling you their complaints about the church leaders, then you have your answer!

Sadly, when we are a Negative toward others we are generally being defeated regularly by sin ourselves. We are being defeated because we are not constantly meditating on the Gospel, and it is not our constant motivation. We are defeated because the Gospel is the power to save and to sanctify and we aren't trusting in it! We need to remember that both our positional and practical holiness before God come by grace.

The major breakthrough for me came when I was considering Paul's view of the church at Corinth. Corinth was a church that was riddled with division over leaders, sexual immorality, lawsuits, idolatry, unholy practice of communion, an incorrect understanding of the role of women, and the abuse of spiritual gifts in the church. Yes, the apostle Paul rebuked and corrected this sin in the church. However, Paul began his letter saying something astounding about them:

⁴ I give thanks to my God always for you because of the grace of God that was given you in Christ Jesus, ⁵ that in every way you were enriched in him in all speech and all knowledge— ⁶ even as the testimony about Christ was confirmed among you— ⁷ so that you are not lacking in any spiritual gift, as you wait for the revealing of our Lord Jesus Christ, ⁸ who will sustain you to the end, guiltless in the day of our Lord Jesus Christ. ⁹ God is faithful, by whom you were called into the fellowship of his Son, Jesus Christ our Lord.

I pray that we can be as gospel-minded as the apostle!

To watch Mark Driscoll's sermon on Positives, Negatives, and Neutrals, watch here.

Wings to Fly

"Ask the man who is in the flesh to engage in truly spiritual exercises, and he eventually collapses in exhaustion or despair. Reading Scripture, singing praises, spending time in prayer, giving ready obedience to the commandments - these are burdens that break him, not (as they become for the regenerate) wings that enable him to fly."

Sinclair Ferguson

The Father's Pruning Knife

"In Christ, we are safe under the Father's pruning knife."

Sinclair Ferguson

Rightly Dipleased with Self

"Plato sometimes says that the life of a philosopher is a meditation upon death; but we may more truly say that the life of a Christian man is a continual effort and exercise in the mortification of the flesh, till it is utterly slain, and God’s Spirit reigns in us. Therefore, I think he has profited greatly who has learned to be very much displeased with himself, not so as to stick fast in this mire and progress no farther, but rather to hasten to God and yearn for him in order that, having been engrafted into the life and death of Christ, he may give attention to continual repentance. Truly, they who are held by a real loathing of sin cannot do otherwise. For no one every hates sin unless he has previously been seized with a love of righteousness."

John Calvin

HT: Kevin DeYoung

We Were Made for God

"We were made for God. Only by being in some respect like Him, only by being a manifestation of His beauty, loving-kindness, wisdom or goodness, has any earthly Beloved excited our love. It is not that we have loved them too much, but that we did not quite understand what we were loving. It is not that we shall be asked to turn from them, so dearly familiar, to a Stranger. When we see the face of God we shall know that we have always known it. He has been party to, has made, sustained and moved moment by moment within, all our earthly experiences of innocent love. All that was true love in them was, even on earth, far more His than ours, and ours only because His. In Heaven there will be no anguish and no duty of turning away from our earthly Beloveds. First, because we shall have turned already; from the portraits to the Original, from the rivulets to the Fountain, from the creatures He made lovable to Love Himself. But secondly, because we shall find them all in Him. By loving Him more than them we shall love them more than we now do."

C.S. Lewis

Be Killing Sin or Sin will be Killing You

"I'm against sin. I'll kick it as long as I've got a foot, and I'll fight it as long as I've got a fist. I'll butt it as long as I've got a head. I'll bite it as long as I've got a tooth. And when I'm old and fistless and footless and tootheless, I'll gum it till I go home to Glory and it goes home to perdition!"

Billy Sunday

HT: Tim Challies

The Tyranny of 'Sensitivity'

“Did we pretend to be ‘hurt’ in our sensitive and tender feelings (fine natures like ours are so vulnerable) when envy, ungratified vanity, or thwarted self-will was our real problem? Such tactics often succeed. The other parties give in. They give in not because they don’t know what is really wrong with us, but because they have long known it only too well, and that sleeping dog can be roused, that skeleton brought out of its cupboard, only at the cost of imperiling their whole relationship with us. It needs surgery which they know we will never face. And so we win; by cheating. But the unfairness is very deeply felt. Indeed what is commonly called ‘sensitiveness’ is the most powerful engine of domestic tyranny, sometimes a lifelong tyranny. How we should deal with it in others I am not sure; but we should be merciless to its first appearances in ourselves.”

C.S. Lewis

A Personal Liturgy of Confession

"When I counsel with people who struggle with deep feelings of shame, guilt, and regret, I sometimes suggest that they design a personalized liturgy. In what follows, I walk through the example of a woman who has had an abortion, and all that led up to that choice, and all that follows in someone whose conscience is alive. But you can tailor it to whatever struggle you or another person needs to deal with. Where is your struggle? Is it temper or bitterness? Sexual immorality? Amnesia toward God? Gluttony, laziness or greed? Judgmental words or thoughts? Gossip? Obsessive worrying? God welcomes all who are weary with sin.

Designing your own liturgy of confession will help you to think through exactly what you need to bring to God, and what you need from God. It will give you serious words to express your sorrow, regret, guilt and pain over ______. It will lead you by the hand to God’s mercy and to his washing away of your sin and guilt. The parts of this liturgy in italics are taken and adapted from the General Confession of Sin in The Book of Common Prayer. Even when your thoughts and feelings are chaotic, these words can serve as your guide. They are a channel for honesty. Instead of wallowing in misery and failure, these words help you to plan how you will walk in the direction of honesty, mercy, gratitude, and freedom."

Read it online here or download and print it as a PDF.

David Powlison

HT: Justin Taylor

The Great Master Gardener

"The great master gardener, the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, in a wonderful providence, with His own hand, planted me here, where by His grace, in this part of His vineyard, I grow; and here I will abide till the great Master of the vineyard think fit to transplant me."

Samuel Rutherford

Spiritual Pride

“Spiritual pride is the main door by which the devil comes into the hearts of those who are zealous for the advancement of Christianity. It is the chief inlet of smoke from the bottomless pit, to darken the mind and mislead the judgment. It is the main source of all the mischief the devil introduces, to clog and hinder a work of God.

Spiritual pride tends to speak of other persons’ sins with bitterness or with laughter and levity and an air of contempt. But pure Christian humility rather tends either to be silent about these problems or to speak of them with grief and pity. Spiritual pride is very apt to suspect others, but a humble Christian is most guarded about himself. He is as suspicious of nothing in the world as he is of his own heart. The proud person is apt to find fault with other believers, that they are low in grace, and to be much in observing how cold and dead they are and to be quick to note their deficiencies. But the humble Christian has so much to do at home and sees so much evil in his own heart and is so concerned about it that he is not apt to be very busy with other hearts. He is apt to esteem others better than himself.”

Jonathan Edwards

HT: Ray Ortlund

The Gospel Isn't the Just for the Beginning of the Journey

"Christ is not only the Way on which we must begin our journey, but He is also the right and safe Way we must walk to the end. Christ wants to say: 'When you have apprehended Me in faith, you are on the right way, which is reliable and does not mislead you. But only see that you remain and continue on it.' Christ wants to tear and turn our hearts from all trust in anything else and pin them to Himself alone."

Martin Luther

He Stoops to Conquer

"Our Lord's self-humbling is not merely exemplary (although it is that, too, John 13:14-15); it is saving. Jesus does not stoop merely in order to shame the disciples, but to show them that the only way of salvation is through His washing away the filth of their sins by His self-emptying on the cross. Only those who are washed can have any part in Jesus (John 13:8)."

Sinclair Ferguson on John 13:1-17 and Philippians 2:5-11

God Crowns His Own Gifts, Not Your Virtues

"The Pelagians say that the only grace that is not given according to our virtues is the grace by which a person’s sins are forgiven, but that the final grace of eternal life is given as a reward to our preceding virtues. They must not be allowed to go without an answer. If, indeed, they understand and acknowledge our virtues to be the gifts of God too, then their opinion would not deserve condemnation. But since they preach human virtues by declaring that a person has them from his own self, then most rightly the apostle replies: ‘Who makes you to differ from another? And what do you have that you did not receive? Now, if thou received it, why do you boast as if you had not received it?’ (1 Cor.4:7) To a person who holds such views, it is perfect truth to say: It is His own gifts that God crowns, not your virtues. If your virtues come from your own self, not from God, then they are evil, and God does not crown them. But if they are good, they are God’s gifts, because, as the Apostle James says, ‘Every good gift and every perfect gift is from above, and comes down from the Father of lights’ (Jam.1:17). In accordance with this John the Lord’s forerunner also declares: ‘A man can receive nothing unless it is given to him from heaven’ (Jn.3:27) — from heaven, of course, because from there came also the Holy Spirit, when Jesus ascended up on high, led captivity captive, and gave gifts to men. If, then, your good virtues are God’s gifts, God does not crown them as your virtues, but as His own gifts."

Saint Augustine, On Grace and Free Will

Mind Your Savior More Than Your Sin

"The first device that Satan has to keep souls in a sad, doubting, and questioning condition, and so making their life a hell, is by causing them to mind their sins more than their Savior. Their eyes are so fixed upon their disease, that they cannot see the remedy. He who minds not Christ more than his sin, can never be thankful and fruitful as he should." Thomas Brooks

Killing Sin

5 Gospel truths to meditate on in order to kill sin:

1. Believe the Gospel promise of the Spirit…he doesn’t promise just to forgive you and declare you righteous…he sends His Spirit to give you new life…he resurrects you from the dead…he is gracious enough to bring to completion what he has started. Believe it! Stop saying I don’t have the resources…and start employing the Resource he has given you already! 2 Pet. 1:3-5a,

In fact, if you don’t believe this and practice them…2 Pet. 1:9

2. Focus your eyes on the truth that your battle is confirming the reality of an eternal reward. 2 Pet. 1:10-11

3. Don’t take your sin too lightly, but Realize you are uniting Jesus to your sin and grieving the Holy Spirit who indwells you when you cease fighting! Your sin is more damaging than just how it wreaks havoc in your life! Eph 4:30, 1 Cor. 6:15-16

4. Do not dwell on your sin so long that you become introspective and lose sight of God’s promise of forgiveness. 1 John 1:9

Robert Murray McCheynne…For every one time you look at your own sin…look 10 times at Jesus!

5. Remember that you are a child of God and not an enemy. His discipline means he loves you and wants your good. Romans 8:14, Hebrews 12:5-6

7 Actions to participate in to kill sin:

1. Meditate on the Word. Renew your mind with the Word. The sword of the Spirit is your greatest weapon for killing sin when temptation comes. Romans 12:1-2, Eph 6:17.

2. Pray for God’s help. You have to plan for this. Matt. 26:36-41…esp 41.

3. Ask other believers to help you carry the burden. Matt. 26:38, Gal. 6:2

4. Cut off sin at the point of temptation. Refuse to entertain it. James 1:14-15

5. Take extreme measures to deal with sin in your life. Ex: If you are given to pornography…get rid of your computer if you have to! Matt. 5:29-30

6. Discipline yourself in pursuing righteousness and avoiding sin. Godliness does not come accidentally…we have to work at it by the power the Spirit is working in us. 1 Cor. 9:24-27

7. Cease immoral behaviors and attitudes and start practicing moral behaviors and attitudes. This may be the most obvious and seemingly impossible…but it is not if the Spirit is in you. Romans 8:13