Grace which Moves

Grace should move us to live out our Christian faith. It is our union with Jesus through faith which transforms us.

It is often felt by many that the church needs practical teaching. Practical teaching is of use, but faith and the gospel will always naturally result in works.

Many times the failure of people to live out the practical parts of Christianity is a failure to grasp the significance of the grace they have received. Once we understand the grace we have received, slowly everything else will begin to fall into place.

The success or failure of Christian living in the church rests and falls on grace. It is not that practical teaching is not useful (because it is). But that practical teaching is only useful once grace is understood.

And too often grace is not understood and thus practical teaching falls on deaf ears. Many congregations with issues in their midst do not need practical teaching on Christian living, but rather to understand the gospel in a more significant way.

Often failures of living are not failures to grasp practical teaching but failure to grasp the significance of the grace we have received.

Post: Ethics as a Result of Faith

Keeping the Main Thing the Main Thing

Often the church is reactionary.  We get caught up with how we are different than the culture, and the emphasis of church can become expounding the difference.

It is important of course for the church to remind itself how it is different than the world, but often the concern with the difference drowns out the proclamation of the gospel.  Often many of the differences the church has with the culture are a very small percent of the message of the bible.

Yet often the differences between the church and culture in many churches take up a massive amount of the time in the pulpit.  We need in the church to insist that what scripture finds as most important we find as most important.

The differences between the church and the world are so over rehashed that we almost don't need to hear them again in many churches.  And yet often the gospel and many other parts of Christian ethics go critically under covered.

The church in the current day is often reactionary.  It plays its message in opposition to the world.  The church would be better served to play to its strength.

The gospel is the power by which the world is overcome.  If you want to make cultures more Christian all that matters is a success of the gospel.  All Christian ethic and Christian living flow from the gospel.

We can argue the philosophical debates and oppose culture all we wish, but the gospel is where success or failure is found for the church on these issues.

Christlikeness

Often people like to talk about being or becoming more like Christ but underestimate the difficulty. Christ is perfect and we are imperfect people.

That doesn't mean we shouldn't try, and the good news is that the Holy Spirit helps every Christian in this. Through the Holy Spirit, God offers us help, even when we feel weak.

"It is the Spirit of God that enables us to grow and begin to keep his commandments. Each day we grow a bit by faith," Danny writes in "The Relationship of Justification and Works."

"Two of the Holy Spirit's chief delights are to show us the glory of Christ and to change us into the image of Christ," says John Stott in Life in Christ. "Sanctification is the process by which we are being transformed into the image of Christ by the Spirit of Christ."

In the book, Stott offers this example:

William Temple helped people in his day to grasp the Christian way of holiness by drawing an analogy between Shakespeare and Jesus, and declaring the impossibility of copying either. How could we ever write plays like Shakespeare's? How could we ever live a life like Christ's? It is impossible. The very suggestion is ludicrous. Ah, but if the genius of Shakespeare were able to enter us, then we could write plays like him, and if the Spirit of Jesus were able to enter us, then we could live a life like him. The good news is that although we cannot have the genius of Shakespeare we can have the Spirit of Jesus! The Christian way of holiness is not that we struggle to live like Jesus but that he by his Spirit comes to live in us.

Some verses on the Spirit's work in becoming Christlike are 2 Corinthians 3:18, Romans 8:5-9, and Galatians 5:22-23.

For more on this topic:

• "Christian love is supernatural in origin. It flows from our union with Christ in his death and the Holy Spirit working in our hearts," Danny writes in "Christian Living is Based on the Gospel."
• "When we dig into the word, God can cause incredible things to happen if he dwells in our heart," Danny says in "Christianity Is About a Relationship."
• "When a man accepts Jesus and begins to be transformed by sanctification through the work of the Holy Spirit he becomes who he was always meant to be," Danny writes in "Becoming Somone." "When we follow God in faith our lives are enriched."

Christian Living is Based on the Gospel

The gospel is the power by which the world is overcome. The world will know we are Christians by our love, but all love flows from the grace we have been given by God.

Christian love is supernatural in origin. It flows from our union with Christ in his death and the Holy Spirit working in our hearts.

You see we cannot try to imitate Jesus' life with out accepting his divinity and saving work. The reason is that the power to live out Jesus' teachings in the world is supernatural in origin. That is why he told his apostles to await Pentecost.

Often preachers wish to have their congregation live more faithfully to the teaching of scripture by teaching a steady diet of law. Law is certainly of use, but often the most lawless living is by those in the church that wish to live out the law but do not understand the gospel.

You see this is the situation which the Pharisees were in. They had great zeal to live out the law but did not really understand the meaning of true religion. This is why they accused Jesus of lawlessness at some of his most ethically beautiful moments.

Legalism is always a prevalent faction in the church wherever the church is. It tries to keep the letter of the law while greatly misunderstanding the spirit of the law.

We must first trust in the saving work of Jesus and only then begin to imitate his life. Of course Jesus commands that we follow him. We must first accept that he is God and his work, death, and resurrection and then begin to try to live like him through the power given through faith.

Grace on Ourselves

It is at times the case that God is more willing to have grace on us than we are willing to have on ourselves. There is a certain type of reflection on sin which is morbid and unbiblical.

Jesus' work is sufficient. It is not an elevation of our sin to say that it might not be forgivable but a devaluation of Jesus' work.

His work is infinite in value and nothing can compare to it. We delude ourselves to place our sin in comparison to Jesus' merit.

Of course works should flow from our lives. But they are based on what God has done for us. Works flow from grace. Grace is what produces works.

On a practical level nothing is more practical to Christian living than the perfect life of Jesus and his death on the cross. It is grace which has far more real practicality than a sermon filled with suggestions on living.

Our Hearts Turned to God

I think most people will read this passage differently than I do. But, now days as I look around I see so many people who claim to be Christians (and they may well be) whose care about God is so superficial. If our hearts are not turned toward God on a regular basis I think we should ponder what we are doing. If there is an eternally important gift and we care for it not and instead we do what follows, "Although they claimed to be wise, they became fools and exchanged the glory of the immortal God for (a shadow) of an image made to look like mortal man..." (Romans 1:22-23), we should wonder if we really have faith. Faith without love is dead. It seems foolish to claim you love someone you only drag yourself to hear about once a week. So if we are not energized daily by Christ we need to look deep into our hearts for as it is written in Luke:

22 Then Jesus went through the towns and villages, teaching as he made his way to Jerusalem. 23 Someone asked him, "Lord, are only a few people going to be saved?"
He said to them, 24 "Make every effort to enter through the narrow door, because many, I tell you, will try to enter and will not be able to. 25Once the owner of the house gets up and closes the door, you will stand outside knocking and pleading, ‘Sir, open the door for us.’

"But he will answer, ‘I don't know you or where you come from.’

26 "Then you will say, ‘We ate and drank with you, and you taught in our streets.’

27 "But he will reply, ‘I don't know you or where you come from. Away from me, all you evildoers!’

28 "There will be weeping there, and gnashing of teeth, when you see Abraham, Isaac and Jacob and all the prophets in the kingdom of God, but you yourselves thrown out. 29People will come from east and west and north and south, and will take their places at the feast in the kingdom of God. 30Indeed there are those who are last who will be first, and first who will be last."