An Appeal to the Working Class

The Christian life consists of worship and work. If you read through the book of Ephesians, you'll see that it divides fairly evenly between what God has done for us (resulting in praise) and how we should therefore live.

If you've been a Christian for a while, perhaps you have grown increasingly mindful of your responsibilities before God. Or perhaps you are what used to be called a "Christian worker" - someone engaged in formal or informal ministry, seeking to help others with the gospel. If so, perhaps you have noticed how easy it is for work to squeeze out worship.

I thought about this on Saturday, as I prepared to preach the following day. In fact, I can be more honest than that. I thought about this on Saturday, as I lost all energy to prepare my sermon for the following day because I was burned out! I didn't want to study and I didn't want to pray. And the reason, I am convinced, is that Christ work had squeezed out worship.

When I realized this, I stopped feeling guilty that I had no desire to prepare my sermon and I simply allowed myself some spiritual breathing space. As I was able to set my mind on God in quiet worship - as I mowed the lawn, dug out some tree stumps, played with my son, and walked the dogs - I was gradually refreshed and energized.

This train of thought led me to remember how, in the Old Testament, the worship leaders went out in front of the army:

[The king] appointed those who were to sing to the LORD and praise him in holy attire, as they went before the army, and say, "Give thanks to the LORD, for his steadfast love endures forever." (2 Chronicles 20:21)

It seems quite odd to put the worship leaders in front of the army (unless you really, really don't like the direction of the music at your church!). You would think the swordsmen or calvary would be up front, and perhaps some praise might waft in from the rear. But no, God put the priority on worship.

Our walk with God involves worship and work. We'll never work well, or battle well, if we don't worship well.

Blogging Bridges: Anxiety and Frustration

The opposite of trust in God is anxiety or frustration. When we say to someone "don't worry" or "don't be afraid," we are trying to speak encouragement to that person, Bridges says. But when Jesus, Paul or Peter say "don't be anxious," it's a moral command - in other words, anxiety is sin. Bridges says that it is sin for two reasons - first, because it is a distrust of God and second, because it is a lack of acceptance of God's sovereign will or providence in our lives.

I know that often I focus on the here-and-now when I get anxious or worrisome or restless when instead I need to turn to God's promises that speak to his sovereignty and power over every circumstance. So often do I lose sight of the fact that God's will is infinitely better than my plans or my desires. John Newton wrote that "whatever befalls us is according to his purpose, and therefore must be right and seasonable in itself, and shall in the issue be productive of good." In other words, a lack of conscious reflection on this truth results in impatience, stress, worry, complaints, and even resentment and bitterness - all forms of sin.

How much do I need God to give me a submissive heart and will when it comes to the plans for my life, and even in day-to-day circumstances. In those situations, Bridges says to bring to mind scripture that speaks to these situations (Philippians 4:6, Matthew 10:31, Matthew 6:25-34), and to pray - not only for a godly response and wisdom in dealing with the situation, but also asking God to show me what I need to learn from the situation.

An example of this from my family is forever etched in my memory. When my mom was giving birth to my older brother (I obviously wasn't there), it was a bad situation, and their health and life was "up in the air" so to speak. But instead of being scared or anxious, my mom took my dad's hand, looked him in the eye, and quoted Psalm 139:16 - "All the days ordained for me were written in your book before one of them came to be." Though the outlook was in question by human standards, God proved sovereign, and he brought my mom and brother through.

Blogging Bridges: (un)Godliness

According to Jerry Bridges, ungodliness is the root system beneath our other sins. He defines ungodliness in ch.7 as failing to keep God in our thoughts, failing to live before Him. I think the Greek word implies a worshipless life. Thus, you can be an upright citizen, a seemingly moral person, perhaps win or even host a reality show, and yet be ungodly.

And no one would care.

Just the other day I heard a Christian college professor remark how easily a diploma may be placed in a student's hands, and perhaps additional awards, marking that student as intelligent, promising, a high achiever. Yet at the very same moment, he lamented, a divine stamp might be applied: "No fear of God."

His point: that there is a human verdict and a divine verdict. We are not too bothered if God is not in someone's thoughts. Yet God finds this highly offensive.

What about you, and what about me? Are we conscious that we live before God? Do we act as if his opinion matters most, or are we content with the award ceremonies we've developed?

For a man's ways are before the eyes of the Lord,
and he ponders all his paths. (Proverbs 5:21)

In him we live and move and have our being. (Acts 17:17)

So, whether you eat or drink, or whatever you do, do all to the glory of God. (1 Corinthians 10:31)

Blogging Bridges: Directions for Dealing with Sin

After looking at the remedy for sin, the power of the Holy Spirit, and our active role in dealing with sin, Bridges turns to giving general directions that apply to all our subtle (and even not so subtle) sins. For those of you following the blog and not necessarily the book, I'll list all seven here before writing my thoughts.

1. Apply the gospel
2. Depend on the Holy Spirit
3. Recognize your responsibility
4. Identify specific respectable sins
5. Memorize and apply appropriate Scriptures
6. Cultivate the practice of prayer
7. Involve one or a few other believers with you

Something that is hard for me to grasp and easy to lose sight of is the combination of the Holy Spirit's work in our lives and our diligence in rooting out our own sin. Ken wrote more on this issue in the previous post. But Bridges hints at something I have been learning lately in my own life - that the "flesh will sometimes get the upper hand...as you zero in on a particular sin, your situation may get worse before it gets better...The Holy Spirit will use these times of disobedience and defeat to help you see how deeply rooted your subtle sins are and how totally dependent you are on His power to help you."

As we go through this life struggling against sin while depending on the Holy Spirit, many times our sins won't "magically" disappear. What I've been learning is that as we become more aware of our sin, God will give us opportunities to defeat that sin. After all, if we are not faced with the temptation to certain sins, how will we grow in our faith and in or sanctification? God does not tempt us, but he brings into our lives situations designed to make us grow spiritually. Through the sovereign workings of God through the Holy Spirit, we face situations whose results should be a greater, humbler, thankful dependence on Him.

Blogging Bridges: The Nuclear Option

Respectable Sins, ch. 5: "The Power of the Holy Spirit"

There is an intriguing statement in Romans 8:13: "If by the Spirit you put to death the deeds of the body, you will live." It's that phrase by the Spirit that makes the Christian offensive against sin a promising mission - in fact, a mission that will certainly be accomplished.

Bridges uses this verse, and others, to describe what he calls "dependent responsibility." We are responsible to God to take action against the enemy within, but we do so with a dependence on (and I would add, confidence in) God's work within.

We should pause for a minute to realize how mind boggling this is. It is not typical for us to think of our struggle against sin as involving both ourselves and the Holy Spirit. We instead fall into one of two traps: we either think the burden rests solely on us, or we think the work is the Lord's in a way that frees us of responsibility. Wow. God says the two go together. Let's try to live that out.

Now, I titled today's post The Nuclear Option. Here's why:

One thing not emphasized by Bridges, though not absent, is the way the Holy Spirit makes us effective servants of Christ. The Spirit, as we see throughout the New Testament, assures of our salvation and (thereby) leads us to live out our faith with joy and certainty. And the Spirit leads us to exercise our gifts to the glory of God, which includes helping others to see Jesus more clearly.

In short, the Holy Spirit provides a direction for our lives -- and it is the direction of joyful service to the Lord. Part of that service is slugging it out against our own sin, including the "subtle" sins that encamp within us. But another part is the joyful march forward, walking "in newness of life" as "new creations" who are "constrained by the love of Christ."

My thought is this. Sin will be put to death within us not only as we fight against it directly, but especially as we move away from it because we're busy about the mission God has placed us on.

This, then, is the nuclear option: Live for Jesus Christ in very practical ways. In ways that fill up your mind and your time. You won't stop fighting against sin - in fact, you'll be forced to confront sins as you are attempting to live for Christ. But if you're not allowing stagnant pools of (living) water to gather in your life, it's more likely that bacteria won't be growing there.

Jesus told us to "pray for the Holy Spirit" in Luke 11. I try to do this each morning, with the understanding that this means praying for joy and effectiveness in serving him.

Your thoughts?

Respectable Sins: The Remedy for Sin

After spending a couple chapters on the loss of a real sense of sin in our churches and society, and a discussion on the seriousness and malignancy of sin, Bridges gets to the good news of the remedy of sin found in the gospel. To make his point, Bridges uses the examples of slave-trader-turned-preacher John Newton and former-persecutor-turned-apostle Paul as men who were keenly aware of their radical sinfulness and need for forgiveness found through their Savior.

Both men recognized in their respective lives that they were, and still are, great sinners - their sinfulness was never merely something from the past. As such, they never outgrew their need for the gospel - the forgiveness of sins found in Christ Jesus. Bridges uses these examples as springboards for discussing how the gospel is a remedy for our sins:

• The gospel plows the ground of our hearts so that we can see our sin
  
• The gospel prepares us to face sin by freeing us to do so by assuring us of forgiveness of our sin
  
• The gospel motivates and energizes us to deal with our sin and to put it to death
  

I find that the assurance I have of forgiveness of my sin is, in fact, freeing. Like Bridges mentions, this assurance encourages me and assures me that as one of God's children, God is for me and not against me. It is "like he is coming alongside me, saying 'We are going to work on that sin, but meanwhile I want you to know that I no longer count it against you.'"

Because I am a great sinner, and am in need of forgiveness each and every day, this thought is immensely encouraging, and it should lead (as Ken mentioned in an earlier post, and as Bridges points out here) to gratitude for what God has done, is doing, and will continue to do in my life through Christ. This cleansing of guilt through forgiveness of sins is only the first part of the discussion about gospel, though. The second part is the triumph over sin by the power of the Holy Spirit, which is the topic for the next chapter.

There was much more to this chapter that I didn't have time/room to discuss, so please feel free to share your thoughts! For a brief tutorial on how to comment, click here.

Respectable Sins: Registering Our Complaints

In the third chapter of Respectable Sins, Jerry Bridges discusses "the malignancy of sin." He compares sin to a cancer that spreads deep and wide if not treated. For example, Bridges gives an example of how easily sin spreads through our speech:

If I gossip, I both tear down another person and corrupt the mind of my listener. If I complain about the difficult circumstances of my life, I impugn the sovereignty and goodness of God and tempt my listener to do the same. In this way, my sin "metastasizes" into the heart of another person. (p.24)

This is an example of a "respectable sin." It is so easy, and so culturally acceptable, to complain. Yet this sin, like all others, brings with it serious consequences. Not only may we demonstrate ingratitude, but unthankfulness can very quickly lead to other "less respectable" sins.

Think about it: When we allow ourselves to think that our circumstances are an exception to the rule, that we deserve a break, and that God isn't fair, what kind of actions tend to flow from this?

Yet we also need to remember how important it is to be honest with others. If we feel ingratitude in our hearts but "grin and bear it" and try to put on a happy face to others, this leads to a different kind of sin -- we are unreal, inauthentic, dishonest. The only solution, therefore, is to get at the root of sin -- and yank it out!

But how?

And that's where the next chapter comes in...

Blogging Bridges: The Disappearance of Sin

We have come to the second chapter in our effort of reading through Jerry Bridges' Respectable Sins, titled "The Disappearance of Sin." In this chapter, Bridges continues his introduction, and gives several examples from secular and Christian culture about how the concept of sin has been extinguished from the American consciousness. This phenomenon is evident in secular and pop culture: "People no longer commit adultery - instead they have an affair. Corporate executives do not steal - they commit fraud."

But perhaps more disturbing is that the biblical idea of sin is no longer prevalent in many of America's evangelical churches - at least not on an individual level. Bridges explains that sin has been deflected to those outside church circles who commit "flagrant" sins such as abortion, homosexuality, murder, etc. Bridges says that "it is easy for us to condemn those obvious sins while virtually ignoring our own sins of gossip, pride, envy, bitterness, and lust."

But Bridges uses James to relate the concept of the seriousness of individual sins to the reader. James (in James 2:10) says that whoever fails in one point of the law is guilty of all of it. Thus, all sin is serious and deserving of God's wrath because all sin is a breaking of God's law. Bridges admittedly "painted a rather dark picture," but he points out that as God's chosen people, we must take all sin seriously and heed God's call to repentance and reconciliation with him. Part of the purpose of Bridges' book is to open our eyes "to God's calling to lead us to the place where we do see the sins we tolerate in our own lives so that we will experience the repentance and renewal we need."

I know I have definitely been guilty of overlooking my own personal sins like impatience, lack of self control, bitterness, anxiety, and lust and focusing my attention and grief on larger, societal sins like crime, oppression, and lack of care for the poor. While these are definitely important issues, and we as Christians should be concerned with them, we should not be so consumed with passion for them at the expense of an awareness of and confession of our own individual sins.

Blogging Bridges: Ordinary Saints

Today we begin our look at Jerry Bridges' book, Respectable Saints, one chapter at a time. Twice a week (at least that's our plan!) we will summarize a chapter and offer some reflections as well.

On an introductory note, I'd like to mention that this looks like an excellent book. I think it will be used for years to come in contexts like this, as a resource for Christian growth and discussion. This is because once we get on the path of following Jesus, it's not long before we realize that "big" sins really are just the flowering of "little" ones. I think for example of James 4:1-4.

For his part, Jerry Bridges says he wrote the book "from a growing conviction that...conservative evangelicals may have become so preoccupied with some of the major sins of society around us that we have lost sight of the need to deal with our own more 'refined' or subtle sins" (p.9).

And so with these things in mind, let's dig in...

Respectable Sins, Chapter One: Ordinary Saints

In the first chapter, Bridges reminds us that the Bible calls all believers "saints" while also saying we are "called to be saints." In other words, our relationship with God is secure (we are "set apart" for him) but we must learn to live like it. I think of the Apostle Paul who frequently said, "Walk worthy of the Lord Jesus Christ."

Bridges illustrates this with an expression from the U.S. Navy: "conduct unbecoming an officer." Do we exhibit conduct unbecoming a saint?

Since we live in a Navy town, and I've driven through other military towns recently, this made me think of another illustration. And I think this illustration points to the reason we're reading this book:

In the U.S., we respect our men and women in uniform. We respect them because their vocation is on our behalf, and also because they conduct themselves with discipline. They stand out to us in the airport because they're not slouching about with earphones but walking uprightly, carrying themselves with confidence and quietly commanding respect.

But suppose you move into a military town, and you live among military families in your neighborhood. Now you see these families behind the scenes, when the uniform is not on, at the grocery store, with their kids, off hours, etc. Now you're going to have a closer look. And what do you find? Are they good neighbors? Do they command respect, or do you avoid them? Are you concerned for their kids? Are they friendly?

Of course military men and women come in all stripes. Some engage in "conduct unbecoming an officer" and some are exemplary. But think about this now in terms of how outsiders view Christians. From a distance, Christians seem to be good citizens - promoting family values, doing something safe on Sunday mornings, avoiding really big sins like murder and embezzling and acts of terrorism. But what happens when people get closer to us? What do they see? Do they see anxiety, discontentment, selfishness, and irritability?

These are the kinds of subjects addressed in this book. But first the big picture is examined (in chapters 1-6): the Bible's teaching concerning sin, how to deal with it, and experiencing the powerful change that God brings in our life--not making us perfect yet, but moving us to become more like the Lord we follow.

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