Perhaps…

Over the past few weeks, I’ve read a variety of books for my Theology of Holiness class.  They all center on the concept the sanctification of the believer.  The term “sanctification” refers to holiness, and essentially it is the path to becoming like Christ.  The book that is this week’s reading is entitled The Way of Holiness: Experience God’s Work in You and it has been some of the most challenging stuff that I’ve read in a long, long time.  He talks about how we have eliminated God’s holiness, minimized the offensiveness of sin and relegated it to mere mistake, and turned true repentance into mere confession of sin.  Check out these gems from chapter four:

“The top-three values of the born-again Christian are familiy, health and religion.  But Jesus talked about hating one’s mother and father (Luke 14:26) and even one’s life (John 12:25) in order to be his disciple.  So why is religion third” (65)?

“But if modern repentance does not affect our beliefs, values or desire to fellowship with other believers, then what does it affect?  What got converted?  From what were we saved?  Where is the metanoia?…the reason so many never pursue holiness in their Christian lives is that they were (dare say it?) never truly converted in the first place” (66).

“…our sanctification will be the logical conclusion to our conversion” (75).  Translation…if you are not being made into the image of Christ, if this pursuit is not of the highest order and priority in our lives, we are not converted.

This past weekend, I listened to a little bit of Francis Chan’s Forgotten God on the way home from visiting our daughter.  In it, Chan says that, “If a basketball player was given a ‘supernatural’ abilty to play basketball, wouldn’t you expect that they would be able to play differently than they had before and shouldn’t this ‘supernatural’ abilty cause them to look different?”

So yesterday, you walked out of your house of worship, where you met the God of the Universe.  How were you marked by that encounter?

Sanctification and Spontaneity

I’m currently taking “Theology of Holiness” as I complete my Masters program at Indiana Wesleyan.  As a non-Wesleyan, the book Five Views of Sanctification has proven to be helpful.  At this point, I find myself more closely aligned with the Lutheran view.  At the end of his chapter, Gerhard Forde has an insightful list on what sanctification might look like: spontaneity, taking care, vocation, and truthfulness and lucidity.  I’m simply going to mention one, spontaneity, in the light of what I read in Romans 15 this morning.

“Spontaneity- What is a truly good work, one that might qualify as the fruit of sanctification?  One, I think, that is free, uncalculating, genuine, spontaneous.  It would be like a mother who runs to pick up her child when it is hurt.  There is no calculation, no wondering about progress, morality or virtue.  There is just the doing of it, and then it is completely forgotten.  The right hand doesn’t know what the left is doing.  Good works in God’s eyes are quite likely to be all of those things we have forgotten! True sanctification is God’s secret” (30).

Romans 15:1-6:  Those of us who are strong and able in the faith need to step in and lend a hand to those who falter, and not just do what is most convenient for us. Strength is for service, not status. Each one of us needs to look after the good of the people around us, asking ourselves, “How can I help?”  That’s exactly what Jesus did. He didn’t make it easy for himself by avoiding people’s troubles, but waded right in and helped out. “I took on the troubles of the troubled,” is the way Scripture puts it. Even if it was written in Scripture long ago, you can be sure it’s written for us. God wants the combination of his steady, constant calling and warm, personal counsel in Scripture to come to characterize us, keeping us alert for whatever he will do next. May our dependably steady and warmly personal God develop maturity in you so that you get along with each other as well as Jesus gets along with us all. Then we’ll be a choir—not our voices only, but our very lives singing in harmony in a stunning anthem to the God and Father of our Master Jesus!

Some questions (based on Emilie Griffin’s book, Wilderness Time) worth asking as you evaluate:

• Has your service to others become another form of overwork?
• Or is it truly integrated into your life in a comfortable and valuable way?
• Have you been selfish in the use of your time?
• Should you be giving more of yourself to others that you currently do?

For response:

• Why is it so hard to serve others?
• Is there such a thing as “balance”?
• Did Jesus seek balance, or was He always “on”?
• How might we prevent burnout?

Spiritual Adultery

Last night, I was out with Phoebe our beagle on a walk.  As we walked past this vehicle, I saw something that struck me.  Do you see it?

On the right, is a large sticker that reads, “It’s all about ME”.

To the left, is the Jesus fish.

This morning, I was reading John 8:1-11, when the Pharisees bring the woman caught in adultery to Jesus.  The devotional that I’m reading makes the point that there are times that we are all guilty of spiritual adultery.  In the “Live” section, it reads, “Ask the Holy Spirit to give you wisdom and guidance not to condone other people’s sin and at the same time not to condemn those people (or yourself) either.  Ask the Spirit to bring to your mind people you can love while avoiding condemning and condoning.”

So, instead of casting stones at the owner of the vehicle, I should probably look to my own spiritual adultery.  And then, recognize that Jesus sets me free from that.