Stott on Preaching

I love this!

The essential secret is not mastering certain techniques but being mastered by certain convictions.

Amen!!!

Effort and the Gospel

Kevin DeYoung

Gospel-Driven Effort

Last week I wrote a piece about the role of effort in the Christian life. It was born out of concern that in our passion for glorying in the indicatives of the gospel (something I have gladly advocated many times) that we are in danger of giving short shrift to the necessity of obeying biblical imperatives. My worry is that we are afraid to exhort each other, as Scripture does, to strive, fight, mortify, vivify, and make every effort for godliness.

Later in the week Tullian Tchividjian offered some pushback with his post “Work Hard! But In Which Direction?” I’m thankful for Tullian’s post. He is a good writer and an ardent champion of the gospel. He is also a good friend, not the “I met him once in a cab and now we always call each other ‘my friend’” way, but an actual friend. These are important issues and I’m glad to have Tullian to sharpen me.

A Big Issue

As you may recall, I’m on sabbatical this summer. My main project is to write a book on holiness and union with Christ. Essentially it’s a book on sanctification. So I have lots of thoughts rolling through my mind, thoughts not directly related to Tullian’s post (even less, a direct rebuttal of his post), but thoughts related to sanctification in general. Thoughts like:

• Can the justified believer please God with his obedience?
• Is the justified believer displeasing to God in some way when he sins?
• Is unbelief the root of every sin? Or is it pride? Or idolatry? Should we even both trying to find a root sin?
• How are justification and sanctification related?
• Can we obey God?
• Can we feel confident about our obedience, not in a justifying way but that we have done as we were commanded?
• How does Scripture motivate us to obedience?
• Are most Christians too hard on themselves (thinking they are filthy scum when they actually walk with the Lord in a way that pleases him)?
• Or are most Christians too easy on themselves (thinking nothing of holiness and content with little progress in godliness)?
• What is the role of union with Christ in sanctification? And how do union with Christ and sanctification relate to justification?

These are just some of the issues I’m exploring this summer. I’ll keep you posted.

To the Point

But with this post I simply want to respond to the main point Tullian raised in response to my earlier post. Tullian agrees that effort is not a bad word for the Christian. He questions, however, what exactly this effort is aiming at.

Kevin rightly affirms the fact that the Christian life is not effortless–”let go and let God” is not biblical. Sanctification is not passive but active. My concern here is to add to what Kevin wrote and identify the direction of our effort.

Tullian’s concern is that we don’t think of sanctification as moving beyond justification. I couldn’t agree more. It’s all too common for Christians to figure (in their heads if not spoken explicitly): “I’m saved by grace and assured of eternal life. But now I have a lot of work to do in making myself better. God gets me in all on his own, but now it’s all up to me to become like Him.” Justification feels like good news and sanctification feels like punishment. This is not the message of Christianity.

Tullian acknowledges that “sanctification is a grueling process.” It requires effort. But the effort of our sanctification is to believe the good news of our justification. “Remembering, revisiting, and rediscovering the reality of our justification every day,” says Tullian, “is the hard work we’re called to do if we’re going to grow.” Later: “Sanctification is the hard work of going back to the certainty of our already secured pardon in Christ and hitting the refresh button over and over.” Again: “sanctification is the hard work of getting used to our justification.” Tullian’s point is that sanctification requires the hard work of fighting to believe that we are justified by faith alone apart from anything good do or could possible contribute.

I agree sanctification requires the fight of faith to believe this scandalous good news of the gospel of justification. I disagree that this is the only kind of effort required in sanctification.

Effort Once Again

Growing in godliness is a fight of faith–a fight to believe the truth about our justification, our adoption, a fight to believe all that God says about us by virtue of our union with Christ. But growing in godliness is more than trusting; it is also trusting enough to obey. The New Testament gives us commands, and these commands involve more than remembering, revisiting, and rediscovering the reality of our justification. We must also put on, put off, put to death, strive, and make every effort.

Yes, this effort is always connected to gospel grace. But we cannot reduce “effort” to simply believing in justification. Tullian rightly points out that after Peter tells us to “make every effort” (2 Peter 1:5), he warns us against forgetting that we have been cleansed from our former sins (1:9). If we live ungodly lives we show that we have forgotten God’s mercy in our lives. The antidote is to remember who we are in Christ andto “be all the more diligent to make your calling and election sure” (1:10). Sanctification is from God and by faith, but unlike justification it is not by faith alone. (If that last sentence threw you for a loop, I’ll say more later in the week.) As we work hard to remember the reality of justification, we must also work hard in the Spirit to stop doing sinful stuff and start doing righteous stuff.

True, there are lots of Christians who need to know the glorious good news of their forgiveness. American Christianity tends to be overly activist and can drive timid souls to despair. But just as surely, there are lots of professing Christians (and non-Christians!) who feel perfectly justified but are not growing in godliness and may not even be God’s children. They do not doubt God loves them. They do not worry that they might not be accepted. They have no problem with grace. They do not come to church with crushed consciences. They do not need to work hard to rediscover God’s forgiveness. They need to work hard to live like they have died to sin and been raised with Christ. The basic New Testament ethic is “be who you are.” This requires believing “who we are” and working hard to “be” just that.

A Few Examples

At this point, I’m not really responding to Tullian (because he probably agrees with much of what I’ve written above and probably everything that is written below). But I do want to make clear why we must be clear about the sort of effort required in sanctification.

Hannah Whitall Smith’s book, The Christian’s Secret of a Happy Life, is an unfortunate classic. As Andy Naselli has pointed out, Hannah’s life was not happy and her theology provided no secret for Christian living. She makes a sharp distinction between God’s work in holiness and our work. God’s work is to make us holy. Our work is to continually surrender and continually trust (5). “All that we claim then in this life of sanctification,” she wrote, “is that by a step of faith we put ourselves into the hands of the Lord, for Him to work in us all the good pleasure of His will; and that by a continuous exercise of faith we keep ourselves there. . . .Our part is trusting, it is His to accomplish the results” (7). It was this sort of teaching that prompted J.C. Ryle to ask “whether it is wise to speak of faith as the one thing needful, and the only thing required, as many seem to do nowadays in handling the doctrine of sanctification? Is it wise to proclaim in so bald, naked, and unqualified a way as many do that the holiness of converted people is by faith only, and not at all by personal exertion?” (Holiness, xvii-xviii).

Long before the Keswick controversy the Dutch theologian Wilhelmus a Brakel (1635-1711) expressed a similar sentiment in The Christian’s Reasonable Service. In his chapter on “Spiritual Growth” a Brakel explores “Reasons why Believers Do not Grow as much as They Ought.” He gives five reasons: 1) They presume upon grace. 2) They doubt their conversion. 3) They are discouraged by their progress. 4) They conform themselves to the world. 5) They are lazy. Remembering our justification may be the antidote for reasons 2 and 3, but effort is required with number 5. Many Christians “are hindered in their walk solely by lazines.” Later a Brakel observes, “We indeed desire to be in an elevated spiritual frame and to grow as a palm tree, but we are not willing to exert any effort–and thus we also do not receive it. . . .Therefore, Christians, to the task! Strive to grow in both habitual and actual grace” (Volume 4, 154). It is precisely this exhortation that I fear is missing from some quarters of evangelicalism.

Martyn Lloyd-Jones made the same point more recently. After taking several sermons to unpack the glorious objectivity of our union with Christ in Romans 6:1-11, Lloyd-Jones turned to our efforts in 6:12-14. He emphasizes over and over that “holiness is not a constant appeal to us to surrender” (The New Man, 156). A little later he adds, “The New Testament teaching about sanctification is not just an appeal to us to ‘look to the Lord.’” Sanctification, he argues, requires personal exertion. When we are told “Let not sin therefore reign in your mortal body” this is “an exhortation addressed to us, an admonition, a call to a positive activity of the will” (157).

I’ve read enough Lloyd-Jones to know that he often takes his readers/listeners back to justification (as he should). Spiritual Depression is mainly about applying the gospel of free grace to our pursuit of God. But Lloyd-Jones does not suggest that sanctification comes about only by recalling our justification.

The New Testament calls upon us to take action; it does not tell us that the work of sanctification is going to be done for us. . . .We are in the ‘good fight of faith’, and we have to do the fighting. But, thank God, we are enabled to do it; for the moment we believe, and are justified by faith, and are born again of the Spirit of God, we have the ability. So the New Testament method of sanctification is to remind us of that; and having reminded us of it, it says, ‘Now then, go and do it’. (178, emphasis mine)

Remember the gospel indicatives. Then give full throat to the gospel imperatives.

A Crucial Matter

These issues matter because, on the one hand, some Christians are beating themselves up to be more like Jesus when they first need to realize that in Christ they’ve already died to sin and been raised with Christ. And on the other hand, some Christians are stalled out in their sanctification for plain lack of effort. They are lazy and need to be told so.

And then there are those who are confused, wondering why sanctification isn’t automatically flowing from their heartfelt commitment to gospel-drenched justification. They need to get up and, as one author put it, “just do something.”

We all need God’s grace to believe what is true and do what is right. We died to sin in the death of Christ. Now we must put to death the deeds of the flesh.

Trueman on Ministry

Perhaps Reformed theology in general and Presbyterianism in particular are especially vulnerable to regarding intellectual achievement as identical with qualification for office. This is unfortunate. If a man cannot string a decent sentence together from a pulpit, has the personality of a ping-pong ball or the social graces of a pit viper, he will be a disaster in the ministry. The first will simply not be able to preach, the second will not be able to connect with people, and the third -- well, we all know such types and we know they only ever seem to grow churches on the basis of similarly angry people leaving the church down the road and coming to join them.

Blogs on Depression

Two great blogs - Mark Heath and Matt Hosier:

Depression

In Ps 119:25 the Psalmist says “I am laid low in the dust”, and then in verse 28 “My soul is weary with sorrow” (one commentator paraphrases “I have collapsed with intense sorrow”). These days we’d probably diagnose him with depression and pack him off to the doctors to get some happy pills. But for the writer of this Psalm, there is no question where he will turn first for comfort and strength – the Word of God.

²⁵ I am laid low in the dust;
preserve my life according to your word.

…
²⁸ My soul is weary with sorrow;
strengthen me according to your word.

Of course, I in no way want to trivialise the very real issue of depression, or glibly claim that a few hours of Bible reading will automatically fix it, but it does raise the issue of where we do we turn in times of sorrow. Part of the battle with depression is the battle for the mind (see Matt Hosier’s excellent prayer for depression), and to fight that battle effectively we must fill our minds with truth.

Grace and Truth

The reason the Psalmist turns to the Word of God when he is feeling low is that he knows that it is a source of grace and truth:

²⁹ Keep me from deceitful ways;
be gracious to me through your law.
³⁰ I have chosen the way of truth;
I have set my heart on your laws.

This is an interesting combination of terms since in John 1:17 it says that “the law was given through Moses; grace and truth came through Jesus Christ.” John is not denying that the law contains grace and truth, but is claiming that the fullest expression of God’s grace and truth is found in Jesus. This is why a christological approach to Scripture is so important. The Bible leads us into grace and truth as we let it point us to Christ.

Freedom

The final verse in Psalm 119:25-32 (“the Daleth strophe”) is perhaps favourite in the whole Psalm, although it would appear that the translators can’t quite agree on how the second phrase should be translated. I like the NIV 1984’s “you have set my heart free” and think it fits well with the metaphor of running:

I run in the path of your commands,
for you have set my heart free.

It is often assumed that a life of following commands must be one of drudgery, but for the Psalmist, the opposite is true. For him, it is when he is “running” in the path of God’s commands that he is free from anxiety and fear. Running in God’s way is both liberating and refreshing. I think the Psalmist would agree with the sentiment of Eric Liddell in Chariots of Fire when he says, “when I run I feel His pleasure”.

PRAYING FOR THE DEPRESSED

Anxiety and depression have reached almost epidemic proportions in Western society, and the church is not immune from this. At Gateway we have called a day of prayer and fasting today for those who are struggling with depression, but knowing exactly how to pray can be difficult. How, then, should we pray for Christians who are suffering from these illnesses? Here are a few pointers…

Pray with sensitivity for the body of Christ

· If you are a Christian you are intimately and organically connected with other Christians, and this is worked out by your membership of a local church. What happens to one part of this body affects every other part – as 1 Corinthians 12:26 says, “If one member suffers, all suffer together.”

· This means praying for others with compassion even if you cannot empathize with what they are going through. Those who have never suffered depression can find it very difficult to understand the illness – don’t let this be a bar to compassion!

· The letter to the Galatians says that we are to “bear one another’s burdens” yet at the same time each one of us is to “bear your own load” (Gal 6:2,5). Corporately we are to help each other. Individually we are not to give up!

· As 1 Thessalonians 5:14 urges us, we need to treat people with an appropriate combination of gentleness and firmness – and recognize that we won’t always get this balance right.

Pray for sudden breakthrough

· Sometimes those suffering with depression have an encounter with God that leads to their immediate and total healing. We should pray for this!

· Sickness is part of the curse of our fallen world, and as the kingdom of God breaks in sickness is banished – so we should always pray for immediate deliverance.

Trust in the sovereignty of God

· While we pray in faith for immediate breakthrough, very often we have to endure under hardship. Immediate healing is under the sovereignty of God, and so is patient endurance.

· We need to believe Romans 8:28-30!

· Our troubles are meant to drive us closer to God, as they prove and purify our faith. The struggles we go through are permitted by a sovereign God in order that we might be conformed to the image of Christ.

· Often it is our sufferings that do the most to shape us in a Christ-like way, and the end result of this is our glorification!

· We mustn’t allow our lack of understanding to be a bar to God’s perfect understanding. Often our suffering will seem inexplicable (just look at the story of Job!) but we must stay firm in the belief that God is working out his sovereign plan.

· In this life we will experience many things that cause us to groan in pain, but the sure hope of resurrection should keep us pressing on (2 Corinthians 5:4).

· Recognizing the sovereignty of God also releases us from the pressure of thinking we have to fix everything – in the end God is in control.

Fight the battle for the mind

· Our worship of God is meant to involve our bodies and our minds, and this means we need to engage in a fight that is both body and mind (Romans 12:1-2).

· Sometimes the cause of depression is physical, due to chemical imbalances in the brain. When this is the case we need to pray for physical healing.

· We also need to pray for the development of right thought patterns. Our minds can be trained for better or worse. We should train them for better!

· The battle for the mind involves a fight against anxiety and for God’s peace (Philippians 4:6-7). The way we engage in this fight is not by focussing on anxiety, but on truth and hope. Truth and hope grow in us as we make a practice of thankfulness. We need to train our minds towards gratitude.

Break the power of sin

· Anxiety/depression can be the result of sin.

· If the sin is something that has been committed against you, then lay hold of the death of Christ which is our expiation. This means that Christ’s death has absorbed all the sin that has defiled us. Christ’s death means you are no longer defiled by what others have done to you, but declared spotless because of Christ’s atoning blood.

· Laying hold of this means developing the practice of forgiveness. As long as we remain in unforgiveness to someone, we are not free from what they have done to us.

· However, if the root of anxiety/depression is sin that has been committed by you, then repent, and lay hold of the death of Christ which is our propitiation. This means that the wrath of God which should be our just reward has instead been born by Christ, so God’s anger has been turned away from us. Hallelujah!

Identify our cultural vulnerabilities to anxiety/depression

· Many people suffer from options paralysis – we have so many options we find it impossible to decide which to choose!

· Choice is not always a blessing and can be the cause of huge mental stress.

· In the Western world we are not engaged in a physical fight for survival, as most people in most places for most of history have been. But our enemy is always looking for ways to destroy us – and emotional sickness is one way by which he attempts this.

· In response, we need to find our security and identity in Christ, and be alert to Satan, resisting him so that he will flee from us (1 Peter 5:8-9).

Recognize that it is often good things that cause anxiety/depression

· Significant causes of depression are things that should make us happy! This includes such things as a house move, job change, marriage, or having a baby.

· We need to identify Satan’s tactics to rob us of joy – and fight!

· We need to recognize a spiritual fight for what it is, and lay hold of the armour of God (Ephesians 6:10-18).

Thank God for common grace

· There are many things God provides for us that can help us in the fight against depression, and we should thank him for them, even if they seem very ‘normal’.

· These things include friends to talk to, medication, sick pay, and appropriate therapies. These are gifts from God, which we are to be thankful for.

· Thankfulness is a powerful weapon against depression!

Fight the stigma and shame

· The shame of suffering depression can be a significant reason for keeping us locked in depression. We need to fight this.

· This doesn’t mean that everyone has to know everything about our mental health – just as we might not want everyone to know everything about personal physical health issues.

· We need to recognize that Jesus is our scapegoat, who has born our shame and disgrace (Hebrews 12:2). In him, we will never be put to shame!

· We also need to see the honesty and rawness of the Bible, when great saints of God call out in emotional pain to him. E.g., Psalm 22.

· We need to find people we can talk to appropriately, about what we are experiencing, without feeling ashamed.

Grasp who you are in Christ

· If you are a Christian then you are chosen by God and precious to him. You are part of his body and bride, and he delights over you. Jesus died to save you, the Father has adopted you, and the Spirit dwells in you. Feed yourself on these truths.