Category Archives: Sanctification

Personal Revenge – Spurgeon

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spurg7“Be not overcome of evil, but may God deliver us from the nature which makes it natural! It is just, no doubt, after a fashion, but from that sort of justice may our Redeemer rescue us! Again, it is admitted that the art of returning evil for evil is very, very easy. If, my dear Friend, you make it a rule that nobody shall ever insult you without having to pay for it, nor treat you with disrespect without meeting his match, you need not pray to God, in the morning, to help you to carry out your resolve. There will be no need to wrestle in prayer that you may be graciously enabled to take vengeance on your adversaries and stand up for your rights! You can do that decidedly better by trusting to yourself than by looking to God! Indeed, you dare not look to God about it at all. The devil will help you—and between your own passion and the Evil One, the thing may be very easily managed. There will be no reason for watchfulness. You need not be on your guard or keep your self in check. On the contrary, you may give to the very worst part of your nature the greatest possible license and go ahead according to the rage of your passionate spirit.

Prayer and humility of mind will, of course, be quite out of the question. Nor will there be any need for faith—you will not commit your case unto God and leave it there—you will fight your own battles, wipe off old scores as you go, and place your dependence on fierce speeches, on mighty fists, or on the law and the policeman. Christian Graces will be too much in your way for you to think of them! Gentleness, meekness, forbearance, forgiveness—you will bid good-bye to these and cultivate the virtues of a savage or of a bulldog. All this is wonderfully easy, though it may be that before long it will turn out to be difficult…

By many, to return evil for evil has been judged to be the more manly course. Years ago if a gentleman imagined himself to be insulted, it was necessary, according to the code of honor then in vogue, for him either to shed the blood of the offending person, or at least to expose himself to the like peril of his life. Thank God that murderous custom is now almost entirely gone from the face of the earth! The spirit of Christianity, has, by degrees, overcome this evil. But there still abides in the world the idea that to stand up for yourself, to just let people know what you are, never to knuckle down to anybody, but to defend your own cause and vindicate your honor has something extremely manly about it. And to yield, to submit, to be patient, to be meek, to be gentle is considered to be unworthy of a man of spirit. They call it showing the white feather and being cowardly, though to my mind, he is the bravest man who can bear the most.

Now, Christian, who is your model of a man? You do not hesitate for a second, I am sure. There is but one model of a Christian and that is the Man, Christ Jesus. Will you then remember that whatever is Christly is manly and whatever you think to be manly which is not Christ-like, is really unmanly, as judged by the highest style of man? The Lord Jesus draws near to a Samaritan village and they will not receive Him, though He was always kind to Samaritans. Good John, gentle John, becomes highly indignant, and cries, “Lord, will You that we command fire to come down from Heaven and consume them?” Jesus meekly answers, “You know not what manner of spirit you are of: for the Son of Man is not come to destroy men’s lives, but to save them.”…

Beloved Brothers and Sisters, I beseech you by the mercies of God that you refrain from, forever, the method of seeking to overcome evil with evil, and that you follow the example of your Lord, taking His yoke upon you and learning of Him, for He is meek and lowly in mind.

Let us consider THE DIVINE METHOD OF OVERCOMING EVIL WITH GOOD. And here I freely admit, to commence with, that this is a very elevated mode of procedure. “Overcome evil with good! Ridiculous!” says one. “Utopian,” cries another. “It might do for Plato’s republic,” says a third, “but it will never do for ordinary, everyday life.” Well, I shall not blush to admit that this is a very high course of conduct and one which the mere worldling cannot be expected to follow—but of Christians we expect higher things! You have a high calling of God in Christ Jesus and you are, therefore, called to a high style of character by your glorious Leader, the Lord Jesus Christ!

Brothers and Sisters, if it is difficult, I commend it to you because it is so! What is there which is good which is not, also, difficult? Soldiers of Christ love those virtues most which cost them most. If it is hard to obtain, the jewel is all the more precious. Since there is sufficient Grace to enable us to become like our Lord, we will labor after this virtue, also, and obtain the great Grace which its cultivation requires. Notice that this text inculcates not merely passive nonresistance, though that is going a good way, but it teaches us active benevolence to enemies. “Overcome evil with good,” with direct and overt acts of kindness. That is, if any man has done you a wrong, do not only forgive it, but avenge it by doing him a favor!

Dr. Cotton Mather was never content till he had bestowed a benefit on every man who had, in any way, done him an injury. If anybody has slandered you, or treated you unkindly in any way, go out of your way to serve him. “If your enemy is hungry, feed him.” You might say, “Well, I am sorry for him, but really, he is such a vagabond! I could not think of relieving him.” Yet according to this Scripture, he is the very man you are bound to feed! If he is thirsty, do not say, “I hope somebody will relieve him. I feel no animosity to the man, but I am not going out of my way to give him a drink.” According to your Lord’s command, he is the man to whom you must give drink! Go straightway to the well and fill your pitcher—and hasten to give him a drink at once, and without stint. You have not merely to forgive and forget, but you are bid to inflict upon the malicious mind the blessed sin-killing wound of your hearty and practical goodwill!

Give a blessing for a curse, a kiss for a blow, a favor for a wrong. “Oh,” you say, “this is high. I cannot attain unto it.” God is able to give you strength equal to this, also. “It is hard,” you say. Ah, but if you take Christ to be your Master, you must do what He tells you and, instead of shrinking because His command seems difficult to flesh and blood, you must cry, “Lord, increase my faith and give me more of Your Spirit.” To forgive to 70 times seven would not be hard to Christ, for He did it all His life. And it will not be hard for you if the same mind is in you which was also in Christ Jesus. It is to this that you are called! It is a sublime temper and it is exceedingly difficult and needs Divine Grace, needs watchfulness, needs living near to God—but for these reasons it is all the more worthy of a follower of Jesus and, therefore, we should aim at it with our whole heart.

– C.H. Spurgeon (1834-1892)

taken from: Overcome Evil with Good, Sermon No. 1317, Delivered at the Metropolitan Tabernacle, Newington Lord’s Day Morning, October 8, 1876

HT: Eric T. Young

Conditional Standing?

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John-HIn article entitled “Is Our Continued Standing in Christ Conditional?” John Hendryx writes:

Good works and obedience may be the necessary fruit of conversion but they are not the gospel which saves, nor do they play ANY part of what maintains our right standing before God. That office is reserved for Jesus alone. We contribute nothing to our justification. And if, as some claim, our continued standing in Christ is ultimately conditional, then it would directly contradict any feigned assertion that justification comes through Christ ALONE. Again, fruit is necessary, but it is Christ’s fruit.. He chose us and APPOINTED US TO BEAR FRUIT… fruit that will abide (John 15:16)

What about passages which call us to obedience and warn about disobedience. Well, this is what actually happens to true believers who fall into sin:

“But if we judged ourselves truly, we would not be judged. But when we are judged by the Lord, we are disciplined so that we MAY NOT BE condemned along with the world.” (1 Cor. 11:31-32)

When a believer acknowledges his sin and the righteous judgment of God, God will not judge us, but when we sin we are judged by GOD as a form of discipline SO WE MAY NOT BE CONDEMNED ALONG WITH THE WORLD. Such discipline drives us back to obedience, and never results in causing God to forsake our status as His children. No one, including you or me, would have hope if any of our salvation depended, even a little, on ourselves. The idea that Christ can lose a believer also directly contradicts God’s promise that His call is irrevocable to all those he has given Christ. (Rom 11:29; John 6:39)

Theologian Robert Reymond once noted that in 1 John there is “a cause and effect relationship exists between God’s regenerating activity and saving faith/obedience/perseverance.” When one takes into account that John says in 1 John 3:9a that “everyone who has been begotten [gegenn?menos] by God does not do sin, because [hoti] his seed abides in him” and then in 1 John 3:9b that “he is not able to sin, because [hoti] he has been begotten [gegenn?tai—the word in 5:1] by God,” we definitely find a cause and effect relationship between God’s regenerating activity as the cause and the Christian’s not abiding in sin as one EFFECT of that regenerating activity. [The reverse is true that those who continue to abide in sin have not been regenerated]…In every other place where it occurs — an?then, means “from above.” [i.e. those who have been begotten [perfect tense] by God sins [present tense] not,”[ Though he does not say so in so many words, it is surely appropriate, because of his pattern of speech in 1 John 3:9 and elsewhere this word is used, to understand him to mean that the cause behind one’s not abiding in sin [and even the cause of one’s faith (1 Jn 5:1)] is God’s regenerating activity.”

In other words, the work of grace which the Lord does for us in the gospel is a complete work, and lacks nothing. Jesus Person and work is sufficient to save to the uttermost (Heb 7:25). Jesus says, “I have come to do your will … And by that will we have been sanctified through the offering of the body of Jesus Christ once for all.” (Hebrews 10:10)

The Worst Sinner You Know

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pharisee

“Unless you know yourself to be the lowest of sinners you will not see the greatness of your Savior. It is the one who is forgiven of much that loves much in response (Luke 7:41-49).”

This and other excellent insights from Joe Thorn can be found in an article if not inappropriate. So let me tell you up front that I am convinced the answer to this question, when posed to a Christian, ought to always be, “Yes. I am the worst sinner I know.” Many balk at this idea–pointing to people who are constantly overwhelmed by guilt and find no relief. Such theology can seem cruel. Yet when properly understood this leads to deliverance rather than to despair. Knowing ourselves and knowing our Savior highlights our transgressions and Christ’s glories in such a way that we are both humbled and made happy by the grace of God in Christ.

The Apostle Paul wrote of himself in a way that demonstrates what he believed about himself. First he said he was “least of the Apostles” (1 Cor. 15:9), then “least of all the saints” (Eph. 3:8), and, at the end of his life, he saw himself as the “foremost” of sinners (1 Tim 1:15). This, combined with Paul’s ongoing struggle with sin described in Romans 7:13-25, gives a picture of the Apostle’s self-image. Though now a saint he remained, in his own eyes, the worst sinner he knew due to his wicked past and even his present corruption. Note what the Second London Confession has to say about the sin nature in believers:

The corruption of nature, during this life, does remain in those that are regenerated; and although it be through Christ pardoned and mortified, yet both itself, and the first motions thereof, are truly and properly sin. – Second London Confession, VI.5

To say that you are the worst sinner you know is not to compare yourself to others. It is a confession of one’s own weakness and transgressions. What enables us to make such a judgment is that we know our sins better than we know anyone else’s. We know (at least in part) our motives, thoughts, and desires. We know not only those visible sins that others may take notice of, but also those that go unnoticed. We do not merely sense this as sinners, but we sense it primarily as saints. We feel our sins, and know the greatness of their heinousness in light of God’s patience toward us, and Christ’s sacrifice for us. In this we find deep humility. Continue reading →