Against Sin: In View of His Mercy

"The consideration of all the love and kindness of God, against whom every sin is committed, is another thing that the mind ought to diligently attend unto...

"Deut.32.6, "Do ye thus requite the LORD, O foolish people and unwise? Is not he thy Father that bought thee hath he not made thee, and established thee?" --Is this a requital for eternal love, and all the fruits of it? For the love and care of a Father, of a Redeemer, that we have been made partakers of?

"2 Cor.7.1, "Having therefore these promises, dearly beloved, let us cleanse ourselves from all filthiness of the flesh and spirit, perfecting holiness in the fear of God.

"It is to be considered as to such Peculiar Mercies and fruits of love as every one's soul hath been made partaker of. There is no believer but, besides the love and mercy which he hath in common with all his brethren, hath also in the lot of his inheritance some enclosures, some especial mercies, wherein he hath a single propriety. He hath some joy which no stranger intermeddleth withal, Prov.14.10--particular applications of covenant love and mercy to his soul."
John Owen T&S pg 240,241

I particularly like this very last portion about 'peculiar mercies.' John Owen, in his challenging prose, is saying something potentially devastating. You will feel the impact when you recall in your own conversion story the moment that you realized...

"God is real; God is holy. He is indeed bigger than I ever imagined. I'm only scratching the surface...and only because he is stooping down to reveal himself to me. In spite of the millions of people in existence He has stooped down, in love, to personally open my heart to Him. He is making a particular claim on my person for Himself. He has heard my cry for Him."

John Owen, once again:
" There is no believer but, besides the love and mercy which he hath in common with all his brethren, hath also in the lot of his inheritance some enclosures, some especial mercies, wherein he hath a single propriety. He hath some joy which no stranger intermeddleth withal, Prov.14.10--particular applications of covenant love and mercy to his soul."

Thoughts on Mark Galli's Article in CT

"It is God's utter acceptance of us that allows us to look at our miserable sinfulness and not flinch. If that's not the final step in sanctification, it is certainly a prerequisite to any other step. And it's about all most of us will experience in this life." - Mark Galli

I appreciated the thoughts offered by Mark Galli on the importance of recognizing that it is not lives of moral example and spiritual integrity that we hold out, but mainly lives of brokenness that we have to offer (http://bit.ly/12mwOg). However, we want to be sure that we don't resemble those we are warned about in 2Tim 3:5, who will have a form of religion but not the power of it. If our religion cannot change us, it demonstrates powerlessness. James 1:26 calls that type of religion worthless. The best way to strike this balance between humble representation of ourselves as sinners and Gospel adorning lives and work, is through a meditation on the Gospel itself. Titus 3:8 tells us that this has the very profitable result of motivation to do good deeds.

So it is not moral example and spiritual integrity that we offer the world. But it is salve for brokenness that we are entrusted with in the Great Commission.

The human Humpty Dumpty story has a twist.

"Humpty Dumpty sat on a wall, (between obedience and deceitful desire?)
Humpty Dumpty had a great fall.
All the king's horses,
And all the king's men,
Couldn't put Humpty together again."

The twist?

The King can and will restore the Humpty Dumpty's who acknowledge that the strongest and wisest of solutions are powerless to put us back together, and who instead seek His Grace.

J.Owen: The Effects of Age on our Passions (re-post)

Below are some very interesting thoughts by John Owen on the effects of age on our affections both naturally and also spiritually. To preface with a summary, he postulates that our affections wane and temper as we age naturally. He says this also happens as we spiritually age. His conclusion is that our keen sensitivity to sin needs to be protected.

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"Sin takes advantage to work by its deceit in this matter of drawing off the mind from a due sense of it...

"I shall give only one instance of its procedure in this kind. Men, in their younger days, have naturally their affections more quick, vigorous, and active, more sensibly working in them, than afterward. They do, as to their sensible working and operation, naturally decay, and many things befall men in their lives that take off the edge and keenness of them. But as men lose in their affections, if they are not [drunken] in sensuality or by the corruptions that are in the world through lust, they grow and improve in their understandings, resolutions, and judgments.

"Hence it is, that if what had place formerly in their affections do not take place in their minds and judgments, they utterly lose them, they have no more place in their souls. Thus men have no regard for, yea, they utterly despise, those things which their affections were set upon with delight and greediness in their childhood. But if they are things that by any means come to be fixed in their minds and judgments, they continue a high esteem for them, and do cleave as close unto them as they did when their affections were more vigorous; only as it were, they have changed their seat in the soul. It is thus in things spiritual. The first and chiefest seat of the sensibleness of sin is in the affections. As these in natural youth are great and large, so are they spiritually in spiritual youth: Jer.2:2"I remember the kindness of thy youth, the love of thine espousals." Besides, such persons are newly come off from their convictions wherein they have been cut to the heart, and so made tender.

"...But now, when affections begin to decay naturally, they begin to decay also as to their sensible actings and motions in things spiritual. Although they improve in grace, yet they may decay in sense. At least, spiritual sense is not radically in them, but only by way of communication. Now, in these decays, if the soul take not care to fix a deep sense of sin on the mind and judgement, thereby perpetually to affect the heart and affections, it will decay. And here the deceit of the law of sin interposeth itself."

- John Owen
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So we need to fix in our mind and judgment perpetually, a deep sense of the grievousness of sin. That can sound a bit like a resignation to morbid and melancholy living. But it doesn't need to be. We must recognize the enemy within, and fix in ourselves a due appreciation for the danger of it. However, we fall on the mercy and grace that is provided for us in Jesus Christ's atonement for us. Through Him we find "utter acceptance" from God the Father.

"It is God's utter acceptance of us that allows us to look at our miserable sinfulness and not flinch. If that's not the final step in sanctification, it is certainly a prerequisite to any other step. And it's about all most of us will experience in this life." - Mark Galli

LiveWeak!

Here's a motto that withstands the test of life's harsh waves. It agrees with Nature's assessment of God's finest creation. We are weak. I think a good grasp of this every once in a while can help us to really live well.

When we perceive ourselves as strong, we tend to believe that things we have already enjoyed and acquired are not to be compared with what we are striving for. There is no time to stop and smell the roses. For example, there is no greater gift that I could enjoy then the one already given to me in my wife. However, it seems that I take her for granted all too often.

When we recognize that we are weak, we take inventory...and then take nothing for granted.

Here are some good thoughts from one who experiences weakness more regularly than others perhaps.

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Living Weak--Stuntz (Posted by David Skeel)

(http://www.law.upenn.edu/blogs/dskeel/archives/2008/05/living_weakstuntz.html)

“Live strong” is a common slogan among cancer patients. I think I understand the slogan’s appeal, and I admire the spirit that lies behind it. But it doesn’t fit my experience, and I suspect I’m not alone.
Reduced life expectancy aside, the chief consequence of stage 4 cancers—even more, the chief consequence of their treatment—is weakness, not strength. Cancer and chemotherapy, taken together, are exhausting. Walking up a flight of stairs feels to me like running a couple of miles would feel to a typical out-of-shape 50-year-old, which is what I would be if I were healthy. All mental exercises are several times harder than they used to be. Concentrating takes real effort, and most of the time, I can’t pull it off—I have to read things twice (at least) in order to understand them once. My mind is two steps behind whatever conversation I’m in; I have to scramble to keep up. I feel half dead, as though a large fraction of whatever I was is gone, never to return.
In short, I can’t live strong, because there isn’t much strength left in me. But I can live weak.
What does that mean? ..."

Another quote...

"...cancer is an ugly disease, in every possible way. No wonder people recoil from it. But in the midst of all its life-sapping, soul-destroying ugliness, something amazing can happen: the most ordinary things, the most mundane tasks, take on value and beauty beyond anything I could have imagined. "

Another quote...

“Live strong” sounds to me like denial: I’m not strong, and pretending I am can’t change that fact. But I can live weak: do what I can, however small and ordinary, day by day. Some of the living—I wish it were more, but at the same time, I thank God for the “some”—is surprisingly good."

George Burder on Hell and The Intended Effect of Good

[Excerpt taken from George Burder's Sermon compilation, Village Sermons]

Matt 25:46 - "And these shall go way into everlasting punishment; but the righteous into life eternal."

"Let us turn our thoughts to the account that the Word of God gives us of Hell. It is true, it is an awful subject, and wicked men do not love to hear of it; but if they cannot bear to hear of it, how will they be able to endure it? Our Saviour, in the text (Mt 25:46), calls it everlasting punishment.

"It is punishment. Punishment is a pain inflicted on account of the breaking some law. Hell is the prison where the breakers of God's law will be confined and punished. God has made known his will in the ten commandments. These require us to love and serve him: but being fallen creatures, and unable of ourselves to do it aright, he has given us his gospel. Herein Christ is set forth as an all-sufficient Saviour, able and willing to save us from the guilt already contracted by our sins, and to renew and sanctify us, that we may comply with his will, and serve him acceptably. This is our reasonable service. But the sinner refuses it. He is so strongly bound with the cords of his sins, so in love with the lusts of the flesh, so besotted with the love of the world, that he persists in his sin, notwithstanding the warnings of God, and neglects salvation, though a thousand times invited and entreated. Thus he lives and thus he dies. What must be the consequence? ....The sinner has no room to complain. He chose the ways of sin, and now he must take the wages... Not the death of the body only, for good men as well as bad men die; but the second death, the death of the soul in its everlasting separation from God, the fountain of life and happiness.

"This is the import of that awful word "Depart." In the present world, whether men know it or not, all their comfort flows from his favor. God is the chief good, and the source of all the good in the world. It is he who has made creatures what they are. It is his sun which fills the world with light; it is his power by which man subsists, and enjoys his senses and his health. It is from his creatures we get our food and raiment; and though wicked men forget God in all their mercies, they are nevertheless from him, and in their proper tendencey lead to him, for "the goodness of God leadeth us to repentence." But in hell, all these comforts will be withdrawn. They did not answer their purpose to soften the hard and rebellious heart to obedience; and now, the season of trial and the day of grace being over, there is no end for which they should be continued."

"But it is not the loss of bodily comforts only that the damned must sustain; they must for ever lose the infinite pleasures that the redeemed will enjoy in the presence of Christ, and in the society of the blessed. This indeed they do not value now; but they will then. They will then plainly see that heaven itself consists in the presence and favor of God...."

- George Burder, "Hell and Heaven" sermon on Matt 25:46

It was particularly the portion that discusses the purpose of the good that we receive in this life which struck me. Look at the merciful heart of God in his pursuit of the sinner! Consider all of the good that He pours out on the unrepentant each day. What energy, and what untiring repetitious invitations he extends to the hardened of heart, the ignorant and wayward! How his love for the unlovely puts my compassion to shame. I, a leper, having been introduced to the only Source of Cleansing, will scarcely invite others to their only hope...for fear of mockery.

The Beauty of Gethsemane

Since November I have not moved out of Matthew 26. There is something about Christ in his anguish in the Garden of Gethsemane that helps me to appreciate the Incarnation. He knows our pain. He truly knows it from experience. This helps me to appreciate His comfort and to look for it... because He is familiar with our infirmities, sorrows and weaknesses.

I have re-read that chapter at least a hundred times since November. It is a well of darkness that somehow draws up comfort from its depths. Jesus, who was voluntarily plunged into that darkness, was fully man and tasted every texture of the pain and sorrow and foreboding. Because of that cup, Christ can experientially empathize, weep and work on our behalf to accomplish our good--interwoven as one piece with his glory. However black the darkness may seem, his experience will always be the deepest and darkest, not only to propitiate God's wrath on our behalf, but to establish him as the perfect High Priest who has compassed all of our infirmities. "For we have not a high priest which cannot be touched with the feeling of our infirmities; but was in all points tempted like as we are, yet without sin. Let us therefore come boldly unto the throne of grace, that we may obtain mercy, and find grace to help in time of need." Heb 4:15,16

"Come troubled believer, fret not over your heavy troubles, for they are the heralds of weighty mercies." CHSpurgeon

Judas

When it was evening, he reclined at table with the twelve. And as they were eating, he said, "Truly, I say to you, one of you will betray me." And they were very sorrowful and began to say to him one after another, "Is it I, Lord?" He answered, "He who has dipped his hand in the dish with me will betray me. The Son of Man goes as it is written of him, but woe to that man by whom the Son of Man is betrayed! It would have been better for that man if he had not been born." Judas, who would betray him, answered, "is it I, Rabbi?" He said to him, "You have said so." Matt 26:20 - 25

As I considered this sobering passage I was moved. First I was moved to pity Judas. Then I realized that God's aim in this portion of Matthew 26 was probably not for us to feel sorry for Judas. This passage emphasizes the greatness of the person of Christ by the greatness of the punishment reserved for that man who betrays him; "It would have been better for that man if he had not been born."

I think this passage also displays who we are apart from His intervening grace. Grace is favor given, though punishment is warranted. If I said "intervening mercy" it would sound like we are pitiful, and neither Judas nor we are pitiful. We are hard hearted. We, like Judas, heard the word of the Lord: "This is the work of God, that you believe in him whom he has sent" (Jn 6:29), and we scorned that word. Were it not for the grace of God, we like Judas, would have continued to harden our hearts against the words of life, continued to deny the authority of Christ, and continued to walk brazenly before Him, pleasing only ourselves (Jn 12:5-6).

Now I look at this passage, and at Judas, with new eyes. The sense of pity now is the pity one feels when his own guilt is somehow pardoned, while his fellow receives the just punishment. We also deserved judgement, but we received grace. This perspective cannot embrace self-righteousness. This perspective cannot charge God.

In the mysterious providence of God, his love enfolded me, and grace intervened, and I did not wake up this morning as Judas, the "son of destruction, that the Scripture might be fulfilled"(Jn 17:12).

May I humbly thank my Heavenly Father throughout this day for choosing me to be his own adopted child from before the creation of the world (Eph 1:4).