My message and my preaching were not with wise and persuasive words, but with a demonstration of the Spirit's power, so that your faith might not rest on men's wisdom, but on God's power.
— 1 Corinthians 2:4-5
There has emerged lately in American Christianity a school of religious thought conceived in intellectual pride and dedicated to the proposition that everything of value in the Christian faith can be reduced to philosophical terms and understood by the human mind. The notion seems to be that anything God can utter we can comprehend, allowing possibly for the need of a little divine aid with the heavier stuff. The brethren who are promoting this movement seem to feel that the trouble with evangelicalism is that it is not scholarly enough, that it cannot state itself in scientific terms. They appear to be chagrined by the chuckles of the learned liberals at the allegedly ignorant fundamentalists and have been needled into an attempt to prove that we evangelicals are not so dumb after all.
They hope to make their point by equating Christian theology with Greek philosophy and the findings of modern science, and demonstrating that if the truth were known the Christian revelation is just good clean reason, nothing more. I pass over the pretty obvious fact that there is in all this more than a trace of the taint of mind-worship. And am I just seeing things or do I detect a deep and painful inferiority complex on the part of these apostles of evangelical-rationalism? But I won't call attention to it. I know how they feel. Well, I believe these brethren are wrong. I believe they are as badly mixed up and confused as the peddlers of old wives' tales in Paul's day or the snake handlers of our own Ozark Mountains ? only, of course, in a different and more respectable way. If they succeed in reducing Christianity to a philosophical proposition, they will do more damage to the true faith of Christ than liberalism, Catholicism and Communism combined.
thought
Between eloquence and superior wisdom that impress the listener and the demonstration of the Spirit's power that changes people, there is a tremendous difference. It is the latter that is overwhelmingly convincing.
prayer
Lord, I can prayerfully study and trustingly proclaim Your Word but only You can demonstrate Your power among Your people.
This is what we speak, not in words taught us by human wisdom but in words taught by the Spirit, expressing spiritual truths in spiritual words.
— First Corinthians 2:13
Having as the High Priest of our profession the incarnation of all divine wisdom and having as our source book of religious knowledge the holy Scriptures, the soundest and saltiest work ever written, why do we tend so easily to become confused about things spiritual? I believe the causes are four, and I propose to state them in this and the next chapters. The first cause of religious confusion is our failure to understand that the truth as it is in Christ Jesus is a moral and spiritual thing and not something intellectual merely. Let a man approach the burning bush of divine truth with the desire to grasp it in his hand and the intensity of the fire will blind his eyes and cauterize his hands and face to the point of insensibility. Before the awesome vision of revealed truth, the human intellect should kneel and hide its face in trembling adoration.
Because Moses was afraid to look upon God, the Lord could speak to him face to face as a man speaks to his friend; but God hides His face from the man who does not instinctively hide his own. Intellectual pride, then, with its corollary, irreverence, is one cause of religious confusion. Satan's original doctrine, "You will be like God, knowing . . ." (Genesis 3:5) has been accepted by millions of religious persons through the centuries and commands a big following today even among professedly orthodox Christians. In spite of all Christ said while among men and all His inspired apostles wrote after His ascension, we seem never to learn that the inner essence of truth cannot be apprehended by the mental faculties. We still come at the awesome supernatural reality headfirst.
thought
Indispensable in uderstanding divine revelation is the ministry of the Holy Spirit. There is truth our minds cannot grasp but our hearts can fully embrace. The things of the Spirit are spiritually, not intellectually, discerned.
prayer
O Holy Spirit teach me. Not that I may merely understand with my mind but will obey from my heart.
There has never been the slightest doubt in my mind that the God who started this great work in you would keep at it and bring it to a flourishing finish on the very day Christ Jesus appears.
— Philippians 1:6 (The Message)
There comes a time when the true believer must take his stand on the oath and covenant of God and refuse to be shaken. He must lift high his happy affirmation, not in arrogance, but in faith and in deep humility. Perhaps his declaration of independence will go something like this: I am not yet perfect, but I thank God and my Lord Jesus Christ that I am done with the past and I do now trust in my Savior for full deliverance from all my sins.
I cannot pray like Daniel, but I shall never cease to praise God that He inclines His ear to me. I am not as wise as Solomon, but I glory in this, that "I know whom I have believed, and am convinced that he is able to guard what I have entrusted to him for that day" (2 Timothy 1:12). I have not the gifts of Moses or Isaiah or John, but I'll be everlastingly grateful that I have been given the moral perception to understand and appreciate such men as these. I am not what I want to be, but thanks be to God that I do want to be better than I am; and I am sure that "He who began a good work in [me] will carry it on to completion until the day of Christ Jesus" (Philippians 1:6). Here I stand. I can do nothing else, so help me God.
thought
We can't grow by our own effort and determination. But we can fully commit ourselves to God, trusting Him for empowerment. As we submit to His control, the Spirit will grow us!
prayer
Father, complete in me the transformation You have begun. For Jesus' sake
Brothers, I do not consider myself yet to have taken hold of it. But one thing I do: Forgetting what is behind and straining toward what is ahead, I press on toward the goal to win the prize for which God has called me heavenward in Christ Jesus.
— Philippians 3:13-14
Once while listening to a man reproach, disparage and scold an assembly of Christians with whom he was only slightly acquainted and whose personal lives he had no way of appraising, I asked myself some questions, the answers to which up to this point I have not received. Since they bear directly on the matter here being discussed I want to list them. Perhaps some reader can answer them for me. Here they are: Why do some preachers ? 1. To take us on in the Christian life, begin by trying to prove that we have not started yet? 2. To emphasize a truth, assume or assert that everyone but them is ignorant of it?
3. To stir us to more praying, assume that we never pray at all? 4. To make us feel penitent, imply that we had a fierce family quarrel just before we left for church? 5. To bring conviction of sin on an audience, act wise and mysterious and subtly suggest that there is deep and grave hidden evil present somewhere? 6. Create invidious comparisons, as for example: "You can preach about the deeper life all you will; I believe in foreign missions"; or "You may run to and fro over the earth engaged in foreign missions; I believe in love as the only way to please God." This is dishonest and confusing, but it does disturb the tenderhearted saints and bring them to the altar. I wonder if that is not the real purpose of it after all.
thought
None of us is born fully mature. There is a great deal of growing to be done. Rather than concentrating on weaknesses and failures in learning to walk, let's encourage one another to keep pressing on.
prayer
Thank You, Lord, I can grow. I don't have to remain what and where I am today. I can grow because of Your grace and enablement.
'Simon, Simon, Satan has asked to sift you as wheat. But I have prayed for you, Simon, that your faith may not fail. And when you have turned back, strengthen your brothers.'
— Luke 22:31-32
This concept of the Christian life as a journey to be taken, a growth to be attained, is being lost to us through two widely separated modern errors. . . . The second error is found among us evangelicals. This error is the exact opposite of the liberal's, which assumes spiritual life to be present when it is not; this one assumes that life is not there when it is. Unless every Christian virtue is in the soul, it flatly denies that any virtue is there at all. It requires all babies to be born full grown, and all pilgrims to reach their destination the same moment they set out on their journey. Those who hold this error seem possessed by a desperate hope that if they can shatter all faith and shake every Christian loose from his confidence they can bring about a revival. As they see it, no one is where he should be and will never arrive there until he admits that he has been deceived about himself up to now and has only just this minute seen the true light.
thought
Consider Peter. Terrible failures in his life there were but mark the growth. At various points in his life we might have written him off. But Christ didn't. Let's give our brothers and sisters room to grow.
prayer
Awesome is Your patience with me in my walk with You. I trip and fall. You pick me up. You intercede for me. Thank You, Lord, thank You.
For you have been born again, not of perishable seed, but of imperishable, through the living and enduring word of God.
— First Peter 1:23
In the Hebrew epistle a great deal is said about the need for persistence in the Christian life. The converts were losing heart and the man of God sought to encourage them to "hold firmly till the end the confidence we had at first" (3:14). "So do not throw away your confidence," he exhorts them, "it will be richly rewarded" (10:35). This concept of the Christian life as a journey to be taken, a growth to be attained, is being lost to us through two widely separated modern errors. The first is that of the liberal, who cheerfully advises the unrenewed sinner to continue in the Christian life, overlooking the important fact that he has no life in which to continue. Where there has been no impartation of life to the soul of the man, growth and development are impossible. To assume that a saving act of God has been done in a man's heart when in reality no such act has been done is to set the soul of the man in mortal jeopardy and all but guarantee his final ruin.
thought
You cannot progress in the Christian life if you have never begun. It is spiritual birth through faith in Christ that gives us life, equipped with the Holy Spirit within and the spiritual dynamic of God. But we can't grow if we have never been born.
prayer
Father, thank You I am Your child.
But grow in the grace and knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. To him be glory both now and forever! Amen.
— Second Peter 3:18
One thing taught throughout the Bible, and particularly in the New Testament, is that the Christian life is a progression, a journey of the redeemed soul toward God. Another is that Satan stands to resist every step and to hinder the journey in every way possible. To advance against his shrewd and powerful opposition requires faith and steadfast courage. The epistles call it "confidence." In his Philippian epistle Paul declares his own determination to advance against all obstacles. He says in effect that while he is not yet perfect and has not yet attained unto the goal set before him, he is putting the past behind him psychologically as well as chronologically that he may go on to find in Christ his all in all. "I press on toward the goal," he says, "to win the prize for which God has called me heavenward in Christ Jesus" (Philippians 3:14). Then with a fine disregard for apparent self-contradictions he urges, "All of us who are mature should take such a view of things" (3:15).
thought
There is that imperative to "keep growing!" No matter how far we have come there is so much more growing to experience. Let's press on!
prayer
Lord, thank You, I can grow and keep growing!
Then he said to them all: 'If anyone would come after me, he must deny himself and take up his cross daily and follow me.'
— Luke 9:23
About 300 B.C. a Greek king named Pyrrhus fought a battle with the Romans at Heraclea. Pyrrhus won the battle but in doing so he suffered such appalling losses as to more than offset his gains. Thus a victory that costs too much is often called a Pyrrhic victory. . . . For years I have watched misled Christians in their unholy effort to make friends with the enemy and to render the cross socially acceptable. A few prophets have written and preached against this outrageous sellout, but their words have gone unheeded. The leadership of the popular Christian movements has been and still is in the hands of persons who are blind to the meaning of the cross.
That darkness and light cannot mingle never so much as occurs to them. They are busily engaged copying the world and trying to be like it as far as they dare. To be a Christian one need only "accept" Christ. That brings "peace of mind" and assurance of heaven. After that the cross has no meaning and Christ no authority. Compromise and collaboration are now the distinguishing marks of religion. To be relaxed and well adjusted to society is more important than to keep the commandments of Christ.
The fawning, ingratiating spirit is the modern badge of saintliness. Between the world and the Christian there is no longer any great difference. And that not by accident. They planned it that way. Yes, we have won a victory over the atheists. They no longer cause us any trouble. But subsequent developments will show that our triumph has cost us too much. It is a Pyrrhic victory.
thought
The cross is mounted on church steeples. We have overlaid it with gold to wear around our neck or on our lapel. In doing so, have we forgotten that the cross is an instrument of death! It was for Christ and it is for us ? death to self. Are we bearing our cross daily?
prayer
Lord, in reaching out to people in this world may I not seek to disguise the cross nor leave mine at home each day.
We have this hope as an anchor for the soul, firm and secure. It enters the inner sanctuary behind the curtain, where Jesus, who went before us, has entered on our behalf. He has become a high priest forever, in the order of Melchizedek.
— Hebrews 6:19-20
Only a Christian has a right to hope, for only he has the power of God to give substance to his hope. The man who hopes in Christ is as safe as the rainbow-circled throne where sits the God who cannot lie. Such a man has a moral right to look upward and quietly wait for the fulfillment of every promise. Let him but see to it that his anticipations conform to the revealed Word of God and he has nothing to doubt or fear in life or in death. His loftiest flights of fancy cannot outsoar the promises of God to those that love Him and that hope in His mercy.
Because God wanted to make the unchanging nature of his purpose very clear to the heirs of what was promised, he confirmed it with an oath. God did this so that, by two unchangeable things in which it is impossible for God to lie, we who have fled to take hold of the hope offered to us may be greatly encouraged. We have this hope as an anchor for the soul, firm and secure. It enters the inner sanctuary behind the curtain, where Jesus, who went before us, has entered on our behalf. He has become a high priest forever, in the order of Melchizedek (Hebrews 6:17-20). Hope without the great High Priest is a false hope. How dare they look forward with cheerful expectation of blessedness to come who are not protected by the oath nor held steadfast by the anchor? What is certain about human hopes?
Yet millions go on assuming that all is well with their souls when they have never known the forgiving love of God nor felt the kiss of His approval. They nourish the flimsy hope that they are not so bad after all and that "God's a good fellow and 'twill all be well." The worldly minded hope that they are children of God. The impenitent and unrenewed dream of the reward of the righteous and those whose nature fits them for hell pensively hope that they will enter heaven at last. Earth is bearable because there is hope. Hell is unendurable because all hope has fled. Heaven is eternal beatitude because hope is there in radiant fulfillment. "For you have been my hope, O Sovereign LORD, ... I will always have hope; I will praise you more and more" (Psalm 71:5, 14).
thought
God's promise and His confirming oath are unchangeable. This hope we may firmly grasp. Christ paid our sin-debt ? all of it. Christ is our High Priest ? He intercedes for us.
prayer
Father, use me to share genuine and certain hope with those who are without such hope but may not know it.