Faith Will Become Sight

From the Epilogue of Jonathan Dodson's, "Gospel-Centered Discipleship." This was too good not to post.

"One day the fight will be over. Faith will become sight. Our image will be perfectly aligned with Christ's image. Our affection for Christ will be so strong that it will be chief among ten thousand. All competitors for his attention will bow before him, and we will recover a childish, yet mature delight that will never cease to thrill our souls. Every act will be a natural act of obedience sparked by joy. The warnings will fade and the promises will be fulfilled. Threats will no longer be necessary and rewards will abound. The Spirit will have full sway in our gladdened hearts as we live forever in Spirit-led worship. We will no longer lean toward performance or license. The gospel will be central forever. Our conversions will be complete, our community characterized by love, and our mission colored in worship. We will no longer know our sin, fight our sin, or struggle to trust our Savior. Until then, may God grant us his sovereign grace to fight the good fight of faith, for our joy, and for his eternal glory."

Jesus Transforms

From Erik Most:

Sin deforms. Advice reforms. Jesus transforms. 

God created us for himself. We are made in His image. We were made to know and be known by God. Sin deforms this image. It deforms the entirety of our being. It severs the intended Creator/creation relationship we were made for. It causes us to hide rather than be known. A great reminder that the only remedy for this deformation is not moral reformation or behavior modification. We don't need an external band-aid or a temporary fix-up. We don't need a mask to where, so as to deceive everyone into thinking that we really aren't broken creatures; we aren't really deformed. What we do need is the gospel. What we need is to be re-made. What we need is new birth. The only remedy for sin is to be transformed by Jesus. We need new hearts. Only Jesus can re-make us as God's image bearers. Only the one who is in fact the perfection of God's image can transform us and bring us back to what we were created for. Good advice isn't good enough. We need new life. We need Jesus. 

New Life > Improvement

"When Adam sinned, sin entered the world. Adam's sin brought death, so death spread to everyone, for everyone sinned...But there is a difference between Adam's sin and God's gracious gift (Christ). For the sin of this one man, Adam, brought death to many. But even greater is God's wonderful grace and his gift of forgiveness to many through this other man, Jesus Christ. And the result of God's gracious gift is very different from the result of that one man's sin. For Adam's sin led to condemnation, but God's free gift leads to our being made right with God, even though we are guilty of many sins. But even greater is God's wonderful grace and his gift of righteousness, for all who receive it will live in triumph over sin and death through this one man, Jesus Christ." Romans 5:12-17

OK, there is a ton of weighty (no pun intended) stuff in this short passage and a lot you could talk about. One thing that sticks out to me as I read this is the contrast between life in Adam and life in Christ. The New Testament is constantly drawing a distinction between the two. Our life in Adam is defined by sin and an inability to obey. The result, as Paul points out in this passage is inevitable death. We are all by nature descendants of Adam, and under him, we will all die.

Here is where the good news of the gospel comes in. Jesus comes to save us from the reign of sin and death, and give us completely new life. We are either in the old life, under Adam, and under sins condemnation, or we are under Christ, and have received new life.

 I love this contrast, because this is not what most people hear from the pulpits on a given Sunday. It is our tendency to turn the gospel into mere life improvement rather than completely new life. Jesus did not come to improve the old Adam. He came to make man completely new. He came to be the new Adam, where all those who believe in him, now become under His reign. The result of His work is eternal life, and a righteous standing before a good and Holy God.

To prove my point about contemporary Christianity choosing to preach a mere "life improvement gospel," take a look at some of the titles of best selling Christian books from the last several years.

Your Best Life Now
Become a Better You
Love Does: Discover a Secretly Incredible Life in an Ordinary World
Unglued: Making Wise Choices in the Midst of Raw Emotions
Battlefield of the Mind: Winning the Battle in Your Mind

Not to knock on any of these books (I haven't read any of them), but I think they get my point across. We love hearing a message that we are good and that all we need is a couple steps so we can be even better. It is unfortunate that so many pastors are swayed by people's itching ears rather than giving the truth we so desperately need. We need to hear that we are broken and insufficient in ourselves. That in our own strength, we will never be enough. What we need is Jesus. We need to hear  that Jesus didn't come to make us "better", but to make us completely new. Jesus didn't come so that we can be "fans" of him and use him to get something that we want out to life. He came to turn our lives upside down. And the good news is that through Christ's finished work, we can be redeemed from the old self. We can be made new. By God's grace, we can live this new life.

Titus 3:3-7 Part 4 (New and Clean)

"For we ourselves were once foolish, disobedient

led astray, slaves to various passions and pleasures,

passing our days in malice and envy, hated by others and hating one another.

But when the goodness and loving kindness of God our Savior appeared, 

he saved us, not because of works done by us in righteousness, 

but according to his own mercy, 

by the washing of regeneration and renewal of the Holy Spirit,

whom he poured out on us richly through Jesus Christ our Savior,

so that being justified by his grace,

we might become heirs according to the hope of eternal life."

Titus 3:3-7

Up to this point, we know that God, through Jesus Christ has saved us. More specifically, we read today that God saves us by the 'washing of regeneration' and 'renewal'. In other words, God saves us by making us 'new' and 'clean'. The new birth is a theme that runs throughout the Bible story, especially the New Testament. In John 3, Jesus says that "unless one is born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God" (John 3:3). Again in 2nd Corinthians, Paul writes, "if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation. The old has passed away; behold, the new has come" (2nd Corinthians 5:17). At the heart of the Christian story is God making new that which was lost in the fall. God created all of life to be held together in intimate harmony with himself. At the fall, that perfect relationship was lost, and since then everything is suffering. The promise of the Old Testament is that God will redeem his creation from this mess. The glory of the New Testament is that this promise is completely fulfilled in Jesus Christ. This was his plan from the beginning. Here, as Paul writes to Titus, he reminds Titus of this good news.

So, by the blood of Jesus Christ, we are given completely new life. I love this language of the 'washing' and 'regeneration' and 'renewal'. Sometimes its easy to minimize the Christian faith to a few external acts like going to church and 'being good'. Yet, this language shows how this gospel is something way different. It is a complete renewal. It is a complete washing away of the old nature and an implantation of the new nature. It is a complete regeneration. Jesus came to give new life, not second chances. Now, when I say 'complete', I am not implying that we will no longer sin, or that we are now perfect. Far from it. But, we have been completely redeemed from the reign of sin and death. In other words, we are no longer slaves to sin, it is no longer our master. Secondly, we are redeemed from the punishment of sin and death. There is no more condemnation. Jesus died and resurrected that we may be 'new' and 'clean'. Next time we'll talk about how this gift is a one of complete grace, and how this gift changes our lives. 

The Spirit of the Mind

"and to be renewed in the spirit of your minds, 

and to put on the new self, created after the likeness of God

in true righteousness and holiness"

Ephesians 4:23-24

A few observations about these two verses....

1: Our mind has a Spirit

• As humans, we are quite unique in our thought life. We are not merely robots, acting off of chemical reactions, but we are created after the likeness of God, made with a mind that is able to think, know, feel, and love. This verse refers to this as the spirit of the mind. 
• The spirit of our minds is deceitful. Something I notice about myself, is that I can sit down for hours and watch my favorite sports team. I can memorize every fact about the Chicago Bulls, or have the Bears 53 man roster memorized. I can tell you the Florida Gator's football recruiting stats for the last 5 years. But the second I sit down and try to focus on the Bible, it's like my mind is at war with me. I instantly start thinking of other things I need to do. When I try to meditate on Christ, my mind instantly wants to be elsewhere. I imagine I'm not the only one like this. This is because our mind by nature is depraved. We crave to put ourselves as primary, and God as secondary. It has been this way since Adam and Eve ate of the fruit. And because of this.....

2: Our mind needs to be renewed

• As stated earlier, we are made unique in regards to our thought life. We have an amazing ability to think, feel, know, love, and be loved. Further, our minds were ultimately created to know Christ, to love him, to be loved by him, to feel him. Given the depravity of our minds, where we constantly want to do things our way, rather than God's way, our minds need to be renewed. We need to be renewed to what they were created for. We were created to know and enjoy God. This is what is best for us. This is for our flourishing, for our good. It is for our joy. 
• Renewal is not a matter of information. The right information is everywhere. You can find it on the internet in a second. It is not a matter of merely knowing gospel facts, or knowing the information that God is the creator, and his Son Jesus is savior. There are countless millions in the world today who are informative Christians (which are no Christians at all). Being a Christian is transformative. Our minds must be transformed by the gospel. The Spirit of our mind must be renewed. And we are transformed not by mere information, but through the power of the gospel. 

3. Renewed in Christ:

• These verses tell us to be 'renewed in our minds, putting on the new self'. This new self is referring to our new life. The only way to have new life is through Christ. Being renewed in the spirit of the mind is not a matter of effort, it is a matter of surrender. We can only be renewed, we can only put on the new self, when we've surrendered the old self to Christ.
• Being renewed in Christ doesn't come when we try really really really hard to start thinking the right things, and being extra moral, or extra environmental, or extra nice. No. It comes when we realize that our minds are depraved, and that they never could renew themselves, no matter how hard we try, and that they are constantly putting our way as primary and God as secondary. And renewal comes when we realize this, and surrender our minds to Jesus, who was the only One who had a perfect mind. Jesus was everything we were supposed to be. Where we blew it, Jesus overcame. His mind was perfectly righteous and holy. Ours are not. 
• Let us look to the Jesus, who had the perfect mind in the likeness of God, that our minds may be renewed in Him.