Why Spiritual Formation Matters
Last week, Todd and Amy had dinner with their friend Bob, who converted to orthodox Judaism a few years ago. Todd was asking him what in particular appealed to him about Judaism (and in the process, trying to discern what 'angle' he might take in talking with Bob about Jesus).
The answer: Bob liked the fact that Judaism gave him a life-long goal. "There's no way you can keep all the commandments," he said. "I'll be working my whole life to try to be the kind of person God wants me to be." Then he added, "That's what's wrong with Christianity. People can say they're a Christian, then go on living however they want!"
Astute readers will detect notes of works-righteousness and self-salvation in Bob's answer. He is tripping over grace, which is the defining mark of Christian spirituality. However, we should not neglect his rebuke. The evangelical church has substituted "cheap grace" (Bonhoeffer) for the true, life-transforming power of the gospel... and even an unbeliever can see the effects! A gospel that does not bring transformation is no gospel at all - and is not worthy of the name of Christ.
John Piper put the same thing in different words in a recent sermon:
You don't honor fully what you don't enjoy! God is not glorified fully by being known rightly. He is glorified by being known and so enjoyed that our lives are transformed into the kind of lives that display his infinite worth.
That's a pretty radical kind of life, too. 'Cause most lives look like we treasure the world. If you want to live a kind of life that looks like you treasure the King of Kings... it's gotta change.
That's why spiritual formation matters. If the purpose of my life is to bring glory to God... then a lot of things have got to change!
The answer: Bob liked the fact that Judaism gave him a life-long goal. "There's no way you can keep all the commandments," he said. "I'll be working my whole life to try to be the kind of person God wants me to be." Then he added, "That's what's wrong with Christianity. People can say they're a Christian, then go on living however they want!"
Astute readers will detect notes of works-righteousness and self-salvation in Bob's answer. He is tripping over grace, which is the defining mark of Christian spirituality. However, we should not neglect his rebuke. The evangelical church has substituted "cheap grace" (Bonhoeffer) for the true, life-transforming power of the gospel... and even an unbeliever can see the effects! A gospel that does not bring transformation is no gospel at all - and is not worthy of the name of Christ.
John Piper put the same thing in different words in a recent sermon:
You don't honor fully what you don't enjoy! God is not glorified fully by being known rightly. He is glorified by being known and so enjoyed that our lives are transformed into the kind of lives that display his infinite worth.
That's a pretty radical kind of life, too. 'Cause most lives look like we treasure the world. If you want to live a kind of life that looks like you treasure the King of Kings... it's gotta change.
That's why spiritual formation matters. If the purpose of my life is to bring glory to God... then a lot of things have got to change!
posted by Bob | 11:50 AM
15 Comments:
Wow, what a spot-on indictment of the accomodating church... you can only serve one master, and why would anyone be interested in Christianity if we serve (or appear to at least) the same one they already do?
Dang it. All I was doing was trying to puruse some blogs when I got convicted via this post. Leave it to Baker/Bakers to breathe the Gospel into Orthodox Judaism. Mr. world religions boy!
Willard has a great article on his site about living life to the fullest via transforming grace. It's a must read for anyone like me who struggles to be disiplined.
http://www.dwillard.org/articles/artview.asp?artID=5
Cody... great link. Everyone, please read that article!! It is short, well-written, and deeply important to our sanctification. :)
Grace I think is a concept that is hard for us to understand as a society of having to work for everything. There is no way to pay your bills unless you are out doing your job. There isn't a way to start on the football team if you aren't busting your butt. Thus in our society we see it as, "well I have to do this so that God will bless me." The crazy thing is God is going to do what He wants...we though are also held accountable to what we do and how we live so that others may see His goodness. Our greatest joy should be that of seeing others come to know the Saviour (2 Thess. 2). So instead of living so that we may be blessed and receive this grace, I think we should live and experience grace so that OTHERS can see His grace. Sure we can experience grace but we should only know it so that we can give it and abound in it (2 Peter). The way that we display His infinite worth in our lives is living by this concept of doing it out of love. Sounds elementary but maybe following Christ isn't as hard as we make it sometimes. Just a random thought...
If you see Tony Weers, tell him Micah says "hey Coach!" Be blessed today and continue to give grace to its full abundance as crazy as it is...think about how Paul must have felt trying to explain this to the people of his time.
I still cannot get the struggle of our brother in "Catch 22" off of my mind or out of my prayers. This conversation took me back to reconsider why we struggle so with unmerited favor and reap the whirlwind of bitter self critism and fragmented relationships. It has much to do with our resistance to surrender. We anthropomorphize our Lord into a narrow, small minded judge instead of yielding the magnanimous Creator who lavishes His Love unendingly...His Love is not our love.It is so difficult to understand so we resist. He doesn't hate us because we struggle and fall down. Willard says it so well in that article:
"Now disciplines are not law, they are wisdom. We have to learn how to do them, and we always fail at the outset. But to fail here is not to sin. The sin would be in not adopting and following up on a wise program of disciplines under grace. For then we are not really intending to do what Jesus said. We are planning to fail.
Also, disciplines are for disciples--apprentices--of Jesus, not for dabblers or mere consumers of religious services. They are for people who intend to learn from Jesus how to live their whole lives in the kingdom of God as he would live their lives if he were they. Such people are serious about this and will not be denied.
Thus they are prepared to experiment and learn from their failures until, under their constant teacher, they find that disciplines truly are full of grace and strength."
God's grace is the only environment where we can keep learning and keep living.
Cindy
Who is to say whether or not someone has faith!? This is the problem with reformed theology. While there is much to be said about the emphasis it places upon personal holiness, I sadly observe that its indictment of "cheap grace" is coupled by judgmentalism and and an overall sense of pride. While its true that there are many people who believe that they're Christians that aren't truely Christians - the grounds for this is not based upon whether or not you bear fruit, its upon whether or not you trust Christ. Grace is never about us, grace is a unmerited gift that cannot be validated by anyone, only the Lord. The life of those who hold to a perseverence of the saints is a life of fear and questioning... "Do I know for sure that I'm saved? Well, I better DO something to prove that I am so I will continue to persevere." Instead, simply belief on the Lord Jesus Christ and you will saved. Thats all, its that simple. Call that easy believism all you want, that is the gospel. Its never been about us, its all about God and its His free gift to all who believe. If the gospel is something that a child can understand, why can't grown people get it. The saving work of Christ is mysterious and is not meant to be rationalized. The more that imperfect, sinful humans try to rationalize the gospel, the more muddy we become in how we present it.
I know that its is difficult to motivate believers to holiness, but to bring them into a similar perception of a Jew who has misunderstood the Law is massively wrong. One of the most interesting parts to this post is the fact that all the citations are based in the words of man. Show me the words of God! People need to worry less about what other people say and start worrying about what God has to say. You can have all the John Pipers in the world, I'll take my Bible.
Dear Mr. or Mrs. Anonymous-
I'll take my Bible too. However, Piper and Bonhoeffer and Willard (see the comments section for this reference) are guys that have gone down the road of Christian faith ahead of me so I value their words and thoughts. At the end of the day the Bible is the end-all, and at the end of the day spending some time learning from people that soak in the Bible isn't a bad idea either.
Mr/Mrs/Ms Anonymous,
You wrote, "While its true that there are many people who believe that they're Christians that aren't truely Christians - the grounds for this is not based upon whether or not you bear fruit, its upon whether or not you trust Christ."
Jesus said, "He who has my commands and keeps them, he is the one who loves me" (John 14:21).
Or, as Dallas Willard says, "Obedience is the specific form that trust in Christ takes. If you don't intend to obey Jesus, you simply don't trust him."
test.....bw
How interesting that you might use the book of John to refute "easy believism". John wrote these things "that you might believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, and that believing, you may have life in His name." [20:31].
John 14:21 is not about salvation but about the relationship one has with the Father and Christ after salvation, namely sanctification. To remove Scripture from context is the key to adding perseverance in good works as a condition of salvation. Should one truly believe that perseverance is a condition of salvation, one has absolutely no assurance until one dies, for that will be the only moment when your perseverance ends and the answer will be known. That certainly isn't Good News. The Good News is that you can know for sure that you have eternal life through believing in Jesus Christ.
John 5:24 - "Most assuredly, I say to you, he who hears My word and believes in Him who sent Me has everlasting life, and shall not come into judgement, but has passed from death into life."
Take Christ's words at face value. You can KNOW you have everlasting life. You can KNOW that you will not come into judgement. Praise God that He is faithful when I am not. Praise God that you can be "saved through faith and that not of yourselves; it is the gift of God, not of works, lest anyone should boast" [Eph 2:8,9]. Even as Paul goes on to stress the importance of good works he reminds us that good works are not to prove one's self (for we have nothing on which to do so, save Christ's work) "For we are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand that we should walk in them" [10]. We do good works as a response to our salvation, but should one, after believing, not do good works, this does not undo the belief, for "whoever believes in Him should not perish but have eternal life" [John 3:15].
Let's use passages that clearly speak of justification when we talk about salvation. Let's not confuse the unregenerate. Let's love them and speak the truth clearly so that many might believe and know for sure that they are saved.
test
Mr/Mrs/Ms Anonymous (the 2nd one, if different than the 1st),
1) How in the world you turned this post into a debate about the assurance of salvation isn't quite clear to me...
2) you seem unclear about (or perhaps negatively predisposed toward) what reformed theology teaches regarding the perseverance of the saints, so I would suggest some further study before you make veiled attacks...
3) how you separate sanctification from salvation and justification and sanctification is unintelligible to me in light of passages like Romans 8:29-30 and 2 Thess. 2:13 and Matthew 25. Salvation is holistic. Justification is one part or facet of salvation, but not the only one.
It seems that you want to have a theological conversation, which I am happy to do, and I would be more than willing to continue the conversation over email. You are welcome to drop me an email and reveal your identity and let me know exactly what you question about reformed theology or about Coram Deo. Such an approach would allow us to have an informed dialogue in pursuit of truth rather than a shadowy and half-anonymous debate on a blog thread.
Correct me if I am wrong, but doesn't the greek or hebrew word used for "believe" in most passages of the bible have a much deeper sense to the word than our normal use of the word? Belief in Jesus and his death on the cross means more than simply acknowledging that he existed and his death and ressurection actually happened. I think of James 2:14-25 when I think of these things. Faith without obedience is no faith at all.
Back on the original topic though, I have a buddy that tells me the same thing as the Baker's Jewish friend. His biggest hang up with Christianity is that "It's too easy." We've been preached and have been preaching an "easy" gospel for way too long IMO. I think that's evident in the fact that most Americans would call themselves Christians, yet their "faith" has no impact on their lives.
Mr. or Ms. Anonymous, I want to respond to several things--but to begin we must both confess "judgementalism and an overall sense of pride" (using your own words in your first blog). I have it as "I want to be right" and I think you are very misinformed about so called "Reformed theology" (I like to call it Biblical theology) and you have it if you think you can understand the massive, gloriously deep truths of scripture without theologians, pastors, preachers, creeds, confessions.....from down through the centuries of church history. So let's discuss in the spirit of this quote:
"Some controvery is crucial for the sake of life-giving truth. Running from it is a sign of cowardice. But enjoying it is usually a sign of pride. Some necessary tasks are sad, and even victory is not without tears---unless there is pride. The reason enjoying controversy is a sign of pride is that humility loves truth-based unity more than truth-based victory. Humility loves Christ-exalting exultation more than Christ-defending confrontation---even more than Christ defending vindication. Humility delights to worhip Christ in spirit and truth. If it must fight for worship-sustaining truth, it will, but that is not because the fight is pleasant. It's not even because victory is pleasant. It's because knowing and loving and proclaiming Christ for who he really is and what he really did is pleasant." Now those are good words for us as we discuss----and by the way those words are from Piper (you really should give him a chance!) More to come as I respond to your comments on grace and perseverance of the saints etc.....Contending for the truth, brenda
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