Don’t be simplistic when you come up with a solution
One of the things that caught my eye the most was when Powlison attracts attention when we treat sanctification with simplistic methods.
- This is not to say that having your daily devotion will not help you in the process of sanctification.
- Of course.
- But these are not simplistic mathematics.
- This leads us to be more patient with the little brother who is struggling and more grateful for every little victory in the battle of sanctification.
One thing we have recently lost is the use of the Book of Psalms in our devotion, yet, as Powlison points out, a person who grows in sanctification, reacts more and more biblically to the different emotions we feel. At this point, the psalter is a precious warehouse with all kinds of different emotions and if we want to pray biblically when we are angry, depressed, happy, repentant, etc. , we must start using this precious and inspired book again. We will soon address this problem with a message from Franklin Ferreira.
The book of Proverbs gives us guidance on how to act as God’s people under God’s fear and wisdom. It should be remembered that this book does not contain a series of promises, but a series of maxims. “Will educating the child according to the goals he has for him, and even over the years, not deviate from it?(Pr 22:6) is not a promise that any child of believing parents who taught him along the way will be a believer, but a maxim that expresses the importance of teaching and expresses what normally happens.
May we walk every day on the path of sanctification, which Jesus had already said was narrow.
Progressive sanctification is absurdly complicated. You’re basically called to do something that can only succeed when Jesus Christ appears and you see Him face to face, when you’re like him.
I believe that there is a constant temptation in every human heart, in every ecclesiastical movement, in every denomination, in all kinds of theological generation, to try to find a way Perhaps prayer has this structure :?If you’ve just been in this empty space, and you fill this empty space with?Expel the spirit that enslaves you ?,? If you only remember that you are the king’s son, if you only have more time in devotion?, or if you simply realize someone?, or if you simply repeat yourself that you were justified by faith. you alone, just, right?
And there aren’t any? Sanctification. If it had existed, the Church would have discovered it a long time ago, but often you have these ways, these attempts to portray a secret, where they can put sanctification in one sentence.
In fact, sanctification costs you your life and gives you life, is it dying for the intuitive and natural, so it has been taught, practiced, what has been stimulated, choice, habit?Are you dying of envy of these things, and learning to be a man or a woman who lives?(that is one way of saying it), that lives the honesty and integrity of the Psalms in all their range of moods (situations of joy, sadness, difficulty, need, protest, gratitude), that you become that kind of integrity as a human being living before the face of a God who must save you; and you become a man or a woman of the Proverbs, in terms of wisdom. Who is practical, loving, cares about every word that comes out of his mouth and considers the interests of others, considers the effect of your words on others or the effect of your actions, reflects on their anxieties, irritations, regrets, etc.
You’re called to the impossible. You’re called to be a different kind of person. You are called to be like Jesus Christ, who was a natural person. And that said, then the nice drama of being a Christian is this: “My sheep hear my voice,” and those in the vineyard have a working farmer. There is a Spirit that gives life, and there is a Spirit who commits himself to bear fruit, even in the ups and downs, the contradictions, the paradoxes.
I think it would be fair to say that one of the most important brands of someone who is a Christian is that if you notice that person over time, you will see evidence that someone else was working in your life. This is one of the most fantastic things.
My main ministry is pastoral counsel, and it is something impressive to contemplate a person who has ears to listen to the words of promise, hope, ordinance, disapproval, words of enlightenment that give meaning to the world. To see a person who has awakened, God, in his ways, to his sin and the mercy of God.
It is something that takes us by surprise and yet, from another point of view, it is something so fundamentally simple that (and this is the heart of what the gospel is), that there is a God who moves in us, there is a God that walks up to us and invades lives One of my favorite quotes about simplicity and complexity is an old Oliver quote. , and he says:
“I wouldn’t give a penny for simplicity on this side of complexity, but I would give my life for simplicity on the other side of complexity. “
And it captures so well that biblical simplicity deals with complexities.
One example I like to use is that Jesus, when he teaches, does so in an absolutely simple way. Or do you serve God or Mammon?. Purpose How many words are there in that sentence?And yet this judgment puts every human being who has ever lived against the wall, he also calls us to Christ who pronounced it, who is the Christ dead for us, and that will transform us. And this phrase gives us a vision that we are progressively free to be obsessed in one way or another by money, retirement, material things, all competitive games, inferiority and superiority in this.
The simplicity of the Bible never does anything simple and simplistic, she always takes care of all the complexities that life imposes on you and yet calls you to this very impressive relationship, for our God and then for her people. And then He sends us through His world, as a people with a mission. It’s simple! Really complex, but simple, in the end; The right kind of simple.