The excerpt below was extracted courtesy of John Piper Fighting Against Incredulity’s book, Faithful Editor.
Being satisfied with all that God promises to be to us in Jesus Christ is the essence of faith in future grace. Keep in mind that when I speak of faith in future grace or satisfaction in what God promises to be to us, I suppose that an essential part of that faith and satisfaction is the understanding of Christ as a substitute for our sin, whose perfect obedience to God is imputed to us by faith; In other words, faith in future grace encompasses the basis of all promises, just as He appreciates Christ as someone whose blood and justice form the foundation of all future grace and appreciates all that God now promises to be to us in Christ, because of the fundamental work. Every time I speak of faith as something satisfied with all that God is to us in Jesus, I include all this in that faith.
- This faith is the power that cuts the root of sin.
- Sin has power because of the promises it makes to us.
- He says.
- “If you lie on your tax return.
- You’ll have more money to get what makes you happier.
- “”If you look at this pornography.
- You will have a wave of pleasure that is better than the joys of a quiet conscience.
- “If you eat these cookies while no one is watching.
- It will ease your remorse and help you deal with the situation better than anything else now.
- “No one sins out of obligation.
- We sin because we believe in the deceptive promises that sin makes.
- Does the Bible warn that none of you will be hardened by the deception of sin?(Hebrews 3:13).
- The promises of sin are lies.
Fighting disbelief and faith in future grace means that we fight fire with fire. We oppose God’s promises to the promises of sin. We cling to a great promise God has made about our future and say to a particular sin: “Do the same?! Thus we do what Paul says in Romans 8:13: “If by the Spirit you kill the actions of the body. “John Owen wrote a book based on this verse and summarized it: “Do you kill sin or not does it kill you?”We mortify acts of sin before they happen, when we cut the root that sustains them: the lies of sin.
Do it by the Spirit? it means that we trust in the power of the Spirit and then we grasp “the sword of the Spirit,” which is the word of God (Ephesians 6:17). The word of God? it’s basically the Gospel, and then everything that God has said in His revealed word. The gospel of the death and resurrection of Christ is not only the core, but the foundation of all the promises of God. This is the sense of the logic of Romans 8:32: “Whoever did not spare his own Son, but abandoned him for us all, will he not give us everything with him in grace? ?Everything? we need ? the fulfillment of all the promises of God? they are guaranteed by the Father by not forgiving his Son. Or, to put it positively, all of God’s promises are guaranteed to us because God sent his Son to live and die to put aside our sins and become our righteousness. So when I say we grasp the Word of God, the sword of the Spirit, what I mean is that we stand firm in this truth of the Christ-centered gospel, with all its promises, and we trust them in every situation. We cut the lifeline of sin by the power of a superior promise. Or, to put it more positively, we release the flow of love through faith in future grace. We become loving people by trusting in God’s promises.
No one sins out of obligation. We sin because sin offers a certain promise of satisfaction. This promise enslaves us until God becomes better and more desirable than life itself. Only the higher power of God’s promises in the gospel can free our hearts from slavery from superficial promises and traveling pleasures. Having the joy of the rewards of the glorious promises of the gospel will free us from sinful disbelief.
In this book, Pastor John Piper provides a biblical guide on how to find joy and victory in the gospel and thus deal with the struggles against sin that lead to disbelief, such as anxiety, pride, inappropriate shame, impatience, greed, bitterness, discouragement. and desire.
Check