I recently wrote a brief defense
of the importance of personal effort (or “trying harder”) in God’s
gracious design to transform His saints. My central claim was that we
put ourselves at odds with the NT if we understand or teach the dynamic
of sanctification in a way that devalues or strongly cautions against
hard work.
But that doesn’t mean emphasizing hard work has no attendant hazards.
Work hard, feel good; blow it and feel terrible. Where is the
confidence in God’s grace in this model? The secret to living victoriously for Christ is gritting your teeth, doing more, and not doing the things you shouldn’t do. Try, try, try. Harder, harder, harder! Don’t quit. Keep going. We say that salvation is by grace, but growing in Christ is about the will power, the commitment and the determination.
This can lead to despair or a terrible form of pride.
The solution Bob advocates (citing Terry Rayburn and Tim Kellar, in
part) is to reject trying harder, and focus exclusively on faith.
Several Reformed leaders have emphasized a similar perspective in recent
years (with a burst of back and forth on the Web beginning in the
summer of 2011, see the table posting tomorrow), Tullian Tchividjian and
Sean Lucas among them.
My purpose here is to explore the problem Bob and others have described. Perhaps we can come to more fully understand it.
The “just preach the gospel to yourself” view of sanctification has a
legitimate complaint when it describes the despair-pride yo-yo
experience many believers go through. I’ve not only met Christians like
this but have done my share of bouncing up down as well. Whatever might
be lacking in the “just preach to yourself” or “gospel centered” model,
it’s advocates are right that a state of alternating inner turmoil and
arrogance cannot be what Christ and the apostles had in mind in the New
Testament. Continue at Aaron Blumer
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