I am an avid reader. There are books that are dear old friends to me. There are books that are mere acquaintances. There are books from which I’ve gleaned wisdom and knowledge and books that have done nothing more than entertain. There are a handful of books, however, that mark milestones in my life; road markers, if you will, on my journey to even get on and stay on the narrow road. These are books that came to me when I was living one way and after I read them I began living another way.
Two of those books are The Normal Christian Life, written by Watchman Nee and originally published in 1957 and the other is True and False Repentance which is a book form of sermons preached by Charles Finney, a minister who played a significant role in the major revival of the mid 1800’s. Some may question the value of The Normal Christian Life, because of the controversial leadership of Watchman Nee and those who followed after him, but in this book I found a key that opened the door to understanding what it means to be freed from the power of my indwelling sin.
Basically, The Normal Christian Life is an exposition of the sixth chapter of the book of Romans. And while there is much to truth to glean from its pages, the pivotal point for me is this: our initial approach to God is always on the basis of Christ’s blood that we are forgiven, but it’s the cross and our reckoning of ourselves as dead with Christ on that cross is what delivers us from the indwelling sin nature rooted in our soul.
You see, I was caught in, it seemed to me, and inescapable roller coaster cycle of poor choices, guilt, shame, (what I thought was repentance, but was instead selfish remorse), and victory for awhile. Then eventually, just as James 1: 14 says, the evil desire within me drug me away and enticed me back into the cycle of ‘self-living’ and I couldn’t seem to keep it from happening. Willpower wasn’t enough. I began to believe that while the Jesus way was the right way, I just wasn’t able live that way.
If The Normal Christian Life opened the door to my understanding of sin, Finney’s True and False Repentance bludgeoned me with the truth about how I much I loved my sin, how much God hated it, and what it meant to be repentant, truly repentant. By reading Finney’s book, I discovered that most of the time I found myself seeking God’s forgiveness because was remorseful over the consequences (consequences meaning guilt and shame) of my actions. In other words, I wanted to be forgiven because I felt guilt and shame, not because I’d sinned against God. My repentance was false because it was selfish.
I am sure this all may sound so negative – the depth and entanglement of indwelling sin, death to self in order to be free, true godly sorrow – not the kind of stuff Christians like to talk about these days. I can’t speak for anyone else but myself, but it was only when I did talk about this stuff to God and godly people leading me through time of discipleship did I become the person God intended for me to be all along. It was only when I could and would see my indwelling sin for what it was, in all of its ugliness, was I horrified enough to finally truly repent and stop the up and down cycle I was living.
Several years later, I was blessed to be a part of establishing a discipleship program at my church. I knew I wanted to share not just the lessons I’d learned, but the transformation that was possible by understanding that there was more to dealing with sin than confession and seeking forgiveness for wrong behavior. I wanted these young Christians to know that we not only have to deal what we’ve done, we have to deal with who we are.
Coming up…The Metaphor I found in my flower garden.
No comments:
Post a Comment