Spiritual Formation

Your Will Be Done in My Life

/ Dennis Griffith / Leave a comment

This prayer from Thomas a Kempis has really touched me where I am today:

O Lord, blessed be your name forever, for it is your will that this temptation and trouble come to me. I cannot escape it, but must run to you so that you can help me and turn it to my good.  Lord, I am now being afflicted, and my heart is troubled by my present suffering and not at peace.

And now, Dear Father, what shall I say? I am caught in the middle of trouble,  “Save me from this hour”.  Yet I come to this hour so you may might be glorified when I am deeply humbled and delivered by you.   Therefore, may it please you, Lord, to deliver me, for what can a poor wretch like I am do, or where can I go, without you?

Give me patience, O Lord, even now in this emergency. Help me, my God, and I will not be afraid of how much I may be afflicted.

~ From Imitation of Christ III.29

Who Does What?

/ Dennis Griffith / 6 Comments

Reading Jerry Bridges’ book Discipline of Grace, especially chapter 6, prompted me to think about the importance of understanding “Who does What?” in our salvation.

Here are a few observations that I hope will provide some clarification:

  • Many are frustrated to unfortunate degree because they do not understand that sanctification is a process.
  • Many are spiritually stunted because they do not realize spiritual growth and maturity is a process in which we must actively and intentionally participate.
  • Many people just assume that, now that they are “New Creations”, Christ-likeness will inevitably emerge from within them whether they do anything or not.
  • But spiritual growthis not automatic.  God calls us to cooperate with his grace, by actively engaging in the Means of Grace (Word, Sacraments, Prayer), responding to the Spirit by his grace.
  • The confusion seems to be rooted in misunderstanding the differences and the relationship between justification (conversion) and sanctification (growth). 
  • While it is true that we can do nothing to bring about our justification, our new birth, any more than we can do anything to bring about our physical birth; it is not true that we can do nothing, or should do nothing to cultivate healthy spiritual growth.  Just as in our physical growth, where we develop in accord with our God-given DNA in no small part through healthy eating and activity, we grow spiritually by God-given grace AND healthy activity (i.e. Means of Grace, Obedience, Active Mission and Spiritual Disciplines).

My Lukewarm Heart

/ Dennis Griffith / Leave a comment

Here are a couple of question to ponder from Ole Hallesby:

Do I really desire to be set free from the lukewarmness of my heart and worldly life?

Is not my Christian life always lukewarm and half-hearted for the simple reason that deep down in my heart I desire it to be that way?

If you find this to be true of your heart, as I sometimes do, you may find John Piper’s book, When I Don’t Desire God, to be beneficial.  It is  available free from Desiring God Ministries: here

The Great Omission

/ Dennis Griffith / Leave a comment

I’ve been reading Dallas Willard’s The Great Omission.  This book is a compilation of essay’s Willard has written through the years.  Most of those essays are available online.  They are each able to stand alone, and all are worth the read.

3 Lane Escape from Moralism

/ Dennis Griffith / Leave a comment

I am thankful to Joe Thorn for concisely clarifying an issue that I believe confounds many well intentioned Christians.  The problem addressed is the confusion of moralism with the gospel.  In many case moralism is an attempt to take seriously both God and the Christian faith.  Nevertheless, moralism is off track.

In a post titled Killing Moralism, Thorn observes:

Many Christians have grown up in the church on moralistic preaching; that is, preaching that calls for obedience without connecting the commands of God to the cross of Christ.

Thorn goes on to suggest:

This disconnect is dangerous, potentially leading hearers into either self-loathing or self-righteousness. Moralistic preaching is often the ground in which the devil sows the seeds of legalism.

The more I study the more I am amazed by how cohesive the Scriptures are – both Old Testament and New Testament.  Christ is central to both, as together they unfold God’s awesome plan and work of redemption. 

But Thorn is right, too much of what we hear from our pulpits fails to make the connection.  And sadly that has all too often been true of the pulpits I have stood in through the years.  Oh, the Word was proclaimed. The teaching was faithful. Often rich truth was expressed: doctrinal, devotional, and dutiful.  But too often the cross – which is the crux of the whole Bible – was not clearly tied in.

In recent years I have labored to remedy that. But it is still a work in progress.

In his post Thorn suggests three observations we should look for to draw more deeply from the Scriptures for our preaching, teaching, and personal formation:

  • See the God of the Command
  • See the Grace Behind the Command
  • See the Gospel Above the Command.

To practice this observation Thorn wisely instructs us to remind ourselves of three truths:

  1. Jesus atoned for our failure in this command. (Colossians 1.3; Colossians 2.13, 14; Ephesians 2.16; Romans 5.9)
  2. Jesus fulfilled this command for us. (1 Corinthians 1.30-31; Romans 5.19; Philippians 3.9)
  3. Jesus empowers us to live out this command. (Philippians 2.12-13; Ephesians 6.10-20; 1 Peter 4.11)

The more we embrace these principles the better we will become in “preaching the gospel to ourselves”.  And living in light of the gospel is the key to escaping well intentioned but ultimately vapid moralism.

How Can I Be Sure I Would?

/ Dennis Griffith / 1 Comment

Steve Timmis of The Crowded House and co-author of the book Total Church posed the following questions and thoughts for reflection:

How can I be sure I would lay down my life for sake of Jesus & the gospel? Perhaps I’ll be like Peter in his bravado and subsequent denial? Can’t ultimately be sure until I’m called on to do so.

But there are indicators in what I am reluctant to give up…

  • If I’m not prepared to give up my bed to go and serve someone, I can be fairly confident I won’t give up my life…
  • If I refuse to give up a holiday abroad so I can support someone in gospel ministry, I can be fairly confident I won’t give up my life…
  • If I’m not willing to pursue people who are different from me in order to bless them, I can be fairly certain I won’t give up my life…
  • If I’m not prepared to miss out on promotion so I can stay & help plant churches, I can be fairly certain I won’t give up my life…
  • If I’m not prepared to jeopardize a friendship so that I can tell others about Christ, I can be fairly certain I won’t give up my life.

I think these are worth some personal consideration.  Jesus told those who wanted to hang with him:

“If anyone would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow me.” (Luke 9.23)

Being a follower of Jesus and being a fan of Jesus are very different things.

4 Keys to Cultivating Inner Peace

/ Dennis Griffith / 1 Comment

How can one cultivate genuine inner peace?  Thomas a Kempis suggests embracing the following four attitudes and practices:

Such a person will enter into the realm of peace and rest.

From Imitation of Christ 23.1

Spiritual Formation Beyond Decency

/ Dennis Griffith / 2 Comments

We must stop using the fact that we cannot earn grace (whether for justification of for sanctification) as an excuse for not energetically seekng to receive grace.  Having been found by God, we then become seekers of ever-fuller life in him. Grace is opposes to earning, not effort.  The realities of Christian spiritual formation are that we will not be transformed “into his likeness” by more information, or by infusions, inspirations, or ministrations alone. Though all of these have an important place, they never suffice, and reliance upon them alone explains the now-common failure of committed Christians to rise much above a certain level of decency.

~ Dallas Willard, in The Great Omission

Christ-likeness: The Purpose of God for His People

/ Dennis Griffith / 1 Comment

by John R.W. Stott

I remember very vividly, some years ago, that the question which perplexed me as a younger Christian (and some of my friends as well) was this: what is God’s purpose for His people? Granted that we have been converted, granted that we have been saved and received new life in Jesus Christ, what comes next? Of course, we knew the famous statement of the Westminster Shorter Catechism: that man’s chief end is to glorify God and to enjoy Him forever: we knew that, and we believed it. We also toyed with some briefer statements, like one of only five words – love God, love your neighbour. But somehow neither of these, nor some others that we could mention, seemed wholly satisfactory. So I want to share with you where my mind has come to rest as I approach the end of my pilgrimage on earth and it is – God wants His people to become like Christ. Christlikeness is the will of God for the people of God.

So if that is true, I am proposing the following:

  • First to lay down the biblical basis for the call to Christ-likeness;
  • Secondly, to give some New Testament examples of this;
  • Thirdly, to draw some practical conclusions.

And it all relates to becoming like Christ.

So first is the biblical basis for the call to Christlikeness. This basis is not a single text: the basis is more substantial than can be encapsulated in a single text. The basis consists rather of three texts which we would do well to hold together in our Christian thinking and living:

Lets look at these three briefly.

Romans 8.29 reads that God has predestined His people to be conformed to the image of His Son: that is, to become like Jesus. We all know that when Adam fell he lost much – though not all – of the divine image in which he had been created. But God has restored it in Christ. Conformity to the image of God means to become like Jesus: Christlikeness is the eternal predestinating purpose of God.

My second text is 2 Corinthians 3.18: ‘And we all, with unveiled face, beholding the glory of the Lord, are being changed into his likeness, from one degree of glory to another; for this comes from the Lord who is the Spirit.’ So it is by the indwelling Spirit Himself that we are being changed from glory to glory – it is a magnificent vision.

In this second stage of becoming like Christ, you will notice that the perspective has changed from the past to the present, from God’s eternal predestination to His present transformation of us by the Holy Spirit. It has changed from God’s eternal purpose to make us like Christ, to His historical work by His Holy Spirit to transform us into the image of Jesus.

That brings me to my third text: 1 John 3.2. ‘Beloved, we are God’s children now and it does not yet appear what we shall be but we know that when he appears, we will be like him, for we shall see him as he is.’ We don’t know in any detail what we shall be in the last day, but we do know that we will be like Christ. There is really no need for us to know any more than this. We are content with the glorious truth that we will be with Christ, like Christ, for ever.

Here are three perspectives – past, present and future. All of them are pointing in the same direction: there is God’s eternal purpose, we have been predestined; there is God’s historical purpose, we are being changed, transformed by the Holy Spirit; and there is God’s final or eschatalogical purpose, we will be like Him, for we shall see Him as He is. All three, the eternal, the historical and the eschatalogical, combine towards the same end of Christlikeness. This, I suggest, is the purpose of God for the people of God. That is the biblical basis for becoming like Christ: it is the purpose of God for the people of God.

***

NOTE: The above address was the last message John Stott gave at the Keswick Convention. This address was given in Summer 2007

Ordinary Saints

/ Dennis Griffith / 1 Comment

Jerry Bridges opens his book, Respectable Sins, with a reaffirmation and reminder that all who are in Christ are declared Saints.  While some may find this status difficult to believe, Bridges explains:

“We don’t become saints by our actions. We are made saints by the immediate supernatural action of the Holy Spirit alone who works this change deep within our inner being so that we do, in fact, become new creations in Christ (2 Corinthians 5.17).  This change of state is described prophetically in Ezekiel 36.26: “I will give you a new heart, and a new spirit I will put within you. And I will remove the heart of stone [a dead, unresponsive heart] from your flesh and give you a heart of flesh [a living responsive heart].”

Bridges goes on to write:

“It would be nice if we could end the story here, because [this] might suggest a saint is someone who no longer sins.  Alas, we all know this is not true.  Rather, if we are honest with ourselves, we know that nearly every waking hour, we sin in thought, word, and deed. Even our best deeds are stained with impure (mixed) motives and imperfect performance…”

As Bridges points out, most of us never think of ourselves as saints and few of us think about the responsibility to live as saints.  And while we can easily identify sin in the actions and conduct of segments of our society, in most churches we fail to address how gossip, worry, etc. are also sins that tarnish and erode.

My Spiritual EKG

/ Dennis Griffith / 1 Comment

“How are you doing, Spiritually?” That is an important question.

The Great Physician, by both direct and indirect statements in his Word, repeatedly encourages us to examine our hearts. But while many may be  aware that it ought to be our regular practice to take a Spiritual pulse, I suspect that relatively few know how to read the gauges even if they try. Consequently, if we are not certain what we are looking for, it follows that we are not always quite sure how to answer our opening question. So, it seems, the typical response we might give, even to those who may genuinely care, is an awful lot like the responses we give to the stranger on the street, or the hotel clerk we see each morning on vacation, when they ask “How are you today?” “Fine, thanks. And you?” But this is too important a question to simply perpetuate the standard reflex response.

I have benefited from regularly asking myself 10 Questions I learned from Don Whitney and his short but helpful book: 10 Questions to Diagnose Your Spiritual Health. Asking myself these questions, or considering observations people have offered about me as they relate to these questions, serves as a good spiritual check-up.

Each of the 10 Questions below is a link to an excerpt of respective chapters from Whitney’s book:

  1. Are you more thirsty for God than ever before?
  2. Are you more and more loving?
  3. Are you more sensitive to and aware of God than ever before?
  4. Are you governed more and more by God’s Word?
  5. Are you concerned more and more with the physical and spiritual needs of others?
  6. Are you more and more concerned with the Church and the Kingdom of God?
  7. Are the disciplines of the Christian life more and more important to you?
  8. Are you more and more aware of your sin?
  9. Are you more and more willing to forgive others?
  10. Are you thinking more and more of heaven and of being with the Lord Jesus?

How to – or NOT to – Read Your Bible

/ Dennis Griffith / Leave a comment

How should we read our Bibles? There are a number of good ways.  But Dane Ortland offers some suggestions about how not to approach it:

  • The Gold Mine Approach – reading the Bible as a vast, cavernous, dark mine, in which one occasionally stumbles upon a nugget of inspiration. Result: confused reading.
  • The Hero Approach – reading the Bible as a moral hall of fame that gives us one example after another of heroic spiritual giants to emulate. Result: despairing reading.
  • The Rules Approach – reading the Bible on the lookout for commands to obey to subtly reinforce a sense of personal superiority. Result: Pharisaical reading.
  • The Artifact Approach – reading the Bible as an ancient document about events in the Middle East a few thousand years ago that are irrelevant to my life today. Result: bored reading.
  • The Guidebook Approach – reading the Bible as a roadmap to tell me where to work, whom to marry, and what shampoo to use. Result: anxious reading.
  • The Doctrine Approach – reading the Bible as a theological repository to plunder for ammunition for my next theology debate at Starbucks. Result: cold reading.

This post is excerpted from Ortland’s post on The Resurgence blog: Transform Your Bible Reading.  The expanded article offers some valuable insights.

Organic Church

/ Dennis Griffith / 4 Comments

You will observe that I am not merely exhorting you “to go to church.” “Going to church” is in any case good. But what I am exhorting you to do is go to your own church – to give your presence and active religious participation to every stated meeting for worship of the institution as an institution. Thus you will do your part to give to the institution an organic religious life, and you will draw out from the organic religious life of the institution a support and inspiration for your own personal religious life which you can get nowhere else, and which you can cannot afford to miss – if, that is, you have a care to your religious quickening and growth. To be an active member of a living religious body is the condition of healthy religious functioning.

–B.B. Warfield