Book Review: The Pursuit of Holiness

Over a year ago, I read The Pursuit of Holiness by Jerry Bridges for the first time; I just finished reading it for a second time this week, and I think reading it the second time impacted me even more deeply than the first. You know those books you can’t imagine not having read after their completion, because of the impact they’ve had on your life. This is one of those books for me. Perhaps I will read it for a third time in another year.

Basically, throughout the book Bridges thoroughly and biblically handles the topic of our personal pursuit of holiness, leaving you with a powerful challenge to more seriously pursue holiness. He writes in a very straight-forward, firm, and humble manner, using many examples from his own life, and providing many practical applications. More importantly, the book is rooted in the authority of Scripture.

If you need the challenge like I do to take sin more seriously and pursue holiness more vigorously in your life, this book will help you. And if, you say, you don’t need the challenge, this book will help you.

I will leave you with a few principles that I gleaned from the book.

• Holiness is not an option, and although no one is without sin, a desire for holiness and a pursuit of it characterizes the life of a true Christian.
• Our attitude toward sin should not be “self-centered,” but “God-centered.” We should be more concerned that our sins grieve God rather than simply being success-oriented or not wanting to experience the consequences of sin.
• If there is unrepentant sin in our lives, we must not say that we are overcome by the sin, but understand our responsibility to obedience and mortification of our sin.
• In our pursuit of holiness, we must depend upon the strength and provision that God provides, without the exclusion of our responsibility.
• When we struggle to mortify a particular sin, we must not give up but keep persevering.
• The more we sin, the easier it becomes to do so and the more likely we are to sin again, whether in the same area or a different one.

~ by nve on February 6, 2009.