Hardened by the Deceitfulness of Sin
23 Feb 2009 Leave a Comment
in Quotes, Self-Examination, Sin
“You know the flesh has made a breach in your defenses when your heart is hardened by its deceitfulness (Hebrews 3:13) so that you are careless about sin. You will look at your life and think about how often you need God’s forgiveness, and so think of it as something common, nothing to worry over or take pains about. You’ll know you are hardened when you begin to extend the boundaries of Christian freedom to include indulgences that in the past would have shocked you. Your flesh will whisper to you that strictness and anxious care about obedience are legalism—the gospel came to deliver you from such things! And besides, if you really do commit a sin, you can be forgiven later.”
- Kris Lundgaard, The Enemy Within, p.65
Contrition and Mortification
10 Oct 2008 Leave a Comment
in Brokenness, Sin
A word from Jerry Bridges-
We present-day believers have, to some extent, been influenced by the “feel good about myself” philosophy of our times. By contrast, believers in the Puritan era of the seventeenth century had a different view of themselves. They feared the reality of sin still dwelling in them.
Bridges writes this in a book about “respectable” sins, that is, the sins we tolerate, such as: anxiety, frustration, discontentment, selfishness, impatience, etc. Consider the quote above, and now consider how often sins such as these produce deep contrition, brokenness, and remorse within us.
Do we pursue the feel-good philosophy that Bridges notes above, and use our inherited sinfulness as an excuse to subtly justify continuing in our respectable sins? Or do we pursue awareness and exposure of our sin, with humble and contrite hearts before God, rejoicing in the forgiveness we’ve received through the cross while we, as justified sinners, actively put our sin to death in the strength that God provides?
May we pray as David did, and tremble as we pray-
Search me, O God, and know my heart!
Try me and know my thoughts!
And see if there be any grievous way in me,
and lead me in the way everlasting!
Psalm 139:23-24
That we may proceed with putting our sin to death.
“Do you mortify;
do you make it your daily work;
be always at it while you live;
cease not a day from this work;
be killing sin or it will be killing you.”
-John Owen
1 John 3:9 No one born of God makes a practice of sinning, for God’s seed abides in him, and he cannot keep on sinning because he has been born of God.
And a word from Charles Spurgeon-
Remember that the man who truly repents is never satisfied with his own repentance. We can no more repent perfectly than we can live perfectly. However pure our tears, there will always be some dirt in them: there will be something to be repented of even in our best repentance. But listen! To repent is to change your mind about sin, and Christ, and all the great things of God. There is sorrow implied in this; but the main point is the turning of the heart from sin to Christ. If there be this turning, you have the essence of true repentance, even though no alarm and no despair should ever have cast their shadow upon your mind. (from All of Grace, ch. 11)
I speak as one who needs all the help she can get. Look to the cross and the glorious gospel, take heart, and remember-
No temptation has overtaken you that is not common to man. God is faithful, and he will not let you be tempted beyond your ability, but with the temptation he will also provide the way of escape, that you may be able to endure it.
1 Corinthians 10:13
