Monday, June 11, 2007
Now That Is A Heck Of A Question
Personal note: We are going to slowly try to return to "normal" here at Blogotional, though under the circumstances "normal" is a state finding a new definition. Regular reader probabaly realize that I write many of the essay-type posts well in advance and there are many sitting around that were intended to be published during this recent spate of familial tragedy. I am going to start by trying to update slightly and publish those. My links posts, which I have no idea if anyone ever read will have to wait a bit. I currently lack the wit.
Continue to pray for my mother as we try to line up the surgery this week.
And now on with the "regular" programming:
Jollyblogger wonders why the church has not changed the world. In response he quotes Peter Gilquist saying
We are indeed saved by grace, not works, and are primary mark is indeed love, but grace is not in opposition to works, but rather the path to both works and to love.
I am purposely dismissive of the grace v. works question above because I increasingly think it a false dicthomy, and one that has lead to much mischief. Simply put, apart from grace we cannot love righteously, nor perform to standard on any other work. Works without grace are empty and Pharisetical. However, grace without works is cheap grace, to borrow Bonhoeffer, but I think I am learning to prefer the term "incomplete grace."
Grace, real grace, true grace, COMPLETE grace does not stop at mere salvation, but rather works itself throughout the entirety of our lives and transforms us into people in whom love is evident as the chief of works. Grace involves BOTH "You are forgiven" and "go and sin no more," it does not stop at the first phrase. When we set up the grace/works dichtomy we encourage the separation of those two phrases.
I think we need to learn a new way to discuss this issue, for then and only then can we really change the world.
Last minute reflection: This post may be the perfect one to be the first after the death of my father. As I noted, people's comments were overwhelmingly about my father's service. My dad only told me he loved me once since I was about 12 years old - it is in a letter he wrote me in college and I still have it - and yet his love was never, ever in doubt. Grace worked completely in my father and he shared that grace with all around him.
Related Tags: grace, works, sactification, salvation, Jollyblogger
Continue to pray for my mother as we try to line up the surgery this week.
And now on with the "regular" programming:
Jollyblogger wonders why the church has not changed the world. In response he quotes Peter Gilquist saying
"All the evangelism in the world from a church that is not herself holy and righteous will not be worth a hill of beans in world-changing power."to which he adds the personal observation
In other words, the primary identifying mark of the Christian is not his theology, his convictions, or even his morals - it is his love. And this primary identifying mark is not love for all men in general, it is love for believers in particular. In other words, if professing Christians don't love one another then the world outside the church has no compelling reason to believe they are truly Christian.David's comments are right on, up to a point. He sets up the nearly cliche' grace v. works conundrum as the context for his comments on love.
We are indeed saved by grace, not works, and are primary mark is indeed love, but grace is not in opposition to works, but rather the path to both works and to love.
I am purposely dismissive of the grace v. works question above because I increasingly think it a false dicthomy, and one that has lead to much mischief. Simply put, apart from grace we cannot love righteously, nor perform to standard on any other work. Works without grace are empty and Pharisetical. However, grace without works is cheap grace, to borrow Bonhoeffer, but I think I am learning to prefer the term "incomplete grace."
Grace, real grace, true grace, COMPLETE grace does not stop at mere salvation, but rather works itself throughout the entirety of our lives and transforms us into people in whom love is evident as the chief of works. Grace involves BOTH "You are forgiven" and "go and sin no more," it does not stop at the first phrase. When we set up the grace/works dichtomy we encourage the separation of those two phrases.
I think we need to learn a new way to discuss this issue, for then and only then can we really change the world.
Last minute reflection: This post may be the perfect one to be the first after the death of my father. As I noted, people's comments were overwhelmingly about my father's service. My dad only told me he loved me once since I was about 12 years old - it is in a letter he wrote me in college and I still have it - and yet his love was never, ever in doubt. Grace worked completely in my father and he shared that grace with all around him.
Related Tags: grace, works, sactification, salvation, Jollyblogger
