Spiritual Battle After Sexual Sin

In a CT article adapted from a message he gave at Passion '07, John Piper gives gospel-grounded instruction in withstanding Satan's onslaughts after sexual sin:

The problem is not just how not to fail. The problem is how to deal with failure so that it doesn't sweep away your whole life into wasted mediocrity with no impact for Christ.

The great tragedy is not masturbation or fornication or pornography. The tragedy is that Satan uses guilt from these failures to strip you of every radical dream you ever had or might have. In their place, he gives you a happy, safe, secure, American life of superficial pleasures, until you die in your lakeside rocking chair.

I have a passion that you do not waste your life. My aim is not mainly to cure you of sexual misconduct. I would like that to happen. But mostly I want to take out of the Devil's hand the weapon that exploits your sin and makes your life a wasted, worldly success. Satan wants that for you. But you don't!

What broke George Verwer's heart back in the 1980s, and breaks mine today, is not that you have sinned sexually. It's that this morning Satan took your 2 A.M. encounter—whether on TV or in bed—and told you: "See, you're a loser. You may as well not even worship. No way are you going to make any serious commitment of your life to Jesus Christ! You may as well get a good job so you can buy yourself a big widescreen and watch sex till you drop."

Read the whole thing.

When Sinners Say "I Do"

Since learning of it I've been eager to read Dave Harvey's new book. The title hooked me and it's endorsed by men I admire and trust. Reading this interview with the author yesterday only heightened my anticipation. Here's Harvey's response to the question of why he's adding to the plethora of marriage books already on the market:

Though I’m grateful for some of these books, it’s common for marriage books to address the symptoms of marital challenges while neglecting the real problem. In this book, I say, “The cause of our marriage battles is neither our marriage nor our spouse. It’s the sin in our hearts—entirely, totally, exclusively, without exception. This is taught clearly and consistently in Scripture, from the first sin to the final judgment.” But don’t get me wrong—this book doesn’t merely bemoan the problem but exalts in the solution—the gospel! When Sinners Say “I Do”: Discovering the Power of the Gospel for Marriage avoids the psychological discussions that fill the pages of many popular needs-based resources. Instead, it encourages readers to develop the tools to diagnose their hearts and then flee to the gospel for help. The most helpful summary I think I can offer is taken right from the book: “God wants Christians to delight in marriage. And He has made provision in the gospel to do so. But we can’t truly understand the gospel, or even the basic problems of every marriage, until we come to terms with the undeniable reality of sin. Men and women (and me!) find real hope and help when we realize that God uses marriage to reveal the heart and change the soul.”

You can view the book's table of contents, foreword by Paul David Tripp, and preface here.

Technorati Tags: Christianity, Dave Harvey, marriage, gospel

Why the Gospel Often Seems Irrelevant (to Christians)

Yesterday, as I've done so frequently in the past, I reflected on my deep appreciation and gratitude for the Journal of Biblical Counseling and those responsible for producing it. In some ways, the title is misleading because it could give the impression that only those engaged in formal counseling ministry can benefit from it. To be sure, it's a valuable resource for pastors, so much so that I think it should be a staple in every minister's reading. However, every issue contains thoughtful, theologically-rich content that can aid any follower of Christ in his or her pursuit of spiritual maturity.

A conversation with a frazzled parent seeking help in how to deal with a child's explosive tantrums led me to read an article by Michael Emlet and David Powlison called "Helping the Parents of an Angry Child" (Winter 2007, Volume 25, Number 1). As is so often the case when I read JBC articles, I not only received guidance for helping others but was confronted about issues in my own heart and life. The following paragraph, especially the last sentence, stood out to me because it addresses something that I think about frequently:

A child needs to learn how her anger operates directly against God. Too often parents only focus on the horizontal aspect of their child's sinful behavior - what the child has done to them. Targeting the heart means helping the child understand that her attitude, words, and actions violate God's standards first and foremost. To be self-willed is to assault God's right to rule. This God-ward focus keeps the gospel front and center, because sin against God and others has a remedy. If we confess our sins honestly, He is faithful and just to forgive us and cleanse us (1 John 1:9). Opening up the vertical dimension presents the immediate relevance of the gospel.

When considering my own reactions to life's problems and from conversations with other believers, I often wonder why it is that the gospel seems so disconnected and unrelated to the here and now. When we're dealing with the complexities and difficulties that are bound to arise, I think our (usually) unspoken mindset is "Yeah, I'm a Christian and I believe all that Bible stuff but I'm talking about real life here." That attitude betrays an underlying assumption that the gospel is largely impractical in terms of its explanatory and transforming power as far as our everyday struggles are concerned. As Paul Tripp and Tim Lane note in their book How People Change, believers often live with a gap between the two "thens" of the gospel:

The good news of the gospel of Jesus Christ is a "then-now-then" gospel. First, there is the "then" of the past. When I embrace Christ by faith, my sins are completely forgiven, and I stand before God as righteous. There is also the "then" of the future, the promise of eternity with the Lord, free of sin and struggle. The church has done fairly well explaining these two "thens" of the gospel, but it has tended to understate or misunderstand the "now" benefits of the work of Christ. What difference does the gospel make in the here and now? How does it help me as a father, a husband, a worker, and a member of the body of Christ? How does it help me respond to difficulty and make decisions? How does it give me meaning, purpose, and identity? How does it motivate my ministry to others?

Emlet and Powlison have identified one of the primary reasons that the gospel is functionally distanced from our daily lives - to the extent that I fail to see misguided worship as my greatest problem and adopt alien anthropologies offering alternative visions of what it means to be human, to that extent the gospel's luster appears dull and its melody sounds flat to my ears.

Classic Works on Spiritual Growth

The folks at Reformation Theology and Monergism Books have compiled a top ten list of books on piety, sanctification, and spiritual growth but don't expect to find any of these on the best-seller shelves of your local Christian bookstore. Come to think of it, they're probably not on any of the shelves! I wonder which contemporary Christian books will be counted as classics by future generations.

Interview with Elyse Fitzpatrick

Lydia Brownback asks author and biblical counselor Elyse Fitzpatrick about women, sin and sanctification, and two of her books - Idols of the Heart and Because He Loves Me: How God's Love Transforms Our Identity and Life (part 1 | part 2). (HT: Justin Taylor)

What Does it Mean to be Worldly?

Aaron Blumer recently posted the second part of an excellent series (Part I here) answering the question "What Does Worldly Look Like?" For many believers, abstaining from worldiness means just doing the opposite of whatever is popular, stylish, or mainstream among non-Christians but Aaron demonstrates how this notion is both biblically and logically unwarranted. Certain forms of worldliness may, in fact, be popular but what is popular is not necessarily worldly.

Concerning the reasons for the confusion over what "worldly" means, Aaron says:

The most important for our purposes is that the meaning of “worldly" depends on the meaning "the world," and many are confused regarding what "the world"” means. What exactly is it that disciples of Christ should not be “like"? How much does it have to do with garments, music, hairstyles, or theaters?

These posts called to mind one of the most memorable definitions of worldliness I've come across. It's from David Wells's book, Losing Our Virtue: Why the Church Must Recover Its Moral Vision:

Worldliness is that system of values, in any given age, which has at its center our fallen human perspective, which displaces God and his truth from the world, and which makes sin look normal and righteousness seem strange. It thus gives great plausibility to what is morally wrong and, for that reason, makes what is wrong, seem normal.

Thinking about Humility

In the comment section of a post I wrote about loving our neighbor as we love ourselves, a thoughtful reader repeated a popular saying about the nature of humility: "Humility is not thinking less of yourself; it's thinking of yourself less" (a variation says it's not thinking of yourself at all). She concluded with the following query:

I wish a Christian would write a book on how to know when you've bought enough Christian self-help books. I think I have about 1,000 now. I'm including expositions on scripture, so I don't know if that would also qualify as self-help. Self-help sounds selfish but yet it is self that needs help because self-desire is the source of temptations.

I'm not sure if there is anything so confusing as knowing if answers to improving self can come from books apart from the bible. They are interesting to ponder over, but the huge problem that seems to arise from the whole principle is that it does not have the reader thinking of herself or himself less. How do you read a self-help book without thinking about yourself? I'm curious as to if and how you'd comment on that.

Here's a slightly edited version of my reply:

I think that for many reasons it's advisable not to think in terms of self-help though I understand the qualification you made. Likewise, I think it can be confusing to speak of self improvement. Both phrases, because of their pop-psychological association, give the impression that the self is autonomous and has the innate capacity to determine the ideal to which it should be moving and to effect the necessary change. I think it better to speak of maturing in Christ, growing in holiness, conforming to the likeness of Christ, etc. In other words, the language of progressive sanctification. This puts things in a gospel-centered context which keeps us focused on the grace of God and His goal - that we more accurately reflect Christ who is the true image of God.

Catchy, memorable sayings can sometimes prove helpful but more often than not I think they make things more cloudy. An example is the saying you mentioned: "Humility is not thinking less of yourself, it's thinking of yourself less." Thinking of myself less can mean one of at least two things. Usually, when we say that someone is always thinking of himself, we mean that he is in the habit of seeking pride of place. He selfishly seeks to get ahead, make a name for himself, and enjoy comfort and ease even at the expense of others. His satisfaction trumps all other considerations. In this sense, to think less of oneself would be to heed Paul's command in Philippians 2:3-4: "Do nothing from rivalry or conceit but in humility count others as more significant than yourselves. Let each of you look not only to his own interests, but also to the interests of others." As he goes on to explain, Christ is the exemplar of such humility in his willingness to obey his Father and serve us (despite his rightful claim to glory)even to the point of a shameful death. In light of this, thinking of myself less means being increasingly motivated by love for God and neighbor as opposed to exclusive self interest that makes the fulfillment of my desires the ultimate end for which I'm living.

Thinking of myself less could also mean that I have fewer episodes of self awareness. Humility, from this perspective, would manifest itself in my not having any consciousness of myself whatsoever. From your question about how you can read a self-help book without thinking about yourself, I take it that this is the sense you're assuming. But I don't think this is biblical let alone possible. It seems to have much more in common with Eastern philosophy in which the aim is to be absorbed into the impersonal One than with biblical Christianity.

God created us as self-conscious beings so thinking about ourselves is not inherently wrong. In fact, the Bible teaches us how we are to think about ourselves in relationship to God, others, and the rest of creation. Thinking about myself is a prerequisite to my obeying Jesus' command to treat others as I would have them treat me. I can't think of anywhere in the Bible that a complete void of thoughts about oneself is presented as a commendable goal. The critical issue is not one of the frequency with which I think about myself but that when I am thinking about myself it is with sober judgment (Romans 12:3)and not the exaggerated self-importance to which I am prone. The only way this will be accomplished is by my mind being renewed and reoriented by God's Word.

Since part of Christ's plan for building his church involves endowing some with the gift of teaching, I do believe that we can prosper from books other than the Bible. (Odd that people never question the value of sermons. It's always books for some reason.) to the extent that they help us understand and apply biblical truth.