SANCTIFICATION | Bonnie's Prayer Affair

WE ARE RESPONSIBLE

[W]e do not understand the proper distinction between God’s provision and our own responsibility for holiness. ‘What am I to do myself, and what am I to rely on God to do?’” Jerry Bridges (ref#244, p10).

“God is always self-consistent and true to His way. He works only through man, but He demands things be done His way” Bob Sorge (ref#197, p14).

GOD said the following to Jeremiah and He also says this to us, His children: “[D]ress yourself for work; arise, and say to them everything that I command you. Do not be dismayed by them, lest I dismay you before them. And I, behold, I make you this day a fortified city, and iron pillar, and bronze walls. [T]hey will fight against you, but they shall not prevail against you, for I am with you, declares the LORD, to deliver you” (Jer 1:17-19 ESV).

“Ours is the duty, but His is the strength” Richard Steel (ref#225, April 18^th).

“[T]he victory won by Jesus must be enforced by us. John Wesley wrote: ‘All this is indeed the work of God. It is God alone who can cast our Satan. But he is generally pleased to do this by man, as an instrument in his hand’” Doug Newton (ref#166, p91).

“[You] are responsible, although you have received all your strength from Christ to do it. [T]he sun works as an universal cause, and the tree as a particular cause. Christ works as an universal cause, and you work as a particular cause” William Bridge (ref#225, Oct 24^th).

“He waits to work alongside man until man conforms to His way” Bob Sorge (ref#197, p15).

“[M]ay the LORD do what seems good to him” (2 Sam 10:12 ESV).

“[W]ork at living a holy life, for those who are not holy will not see the Lord” (Heb 12:14 NLT).

“’Purse holiness, for without holiness no one will see the Lord.’ The word pursue suggest two thoughts: first, that diligence and effort are required; and second, that it is a lifelong task” Jerry Bridges (ref#244, p10).

“[H]e is unchangeable, and who can turn him back? What he desires, that he does. For he will complete what he appoints for me” (Job 23:13-14 ESV).

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ABIDING IN CHRIST

My Part in sanctification as it relates to Abiding in the God-head – Part 3

“Jesus said, ‘He who abides in Me, and I in him, bears much fruit.’ Our challenge is not to bear fruit, but to abide” Charles F. Stanley (ref#230, p63).

“It is impossible to abide in him, unless we are first of all in him—vitally united to him by faith. [O]ur first care must be to get an interest in Christ, and our continued care must be to abide in him” Charles Ross (ref#241, p122).

“[T]hat which we have seen and heard we proclaim also to you, so that you too may have fellowship with us; and indeed our fellowship is with the Father and with his Son Jesus Christ” (1 John 1:3 ESV).

“What does fellowship mean? To be in a state of fellowship means that we share in things. We are partakers or, if you life, partners—that idea is there intrinsically in the word. That means something like this: The Christian is one who has become a sharer in the life of God” Martyn Lloyd-Jones (ref#189, Sept 22^nd).

“[W]hat is it to abide in Christ? It implies for one thing it’s a continued sense of need of him. [I]t implies also an abiding perception of Christ’s all-sufficiency and glory. Christians growing in poverty of spirit lies in this, that Christ is his. [T]o abide in Christ is to depend upon him—to trust in him—to adhere to him to the end. And this union is mutual. [J]ust as truly as the soul is to abide in Christ, so Christ is to abide in the soul—Christ in the soul through the indwelling Spirit, and the soul in Christ by faith” Charles Ross (ref#241, p123).

“Jesus says: ‘Even as the Father hath loved me, I also have loved you.’ What, then, is the love wherewith the Father loves the Son? Not surely the love of pity and compassion, but that of complacency and delight. Of the like nature is the love of Jesus to his people. It is true indeed, that he loved them with a love of pity and compassion, when they were in their low and lost estate—when they were in the filthiness of sin; but it is also a most blessed truth that ever since he made them ‘his own’ by his effectual grace—ever since he clothed them with his righteousness and made them the temples of his Holy Spirit—he regards them with peculiar satisfaction and delight” Charles Ross (ref#241, p129).

“[I]t is this love of complacency and delight on the part of Jesus, in which we are exhorted to ‘continue,’ or rather to ‘abide.’” Charles Ross (ref#241, p130).

“Christians are not merely people who are a little bit better than they once were and who have just added certain things to their lives. Rather, they are men and women who have received the divine life” Martyn Lloyd-Jones (ref#189, Sept 22^nd).

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ABIDING IN GOD

My Part in Sanctification as it Relates to Abiding in the God-head – Part 2

“[T]he Christian is one who has come to know God as Father. [W]e have the spirit of adoption, the result of which is that we know God in an intimate way so that we address Him as ‘Abba, Father’ because we are His children. This also means that we delight in God and that we have joy in His presence. We know God in that way” Martyn Lloyd-Jones (ref#189, Sept 23^rd).

“Whoever confesses that Jesus is the Son of God, God abides in him, and he in God. So we have come to know and to believe the love that God has for us. God is love, and whoever abides in love abides in God, and God abides in him” (1 John 4:15-16 ESV).

“It is God speaking to me; it is God saying something and calling forth a response in me. ‘We love him, because he first loved us.’ God has fellowship with us in that way” Martyn Lloyd-Jones (ref#189, Sept 24^th).

“He reveals His will to us. He shows us what He would have us to do. He leads us. He opens doors and shuts them; sometimes He puts up barriers and obstacles. It means you are aware of the fact that you are in the hands of God, and that He is dealing with you, and that as you go forward in this journey called life, God is there. That is having fellowship with God—knowing that He is there in these various ways in which He manipulates our lives and speaks to us and gives us wisdom and understanding” Martyn Lloyd-Jones (ref#189, Sept 24^th).

“[F]ellowship with God is such a high privilege that one can regard nothing as being greater and higher” Martyn Lloyd-Jones (ref#211, p11).

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ABIDING IN GOD

My Part in Sanctification as it Relates to Abiding in the God-head – Part 1

“Communion with God is the life of religion” Matthew Barker (ref#225, Aug 12^th).

“Christians are not men and women who are hoping for salvation, but those who have experienced it. They have it; there is no uncertainty. They ‘know whom [they] have believed’ (2 Tim 1:12)” Martyn Lloyd-Jones (ref#189, Sept 21^st).

“[I]f we are ‘in Christ’ all that is in Christ comes to us by free grace, without effort on our part but on the ground of simple faith” Watchman Nee (ref#387, p49).

“Your heart will never be satisfied in things. No, your heart will be satisfied only in the Giver of the things. [T]he physical, created world was designed to be glorious, but these glories cannot satisfy your heart. You were made for him. Your heart was designed to be controlled by worship of him. Your inner security is meant to come from rest in him. Your sense of well-being is intended to come from a reliance on His wisdom, power, and love” Paul David Tripp (ref#190, May 24^th).

“[H]e has granted to us his precious and very great promises, so that through them you may become partakers of the divine nature, having escaped from the corruption that is in the world because of sinful desire” (2 Pet 1:4 ESV).

“’Our fellowship is with the Father.’ We have communion with God. This can be looked at from our side. What does this wondrous thing that has been made possible for us in Christ mean from our side? It means, obviously and of necessity, that we have come to know God. God is no longer a stranger somewhere away in the heavens; He is no longer some stray force or power somewhere, some supreme energy. God is no longer some potentate or lawgiver far removed and faraway from us; God now is someone we know” Martyn Lloyd-Jones (ref#189, Sept 23^rd).

“It is not merely that you are having communion and association with God, but that you are in a vital union with Him [W]e are thus born of God and in this organic internal relationship to Him” Martyn Lloyd-Jones (ref#211, p11).

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THINKING OF OTHERS 2

Is my religion as obvious as a black eye just waiting to be asked about?

“Even though I am free of the demands and expectations of everyone, I have voluntarily become a servant to any and all in order to reach a wide range of people: religious, nonreligious, meticulous moralists, loose-living immoralists, the defeated, the demoralized—whoever. I didn’t take on their way of life. I kept my bearings in Christ—but I entered their world and tried to experience things from their point of view. I’ve become just about every sort of servant there is in my attempts to lead those I meet into a God-save life. I did all this because of the Message. I didn’t just want to talk about it; I wanted to be in on it” (1 Cor 9:19-23 MSG)!

“When have you resisted helping people in trouble, saying they brought it on themselves? Have you shunned those who are ungodly or cut off those who are ungrateful? [L]et us be challenged by Christ’s teaching to extend love to anyone in need” John Calvin (ref#164, June 15^th).

“[N]o one gives grace better than a person who is deeply convinced of his own need of it” Paul David Tripp (ref#190, Jan 19^th).

“[C]ontend for the faith. [C]ontend means, to strive, to fight, to labour fervently. Lukewarmness neither pleases our Captain, nor prevails over our adversary. Everyone must give account for his idle words, and for his idle silence” Willian Jenkyn (ref#225, April 16^th).

“Reprove seriously. Reprove compassionately. Soft words and hard arguments go well together. Passion will heat the sinner’s blood, but compassion will heal his conscience. Our reprimanding may be sharp, but our spirits must be meek. The reprover should have a lion’s stout heart, or he will not be faithful, and a lady’s soft hand, or he is not likely to be successful” George Swinnock (ref#225, Sept 26^th).

“Go into all the world and proclaim the gospel to the whole creation. Whoever believes and is baptized will be saved, but whoever does not believe will be condemned” (Mark 16:15-16 ESV).

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THINKING OF OTHERS 1

“Love is the greatest and most excellent thing we are masters of” Henry Scougal (ref#321, p71).

“Christ sacrificed his life for us. This is why we ought to live sacrificially for our fellow believers, and not just be out for ourselves” (1 John 3:16-17 MSG).

“We have greater work to do here than merely securing our own salvation We are members of the world and Church, and we must labour to do good to many. We are trusted with our Master’s talents to do our best, to propagate His truth, grace, and Church; to bring home souls, honour His cause, edify His flock, and further the salvation of as many as we can. All this to be done on earth, if we are to secure our goal in heaven. It is then an error, though it is but a few that are guilty of it, to think that religion only concerns the life to come” Richard Baxter (ref#225, April 19^th).

“It’s no light thing to know that we’ll all one day stand in that place of Judgment. That’s why we work urgently with everyone we meet to get them ready to face God” (2 Cor 5:11-14 MSG).

“God is not satisfied with informing you about the work of his kingdom, He transforms you to participate in the work of his kingdom. He has called all his children to be his ambassadors, that is, to represent his message and his character in whatever environment he has placed them. You have been called to be the look on his face, the tone of his voice, and the touch of his hand. You are to represent his presence and his love. You are placed where you are to make his mercy and faithfulness visible and concrete. His ambassadorial call drives us to him to receive the grace we need to represent his grace in the lives of others” Paul David Tripp (ref#190, Nov 10^th).

Note: Evangelism is my whole life; it’s not just opening my mouth and talking about GOD.

“Stay alert. This is hazardous work I’m assigning you. You’re going to be like sheep running through a wolf pack, so don’t call attention to yourselves. Be as shrewd as a snake, inoffensive as a dove” (Matt 10:16 MSG).

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OUR WEAKNESSES

“We are ready to turn into any house, stay and play with everything in our way, and sit down on every green bank, and much ado there is to get us home” Richard Baxter (ref#225, May 21^st). Note: CHRIST does not just sit on His throne.

“[T]o keep me from becoming conceited because of the surpassing greatness of the revelations, a thorn was given me in the flesh, a messenger of Satan to harass me, to keep me from becoming conceited” (2 Cor 12:7 ESV).

“Paul’s earthy weakness, not his revelations, are to be the platform for demonstrating the Lord’s power and grace” ESV Study Bible (ref#125, p2238).

“[D]o not be anxious about your life, what you will eat, nor about your body, what you will put on. For life is more than food, and the body more than clothing. Consider the ravens: they neither sow nor reap, they have neither storehouse no barn, and yet God feeds them. O you of little faith! [D]o not seek what you are to eat and what you are to drink, nor be worried” (Luke 12:22-24, 28-29 ESV).

“Be strong and courageous” (Josh 1:6 ESV).

“Take courage, for there must be a consciousness of weakness before the Lord will give you victory. Your emptiness is but the preparation for your being filled, and your casting down is but the making ready for your lifting up.

When I am weak then am I strong,

Grace is my shield and Christ my song” Charles Spurgeon (ref#34, Nov 4^th AM).

“A primary qualification for serving God with any amount of success, and for doing God’s work well and triumphantly, is a sense of our own weakness” Charles Spurgeon (ref#34, Nov 4^th AM).

“Purity is mastery over the inferior appetites” J.I. Packer (ref#321, p10).

“Most men study rather how to pass away their time than to redeem it” Thomas Case (ref#225, Dec 12^th).

“Weak, unskillful, and unfaithful, as I am in practice, the Lord has been pleased to give me some idea of what a Christian ought to be, and of what is actually attainable in the present life” John Newton (ref#322, p135).

“Our native strength is but another term for utter weakness.” Octavius Winslow

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OBEDIENCE

“When Simon and Andrew heard the call of Jesus, they obeyed at once without question. If we would always, promptly and with resolute zeal, put into practice what we hear on the spot or at the first suitable occasion, our attention to the means of grace could not fail to enrich us spiritually. He will not lose his loaf who has taken care to eat it immediately” Charles Spurgeon (ref#34, June 20^th PM).

“[B]e doers of the word, and not hearers only, deceiving yourselves” (James 1:22 ESV).

“Good actions are designed by the counsel and resolution of the spirit, but performed by the ministry of the flesh. Every grace expresses itself in visible actions by the body. In the sorrows of repentance it supplies tears, in fasting its appetites are restrained, in thanksgivings, the tongue breaks forth in the joyful praises of God. All the victories over sensible pleasure and pain are obtained by the soul in conjunction with the body” William Bates (ref#225, Apr 9^th).

“[T]he desire of the righteous ends only in good” (Prov 11:23 ESV).

“[A]s grace prevails, self is renounced. We feel that we are not our own, that we are bought with a price; and that it is our duty, our honour, and our happiness, to be the servants of God and of the Lord Jesus Christ. To devote soul and body, every talent, power, and faculty, to the service of his cause and will, to find our own pleasure in performing his” John Newton (ref#322, p138).

“You spoke with your mouth, and with your hand have fulfilled it this day” (2 Chron 6:15 ESV).

“Human obedience to God’s commands is the means of ratifying or accepting God’s promises, as well as a condition for experiencing the reality of the promises in the present. God himself provides the grace for his people to obey” ESV Study Bible (ref#125, p749).

“Obedience that is not voluntary is disobedience, for the Lord looks at the heart, and if He sees that we serve Him from force, and not because we love Him, He will reject our offering” Charles Spurgeon (ref#34, Jan 9^th PM).

“[W]hen the goodness and loving kindness of God our Savior appeared, he saved us, not because of works done by us in righteousness, but according to his own mercy. [T]hat those who have believed in God may be careful to devote themselves to good works” (Titus 3:4-5,8 ESV).

“The joy of Jesus was the absolute self-surrender and self-sacrifice of Himself. The thing that will hinder joy is the irritation of thinking out circumstances. Stop being self-conscious and live the life hid with Christ” Oswald Chambers (ref#7, Aug 31^st).

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SOUL EXERCISE

Outward actions first, inward state of the heart second, No! Our outward actions cannot be correct if our heart remains unchanged.

“When we consider that soul exercise is a term which has almost passed out of our religious vocabulary and that more attention is paid to the outward actions of the Christian life than to the state of the heart, we cannot but come to the conclusion that vital godliness is at a low ebb” John Newton (ref#322, p11).

“He that rightly understands the Lord Jesus, understands how to have his guilt removed, his heart renewed, his conscience calmed, his soul secured. The better Christ is understood, the more the soul that understands Him is at rest” Nathanael Vincent (ref#225, July 23^rd).

“The deep things are not discovered; they are received. They are not achieved; they are believed” Samuel Chadwick (ref#195, p108).

“Whereas false teaching results in meaningless speculation, proper apostolic teaching results in practical good behavior rooted in love. And that love must come for internal, Spirit-worked changes that have produced a pure heart (rather than one filled with sinful desires), a good conscience (rather than one laden with guilt), and a sincere faith (rather than pretense and hypocrisy)” ESV Study Bible (ref#125, p2325).

“It is only when you understand the completeness of your justification (that your penalty has been paid and you have been made eternally right with God by the life and death of Jesus) that you are able to rest in the ongoing discipline of your sanctification. That discipline is not to make you right with God, but an expression of the fact that you have been made right with God, and because you have, you are not the object of his Fatherly love. You can expect his discipline, but you do not have to fear his anger. You will experience his correction, but you will never face his rejection. He disciplines all his children in order to produce a harvest of righteousness, but he will never punish you for your sin” Paul David Tripp (ref#190, Nov 1^st).

“’My son, do not regard lightly the discipline of the Lord, nor be weary when reproved by him. For the Lord disciplines the one he loves, and chastises every son whom he receives.’ It is for discipline that you have to endure. God is treating you as sons. For what son is there whom his father does not discipline? If you are left without discipline then you are illegitimate children and not sons” (Heb 12:5-8 ESV).

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VALLEYS AND MOUNTAINTOPS

“[P]ut me to the test, say the LORD of hosts, if I will not open the windows of heaven for you and pour down for you a blessing until there is no more need” (Mal 3:10 ESV).

“Endeavor to enrich and enlarge your mind with more spiritual understanding of the personal glory, love, and fullness of Christ. All declension of soul arises from things contrary to the nature of indwelling grace gaining admittance to the mind. The world—its pleasures, vanities, cares, and various temptations—enters the mind, often disguised in the shape of lawful undertakings and duties, and draws the mind away from God and the affections away from Christ. It weakens and deadens faith, love, and every grace of the indwelling Spirit. But when the mind is preoccupied by Christ, filled with meditations on His glory, grace, and love, no room is left for the entrance of external allurements; the world, other people, and the fascinations of sin are shut out, and the soul holds a constant and undisturbed fellowship with God” Octavius Winslow (ref#135, Jul 22^nd).

“Be careful to keep your old receipts which you have had from God for the pardon of your sins. There are some display days, and Jubilee-like festivals, when God comes forth clothed with the robes of His mercy, and holds forth the scepter of His grace more familiarly to His children than ordinary. [T]hen the firmament is clear, not a cloud to be seen to darken the Christian’s comfort. Love and joy are the soul’s repast and pastime, while this feast lasts.

“Now when God withdraws, and this cheer is taken off, Satan’s work is how he may deface and wear off the remembrance of this testimony which is so important for a believer’s spiritual standing. Satan wants to deprive him of this evidence, so that when he accuses him again the believer will have nothing with which to defend himself.

“It will benefit you, therefore, to lay them up safely: such a testimony may serve to non-suit your accuser many years hence. One affirmative from God’s mouth for your pardoned state, carries more weight (though of old date) than a thousand negatives from Satan’s” William Gurnall (ref#225, Dec 14^th).

“I will lead the blind in a way that they do not know, in paths that they have not known I will guide them. I will turn the darkness before them into light, the rough places into level ground. These are the things I do, and I do not forsake them” (Isa 42:16 ESV).

“God knows His grace in us, and will own it, when we doubt of it or deny it” Richard Baxter (ref#225, Dec 14^th).