New Beginnings

What does one write on New Year's Day that has been written before? The start of a new year offers us so many opportunities. We can start a Bible reading plan. We can start a prayer journal. We can start a daily devotional. We can stop squandering our time. We can stop giving in to the one habit that has consumed us for years. We can stop being so self centered and start being more Christ centered.

And yet, all of this is surface level stuff. What really matters is not how well we know the Bible, but how well we know the God of the Bible. The Bible reading and praying, the replacing of sin with righteousness only truly comes when God invades our hearts and minds. When Jesus is first and foremost in what we think and say and do, that's what we are aiming for.

Will we ever get there? Quite frankly, no. But God's expectation is that we keep striving and pressing toward this goal. It will also be by his grace and the strength that he provides. But it still requires grace driven effort; our effort.

So let today be the day of new beginnings. It really doesn't matter if today is January 1 or July 17. Every day, every hour, every moment is a new chance to make a new beginning with God.

Soli Deo Gloria

Grace driven effort

Therefore, my beloved, as you have always obeyed, so now, not only as in my presence but much more in my absence, work out your own salvation with fear and trembling, for it is God who works in you, both to will and to work for his good pleasure. (Phil 2:12-13)

Therefore we must pay much closer attention to what we have heard, lest we drift away from it. (Heb 2:1)

It is fairly clear in Scripture that there are two concepts that run from beginning to end and would, at least at the surface, appear to contradict each other. The two concepts are grace and effort. Now, it almost goes without saying that grace is what underpins the whole biblical storyline. From the creation account, through the flood, the selection of Abraham and his line, the deliverance of Moses and the people, the provision of the land, the provision of a king, the faithful discipline of the exile and the gracious restoration to the land. Of course then there's Jesus, his incarnation beginning with conception, followed by birth, childhood, youth and finally adulthood, his preaching and teaching and miracles and simple relationship building, This is followed by his betrayal, his torture, his mocking rejection, his physical death and his spiritual sin bearing, his resurrection and his ascension. Then there is the giving of the Spirit and the birth of the Church. The message of grace proclaimed faithfully for thousands of years continues to redeem, continues to save, continues to bring glory to God.

But weaved within this theme of grace, is the thread of effort. How are we saved? By grace alone, through faith alone in Christ alone. How are we perfected? By that same grace utilizing that same faith in the same Christ, but we must step into that grace, we must lean on that faith, we must pursue that Christ. If it were not so, too much of the Bible would be nonsense "Rend your hearts, not your garments", "I strain toward what is ahead", "Seek first His kingdom" "Seek the LORD, all you humble of the land, who do his just commands" This concept of pressing into Christ, of leaning into faith, of stepping into grace has been described by DA Carson as "grace driven effort" (See For the Love of God vol 2, Jan 23)

"ONE OF THE MOST STRIKING EVIDENCES of sinful human nature lies in the universal propensity for downward drift. In other words, it takes thought, resolve, energy, and effort to bring about reform. In the grace of God, sometimes human beings display such virtues. But where such virtues are absent, the drift is invariably toward compromise, comfort, indiscipline, sliding disobedience, and decay that advances, sometimes at a crawl and sometimes at a gallop, across generations.

People do not drift toward holiness. Apart from grace-driven effort, people do not gravitate toward godliness, prayer, obedience to Scripture, faith, and delight in the Lord. We drift toward compromise and call it tolerance; we drift toward disobedience and call it freedom; we drift toward superstition and call it faith. We cherish the indiscipline of lost self-control and call it relaxation; we slouch toward prayerlessness and delude ourselves into thinking we have escaped legalism; we slide toward godlessness and convince ourselves we have been liberated."

My prayer for myself, and any who may read this post is that God will give us the strength to make the effort. I know that in me I do not have the strength or the determination to carry out what God expects of me. This reminds me of a prayer from Augustine: "God, command what you will. but grant what you command" May that be our prayer and our hope as well.

I now send forth this post with a deep sense of its many defects; but with an earnest prayer that it may do some good. (JC Ryle)

To God Alone be the Glory