Both the preaching and the literature, for those seeking to put their sin to death and to grow in holiness, is weak and limp-wristed. It is man-centered. It is infected with the disease of modern psychology and self-help remedies. It does not take into consideration the holiness of God. And it doesn’t take the weight of sin seriously.
If you’re a sinner, longing to be free from your sin and aching for holiness, the resources for you are scarce—and those that do exist trivialize your sin and its consequences. And make no mistake; the consequences are immense. The stakes couldn’t be higher. Our lives, our families, our friends, our communities, our country, our eternal souls, and the eternal souls of everyone we come in contact with—especially those that we seize as objects of our lust—are at stake. This is serious business.
I’ve found no better help for dealing with personal sin of any sort than a little book by John Owen called The Mortification of Sin. In many ways, this series might best be called a paraphrase of that great work. I’m just following his notes.
Like Mortification, this series is based on Romans 8:13: “If by the Spirit, you put to death the deeds of the flesh, you will live.” And like Owen, I’ve divided it into 3 basic parts:
1. You Must Kill Your Sin
2. What it Means to Kill Sin
3. How to Kill Your Sin
Starting next Monday, we’ll begin dwelling on the necessity of killing sin. And that’s all we’re going to dwell on for the next several weeks. If we’re going to kill our sin, we have to start by seeing how essential it is to the Christian life. We have to start by caring.
If you long to be free from sin, or if you simply know that you should, I encourage you to keep up with this series. God is in the business of freeing men from both the condemnation and power of sin. He alone can do it. And He delights to do it.
So take courage. There is hope and help for you in the cross of Jesus Christ. Until next week, here’s a bit of hope for you from Owen himself:
[Christ’s] blood is the great sovereign remedy for sin-sick souls. Live in this, and you will die a conqueror; yea, you will, through the good providence of God, live to see your lust dead at your feet.
Comments
"If we’re going to kill our
"If we’re going to kill our sin, we have to start by seeing how essential it is to the Christian life. We have to start by caring."
Amen. That's always been my problem. Rarely do I find myself desperate for holiness.
I'm looking forward to
I'm looking forward to reading this series.
I'm looking forward to this
I'm looking forward to this series, both for myself and those I counsel (I do nouthetic counseling with Christian women with eating disorders). There's another work by John Owen that is also very on-point: "Temptation Resisted and Repulsed". Ed Welch quotes from it in an excellent guide for turning away from addictions which I'm using.
This is a very helpful topic for all of us in the Church.
I think this will be an
I think this will be an interesting study. There is an old book, out there somewhere entitled Victory Through Surrender, by E. Stanley Jones, which talks about the "self" which ties into this, I think.
I have been reading Romans and have been giving some thought to this study.
By the way another book worth reading is the classic, "A Shepherd Looks at Psalm 23, by W. Phillip Keller. One gets an in depth look at what it means to be sheep. The reason I think this book is worth one's time is that it takes the approach of being a sheep and how the Shepherd cares about the sheep. This may seem unrelated, but there is a thread here I think worth reflection in tying things together. Looking forward to the next study.
Post new comment