Adding fuel to the fire
October 21, 2007
It’s been a little over a week since my conversation with a new believer. At the time, I’d almost forgotten how encouraging it is to hear about evidences of God’s grace.
Imagine that.
Anyways, it just so happened to occur right after Justin’s message from Romans 1:1-7 about the gospel. The freshness of the gospel in his mind and heart was refreshing to hear and I could feel his excitement. At the same time, his excitement was tempered by the knowledge that the Christian walk is not an easy one; trials will come, sooner or later, but His grace abounds still more. What was even cooler was not just his understanding that his salvation was a work of God’s grace, but that his future sanctification is also God’s grace in his life.
That was a good conversation.
Oh yeah, I recently came across something that accurately illustrates a Christian’s struggle in sanctification. I thought it was really cool. It’s from E. Prentiss’s book Stepping Heavenward (if you’re asking why I read this book, it was for the following reasons: it was just sitting around on Steve’s desk, I like reading books, and it’s a good book. I was surprised at how quick a read it was).
Here’s the excerpted passage on sanctification, after Mrs. Campbell has given Katherine a set of instructions during their meet-up time:
I was much struck with these directions; but I said, despondently:
“If peace can only be found at the end of such hard roads, I am sure I shall always be miserable.”
“Are you miserable now?” she asked.
“Yes, just now I am. I do not mean that I have no happiness; I mean that I am in a disheartened mood, weary of going round and round in circles, committing the same sins, uttering the same confessions, and making no advance.”
“My dear,” she said, after a time, “have you a perfectly distinct, settled view of what Christ is to the human soul ?”
“I do not know. I understand, of course, more or less perfectly, that my salvation depends on. Him alone; it is His gift.”
“But do you see, with equal clearness, that your sanctification must be as fully His gift, as your salvation is?”
“No,” I said, after a little thought. “I have had a feeling that He has done His part, and now I must do mine.”
“My dear,” she said, with much tenderness and feeling, “then the first thing you have to do is to learn Christ.”
“But how ?”
“On your knees, my child, on your knees!”
It’s better not to forget that sanctification is salvation too.
