Chapell Holiness by Grace

Delighting in the Joy That Is Our Strength
1. Auflage 2003
ISBN: 978-1-4335-1575-0
Verlag: Crossway
Format: EPUB
Kopierschutz: 0 - No protection

E-Book, Englisch, 288 Seiten

'Be Holy, because I am holy.' -1 Peter 1:16 How can God expect us to be as holy as he is? Isn't it unrealistic, given that he is infinitely pure and we are clearly imperfect? Such a standard seems either to ignore our frailty or to impose certain failure-until we understand how God views us. Then we are reminded that, thanks to what Christ accomplished on our behalf, our perfection is not the requirement for entering his kingdom. Yet that very grace still calls us to live righteously-for the sake of our well-being, yes, but most of all, because it glorifies God. In this challenging yet heartwarming work, Bryan Chapell illustrates the principles of grace, the practices of faith, and the motives of love in living a life of holiness. You will journey through reassuring Scripture passages that show good works and obedience to be, not a means of establishing or maintaining salvation, but a grateful response to God's mercy. And in Bryan Chapell's encouraging words-drawn straight from the heart of God-you will understand that your holiness is not so much a matter of what you achieve as it is the grace that God provides. A grace so rich as to make the pursuit of his holiness your soul's deepest delight.

Bryan Chapell is a bestselling author of many books, including Christ-Centered Preaching and Holiness by Grace. He is pastor emeritus of the historic Grace Presbyterian Church in Peoria, Illinois; president emeritus of Covenant Theological Seminary; and president of Unlimited Grace Media (unlimitedgrace.com), which broadcasts daily messages of gospel hope in many nations.

Autoren/Hrsg.

Chapell, Bryan

Leseproben

INTRODUCTION

My Soul’s Delight

“God says, ‘Be holy, for I am holy.’” The young preacher quoted the words of Leviticus with such fervor that I had little doubt he really expected us to live up to this command for untarnished righteousness. Yet, as my eyes scanned those seated between the pulpit and my pew, I wondered if he recognized the true challenge in his words:

• On the front row were two sisters, both divorced in the past year. One had recently confided to friends that her loneliness since her marriage had driven her into sinful relationships with other men. The second sister had found more frequent solace in alcohol that trapped her in a horrid cycle of depression that made her treat her kids cruelly, making her feel guilty, and causing her to drink again to escape her guilt.
• Behind the sisters was a successful businessman and long-term elder who had engineered the ouster of the previous pastor with a combination of biblical proof-texting and political intrigue. The elder’s wife, seated next to him, had conducted a skillful phone campaign that created enough questions about the pastor’s credibility to disarm any defense he tried to make.
• In that same pew was a young mother trying to manage two out-of-control preschoolers. Simultaneously she was ignoring disgusted glances from the nearby elder while glaring daggers at her own husband to motivate him to discipline the children.
• Directly in front of me a teenager sat at the opposite end of the pew from his parents as a geographical statement of what he felt about his relationship with them since he had been grounded for ignoring curfew the previous night.
• Ultimately my attention rested on me, the seminary professor who had been moody with his family for days because of a letter from a stranger that had criticized his work.

My eyes and my heart testified there was not a sinless person among us. Yet the preacher seemed oblivious to our obvious faults. He said it again, “Be holy, for God is holy” (see Lev. 11:44, 45; 19:2; 20:26; 1 Pet. 1:16).

Does God really expect us to be holy as he is? He is infinitely pure. I am an imperfect person. So is everyone about me (see Ps. 14:1-3; Eccles. 7:20). His standard seems either to ignore human frailty or to impose certain failure. We must make sense of this command for perfect righteousness lest our hearts harden into a shrugged, “Get real,” or break into a sobbed, “I can’t do it.”

VISIONS OF HOLINESS

How does God enable us to meet his requirement of holiness? An answer lies along the path of John Bunyan’s famous travelers in the children’s version of Pilgrim’s Progress that our family has read after dinners (which have had their own share of imperfect behavior).

Late on their journey, Bunyan’s pilgrims discover a wonderful mirror. There is nothing unusual about the front of the glass. However, on the back of the mirror appears an image of the crucified Lord Jesus. Everyone who looks in the mirror’s face sees an ordinary reflection that includes the blemishes and scars that always accompany our humanity. Yet anyone who observes these same persons from the reverse side of the mirror sees only the glory of the Son of God.

This amazing glass from Pilgrim’s Progress pictures the answer to how we can be holy in this life. Our holiness is not so much a matter of what we achieve as it is the grace our God provides. Grace is God’s willingness to look at us from the perspective that sees his holy Son in our place.1

God can certainly see the faults and frailties reflected in the mirrors of our lives. Still, he chooses to look at those who trust in his mercy through the lens that features the holiness of his own child in our place. As a consequence he loves and treasures us as much as if we had never sinned.

Many years ago, the preacher Phillips Brooks explained G-R-A-C-E as God’s Riches At Christ’s Expense. The acrostic beautifully expresses how the blessings of God, which Jesus alone deserves, are mercifully passed to us as a consequence of his suffering and dying for our sin. When we trust that Christ’s work, rather than our own achievements, is the basis of our righteousness, then God mercifully grants us the riches of his love that only Jesus deserves. God looks at us as though we were as holy as his own Son, and treats us as lovingly despite our many imperfections.

Most Christians cherish the beauty of the truth that God viewed us through the lens of Jesus’ goodness when we claimed him as our Savior. We trusted that Christ’s death paid the penalty for our sins, and that we were made right with God—justified—not by our own holiness but by trusting in the holiness he provided. Just as objects look red when viewed through a red lens and green when viewed through a green lens, we believed that when God looked at us through Jesus he viewed us as his own child.

Belief in this provision of grace, whereby God chose to view us as his beloved through no good of our own, became the greatest joy of our souls. What robs many believers of this joy, however, is a misunderstanding of how God continues to view us after we have received the grace that justifies us.

After initially trusting in Christ to make them right with God, many Christians embark on an endless pursuit of trying to satisfy God with good works that will keep him loving them. Such Christians believe that they are saved by God’s grace but are kept in his care by their own goodness. This belief, whether articulated or buried deep in a psyche developed by the way we were treated by parents, spouses, or others, makes the Christian life a perpetual race on a performance treadmill to keep winning God’s affection.

While the Christian life can be characterized as a race (see Gal. 5:7; 2 Tim. 4:7; Heb. 12:1), we persevere on the course God marks out for us not by straining to gain his affection but by the assurance that he never stops viewing us from the perspective of his grace. God continually offers us unconditional love and the encouragement that our status as his children does not vary even though our efforts do.

When I see my son’s energy flag in his cross-country meets, I shout encouragement to revive his resolve and keep him going. I know intuitively that threats or expressions of frustration would sap his strength for the long race ahead (and the many races to come) even if my pressure were to spur him on for the moment.

God is a better father than I, and his encouragement rings more powerfully, wisely, lovingly, and continually in his children’s souls. We race in the confidence that his grace does not cease just because we have faltered. Grace becomes not only the means by which God once justified us, it is also the means by which we are continually encouraged and enabled to serve him with undiminished delight.

Since grace is the means by which we find the joy that gives us strength, it is vital that we refine our vision of how God views us. Whether our lives will be typified by joy or by despondency depends largely on the perspective from which we view ourselves. Will earth’s or heaven’s perspective dominate our vision?

The first purpose of this book is to make heaven’s view so clear to us that we will never stop seeing ourselves as God sees us. For if we cannot lift our eyes from an earthly perspective, then we will so focus on our weaknesses and stumbles that the race to please God will be misery. But if we remember that God is the lifter of our heads (Ps. 3:3), then we will raise our eyes to see the affection in his own. When we see that his regard for us does not waver, then his grace will quicken our steps, strengthen our hearts, and delight our souls to carry on.

VIEWS OF GRACE

Another concern must be addressed, however, in a book that seeks to stimulate greater holiness by grace. We must confess that talking about God’s unconditional love in order to promote godliness is counterintuitive. If all we do is keep assuring people that God loves them, then what is to keep them from taking advantage of grace and doing whatever they want?

In recent decades a number of wonderful movements of grace have begun to sweep across the evangelical world. These groups include the Sonship, World Harvest Mission, and New Life ministries that have flourished from the seminal influence of the late Jack Miller; Redeemer churches associated with Tim Keller; New City Fellowship churches and ministries in various cities; and the L’Abri fellowships spawned by the teachings of Francis Schaeffer. To these early and deep fountains of grace could be added a great number of ministers, churches, and institutions in evangelical circles that have recently made grace a chief focus of their ministries. Contributors are as diverse as John Armstrong, Charles Swindoll, Joyce Meyers, R. C. Sproul, Steve Brown, Michael Scott Horton, Jerry Bridges, and Phil Yancey.

Without a doubt a grace awakening is occurring, but the new emphasis does not come without varying accents, challenges, and concerns. Concerns that the new emphasis on grace will result in antinomianism (i.e., disregard for the law of God) have become quite numerous and acute. The history of the evangelical church in North America can partially explain the reasons for these concerns.

Much of the evangelical church finds its cultural roots in the modernist/fundamentalist controversy of the early twentieth century. Not only did those who stood for historic Christianity against modern skepticism fight against disregard for biblical...