StriperAddict
Senior Member
A church that shrinks back from preaching God’s grace as unconditional does so because it knows nothing stronger than the threat of punishment to check men’s behavior. What a tragic admission. If we really fear that lifting all threat of punishment off believers would cause them to run wild with sin, then what we are admitting is that years of ministry of our “gospel” have not changed the hearts of our hearers! They “behave” well, as children might behave under the supervision of a teacher, but in never being allowed out from under that yoke and its threats of punishment, they have been denied maturity. Their hearts have not been granted the opportunity to gain confidence in the power of the Spirit within them, to discover that God’s grace toward them is not just the forgiveness of their sins, but the power to change the very root of their being and the very desires of their heart (Ezekiel 36:26, Titus 2:11–12).
This is because we were designed to live from the inside out, not from the outside in.
For godliness to be authentic, we must be living the life we want to live, not merely the life we feel we ought to live. The heart was not built for trying, but for trusting and believing. Each of our lives is formed and transformed not by what we do, but by what our hearts have believed (Proverbs 4:23).
We were formed as new creations when our hearts heard and believed in Christ and what He has done for us (2 Corinthians 5:17). The expression in our lives of that new form grows in the same way; by hearing about what Christ has done for us (Romans 10:17). We are transformed from glory to glory and we grow up into Christ as our hope remains anchored in His life in us, not in our life for Him (2 Corinthians 3:18). The gospel of grace fixes our gaze on Christ, for it reveals Him not just to be the author, but also the finisher, of our faith (Philippians 1:6, Hebrews 12:2).
The Father We Never Knew: The Unbinding of The Lazarus Church By The Restoration of The Gospel
Phelim Doherty
This is because we were designed to live from the inside out, not from the outside in.
For godliness to be authentic, we must be living the life we want to live, not merely the life we feel we ought to live. The heart was not built for trying, but for trusting and believing. Each of our lives is formed and transformed not by what we do, but by what our hearts have believed (Proverbs 4:23).
We were formed as new creations when our hearts heard and believed in Christ and what He has done for us (2 Corinthians 5:17). The expression in our lives of that new form grows in the same way; by hearing about what Christ has done for us (Romans 10:17). We are transformed from glory to glory and we grow up into Christ as our hope remains anchored in His life in us, not in our life for Him (2 Corinthians 3:18). The gospel of grace fixes our gaze on Christ, for it reveals Him not just to be the author, but also the finisher, of our faith (Philippians 1:6, Hebrews 12:2).
The Father We Never Knew: The Unbinding of The Lazarus Church By The Restoration of The Gospel
Phelim Doherty
