Eric Mason explains how suffering plays a vital role in the sanctification process. We tend to want to avoid suffering at all costs, but we often fail to recognize that one of the costs of avoiding suffering is the opportunity to be made more holy and to draw closer to the heart of the Father. (more…)
In honor of Throwback Thursday, we are remembering that a Christian is someone who believes people can change…
Once we are labelled, once that sin is attached to you, it is seemingly impossible to break free from it. Even when the label no longer fits. Even when you have been cleansed by the blood of Jesus, and have spiritually matured in Christ and repented of these things, and moved on in the power of the Holy Spirit toward Christ-likeness…they can still haunt you. Reputations are nasty, icky, sticky things.
Some people don’t want to believe that people can change. But people do change, because God changes people.
When we fell He didn’t give up on us. Instead He rolled up his sleeves and dusted off His potter’s wheel. He grabbed us formless lumps of clay and got to work. You are an unfinished piece on whom God is still working.
He who began a good work in you will carry it on to completion until the day of Christ Jesus. (Phi. 1:6)
Thank God He’s not finished with you.
I won’t coddle you, like those other bloggers will. You probably are not doing so great…but… everything will be ok. That is, everything will be ok if you look to Jesus. Don’t get caught up in your failures. Stop looking at yourself. I am not saying brush your sins off. Admit your sins. Call them out by name. Claim them as your own, confess them, and then stop looking at yourself and look to Jesus instead. Wage war on your sin in the strength that he provides. He didn’t fail.
So often we tell the sinner to “Just stop sinning and repent.” And when he returns to his sin again, his shame grows more and more as he starts to think that Jesus doesn’t care for him because if He did then He would have completely removed this thorn. I hear you. Yours is a constant refrain that I hear from Christians of various backgrounds, “Maybe I am lost. Why can’t I just get over this?” I have been there myself. “Why can’t I get over this? Why are you not helping me God?”
Having an idea of what you are looking for in a significant other is great! It means you actually took time to be honest with what you are really looking for in a relationship. But if I’m really honest with you, I think there is something more important than a list of non-negotiables.
Can you guess what it is?
Just so you know, there has been some controversy brewing on the interwebs these days about the issue of sanctification. I know what you’re thinking: People become Christians by believing the Gospel, and then spend the rest of their lives becoming sanctified, right? If only it were that simple. You see, there are all kinds of other issues bound up with the discussion of sanctification. Some theologians have been talking about these issues, which roused a response from some other theologians, and before you know it, there is a lively internet debate brewing. Kevin DeYoung offers a helpful summary of where the points of agreement and disagreement are, along with lots of links to help anyone who is interested get acquainted with the issues.
