Here is the second quote that I had wanted to share from “Total Church.” What is said below is certainly not easy but it is illustrates clearly what each of us needs to be preaching to ourselves and what we need others to be speaking into our lives.
Often we can speak the precious promises of the gospel in ways specific to someone’s needs. Here, for example, are four key life-changing truths about God.
- He is sovereign
- He is majestic
- He is good
- He is gracious.
Consider someone who is anxious. They may be anxious because:
- They doubt God’s sovereign control over their future.
- They fear someone’s disapproval more than they fear our majestic God.
- They doubt that God’s intentions toward them are good.
- In their guilt they doubt God’s gracious forgiveness.
Or consider someone who is persistently worn-out. They may be worn out:
- trying to manage their lives because they doubt God’s sovereignty.
- trying to win other people’s approval because they fear other people more than they fear our majestic God
- pursuing material possessions because they do not look for satisfaction in our good God
- trying to prove themselves instead of trusting the justification that is ours by grace through the finished work of Christ.
Before you stop reading don’t miss two other comments the authors make in the midst of this discussion-
In each case they may well affirm these truths in a creedal sense. But in the pressures of the moment they lack faith in a functional sense.
…our own experience reminds us that the struggle to believe the truth is a life-long, daily struggle.