I returned this week from 5 weeks away and began the difficult transition of coming down off the mountaintop of being away with God for a sabbatical rest (i.e. vacation) and returning to the ordinary, the mundane, the imperfect, the very real work of life. The work of bills, house, cars, parenting our four girls, congregants with cancer, families in crisis, a sermon to finish and the rest of what makes up pastoring a church. It sure is easier to be a contemplative away from it all! I am sobered by my limits and body resisting too much activity after time away. By God’s grace, I am trying to listen to the Spirit in my body/spirit to live slowly. Each year I teach a course for 3 consecutive weeks on a book of the Bible. This year it is Galatians and the theme of Sonship and the gospel, one of the greatest contributions of the Reformation. Last night, as we began, was wonderful for me, centering me in the beauty of the love of Jesus. George Whtfield was a powerful, open-air preacher in the first Great Awakening during the early 1700’s. The following is an excerpt from one of his sermons: “But before you can speak peace to your heart, you must be brought to see that all your duties – all your righteousness… put all together are so far from recommending you to God, are so far from being any motive and inducement to God .to have mercy on your poor soul, that he will see them to be filthy rugs… that God hates them and cannot but away with them, if you bring them to him in order to recommend you to his favor….I do not know what you think, but I can say that I cannot pray but I sin–I cannot preach to you or any others but I sin–I can do nothing without sin.., my repentance wants to be repented of, and my tears to be washed in the precious blood of my dear Savior. Our best duties are as so many splendid sins. Before you can speak peace to you hearts, you must not only [repent] of your sin… but also of your righteousness. There must be a deep conviction before you can be brought out of your self-righteousness. It is the last idol taken out of the heart…Did you ever feel the need of the righteousness [not just the forgiveness] of Jesus Christ?…And can you say, “Lord, thou mayst justly damn me for the best duties that I ever did perform?… If you are not thus brought out of self, you may speak peace to yourselves, but yet there is no peace…. You must lay hold by faith of the all-sufficient righteousness of Jesus Christ, and then you shall have peace.” I sat in the love of Jesus this morning – loving and befriending myself in this rich love, knowing his record/righteousness is enough. This really is the first order of our work isn’t it? Why do you think we don’t hear such a sermons in our pulpits today?
22
Aug
