Holiness

Well, the Lord is definitely working in mysterious ways in my life these days... I had a great conversation with my dad yesterday on the phone, then was awoken last night in the middle of the night (by the Lord, no doubt, but not in the "Samuel" way :). I was awoken by the pain in my back from pregnancy and was unable to get back to sleep even when the pain had subsided (this is a prayer request!). Remembering that I had become slack in my reading of "Holiness" (by J.C. Ryle), I decided by the Lord's prompting to read the next chapter, chapter 19, entitled "Wants of the Times". Basically, Ryle is addressing the issues Christianity was facing at that particular time (1879), which could certainly be said of our times as well, minus the whole popery issue which was much more relevant in his time (in many ways) than in ours. I was bursting at the seams over what I read, and wanted to post it all on the blog, but Kurt encouraged me to pace it and post bits and pieces. You can certainly pick up the book on your own and I KNOW you will be blessed beyond belief. I'm going to try to post points from this section over the next week or two, so as to be brief in each entry. Okay, sort of brief. Blog hoppers aren't keen on excessively long posts, so I apologize. If you've made it this far, I hope your curiosity is peaked and you'll read on so you too can be blessed. And now, presenting: the man, J.C. Ryle...

"...the times require at our hands distinct and decided views of Christian doctrine.
I cannot withhold my conviction that the professing church of the nineteenth century is as much damaged by laxity and indistinctness about matters of doctrine within as it is by sceptics and unbelievers without. Myriads of professing Christians nowadays seem utterly unable to distinguish things that differ. Like people afflicted with colour blindness, they are incapable of discerning what is true and what is false, what is sound and what is unsound. If a preacher of religion is only clever and eloquent and earnest, they appear to think he is all right, however strange and heterogeneous his sermons may be. They are destitute of spiritual sense, apparently, and cannot detect error. Popery or Protestantism, an atonement or no atonement, a personal Holy Ghost or no Holy Ghost, future punishment or no future punishment, high church or low church or broad church, Trinitarianism, Arianism, or Unitarianism, nothing comes amiss to them: they can swallow all, if they cannot digest it! Carried away by a fancied liberality and charity, they seem to think everybody is right and nobody is wrong, every clergyman is sound and none are unsound, everybody is going to be saved and nobody is going to be lost. Their religion is made up of negatives; and the only positive thing about them is that they dislike distinctness, and think all extreme and decided and positive views are very naughty and very wrong!" (Holiness, J.C. Ryle, page 354)

Can I just tell you that the very next line is the most potent and striking phrase of all, but I had to stop somewhere? I will try my best to post that tomorrow.
Anyway, don't you think this describes the state of Christianity in most places today? I am struck in many ways by this reading, but my heart is overflowing as I'm sure many of your hearts are too. I am overflowing with gratitude to the Lord for the distinctness that I find at my church, Grace Community. My pastor has paved the way for many men to be educated in the Word of God so as to be distinct in their doctrine. We can understand the Word of God as the mysteries therein are explained clearly to us who do have the Holy Ghost in us! John MacArthur has stood firmly on the Scriptures, studying so as to understand and be convinced of certain doctrines, and then boldly going where few men will go- saying it out loud to his whole church and explaining clearly what it says! I have found great comfort in the certainty and veracity and plain old truth that is expounded from God's Word, and am grateful for my pastor's faithfulness to uphold it unwaveringly before his congregation, giving us great hope, courage, and confidence to stand tall on the Word of God, and giving us the strength by that preaching to not be tossed to and fro by every wind of doctrine that would threaten to shake the ground beneath us. Praise the Lord!