I have been reading this book, The Pursuit of Holiness, by Jerry Bridges and I love it. Everyone else out there in blog-land seems to be reading The Practice of Godliness so it will be next on my list.
In the first chapter, Bridges points out several reasons that more Christians do not experience holiness in daily life as well as why the Church seems to be more conformed to the world instead of Christ. The first reason Bridges discusses is that “our attitude toward sin is more self-centered than God-centered.” Often times people are more concerned about having victory over sin instead of focusing on that fact that our sin grieves the heart of God. Failure because of ‘sinning’ is what frustrates us, not the fact that we have grieved our Father. I often see this attitude in my own heart.
“God wants us to walk in obedience – not victory. Obedience is oriented toward God; victory is oriented toward self.” This is just the first attitude we need to deal with in order to get to the root of our difficulties with sin. When we walk in obedience, we will often experience victory – but what is our goal – to be victorious or obedient? My prayer is that I will seek to be obedient in this pursuit.
4 comments:
This book is on my list to read this year! I'm going through the Practice of Godliness and the study guide now for our ladies bible study. It has been excellent...I like this author a lot.
Thanks for sharing some wisdom from the book!
Kim
Great post, Jenn. Really makes you think about what motivates our obedience. Is it to receive a blessing from God or just to please Him? Good, tough questions.
I enjoyed your reflections on this book. It is on my list--I am reading "The Practice of Godliness."
I am reading The Practice of Godliness, too, and learning a lot.
Jerry Bridges has a lot to day about attitude, it seems. I had not thought about victory being more self-centered...that is something to consider. Thanks for sharing. I'll have to add this book to my list.
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