Isaiah 57:20 says, “The wicked are like the tossing sea; for it cannot rest, and its waters toss up mire and dirt.” The sea does not need to do anything special to produce mire and dirt, that is the result of natural motions. This is also true of us when we are under the condition of sin. The natural motions of our lives produce mire and dirt. Sin is part of the internal structure of our lives. No special effort is needed to produce it. No wonder we feel trapped.
We want to make it clear that we cannot free and purify our own heart by exerting our own ‘will.’”
In Colossians Paul lists some of the outward forms that people use to control sin: “touch not, taste not, handle not.” He then adds that these things, “have indeed a show of wisdom in will worship” “Will worship”—what a telling phrase, and how descriptive of so much of our lives! The moment we feel we can succeed and attain victory over sin by the strength of the will alone is the moment we are worshipping the will.
“Will worship” may produce an outward show of success for a time, but in the cracks and crevices of our lives our deep inner condition will eventually be revealed. Jesus describes this condition when he speaks of the external righteousness of the Pharisees. “out of the abundance of the heart the mouth speaks…I tell you, on the day of judgment men will render account for every careless word they utter”(Matt. 12:34-36), You see we can make a good show for a while, but the unguarded moment will come when the “careless word” will slip out to reveal the true condition of the heart. If we are full of compassion, it will be revealed; if we are full of bitterness, that also will be revealed.
-excerpt from Richard Foster's Celebration of Discipline
The Vision of this Blog
For two millennia man has been grappling with the cost and practical application of following Jesus Christ. The vision of the authors is that we would encourage one another in this journey as we share what we are learning from Jesus through our daily experiences of life. This is not a forum to parade empty knowledge nor is it a place for prideful arguments. Instead, it is for the humble and sincere to learn together from Jesus who invites us into the kingdom of God and teaches us how to live according to this kingdom.
1 comment:
This is really important! Many, many, so many times I have vascillated between "will harder" and "surrender trying"; "more discipline" and "More just collapsing and waiting on the Lord"; more "self-control" and more "believing only God can do it."
At this point, my conclusion is that we absolutely must, and are regularly called to, "will more, will harder, will faithfully and unsurrenderedly", but there is a strong caviat. That caviat is that no activity by which a man would say, "Look Lord and see what I have done and render to me now what Thou owest me" will be a sanctioned, safe, good or wise (perhaps not even survivable) activity. None should ever look at their future plans or their past endeavors and figure on what "a catch" they are or would be to the God of Heaven. All this being true because if we ever are "a catch" it is only because He built beauty into us, He crafted worthiness inside, He planted charms that delight Him in our souls. Thus eliminating us from ever being able to boast.
The Colossians passages about "not touching, not tasting, not handling" aren't telling us never to worry or commit in our hearts to live by these commitments and laws, but they are telling us that these laws are never deep enough, are often too contrived, and they can lead to comparisons with others. They don't touch or solve what's in our hearts in themselves. BUT, when our hearts are aware of our wretchedness, of God's goodness, of the world's stain, of our need and yearning to be free and better and closer to God's heart, than there is a lot of room for abandonments of the world, forsakings of the unclean, avoidances of the idol-like.
If "will worship" means by the will causing ourselves to worship God, even picking ourselves up by our boot-straps--because the Lord has put the drive inside of us--and making ourselves worship Him, this is more appropriate an activity than I could easily describe. But, if "will worship" means we are in any way becoming more impressed with our will than with His, than of course it is weak, dangerous and depraved.
Who else can speak to these things. I'd love to hear other's input.
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