Dear Sovereign Redeemer and other friends,
At this year’s annual national NCFIC conference, “The Highway of Holiness,” I had the great privilege of giving a message on J.C. Ryle’s classic book, “Holiness.”
If you know me well, you know that this book is on my very short “must read” list. Should you decide to invest the time to listen to my summary, I hope you find it very profitable.
If you are interested in the book, here are two great options:
Happy listening and/or reading!
Dear Sovereign Redeemer and other friends,
It is just five weeks until the upcoming National Center of Family-Integrated Churches “Highway of Holiness” conference, October 29-31 at Ridgecrest in Asheville, NC, and I am already looking forward to it.
If you haven’t decided to go yet, please consider these invitations:
At this conference I have the privilege of profiling J.C. Ryle’s classic work, “Holiness,” and the preparation for that is pure joy. Here is a description:
J.C. Ryle’s Classic, “Holiness”
In a day where sanctification is the subject of considerable controversy in the church, J.C. Ryle’s classic, “Holiness,” is an enormously helpful treasure. Ryle carefully considers and then refutes the two great errors regarding the doctrine of sanctification: blurring the lines between justification and sanctification, and isolating them from one another. Blurring the lines welcomes legalism and erodes justification by grace alone through faith alone. Isolating one from the other invites false assurance and an environment of compromise. By keeping justification and sanctification rigidly distinct yet unbreakably connected, Ryle gives us the biblical doctrine of holiness, without which no one will see the Lord. Friends, don’t come for a book report. While the book will be profiled and summarized, Ryle puts forth a robust doctrine of holiness, ill suited for a lecture but perfectly suited for earnest preaching.
Join us!
Dear Sovereign Redeemer and other friends,
In J.C. Ryle’s book “Practical Religion,” in his chapter on happiness (Chapter 10), he calls a succession of witnesses who prove that pursuing happiness in the wrong things only leads to emptiness and misery. Here is one of his witnesses, Lord Chesterfield (a man previously unknown to me), in his own words:
“I have seen the silly round of business and pleasure, and have done with it all [meaning he is finished with it all]. I have enjoyed all the pleasures of the world, and consequently know their futility, and do not regret their loss. I appraise them at their real value, which in truth is very low; whereas those who have not experience always overrate them. They only see their gay outside, and are dazzled with their glare; but I have been behind the scenes. I have seen all the coarse pulleys and dirty ropes which exhibit and move the gaudy machine, and I have seen and smelt the tallow candles which illuminate the whole decoration, to the astonishment and admiration of the ignorant audience. When I reflect on what I have seen, what I have heard, and what I have done, I cannot persuade myself that all that frivolous hurry of bustle and pleasure of the world had any reality. I look on all that is past as one of those romantic dreams which opium occasions, and I do by no means wish to repeat the nauseous dose for the sake of the fugitive dream.”
Think about that. A world of people are chasing happiness on the wide road that leads to destruction, while those who have “been there, done that” have learned by experience that those pleasures never deliver what they promise.
May we be a people who think about the spending of our days and are wise!
Dear Sovereign Redeemer and other friends,
Most of us have never critically examined the genre of fiction. We have simply been swimming in it for decades in its various forms. We know that there are bad things to listen to, watch and read, and that from those things a Christian should steer clear. But what about the genre as a whole? Are there characteristics inherent to the whole category that pose risks? I believe J.C. Ryle has identified one such characteristic in his book “Practical Religion” (Chapter 7, “Charity”). As a preemptive note of explanation, Ryle was writing in the mid eighteen hundreds, and so when he uses the term “charity,” we would substitute the word “love.”
“The delusion which I am trying to combat is helped forward to a most mischievous degree by the vast majority of novels, romances, and tales of fiction. Who does not know that the heroes and heroines of these works are constantly described as patterns of perfection? They are always doing the right thing, saying the right thing, and showing the proper temper! They are always kind, and amiable, and unselfish, and forgiving! And yet you never hear a word about their religion! In short, to judge by the generality of works of fiction, it is possible to have excellent practical religion without doctrine, the fruits of the Spirit without the grace of the Spirit, and the mind of Christ without union with Christ!
Here, in short, is the great danger of reading most novels, romances, and works of fiction. The greater part of them give a false or incorrect view of human nature. They paint their model men and women as they ought to be, and not as they really are. The readers of such writings get their minds filled with wrong conceptions of what the world is. Their notions of mankind become visionary and unreal. They are constantly looking for men and women such as they never meet, and expecting what they never find.
Let me entreat my readers, once for all, to draw their ideas of human nature from the Bible, and not from novels. Settle it down in your mind, that there cannot be true charity without a heart renewed by grace. A certain degree of kindness, courtesy, amiability, good nature, may undoubtedly be seen in many who have no vital religion. But the glorious plant of Bible charity, in all its fullness and perfection, will never be found without union with Christ, and the work of the Holy Ghost.”
His point is that in our intake of fiction, we enter worlds where the heroes have the fruits of the Spirit – love, joy, peace, longsuffering, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control (Galatians 5:22-23) – without being indwelt by the Holy Spirit, and this can never be! This errant view of mankind can detach us from a sense of our desperate need for Christ.
And losing site of that is a high price to pay for having been entertained.
Dear Sovereign Redeemer and other friends,
Okay, things are spiraling out of control… I am currently in various stages of reading “The Holy Bible” (God), “Holiness” (J.C. Ryle), “Knowing God” (J.I. Packer), “Lectures to My Students” (Spurgeon), “Sacred Marriage” (Gary Thomas), “The Reformed Pastor” (Baxter), “Practical Religion” (J.C. Ryle), and a biography of Patrick Henry titled “Lion of Liberty” (Unger) just for fun. And I start “The Gospel’s Power & Message” (Washer) next week. I have never, ever been in such a state. HOWEVER – I must admit that the way I am going about it is making it a little more manageable. Five of these are being read aloud with other people, meaning that we meet and actually do the reading together – NO HOMEWORK (huzzah!).
Here is the latest gem from Chapter 1, “Self-Inquiry”, of J.C. Ryle’s “Practical Religion”:
“Is any reader of this paper a professing believer in Christ, but a believer without much joy and peace and comfort? Take advice this day. Search your own heart, and see whether the fault be not entirely your own. Very likely you are sitting at ease, content with a little faith, and a little repentance, a little grace and a little sanctification, and unconsciously shrinking back from extremes. You will never be a very happy Christian at this rate, if you live to the age of Methuselah. Change your plan, if you love life and would see good days, without delay. Come out boldly, and act decidedly. Be thorough, thorough, very thorough in your Christianity, and set your face fully towards the sun. Lay aside every weight, and the sin that doth so easily beset you. Strive to get nearer to Christ, to abide in Him, to cleave to Him, and to sit at His feet like Mary, and drink full draughts out of the fountain of life.”
We have been invited to plunge into the extremes of wholeheartedly loving God, and all the happiness that accompanies those extremes. Has it been a while since you assessed your entanglements with the world and what they are costing you? It has been a while for me, and I am very thankful for the reminder.
Dear Sovereign Redeemer and other friends,
I am almost finished re-reading J.C. Ryle’s “Holiness”, and I came across this gem in Chapter 18, titled “Unsearchable Riches”, regarding whether or not a person truly knows Jesus Christ:
“After all, this is the question of questions! Pardon, peace, rest of conscience, hope in death, Heaven itself – all hinge upon our answer. To know Christ is life eternal. To be without Christ – is to be without God. ‘He who has the Son has life – and he who has not the Son of God has not life.’ (1 John 5:12). The friends of purely secular education, the enthusiastic advocates of reform and progress, the worshipers of reason and intellect and mind and science, may say what they please, and do all they can to mend the world. But they will find their labor is in vain if they do not make allowance for the Fall of man, if there is no place for Christ in their schemes. There is a sore disease at the heart of mankind, which will baffle all their efforts and defeat all their plans, and that disease is sin. Oh, that people would only see and recognize the corruption of human nature, and the uselessness of all efforts to improve man which are not based on the remedial system of the gospel! Yes, the plague of sin is in the word, and no waters will ever heal that plague except those which flow from the fountain for all sin – a crucified Christ.”
The point being made is obvious: the gospel is remedial, meaning that it – and only it – cures mankind’s real problem. All other attempts amount to treating cancer with band-aids (imagine the futility!). There is no going forward without first going back and dealing with the source of our problems – we have waged a war against a holy God and our many and great sins must be cleansed by the blood of Jesus.
And that, friends, is why a purely social gospel is much worse than just a waste – it sustains people in their rebellion against God while only temporarily alleviating the pain and hardship that should drive them to Christ for real relief.
The saving gospel is a preached gospel that illuminates the sinfulness of sin and points to the only remedy – the work of our Lord Jesus Christ. This is what must be at the absolute leading edge, the absolute forefront of all of our efforts to address the problems of this world, whether poverty or abortion or any other source of pain and hardship.
Dear Sovereign Redeemer and other friends,
Here is another gem from J.C. Ryle’s Holiness, Chapter 15, “Do You Love Me?” (based on John 21:16).
“…if you love Christ, never be ashamed to let others see it and know it. Speak for Him. Witness for Him. Live for Him. Work for Him. If He has loved you and washed you from your sins in His own blood – you never need shrink from letting others know that you feel it, and love Him in return.
‘Man,’ said a thoughtless, ungodly English traveler, to a North American Indian convert, ‘Man, what is the reason that you make so much of Christ, and talk so much about Him? What has this Christ done for you, that you should make so much ado about him?’
The converted Indian did not answer him in words. He gathered together some dry leaves and moss and made a ring with them on the ground. He picked up a live worm and put it in the middle of the ring. He struck a light and set the moss and leaves on fire. The flame soon rose, and the heat scorched the worm. It writhed in agony, and after trying in vain to escape on every side, curled itself up in the middle, as if about to die in despair. At that moment the Indian reached forth his hand, took up the worm gently and placed it on his bosom.
‘Sir,’ he said to the Englishman, ‘do you see that worm? I was that perishing creature. I was dying in my sins, hopeless, helpless and on the brink of eternal fire. It was Jesus Christ who put forth the arm of His power. It was Jesus Christ who delivered me with the hand of His grace, and plucked me from everlasting burnings. It was Jesus Christ who placed me, a poor sinful worm, near the heart of His love. Stranger, that is the reason why I talk of Jesus Christ, and make much of Him. I am not ashamed of it, because I love Him.’
If we know anything of love to Christ, may we have the mind of this North American Indian! May we never think that we can…
love Christ to well,
live to Him to thoroughly,
confess Him too boldly,
lay ourselves out for Him too heartily!
Of all the things that will surprise us in the resurrection morning, this I believe will surprise us most: that we did not love Christ more before we died!”
Dear Sovereign Redeemer and other friends,
When the global church is pressed on every side, from without and within, it is good to remember that the great Head of the Church, the Lord Jesus Christ, needs no help in defending His own.
Consider the true words of J.C. Ryle:
“Fear not for the Church of Christ – when ministers die, and saints are taken away. Christ can ever maintain His own cause. He will raise up better servants and brighter stars. The stars are all in His right hand. Leave off all anxious thought about the future. Cease to be cast down by the measures of statesmen, or the plots of wolves in sheep’s clothing. Christ will ever provide for His own Church. Christ will take care that ‘the gates of Hell shall not prevail against it.’ All is going on well, though our eyes may not see it. The kingdoms of this world shall yet become the kingdoms of our God, and of His Christ.” (Holiness, Chapter 13, “The Church Which Christ Builds”)
Dear Sovereign Redeemer and other friends,
First, this post signifies that I am back in the blogosphere. My last post was October 10, 2012, and it was sparse before that. Self-admittedly, that is pitiful. So while I’ll never be up for blogger of the year, I am rededicating myself to regular entries because there are simply too many benefits to the thinking and precision required by the discipline of writing. Even if no one ever reads a single entry, I will be more well thought-out, more precise, and more articulate on the topics I undertake. Those things are all important.
Now to a piercing quote from J.C. Ryle:
“I do urge on every professing Christian who wishes to be happy, the immense importance of making no compromise between God and the world. Do not try to drive a hard bargain, as if you wanted to give Christ as little of your heart as possible, and to keep as much as possible of the things of this life.” (Holiness, chapter 10)
I will save you the commentary on how hard this hits me personally, and get straight to the question: Do you find yourself wanting to give Christ as little of your heart as possible? There is only one solution: REPENT. True repentance secures times of refreshing from the presence of the Lord (Acts 3:19, and though this verse speaks of the initial repentance of salvation, it is also true of the ongoing repentance of believers as they are sanctified).
Finally, a dear friend and Deacon of the church had a celebration to honor the contributions of J.C. Ryle on May 10, Ryle’s birthday. Though he has now been dead for more than a century, his writings may be having a greater impact now than at any other time. I am a grateful student.
(Yes, the books were edible!)