Saturday 6 September 2008

Look out!

Look out!

Don't look in.

You are a disgusting sinner. Don't look in: look to Jesus, your Saviour.
Look to Jesus, and you see that you're a sinner: but you also see your Saviour.
Look to Him: could you dare to say his life given isn't sufficient, or his atonement incomplete?

Have you faith enough in Jesus to be saved? Irrelevant. Jesus had faithfulness enough to save you.
Can you muster enough will-power to trust in Him? Irrelevant. He set his face steadfastly to go to the cross for you.
Not sure whether you have it in you to keep going as a Christian? Dead right. We have it in Jesus, and we are in Him, and he in us by his Spirit. Look to Jesus.

This is Christianity. We're not to search for the Disney hero within. We're not to embrace who we are. We're not to look for the silver lining. We're to look to Jesus, author and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy set before him, endured the cross, scorning its shame, and sat down at the right hand of the Father, where he always lives to intercede for us. If that is not true, we are the most pitiful fools in the universe.

Don't look in.

Look out!

Bish helpfully concludes with where this ends up - as we look to Christ, we get on with loving others. False spirituality, sin, is man curved in on himself. True religion, looking to a righteousness foreign to us in Christ, turns man out to love God and others.

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