"In today's climate, American Protestanism on the left and the right is committed to Finney's legacy, whether it knows it or not. It can be recognized in the "social gospel" of the left and in the moralistic jeremiads of the right; in the "how-to" pragmatism of the church growth movement and the vast self-help literature and preaching that have become the diet in the Christian subculture; and in the therapeutic obsession with inner spirituality and social activism that one finds in the Emergent movement.
Even if the gospel is formally affirmed, it becomes a tool for engineering personal and public life (salvation-by-works) rather than an announcement that God's just wrath toward us has been satisfied and His unmerited favor has been freely bestowed in Jesus Christ. ...
That's why we can never assume the gospel; it has to be the staple diet not only for the begining, but for the middle and the end of the Christian pilgrimage. ...
The Question "How can I be accepted by a holy God?" is replaced with the quest for self-fulfillment, self-respect, self-esteem, and self-effort. And there are plenty of preachers who will cater to our narcissism, dressing our wound as though it were not serious and telling us how we can have our best life now." -Michael Horton
I borrowed this from Dr. Horton's article, "Does Justification Still Matter?", in Modern Reformation.
It's quite a brain full, but spot on just the same.
Blessings to all who love Christ, and the Cross.
2 comments:
Don,
Thanks for continually pointing us to Christ....
Jazzy, I think it's like the story of the man who sold all he had to buy the field, that had the Treasure.
The treasure is Christ. (And He's our treasure, because He treasured us first.)
"For where your treasure is, that's where your heart will be".
But even with Jesus as our hearts greatest treasure, we do surely have so many other treasures to relinquish throughout our lives.
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