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I spent most of the 1980s heavily involved with a Keswick group which emphasized victorious christian living and the deepr life. While I will not pass any judgment on my fellow believers in that group, I can speak from my experience.
Emphasiziing victorious Christian living instead of focusing on Christ and how He lived fosters pride, division, and isolationism in believers. "Victorious Christian Living" as I have seen it is nothing more than repackaged perfectionism and legalism. What we heard constantly from the pulpit under this type of teaching was that if we didn't somehow reach the victorious life, we were not truly being sanctified. This turned Christian living into an exercise in human effort.
The fact is we sin regularly (O wretched man (woman) that I am!), we fail the Lord, we struggle with depression and weakness, but our comfort is that Christ has already won the victory. How that plays out, I believe, is in our constantly running back to Christ for daily strength and grace. The focus is on Him, not on our victorious acheivement.
The one thought that has helped me the greatest in this regard is this-- when Paul the apostle mentions himself in his earlier NT writings, he calls himself the least of the apostles. By the end, in his later writings, he calls himself the chief of sinners. The more we walk with the Lord, the more of our wretchedness we see, and the more we rely on His grace and mercy. That is what drives us to holiness.
__________________ J Baldwin
Keowee Presbyterian Church, PCA
Pickens, SC
“You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength and with all your mind, and your neighbor as yourself.” Luke 10:27 Check Out My Blog: http://reflectjoy.blogspot.com/ |