We Have a Great Physician!

Sin is the sickness of the soul, in itself mortal and incurable, as to any power in heaven or earth but that of the Lord Jesus only. But he is the great, the infallible Physician.
Have we the privilege to know his name?
Have we been enabled to put ourselves into his hand?
We have then no more to do but to attend his prescriptions, to be satisfied with his methods, and to wait his time. It is lawful to wish we were well; it is natural to groan, being burdened: but still he must and will take his own course with us; and, however dissatisfied with ourselves, we ought still to be thankful that he has begun his work in us, and to believe that he will also make an end. Therefore while we mourn, we should likewise rejoice; we should encourage ourselves to expect all that he has promised; and we should limit our expectations by his promises. --John Newton
..

After all the talk of cutting off hands and feet, and really fighting sin... someone might wonder, "Why doesn't God just deliver us immediately?" "What is the purpose of our struggle with sin?" No one recently has helped me more than John Newton, who writes:

First,-How can these things be, or why are they permitted? Since the Lord hates sin, teaches his people to hate it and cry against it, and has promised to hear their prayers, how is it that they go thus burdened? Surely if he could not, or would not, over-rule evil for good, he would not permit it to continue.

1.) Teach us depth of our sin
By these exercises he teaches us more truly to know and feel the utter depravity and corruption of our whole nature, that we are indeed defiled in every part.

2.) Teach us to love Christ's gracious dealings with us
His method of salvation is likewise hereby exceedingly endeared to us; we see that it is and must be of grace, wholly of grace; and that the Lord Jesus Christ, and his perfect righteousness, is and must be our all in all.

3.) Display that He can accomplish His glorious will despite our sin

His power likewise in maintaining his own work, notwithstanding our infirmities, temptations, and enemies, is hereby displayed in the clearest light, his strength is manifested in our weakness.

4.) To taunt Satan by showing his limits

Satan likewise is more remarkably disappointed and put to shame, when he finds bounds set to his rage and policy, beyond which he cannot pass; and that those in whom he finds so much to work upon, and over whom he so often prevails for a season, escape at last out of his hands. He casts them down, but they are raised again; he wounds them, but they are healed: he obtains his desire to sift them as wheat, but the prayer of their great Advocate prevails for the maintenance of their faith.

5.) So that we might help others who struggle

Further, by what believers feel in themselves they learn by degrees how to warn, pity, and bear with others. A soft, patient, and compassionate spirit, and a readiness and skill in comforting those who are cast down, is not perhaps attainable in any other way.

6.) To increase our longing for the next world

And lastly, I believe nothing more habitually reconciles a child of God to the thought of death, than the wearisomeness of this warfare.

Death is unwelcome to nature; but then, and not till then, the conflict will cease. Then we shall sin no more. The flesh, with all its attendant evils, will be laid in the grave, then the soul, which has been partaker of a new and heavenly birth, shall be freed from every encumbrance, and stand perfect in the Redeemer's righteousness before God in glory. --John Newton, read the whole letter

Praise for the past, trust for the future

I trust you find the name and grace of Jesus more and more precious to you; His promises more sweet, and your hope in them more abiding; your sense of your own weakness and unworthiness daily increasing; your persuasion of his all-sufficiency, to guide, support, and comfort you, more confirmed. You owe your growth in these respects in a great measure to His blessing upon those afflictions which He has prepared for you, and sanctified to you. May you praise Him for all that is past, and trust Him for all that is to come!

--from a letter John Newton wrote that has been titled "The School of Suffering" whole thing here

many other newton letters here

Fellow Strugglers

Earlier this week I found an old quote in one of my journals. Later I was able to share it with a fellow struggler. We need these hard words sometimes to call us out of our groveling and challenge us to believe the gospel and find joy and hope!

You say you feel overwhelmed with guilt and a sense of unworthiness. Well, you cannot be too aware of the inward and inbred evils you complain of, but you may be (indeed you are) improperly controlled and affected by them. You say it is hard to understand how a holy G-d could accept such an awful person as yourself. You, then, not only express a low opinion of yourself (which is right!) but also too low an opinion of the person, work, and promises of the Redeemer, which is wrong...You complain about sin, but when we examine your complaints, they are so full of self-righteousness, unbelief, pride, and impatience that they are little better than the worst evils you complain of!"
-- John Newton, to a pastor friend who was struggling

~John Newton, taken from "The Glory of the Gospel: Studies in Paul's Letter to the Galatians".

Yesterday's Newton Quote

several asked about the John Newton letter i quoted y'day.... here is some of it and a link to all of it:

I think my last letter turned upon the apostle's thought, Galatians 5:I7. "Ye cannot do the things that ye would." In the parallel place, Romans 5:19, there is another clause subjoined, "The evil which I would not, that I do." This, added to the former, would complete the dark side of my experience.

Permit me to tell your Lordship a little part (for some things must not, cannot be told), not of what I have read, but of what I have felt, in illustration of this passage. I would not be the sport and prey of wild, vain, foolish, and worse imaginations; but this evil is present with me: my heart is like a highway, like a city without walls or gates. Nothing so false, so frivolous, so absurd, so impossible, or so horrid, but it can obtain access, and that at any time, or in any place: neither the study, the pulpit, or even the Lord's table, exempt me from their intrusion.

.......I see the baseness and absurdity of such a conduct as clearly as I see the light of the day. I do not affect to be thought ten feet high, and I know that a desire of being thought wise or good, is equally contrary to reason and truth. ....

The pride of others often offends me, and makes me studious to hide my own; because their good opinion of me depends much upon their not perceiving it. But the Lord knows how this dead fly taints and spoils my best services, and makes them no better than specious sins.

I embrace it as a faithful saying, and worthy of all acceptation, that Jesus Christ came into the world to save sinners; and it is the main pleasure and business of my life to set forth the necessity and all-sufficiency of the Mediator between God and man, and to make mention of his righteousness even of his only. But here, as in everything else, I find a vast difference between my judgment and my experience (i.e. "what i say i believe and what i actually live out"). I am invited to take the water of life freely, yet often discouraged, because I have nothing wherewith to pay for it.....though my disease is grievous, it is not desperate; I have a gracious and infallible Physician. I shall not die, but live, and declare the works of the Lord.

You can read the entire letter here

Back from Greece

Kim and I had a wonderful time in Greece. Highlights? Either taking communion in Ancient Corinth while reading about it in 1 Corinthians... or the breath-taking vistas of the Greek Islands. Traveling is wonderful, coming home is better.

While away.... my new best friend John Newton helped me out on something.... How can I KNOW so much about faith/holiness/etc. AND LIVE SO LITTLE?! Maybe he'll help you too.

That which has been a frequent theme of my heart of late...I mean the remarkable and humbling difference which I suppose all who know themselves may observe, between their acquired and their experimental knowledge, or, in other words, between their judgement and their practice. --John Newton,

Basically, Newton says that God allows these gaps so that:
1.) We learn that it is all of grace
2.) We learn to be patient & tender with broken folk
3.) We learn to long for heaven when our struggle with sin shall be gone

read the letter here

How Temptations Show Us Christ

Temptations, by giving us a painful sensibility of the weakness of our graces, and the strength of our inward corruptions, tend to mortify the evil principles of self-dependence and self-righteousness, which are so deeply rooted in our fallen nature; to make Christ, in all his relations, offices, and characters, more precious to us; and to convince us, that without Him we can do nothing. --John Newton (read more of this letter here)

What does Christian growth look like?

I will venture to assure you, that though you will possess a more stable peace, in proportion as the Lord enables you to live more simply upon the blood, righteousness, and grace of the Mediator, you will never grow into a better opinion of yourself than you have at present. The nearer you are brought to Him, the quicker sense you will have of your continual need of Him, and thereby your admiration of His power, love, and compassion will increase likewise from year to year. --John Newton