Having been both challenged and blessed by Larry's post (http://willingwriter.blogspot.com/2008/01/late-night-confessions.html) the other night, I found another excerpt from Ryle's Holiness that I reckon arguably sums up the heart of true holiness:
"Would you be holy? Would you become a new creature? Then you must begin with Christ. You will do just nothing at all, and make no progress till you feel your sin and weakness, and flee to Him. He is the root and beginning of all holiness, and the way to be holy is to come to Him by faith and be joined to Him. Christ is not wisdom and righteousness only to His people, but sanctification also. Men sometimes try to make themselves holy first of all, and sad work they make of it. They toil and labour, and turn over new leaves, and make many changes; and yet, like the woman with the issue of blood, before she came to Christ, they feel “nothing bettered, but rather worse” (Mark 5:26). They run in vain, and labour in vain; and little wonder, for they are beginning at the wrong end. They are building up a wall of sand; their work runs down as fast as they throw it up. They are baling water out of a leaky vessel; the leak gains on them, not they on the leak. Other foundation of “holiness” can no man lay than that which Paul laid, even Christ Jesus...
Holiness comes from Christ. It is the result of vital union with Him. It is the fruit of being a living branch of the True Vine. Go then to Christ and say, “Lord, not only save me from the guilt of sin, but send the Spirit, whom Thou didst promise, and save me from its power. Make me holy. Teach me to do Thy will.”
J. C. Ryle, Holiness: Its Nature, Hindrances, Difficulties, and Roots (1877)
Only in the work of Christ and a relationship with Him can we truly progress in holiness. It's all too easy to slip into a destructive and unscriptural mindset that drives us into desperate attempts to be better people, only to find that we are no better off. That's not to decry the efforts that we must make in means of grace, and it isn't promoting a Wesleyan idea of sinless perfection either. But it recognises that holiness starts and ultimately ends with the work of Christ on the Cross and in the sanctifying work of His Spirit.
Blessings
Will
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Christ, Theology, Life
About Me
- Will
- I'm currently a final year student at the University of Warwick reading Classics. I have just finished serving on the Christian Union Executive, and am considering putting myself forward for pastoral ministry in the Church of England after graduation.
Books I'm enjoying
- "Spirit- Empowered Preaching" by A. Azurdia III
- "The Sovereignty of God" by A. Pink
- "In Christ Jesus" by C. Urquhart
- "George Whitefield Vol. 1" by A. Dallimore
- "Studies in the Sermon on the Mount Vol. 1" by D. Lloyd-Jones
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2 comments:
One of the bits of the NT i am really trying to commit to memory is 2 cor 3:18-4.6..."we all with unveiled face beholding the glory of the Lord are being transformed into the same image from one degree of glory to another. For this is from the Lord" Holiness is from God, of God, through God, in God, to God and because of God.
J.I. Packer often quotes Ryle, (I'm not sure of the citation just now), as having said, "My people's greatest need is my personal holiness". If that is the case, then it follows that he would be saying, what his people's greatest need was is vital union with Jesus himself. So often we try to resist sin own our own, but when we do, we botch the job, just as Ryle has said. We need Jesus not just for our justification alone but also for our sanctification. Many of us forget this, and try to finish the job on our own. . .but it is God himself who works in us, to conform us to Christ. . .and we must remember that, else we fall yet again.
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