“Are You a Quick Forgiver?” (From Don Whitney’s “Ten Questions…”)

(From Chapter 9 of Don Whitney’s Ten Questions to Diagnose Your Spiritual Health)

The unforgiving spirit . . . is the number one killer of spiritual life. –James Coulter

Everyone thinks forgiveness is a lovely idea until he has something to forgive. —C.S. Lewis

1. Real Christians want to forgive.

• Three times in the Gospels Jesus directly connects our forgiveness of others with God’s forgiveness of us (Mark 11:25-26; Matthew 6:14-15; Luke 6:37). 
• “I say to the glory of God and in utter humility that whenever I see myself before God and realize even something of what my blessed Lord has done for me, I am ready to forgive anybody anything” (Martyn Lloyd-Jones).

2. Ready to forgive verses extending forgiveness.

• Biblical forgiveness is never given or required where there is no repentance. There is no unconditional unforgiveness. 
• When Jesus prayed for the forgiveness of those who came against him while on the cross, it was only extended if they repented!

3. Forgive and forget?

• Nowhere in the Scriptures does it say for humans to “forgive and forget.”
• Scripture only says that God will not remember the sins against us anymore (Jeremiah 31:34; Psalm 103:8-11). Believers are called to not use forgiven sins against the offender.
• Satan will bring the offense and the offender to your mind numerous times, but we must be ready and willing to forgive each time (Luke 17:3-4).
• Be careful that you do not think you have forgiven just because you have forgotten.

4. Probing the heart

• Are you ready to forgive? Is there anyone you are not ready to forgive? (See Psalm 86:5)
• Do you need to initiate the process of forgiveness with anyone (1 Peter 4:8)?
• Do you love forgiveness?

Do You Thirst For God?

Last night at our Wednesday night study, we began looking at Don Whitney’s book Ten Questions to Diagnose Your Spiritual Health.  And if the first study is any indication, this will be a marvelous time in the Word and in evaluating our spiritual health!

In this first chapter, Whitney noted that there are three types of thirsts for the Christian.

The first is the thirst of an empty soul.  This is the soul of one who is not a believer—natural (1 Corinthians 2:14) and unconverted.  He is one who is blinded to his real need, as Ecclesiastes 1:14 notes, one who grasps after the wind.  He is one who is is dissatisfied with the pursuit of this world—he needs more and more, but never has enough.

Yet, on the other side of the coin, he is easily satisfied in regards to his pursuit of God.  In his mind, this is a God who demands little, so he receives little.  For the unbeliever, God is made in his image, rather than us being crafted into God’s image in holiness!

The second thirst is that of a dry soul.  This happens to believers who drink too much from the fountains of the world’s streams—or even try to drink from a fire hydrant to get as much as you can as long as your system can take it. 

Christians also thirst from God’s desertions, when He intentionally withdraws the feeling of His presence.  St. John of the Cross called this the “dark night of the soul.”  These times are telling.  For the true believer, even when we cannot feel God, we know from His promises that “he will never leave us nor forsake us” (Hebrews 13:5b).  For those who may not be true believers, this is a time when they abandon whatever they held to regarding God because they cannot sense Him present. 

If Christians suffer from prolonged physical or mental fatigue.  In Mark 6:30-34, Jesus took his disciples to the side and encouraged them to get some rest.  The physical and the spiritual are connected, and when our ‘temple’ (1 Corinthians 6:19-20) is fatigued, then the vessel for the spiritual is not functioning properly.  Sometimes, the most spiritual thing one can do for yourself and all around you is to take a mini-sabbatical and rest. 

Lastly, there is the thirst of the satisfied soul.  Christians find their satisfaction in Christ and Christ alone.  He satisfies and quenched that thirst (John 7:37-38).  But when we taste and see that something is good, we want more.  We taste and see that the Lord is good (Psalm 34 : 8), then we want more.  And this is a good sign, because it is a sign of the Holy Spirit at work (1 Corinthians 2:10-16).  In fact, God initiates that spiritual thirst so He can have the joy of satisfying it.

Whitney then gave some practical steps in this venture:

• Meditate on Scripture.  One of our deacons noted a time when he was on an airplane and he had an aim to read through the Bible in a year.  He noticed someone across the aisle with her Bible opened.  He asked her, “Are you reading the Bible through?”  “No,” she replied, “I’m studying it!”  There is a difference.  While it is admirable to read the Scriptures through, we must study—even taking a verse or two and ruminating and marinating on it for the day. 
• Pray through Scripture.  The Psalms are geared for this very thing.  But we can take other Scriptures and creatively turn them into prayers as we seek to quench our thirst in Christ.
• Read thirst-making writers.  Some of the books in the bookstores are basically man-driven, self-help books.  But there are precious books that point to Christ in ways that are markedly different from these other books.  Men who have proven to be this way for me are:  A.W. Tozer, Charles Spurgeon, John Piper, John Bunyan, Donald Whitney, John Stott, Jerry Bridges, John MacArthur, J.I. Packer among others. 

Why Christians Need to Be In Shape!

In the summer of 2009, I began an activity that I had avoided for the majority of my life—I began exercising. A lot of factors played into the drastic change in my routine, but the end result is that I began a regiment of watching what I eat, walking, running, situps, pushups, etc.—it became a non-negotiable part of my life. At the time of this writing, I have lost 38 pounds (206 to 168). What took me so long?

The delay stemmed from one simple issue: I felt great! As someone who (depending on who you talked to) was fifty pounds overweight, I really did not have too many ill effects. My cholesterol was still in the 150’s, my heart rate and blood pressure was good, and I seldom was sick.

Yet, looking back, I only felt great when I was not exerting myself. The things I enjoyed doing the most were sedentary things: reading, writing, visiting, studying for sermons, sitting at the piano, sitting at the computer, etc. Yet, if you tried to talk to me immediately after I ran up the stairs, you would not get a coherent sentence out of me for a couple minutes. If you saw me sitting in an airplane seat, working to reach my bags underneath the seat in front of me, you would see the blood rushing to my head and my eyes about ready to shoot across the airplane cabin. Any non-sedentary activity took away my great feeling. It was then that I realized that if I wanted to do anything of consequence that involved any activity whatsoever, something had to change.

How many of us live a sedentary spiritual life, thinking that we are in good spiritual shape—only to find that when we exert effort and energy for the things of God, we find ourselves not in the shape we thought we were in?

Think about it:

• We think we are in great shape—until we engage in the blessed act of prayer.  Then we may see that our prayers are simply about our own comfort and leisure, rather than an abject surrender and submission to God’s will and not our own.
• We think we are in great shape—until we begin to invest in other believers to strengthen them.  Then we may see that we must depend completely upon God to exhibit the numerous ‘one anothers’ in another’s life.
• We think we are in great shape—until we try to explain our faith and worldview as a Christian to someone who does not believe.  We are called to “give an answer” for the faith we have (1 Peter 3:15), and we may feel that anxiety in sharing something not only personal but counter to the culture.  We may realize that we are not as strong in our knowledge or our dependence on Christ to lead us into all truth.
• We think we are in great shape—until something doesn’t go “our way” in church.  We may then realize that our Christian life and church life was merely about our own ambitions and direction, rather than the Spirit’s!
• We think we are in great shape–until that certain temptation comes along and we submit to the sin rather than flee to the Savior who redeemed us from that sin.

Dear friends, the way we exert ourselves is by demonstrating that selfless love that was imparted to us through the selflessness of the gospel of Christ.  We love God with all we have, we love our neighbor as we would ourselves (Matthew 22:37-38).  Our Christian lives seem nice, neat, and tidy—until we begin investing in our brothers and sisters in Christ, as well as investing in those who have not received Christ.  It may get messy, but this is why God left us here:

As I close, I did decide to exercise and lose weight for a number of reasons.

• My wife has lupus, so I felt I needed to be in shape in case the direction of that disease took an unfortunate turn;
• I could not preach self-control from the pulpit unless I was demonstrating self-control in my life (especially my diet);
• I was running out of clothes that fit.

The list could go on.  But whatever my physical condition, I pray that I will not spend more time on that than on getting in shape spiritually.  This body will pass on, but what about my soul (Mark 8:36-37)?

Where Do You Think You’ll Find God?

Some people speak of finding ultimate peace of mind in Tibet or rock climbing in the Alps.  Perhaps it’s not surprising that we call spiritual epiphanies “mountaintop” experiences.  Others talk about their experience of seeing the Dalai Lama, the spectacle of the Mass, or experiencing “transcendence” at a Hindu ashram or Buddhist temple.  Some travel great distances to touch the hem of Jesus’ garment: to Lourdes in the hope of experiencing a miracle or at more Protestant venues, like Toronto or Pensacola to “catch the blessing.”  We are always looking for revival: something exciting, awe-inspiring, and majestic.  Newsweek is not likely to send a reporter to your church next Sunday simply because the Word will be preached.  That is not where the action is.  And yet, Paul tells us, that is exactly where the Spirit is miraculously at work in his grace.  It is precisely here where he unites us to Christ and gives us his gifts.  Sometimes we make “spiritual disciplines” a way of making our way up the mountain to experience God.  However, unless we are going regularly to the Scriptures to find Christ and crying out to him for salvation in prayer, even personal Bible reading and prayer can become methods of idolatry and self-trust.

— Michael Horton, The Gospel-Driven Life, Grand Rapids: Baker Books, 2009.  p. 106.