The Cup and the Crucifixion

Fresh stuff from Odd Thomas over at Humble Beast:
 

Grace in Practice

This guy is showing us Protestants what 'grace in practice' looks like. 

Tullian Tchividjian: Grace & Men

Perhaps messages like this are too much. Maybe the critics are right when they say that the "grace folks" have taken things too far. Sometimes I wonder if those men and women, whom I have great  respect for, who call for "balance" are correct.

All I can say is that I love preaching like this! The gospel message, not the "be better" or "try harder" message, gets me through the day. The message of God's radical grace in Christ for sinners is nourishment to my hungry soul.

Honestly, the "balanced" preachers and their masterful expositions bore me to tears. I unsubscribe. 

I will admit that I am an addict. I need grace, grace, and more grace - gospel, gospel, and more gospel - Jesus, Jesus, and more Jesus. 

We all have our proof texts. My "balanced" friends make good arguments from Scripture for what they believe, and I appreciate their call to caution.

I will just say that the whole of Scripture seems to clearly state that men are wicked as hell, yet God's love for them in Christ trumps that wickedness. He is faithful even though they (we) are faithless.

Praise God for Jesus! 

William Beveridge: Depravity

"I cannot pray, except I sin; I cannot preach, but I sin; I cannot administer or receive the holy sacrament, but I sin. My very repentance needs to be repented of; and the tears I shed need washing in the blood of Christ."

With an understanding of sin such as that, I have a strong suspicion that Mr. Beveridge was a lover of grace. 

Victor Hugo: Grace in Old Age

"When grace is joined with wrinkles, it is adorable. There is an unspeakable dawn in happy old age."

George Whitefield: Self Righteousness or Peace with God

[To have peace with God]:

"...You must be troubled for the sins of your best duties and performances. You must be brought to see that God may damn you for the best prayer you ever put up.  Our best duties are so many splendid sins.  There must be a deep conviction before you can be brought out of your self-righteousness; it is the last idol taken out of the heart.”

[via]

Elyse Fitzpatrick: Where Grace is Found

"The only place you can find grace is when you say 'nothing in my hand I bring simply to thy cross I cling'... when you throw yourself at the mercy of God."

[via]

Gerhard Forde: It is Finished!

[In the cross], “God has stormed the last bastion of the self, the last presumption that you really were going to do something for him…He has died in your place! He has done it. He made it. It is all over, finished, between you and God! 

He died in your place that death which you must die; he has done it in such a way as to save you. He has borne the whole thing! The fact that there is nothing left for you to do is the death of self and the birth of the new creature.”

[via]

Tullian Tchividjian: Imputed Righteousness

"As everything, he became nothing so that you, as nothing, could have everything. You bring nothing to the table except the unrighteousness that makes Christ’s righteousness necessary. 

The perfect righteousness of Christ has been freely credited to your bankrupt account forever (what theologians call “imputation”). 

The gospel is good news for those who have finally been crushed under the weight of trying to make “righteousness” happen on their own."

[via]

Dave Harvey: Sin & Grace in Marriage

“The cross makes a stunning statement about husbands and wives: we are sinners and our only hope is grace... Once I know that I am indeed the worst of sinners, then my spouse is no longer my biggest problem: I am.  

And when I find myself walking in the shoes of the worst of sinners, I will make every effort to grant my spouse the same lavish grace that God has granted me.”

[via]

Ravi Zacharias: Jesus Among Other Gods

This is a fantastic message:

B. B. Warfield: Christ, Not Faith, Saves Us

“It is not faith that saves, but faith in Jesus Christ… It is not, strictly speaking, even faith in Christ that saves, but Christ that saves through faith. 

The saving power resides exclusively, not in the act of faith or the attitude of faith or in the nature of faith, but in the object of faith.”

[via]

Grace on Twitter

"The only way we'll find grace to give others when they fail is when we've found it for ourselves in the love of Christ when we fail." - Elyse Fitzpatrick

"Look not to yourselves. You are by nature wretched, miserable, poor, blind and naked. Look simply unto Jesus." - J.C. Ryle via Tullian

“If the Gospel is about anything, it is about a God who meets us where we are, not where we ought to be.” - Robert Farrar Capon

Jack Miller: What is the Gospel?

"Herein is the Gospel and only herein.  

Everything in Scripture may be the truth of God. But only in the proclaimed finished work of Jesus Christ revealed in God's Word do we hear and receive the unique Good News of God, the power of God unto salvation unto everyone that believeth." [via]

This is Jesus Christ

"Born as a son,
led forth as a lamb,
sacrificed as a sheep,
buried as a man,
he rose from the dead as a God,
for he was by nature God and man.

He is all things:
he judges, and so he is Law;
he teaches, and so he is Wisdom;
he saves, and so he is Grace;
he suffers, and so he is sacrifice;
he is buried, and so he is man;
he rises again, and so he is God.

This is Jesus Christ,
to whom belongs glory for all ages."

- Melito, bishop of Sardis (d. 180) [via]

John Piper: Grace in Christ

Here's a grace nugget to feast upon as you go about your Monday:

"Grace was given to you, Christian, before the universe was made. And it was given to you in Jesus Christ."

[via]

D. G. Barnhouse: The Righteousness of God

"God is righteousness, God demands righteousness, and God provides righteousness. 

If those three statements are understood, then the whole gospel will be understood. If those three statements are not understood, then the gospel can never be understood. 

Wherever there is heresy, men have departed from the idea that God is righteousness, and that therefore He must demand that righteousness of all His creatures; and, that since none can have it apart from Him, because His nature is also love, He provides His righteousness in His way."

[via]

David Zahl: Grace and (Social) Media

David Zahl is one of those guys who has helped a lot of people (like myself) better understand human identity and self-justification, and he does so in a culturally-savvy yet gospel-saturated manner. 

You will enjoy his message from this year's LIBERATE conference.

“The gospel is not ‘God loves us,’ but ‘God loves us at the cost of his Son.’” - Derek Thomas

Rich Mullins: Of First Importance?

“I have attended church regularly since I was less than a week old. I’ve listened to sermons about virtue, sermons against vice. I have heard about money, time management, tithing, abstinence, and generosity. I’ve listened to thousands of sermons. But I could count on one hand the number of sermons that were a simple proclamation of the gospel of Christ.” 

[via]

"I wish I could say that Jesus fully satisfies me, but I can't. What I can say is that Jesus fully satisfied God for me." - Tullian Tchividjian

"Even our tears of repentance need to be washed in the blood of the Lamb." 
- Author Unknown

R.C. Sproul: Helpless Sinners Can Survive Only By Grace

"When we understand the character of God, when we grasp something of His holiness, then we begin to understand the radical character of our sin and hopelessness. 

Helpless sinners can survive only by grace. 

Our strength is futile in itself; we are spiritually impotent without the assistance of a merciful God. We may dislike giving our attention to God's wrath and justice, but until we incline ourselves to these aspects of God's nature, we will never appreciate what has been wrought for us by grace."

Tim Keller: The Only Secure Love

"God does not love us because we are serviceable; He loves us simply because He loves us. This is the only kind of love we can ever be secure in, of course, since it is the only kind of love we cannot possibly lose."

[via]

The Good Stuff

There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus...

Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or danger, or sword?...

No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us. For I am sure that neither death nor life, nor angels nor rulers, nor things present nor things to come, nor powers, nor height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord. - Romans 8