When the heart is fat with the love of Jesus

“On the most basic levels, I desire fullness, and fleshly lusts seduce me by attaching themselves to this basic desire. They exploit the empty spaces in me, and they promise that fulness will be mine if I give in to their demands. When my soul sits empty and is aching for something to fill it, such deceptive promises are extremely difficult to resist.

Consequently, the key to mortifying fleshly lusts is to eliminate the emptiness within me and replace it with fullness; and I accomplish this by feasting on the gospel. Indeed, it is in the gospel that I experience a God who glorifies Himself by filling me with His fullness. . . . This is the God of the gospel, a God who is satisfied with nothing less than my experience of fullness in Him! . . .

Indeed, as I perpetually feast on Christ and all His blessings found in the gospel, I find that my hunger for sin diminishes and the lies of lust simply lose their appeal. Hence, to the degree that I am full, I am free. Eyes do not rove, nor do fleshly lusts rule, when the heart is fat with the love of Jesus!”

- Milton Vincent, A Gospel Primer for Christians (2008), 45-46

Despair of Overcoming Chronic Temptations

“I know all about the despair of overcoming chronic temptations. It is not serious provided self-offended petulance, annoyance at breaking records, impatience et cetera doesn’t get the upper hand. No amount of falls will really undo us if we keep on picking ourselves up each time. We shall of course be very muddy and tattered children by the time we reach home. But the bathrooms are all ready, the towels put out, and the clean clothes are in the airing cupboard. The only fatal thing is to lose one’s temper and give it up. It is when we notice the dirt that God is most present to us: it is the very sign of his presence.”

- C.S. Lewis, in a letter to Mary Neylan, January 20, 1942

The Dark Guest

O LORD, Bend my hands and cut them off, for I have often struck you with a wayward will, when these fingers should embrace you by faith. I am not yet weaned from all created glory, honour, wisdom, and esteem of others, for I have a secret motive to eye my name in all I do. Let me not only speak the word sin, but see the thing itself. Give me to view a discovered sinfulness, to know that though my sins are crucified they are never wholly mortified. Hatred, malice, ill-will, vain-glory that hungers for and hunts after man's approval and applause, all are crucified, forgiven, but they rise again in my sinful heart. O my crucified but never wholly mortified sinfulness! O my life-long damage and daily shame! O my indwelling and besetting sins! O the tormenting slavery of a sinful heart! Destroy, O God, the dark guest within whose hidden presence makes my life a hell. Yet you have not left me here without grace; The cross still stands and meets my needs in the deepest straits of the soul. I thank you that my remembrance of it is like David's sight of Goliath's sword which preached forth your deliverance. The memory of my great sins, my many temptations, my falls, bring afresh into my mind the remembrance of your great help, of your support from heaven, of the great grace that saved such a wretch as I am. There is no treasure so wonderful as that continuous experience of your grace toward me which alone can subdue the risings of sin within: Give me more of it. -A Puritan Prayer

You are not allowed to be in the church IF..

Anybody who is NOT a sinner is NOT allowed here. I think we need a serious cleansing in our churches today. We should clean out the church with a whip. Anybody who is good, upright, not a sinner, well, whole hearted, can not cry, not broken, righteous, unrepentant, indifferent should be kicked out of the churches. Church must be a haven for bad people, disreputable, sinners, ill, sick, broken hearted, people whose pillows are soaked with tears, broken, poor, contrite, unrighteous...., Remember, Jesus taught us to worship God in Spirit and Truth. He showed the whole world how to worship, the ultimate function of a human being, by teaching it to a woman who was a member of a sect called Samaritans. Samaritans are half Jews, interbred with the pagans, people who sticked their middle finger to the Jews and God by writing their own version of the Torah (the first five books of the Bible), called it the word of God, made their own version of the Temple (where God was suppose to live)... And most of all the first recipient of the knowledge to worship the right way was a woman with five husbands. She was a whore.... disreputable, bad, broken, contrite, whose pillow was soaked with tears...; Yet, God in His great wisdom chose her and opened her eyes and taught humanity how to worship. Even the twelve disciples were not the first recipient of this... On top of the doors of Christian churches should be a sign, "Anybody who is NOT a sinner is NOT allowed here." My fellow broken sinners, lets be a part of the church and worship God. Jesus said, “Those who are well have no need of a physician, but those who are sick. I have not come to call the righteous but sinners to repentance.” (Read here) You can read the story of the woman here.

Reflections on "Mere Christianity" By C. S. Lewis

I've been dealing with the issues of Sin, Temptation, Chastity and Pride. So, my thoughts and reflections on "Mere Christianity" revolves around these issues. More over, rather than me babbling I'll arrange Lewis' words in a pattern that was helpful to me. "The right direction (in our "walk") leads not only to peace but to knowledge. When a man is getting better he understands more and more clearly the evil that is still left in him. When a man is getting worse, he understands his own badness less and less. A moderately bad man knows he is not very good: a thoroughly bad man thinks he is all right. This is common sense, really. You understand sleep when you are awake, not while you are sleeping... You can understand the nature of drunkenness when you are sober, not when you are drunk. Good people know about both good and evil: bad people do not know about either. Perfect Chastity: We may, indeed, be sure that perfect chastity... will not be attained by any merely human efforts. You must ask for God's help. Even when you have done so, it may seem to you for a long time that no help, or less help than you need, is being given. Never mind. After each failure, ask forgiveness, pick yourself up, and try again. Very often what God first helps us towards is not the virtue itself but just this power of always trying again. For however important chastity (or courage, or truthfulness, or any other virtue) may be, this process trains us in habits of the soul which are more important still. It cures our illusions about ourselves and teaches us to depend on God. We learn, on the one hand, that we cannot trust ourselves even in our best moments, and, on the other, that we need not despair even in our worst, for our failures are forgiven. The only fatal thing is to sit down content with anything less than perfection. The sins of the flesh are bad, but they are the least bad of all sins. All the worst pleasures are purely spiritual: the pleasure of putting other people in the wrong, of bossing and patronising and spoiling sport, and back-biting; the pleasures of power, of hatred. The essential vice, the utmost evil, is Pride. Unchastity, anger, greed, drunkenness, and all that, are mere flea bites in comparison: it was through Pride that the devil became the devil: Pride leads to every other vice: it is the complete anti-God state of mind. Many a man has overcome cowardice, or lust, or ill-temper by learning to think that they are beneath his dignity-that is, by Pride. The devil laughs. He is perfectly content to see you becoming chaste and brave and self-controlled provided, all the time, he is setting up in you the Dictatorship of Pride - just as he would be quite content to see your chilblains (swelling or sore) cured if he was allowed, in return, to give you cancer. For Pride is spiritual cancer: it eats up the very possibility of love, or contentment, or even common sense. Pride (if you want to find out how proud you are..): The more pride one had, the more one disliked pride in others. In fact, if you want to find out how proud you are the easiest way is to ask yourself, "How much do I dislike it when other people snub me, or refuse to take any notice of me, or shove their oar in, or patronise me, or show off?" The point it that each person's pride is in competition with every one else's pride. It is the comparison that makes you proud: the pleasure of being above the rest. Once the element of competition has gone, pride has gone. That is why I say that Pride is essentially competitive in a way the other vices are not. The sexual impulse may drive two men into competition if they both want the same girl But that is only by accident; they might just as likely have wanted two different girls. But a proud man will take your girl from you, not because he wants her, but just to prove to himself that he is a better man than you. Pride is competitive by its very nature: that is why it goes on and on. The Christians are right: it is Pride which has been the chief cause of misery in every nation and every family since the world began. Other vices may sometimes bring people together: you may find good fellowship and jokes and friendliness among drunken people or unchaste people. But Pride always means enmity-it is enmity. And not only enmity between man and man, but enmity to God. Presence of God and humility: The real test of being in the presence of God is that you either forget about yourself altogether or see yourself as a small, dirty object. It is better to forget about yourself altogether. Do not imagine that if you meet a really humble man he will be what most people call "humble" nowadays: he will not be a sort of greasy, smarmy person, who is always telling you that, of course, he is nobody. Probably all you will think about him is that he seemed a cheerful, intelligent chap who took a real interest in what you said to him. If you do dislike him it will be because you feel a little envious of anyone who seems to enjoy life so easily. He will not be thinking about humility: he will not be thinking about himself at all. If anyone would like to acquire humility, I can, I think, tell him the first step. The first step is to realise that one is proud. And a biggish step, too. At least, nothing whatever can be done before it. If you think you are not conceited, it means you are very conceited indeed."