I am reading through David Wells' latest book, The Courage to be Protestant. It is one of those books that is a must read for anyone who loves the church, and offers penetrating insight into our American culture and its affect upon evangelical church culture. I am going to quote several lines from this book that I think are worthy of giving some thought.
"By speaking about faith in terms that are familiar in our world of self-fulfillment, self-esteem, and the whole many-sided self movement, the gospel suddenly is on the cutting edge of where-we-are. By assuming access to God that is as swift and certain as the swipe of a credit card, a spiritual purchase without waiting, the gospel makes itself appealing to consumers. They are getting it when they want and how they want it. By speaking of the gospel in terms not of truth but of feelings, evangelicals of this stripe guarantee for them selves instant success. Feelings are easy to arouse while thought is hard and slow."
"The self-movement is all about feeling good about ourselves, not about being good. It is therapeutic, not moral."
"Evangelical faith, which has lamely followed along this cultural path, has lost its integrity in the world."
"The problem is that study after study over the last four decades has been unable to show any correlation between low self-esteem and all the social maladies that have supposedly followed it."
"The language of sin is not a part of the way people think of themselves."
"The majesty of God's forgiveness is lost entirely when we lose what has to be forgiven."
"When we miss the biblical teaching, we also miss the nature of God's grace in all its height and depth."
"The glory of Christian faith is the grace that has bridged the chasm sin has created, the heights and depths of God's saving love expressed in the person of Christ."
These are some good things to think about as we consider the state of the church in our land.
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