Thursday, July 19, 2007

Cheap Grace

Don't have much time before worship, but just wanted to share part of what I have been reading. I bought a book by John Piper at Passion 07' called When I Don't Desire God: How to Fight For Joy. I have just got around to reading it this summer and it is blowing my socks off. I have to read every page like 3 times just to even begin to understand his genius writing. I am now STUCK on a particular page because of a Dietrich Bonhoeffer quote that Piper adds in at the bottom of the page. I just can't get over it, and the sadness of how true it really is...

"Cheap grace is the preaching of forgiveness without requiring repentance, baptism without church discipline, Communion without confession, absolution without personal confession. Cheap grace is grace without discipleship, grace without the cross, grace without Jesus Christ, living and incarnate....The only man who has the right to say that he is justified by grace alone is the man who has left all to follow Christ...We...have gathered like eagles round the carcass of cheap grace, and there we have drunk of the poison which has killed the life of following Christ."



Sweet Jesus I pray for forgiveness for the ways that we have minimized you, contained you, tried to restrain you, and kept you from doing your work. I hate that we have even thought about making you anything your not, an at the same time not given you enough credit for ALL that you are. I pray that the world would see and know the true Christ, and not some fabrication of Him, or the version of Him that we have adopted and tried to mold you into to give to others. Reveal yourself to us in a way that makes us change and kills any evidence of cheap grace in our lives. We love you, help us love you more.

13 comments:

beckyjomama said...

ok, so I know that you do not know me from Adam (or in this case EVE!!) but I located you from Beth Moore's blog... I was checkin out the other siestas and came upon your blog and can I just say that this has moved me to tears! Cheap Grace is sooooooooo prevalent (sp?) in today's society and, sadly, at times in my own life. This is such a wake up call. God Bless you my sister for waking me up!
Thanks.
In HIM
Becky Jo

Kiran Thadhani said...

Oh gosh, this is good. I'm one of Shelly's friends who came upon your blog.

And Amen sister...it breaks my heart to see the Body prositute ourselves in the name of Christ looking for something to cling to even though we acknowledge Christ as Savior.

You are so wise in Him.

Shelly said...

Ohhh....

I don't know what else to say but that...

(And a side-note that I always feel like I need a dictionary beside me when I'm reading Piper! lol)

Love you...

And His grace...

Anonymous said...

It is so refreshing to see someone so young and beautiful loving the Lord. Thank you for your going after Him. The Lord is searching the earth looking for those who are fully committed to Him so He can show Himself strong on their behalf. I expect you will see His glory in your life again and again. A heart that is fully His is someone whose vision is fully His -- face set like flint with eyes on the Savior. No confidence in self and ALL confidence in Him. When we fix our eyes on Him we learn to follow Him step by step. Keeping in step w/ Him is where the power is (learning to "keep in step w/ the Holy Spirit"). Where the Spirit of the Lord is there is freedom. So you see we aren't bond to living off cheap grace when we learn to walk with the One who is full of grace. The grace that has the power to truly change us into the real thing, into the fullness of Christ.

Lindsee Lou said...

Wow, Abby.

Thank you for sharing this with us!

I have no words.

LKE

Little Steps Of Faith said...

OKAY, I do have something to say(No surprise there lol)
I completely agree...
But I have to ask a question back to you, because this is something I disagreed with.
My Music Leader, and all of us were singing in worship one day, and he stopped and said, " You guys, I don't feel like you're getting this."

Well, he got an overflow of emails saying how wrong it was for him to say what he did and that he hurt their feelings.

He apologized at the next service.

What do you think? I didn't think he did anything wrong in the first place, but I wanted to know what you thought.

: Heart of Worship, Knows Truth.

Angie

Shelly said...

WOOAH BABY WOOAH!!!

You got a new look - and it is beautiful!!! :) Love it!

But I miss you :( haha

Lindsee Lou said...

I love the new look. How did you make it so cute?!?!

Profbaugh said...

Oh wow!! What a find. Don't you just love John Piper? Praise the LORD!!

~Cheryl

Scarlet said...

I found you at Praise & Coffee. Something about your comment made me think, she's on the same page I am. I was wrong...you're further along (and that's a good thing...FOR ME!). Great post. I'll look into that book sometime.

AK said...

Look at your cute little new blog...it's fabulous! I'm loving the red! Oh and I'm all about Piper...haven't read this one yet but I think I may have to after this review!Have a great week precious sister.

Heather said...

I enjoy Piper and need a dictionary too when I read :)

NHizName said...

You are precious! I just discovered your blog thru Beth Moore's blog ~smile~....You are too precious!
I will be back reading more. God has blessed me just reading the last 3 or 4 of your entries .

Janice