christian living on Sin

We are forbidden to take sin more seriously than grace, or even as seriously as grace.

It is a fact that the Lord Jesus has already died for you. It is also a fact that you have already died with the Lord Jesus. If you do not believe in your death with Christ, you will not be able to re...

God of healing, we look for you in all the wrong places. We assume we have figured out how you are at work. Because of this, we miss out on seeing your glory, and we fail to join with you as partners ...

The law is harsh and cannot help us to receive forgiveness. In Craddock Stories, a collection of outstanding stories by Fred Craddock, is the following account with one who could understand law, but ...

God of power, love and wisdom: you’ve known us and loved us from before we even were, and extended your grace to us before we knew your name. You save us from ourselves – from our arrogance, rebell...

At the heart of the Protestant faith is the conviction that there is nothing we contribute to our salvation but our sin, no merit we bring but Christ's, and nothing necessary for justification exc...

To you. O God, glory to you! Heavenly Ruler, Comforter, Spirit of truth, Come and dwell within us. You who are everywhere and who fills all things. Treasury of all good and giver of life, Come,...

Grace is not simply about pardoning sinful behavior; it’s also about rewiring the sinners themselves. The grace the Bible talks about is power not just for justification but also for transformation.

‘Salvation’ is a wonderfully wide-ranging word and it would be a great mistake to think that it refers only to the forgiveness of our sins. God is as much concerned with our present and future as with...

[For Christians] the entire religion shop has been closed, boarded up, and forgotten. The church is not in the religion business. It never has been and it never will be, in spite of all the ecclesiast...

Dear Lord, I pray that You would open my mind to the truth of Your Word by means of the Holy Spirit. Open my eyes to see Jesus. Open my heart to love Him more and more. Open my will to do only that wh...

Saul's Confident Error Last week, we considered Abram and the way that God may send us out on a journey, waiting to see his will without knowing the destination.  Today we move forward to Saul on...

[If] Christ is not all to you he is nothing to you. He will never go into partnership as a part Savior of men. If he be something he must be everything, and if he be not everything he is nothing to yo...

Gracious and loving God—Father, Son and Holy Spirit: We praise you for how wide, how high, and how deep is Your vast love for all people. Incarnate in Jesus, You offered Your life for the healing ...

Follow the Spirit. Walk in the rhythm of the Spirit. Sing in the Spirit. Pray with the Spirit. Be filled with the Spirit. Sow to the Spirit. Reap from the Spirit. Preserve the unity of the Spirit. Be ...

In his excellent book on worship, The Dangerous Act of Worship , pastor and president of Fuller Seminary Mark Labberton shares a story of the transformation of one of his former congregants: Ben ...

It is impossible to conceive how different things would have turned out if that birth had not happened whenever, wherever, however it did ... for millions of people who have lived since, the birth of ...

Serving at the time as provincial governor of Northern Italy, St. Ambrose was called in this capacity in 374 to the cathedral in Milan, where a riot was threatening between two rival factions of Chris...

Following the biblical pattern, the church has always assumed that God can communicate spiritual truths to people through their imaginations, especially through dreams and visions. Church history is r...

In 1947 huge crowds came to hear a thirty-two-year-old Californian preach at mass evangelistic rallies throughout China. Although Bob Pierce had no knowledge of Chinese language or culture, his messag...

We can't save ourselves by pulling on our bootstraps, even when the bootstraps are made of the finest religious leather.

For grace is given not because we have done good works, but in order that we may be able to do them.

Grace ceases to be grace if God is compelled to bestow it in the presence of human merit. . . . Grace ceases to be grace if God is compelled to withdraw it in the presence of human demerit. . . . [Gra...

I am not what I might be, I am not what I ought to be, I am not what I wish to be, I am not what I hope to be. But I thank God I am not what I once was, and I can say with the great apostle, "By ...

Human salvation demands the divine disclosure of truths surpassing reason.

Unless there is an element of risk in our exploits for God, there is no need for faith.

Grace is costly because it compels a person to submit to the yoke of Christ and follow him; it is grace because Jesus says: “My yoke is easy and my burden is light.”

Romans 6 shines a bright spotlight on the dangerous half-truth, currently fashionable, that ‘God accepts us as we are.’ Will ‘God’s acceptance’ do as a complete grounding of Christian ethics? Emphatic...

O God, your mercy is infinite and in your will is our peace. We learn your way so slowly; we choose your will so reluctantly. In this season of learning the limit­lessness of your love, help us throug...

I have come to know a God who has a soft spot for rebels, who recruits people like the adulterer David, the whiner Jeremiah, the traitor Peter, and the human-rights abuser Saul of Tarsus. I have come ...