By comparing ourselves to other people and trying to make ourselves look better than others, we are boasting. Trying to recommend ourselves, trying to create a self-esteem resume because we are desperate to fill our sense of inadequacy and emptiness. The ego is busy. So busy all the time.
The Freedom of Self-Forgetfulness, 2017, 10 Publishing, p. 20. Used by Permission.
The ego is incredibly busy – in other words, it is always drawing attention to itself. It is incredibly busy trying to fill the emptiness. And it is incredibly busy doing two things in particular – comparing and boasting.
The Freedom of Self-Forgetfulness, 2017, 10 Publishing, p. 17. Used by Permission.
Spiritual pride is the illusion that we are competent to run our own lives, achieve our own sense of self-worth and find a purpose big enough to give us meaning in life without God.
The Freedom of Self-Forgetfulness, 2017, 10 Publishing, p. 15. Used by Permission.
Up until the 20th century, traditional cultures (and this is still true of most cultures in the world) always believed that too high a view of yourself was the root cause of all the evil in the world… Our belief today – and it in deeply rooted in everything – is that people misbehave for lack of self-esteem and because they have too low a view of themselves.
The Freedom of Self-Forgetfulness, 2017, 10 Publishing, p. 9. Used by Permission.
The essence of gospel-humility is not thinking more of myself or thinking less of myself, it is thinking of myself less… True gospel-humility means I stop connecting every experience, every conversation, with myself. In fact, I stop thinking about myself. The freedom of self-forgetfulness. The blessed rest that only self-forgetfulness brings.
A truly gospel-humble person is not a self-hating person or a self-loving person, but a gospel-humble person. The truly gospel-humble person is a self-forgetful person whose ego is just like his or her toes. It just works. It does not draw attention to itself. The toes just work; the ego just works. Neither draws attention to itself.
The Freedom of Self-Forgetfulness, 2017, 10 Publishing, p. 33. Used by Permission.
The self-forgetful person would never be hurt particularly badly by criticism. It would not devastate them, it would not keep them up late, it would not bother them. Why? Because a person who is devastated by criticism is putting too much value on what other people think, on other people’s opinions.
The Freedom of Self-Forgetfulness, 2017, 10 Publishing, p. 33. Used by Permission.
In Christianity, the moment we believe, God imputes Christ’s perfect performance to us as if it were our own, and adopts us into His family. In other words, God can say to us just as He once said to Christ, “You are my Son, whom I love; with you I am well pleased.”
The Freedom of Self-Forgetfulness, 2017, 10 Publishing, p. 40. Used by Permission.
You see, the verdict is in. And now I perform on the basis of the verdict. Because [God] loves me and He accepts me, I do not have to do things just to build up my resume. I do not have to do things to make me look good. I can do things for the joy of doing them. I can help people to help people – not so I can feel better about myself, not so I can fill up the emptiness.
The Freedom of Self-Forgetfulness, 2017, 10 Publishing, p. 40. Used by Permission.
The secret to freedom from enslaving patterns of sin is worship. You need worship. You need great worship. You need weeping worship. You need glorious worship. You need to sense God’s greatness and to be moved by it — moved to tears and moved to laughter — moved by who God is and what He has done for you. And this needs to be happening all the time.
Sin as Slavery, March, 17, 1996, available at Gospelinlife.com. Used by Permission.
The Bible defines sin as craving something more than God. Sin is making something more important than God.
Sin as Slavery, March, 17, 1996, available at Gospelinlife.com. Used by Permission.
You know you are an addict when you are trying to escape your distress with the very thing that brought you your distress. And when you are in that spiral, you are stuck forever.
Sin as Slavery, March, 17, 1996, available at Gospelinlife.com. Used by Permission.
You know how addiction works. It starts like this: There’s some kind of disappointment or distress in your life. As a result you choose to deal with that distress with an agent; it might be sex, it might be drugs, it might be alcohol. The agent promises transcendence. The agent promises freedom, a sense of being in control, a sense of being above all this, a sense of being liberated, a sense of escape. And so you do it. But when you do it, when you take the addicting agent as a way of dealing with life, the trap is set.
Sin as Slavery, March, 17, 1996, available at Gospelinlife.com. Used by Permission.
If Jesus, the Lord of Love and Author of Grace spoke about hell more often, and in a more vivid, blood-curdling manner than anyone else, it must be a crucial truth.
Secret Church 2013.
Work is so foundational to our makeup that it is one of the few things we can take in significant doses without harm. Indeed, the Bible does not say we should work one day and rest six, or that work and rest should be balanced evenly – but directs us to the opposite ration. Leisure and pleasure are great goods, but we can only take so much of them. If you ask people in nursing homes or hospitals how they are doing, you will often heart that their main regret is that they wish they had something to do, some way to be useful to others.
Secret Church 2014.
The true god of your heart is what your thoughts effortlessly go to when there is nothing else demanding your attention.
