The Human Heart As My Functional Saviour.

"If we say we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth can't be in us. But if we confess our sins, He is faithful and just to forgive our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness".
(1 John 1:8-9)

Thought I'd share a little revelation I had today, and something I have to repent of. I have a tendency not to rely on Jesus' finished work for my right standing with God. Instead, I rely on how I feel about Jesus' finished work. Thus, my "saviour" can't be Jesus, but my feelings. This simply cannot do.

I think to an extent we all do. Here's the scenario: We sin. We hate, we slander, we gossip, we worship other things, we lie, we lust, we whatever. This is natural fact, this isn't in contention. But, it happens, and the tendency is to feel rubbish, guilty, condemned, convicted before God. We are suddenly made aware of our sin, and we repent before God, which is right. But we then don't really feel any better until we "feel" forgiven. It may be that we feel a rushing sense of forgiveness, it may be that we feel happy, but we identify a feeling with being forgiven. This is stupid.

Time and time again, the Bible tells us that we are under grace, not law, that we stand cleansed by the blood of Jesus, not through our own efforts. We see this even in the Old Testament: Joshua the high priest being accused and instead being robed with white in Malachi; even in Deuteronomy, God tells Israel, "it's not because of your righteousness". I am forgiven, regardless of whether I feel it particularly.

This dangerous. First, it leads to false repentance. The first of Luther's 95 Theses said that the Christian life was one of constant repentance, and I we happen to wake up one day feeling really, really forgiven... that doesn't make me any less of a sinner, or my efforts any less than a filthy rag, nor lessen my need for repentance. I am forgiven, but I need to approach God in humility, acknowledging the fact I can and will mess up, and ask for a change of heart. If I feel good enough already, this becomes redundant, as I won't need to keep my life in check so long as I trust in my arbitrary feelings. This in turn, leads to a works-based thing: I do X because X makes me feel holy before God. This is not only dangerous, but really, really stupid. It's self-deception, that anything I do can put me right with God. And above all, it's replacing Jesus with whatever I do to make me feel happy again. Whether it's the first 3 tracks of Matt Redman's Facedown album, or a favourite Bible verse... these things are awesome, don't get me wrong, and useful because the Psalmist says a LOT we need to keep reminding ourselves, our souls need to wake up... these things don't make me holy. These things point me to my saviour, they do not save me. If I use them as good luck charms to make me feel sanctified, to make me feel better about myself, rather than trusting in the fully objective, fully accomplished, fully transcendent, fully unbreakable, fully irreversible, fully covering work of the Cross, then, it's not only dangerous but pathetically stupid. And still, how easy it is to base our salvation on us: on how we think of ourselves, on how we feel about it, etc, etc.

So, here's a list of things that the work of Jesus are bigger than, and thus, really not subject to whatsoever:

• my feelings / emotions / perception
• reason / logic
• time
• space
• heights
• depths
• life
• death
• anything else in all creation...

Hopefully, that should be clear.

On Christ the Solid Rock I stand, all other ground is sinking sand.