Our Inescapable Need

For I delivered to you as of first importance what I also received, that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures, and that He was buried, and that He was raised on the third day according to the Scriptures, and that He appeared to Cephas, then to the twelve (1 Corinthians 15:3-5). We have—“delivered to [us] as of first importance”—the gospel. We possess the glorious good news of the one and only Christ who died for our sins…who was buried…who was raised…who appeared to many. We possess this grand treasure—unique to all religions that God assumed the burden of reconciliation Himself at great price yet offers it freely to all who will believe it exclusively—but does it possess us? We share it with those who still need to hear it; those who still need to hear it, yet again. We rally around it, sloganize it, write songs about it, preach sermons about it, protect its orthodoxy in a current of heterodoxy. We march to its cadence, throw money to its furthering, dissect its nuances and debate its veracity. We have the gospel but have we forgotten that we still need the gospel we have?

I am unavoidably aware of the inescapable need I have for the very gospel I teach and preach. I admit that there are pockets when I wrongly think the gospel is more for those who haven’t yet received its healing. But the fact of the matter is that I never stop needing the gospel of grace. And neither do you.

O LORD,

I am a shell full of dust, but animated with an invisible rational soul and made new by an unseen power of grace. Yet I am no rare object of valuable price, but one that has nothing and is nothing, although chosen of thee from eternity, given to Christ, and born again; I am deeply convinced of evil and misery of a sinful state, of vanity of creatures, but also of the sufficiency of Christ.

When thou wouldst guide me I control myself. When thou wouldst be sovereign I rule myself. When thou wouldst take care of me I suffice myself. When I should submit to thy providence I follow my will. When I should study, love, honour, trust thee, I serve myself. I fault and correct thy laws to suit myself. Instead of thee I look to a man’s approbation, and am by nature an idolater.

Lord, it is my chief design to bring my heart back to thee. Convince me that I cannot be my own God, or make myself happy, nor my own Christ to restore my joy, nor my own Spirit to teach, guide, rule me. Help me to see that grace does this by providential affliction, for when my credit it good thou dost cast me lower, when riches are my idol thou dost wing them away, when pleasure is my all thou dost turn it into bitterness.

Take away my roving eye, curious ear, greedy appetite, lustful heart; show me that none of these things can heal a wounded conscience, or support a tottering frame or uphold a departing spirit. Then take me to the cross and leave me there.

“Man A Nothing” pp. 166-67, The Valley of Vision