All the Puritans regarded religious feeling and pious emotion without knowledge as worse than useless. Only when the truth was being felt was emotion in any way desirable. When men felt and obeyed the truth they knew, it was the work of the Spirit of God, but when they were swayed by feeling without knowledge, it was a sure sign that the devil was at work, for feeling divorced from knowledge and urgings to action in darkness of mind were both as ruinous to the soul as was knowledge without obedience. So the teaching of truth was the pastor's first task, as the learning of it was the layman's.
J.I. Packer, Knowing God, p. 70
1 comment:
"All the Puritans regarded religious feeling and pious emotion without knowledge as worse than useless . . ."
Glenn, this is something I have been saying for some time, sadly at times it has come at the cost of personal friendships which didn't have sufficiently similar values at their core.
What a pity so many people who say they are "Christians" don't accept even a fraction of the teaching promulgated by the Puritans, and attempt to justify their relaxing of Biblical values by saying "it's just an over reaction to the black and white approach of groups such as the Puritans, but don't worry, the pendulum will eventually swing back to the centre".
No I'm not advocating that we all adopt the lifestyle of the Puritans and become as fiercely legalistic as they were. But I am saying that it probably wouldn't hurt any one of us to honestly reassess if what we call "Worship" is actually worshiping God, and if it's not then it behooves us to get that preacher off the pedestal and redirect the spotlight on to whom it should be focused on.
Sadly, it is always far too easy to mock and ridicule any group (particularly those which are no longer capable of defending themselves), for their strict, (almost legalistic), adherence to Biblical teaching and very high personal moral values, and yet right in the midst of that mocking we are happily permitting the solid teaching and high moral values to assume a diametricly opposite position within both the peoples personal lives, and within what we glibly call "the church".
How can this be honouring to God? How can this be us being obedient to what we know as "The Great Commission" in Mark?
"15 And he said unto them, Go ye into all the world, and preach the gospel to every creature.
16 He that believeth and is baptized shall be saved; but he that believeth not shall be damned."
(Mark 16: 15-16)
I pray Gods strength as you continue your important ministry
Al
Post a Comment