The Good and Beautiful Life – Introduction

10/06/2017
2019.02.01.TGaBL_.Intro_Download

                                                                                                            2-1-19

Summary

The Good and Beautiful Life may be a new book title, but it’s not a new
concept.  Rather, it is a message at the
center of Jesus’ ministry and embraced by the Church through the
centuries.  Yet, it has seemingly been
forgotten, beginning in the 20th century.  The author Wilbourne recently wrote of his
growing realization of the chasm between the Grace he embraced and his
unchanging life in Christ –

“And yet, after a while, having heard this song of grace over and over,
and after singing it myself again and again, when I looked at my own life I
began to feel a growing distress. . . . The distance in my own
life between the grace I proclaimed and the life I was living—that gap was not
shrinking. Grace covered me, but why wasn’t it changing me?”

Smith’s book addresses an important aspect of this issue.  At our last meeting we began with the
introduction and a discussion about our overall place in the world, before and
in Christ our Lord.

Key points

Discussion Notes

This month I’m sharing my notes from our meeting
where we examined the ‘heart’, His Spirit, and how we understand Him.  While it’s not an expansion on our
discussion, I hope the notes can stand enough on their own to encourage our
thoughts and consideration.

  1. Consider
    the correlation of the polluted World and Self, and the wet fish problem.
  • Consider
    the command to Holiness and obedience to Scripture, which is contrary to our
    understanding and inclination.
  • The
    Goal is learning and adopting virtue, a life of God’s understanding and
    practice, while still in the unredeemable problem suffered upon the world.
  • Jesus
    tells us the seat of a person and his actions is the ‘heart’.  The problem is not only that our heart is
    warped, but aside from the protests of our God-given conscience (which we can sear),
    we have no other basis whatsoever to doubt if we are right or wrong before
    God.  This is the fish that cannot be
    unaware that it is wet – it knows no better until shown (and convinced) (and
    accepts) otherwise.
  • It
    matters if we are right before God for at least two reasons – our alignment
    with our Creator’s intent for us, and His judgment of our worthiness on the
    Last Day.
  • Show
    me a sinner who is content in his state, and see a man who fails to realize his
    plight now and on the Last Day.
  • God’s
    Goal is to call us back Home out of this delusion of wrong content, learning
    and enjoying living in the Kingdom, now. 
    Jesus came to help, not condemn – He tells us the truth of God and
    us.  The Old Testament is a demonstration
    of His and our characters; the New Testament reveals the New Covenant and
    explains how to live in God’s realities.
  • Aside
    from the conscience and His Word, His Spirit in us as followers of Christ is
    the truest exposure to God we have.
  1. Luke 24.27, 31-32 – 27 And beginning
    with Moses and all the Prophets, he explained to them what was said in all the
    Scriptures concerning himself…31 Then their eyes were opened and they
    recognized him, and he disappeared from their sight. 32 They asked each other,
    “Were not our hearts burning within us while he talked with us on the road and
    opened the Scriptures to us?”
  • Gal 5.22 – Love, joy, peace,
    patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control.
  • Consider
    the difference between two postures of heart:
  1. Prov 12.18 – There is one whose
    rash words are like sword thrusts, but the tongue of the wise brings healing.
  1. Wherever we see the
    smoke of actions, words, thoughts that are contrary to the Character of God,
    the Fruits of His Spirit, we can know there is a fire of misalignment, sin.
  1. This book goes on to
    help us see, understand, and seek repentant healing form blights of sin.
  1. His Word, His Spirit,
    our understanding, our repentance, our conformity – all under His forgiveness
    and as His workmanship.  These are the
    makings of the Beautiful Life in the now, a foretaste in in our Saved lives
    today, and of the fullness we hope to have when we stand before Him free of sin
    in us and sin in the Creation we occupy.
  1. John 14.21 – He who has My
    commandments and keeps them is the one who loves Me; and he who loves Me will
    be loved by My Father, and I will love him and will disclose Myself to him.