Notes from Book/study The Gospel-Centered life
Pretending minimizes sin by making ourselves out to be something we are not.
Performing minimizes God's holiness by reducing His standard to something we can meet, thereby meriting His favor.
Both are rooted in an inadequate view of God's holiness and our identity.
Because of indwelling sin, we are prone to forget the Gospel. When we are not anchored in the truth of the Gospel, our love for Jesus and our experience of His goodness become very small. We end up "shrinking the cross" by either pretending or performing.
If we are not resting in Jesus' righteousness, this growing awareness of our sin becomes a crushing weight. We buckle under it's load and compensate by pretending that we're better than we really are. Pretending can take many forms : dishonesty ("I'm not that bad"), comparison ("I'm not as bad as those people"), excuse making ("I'm not really that way"), and false righteousness ("Here are all the good things I've done"). Because we don't want to admit how sinful we really are, we spin the truth in our favor.
If we are not rooted in God's acceptance of us through Jesus, we compensate by trying to earn God's approval through our performance. We live a life on a treadmill, trying to gain God's favor by living up to his expectations (or our mistaken view of them).
To discern your subtle tendencies toward pretending, ask yourself this question: what do you count on to give you a sense of "personal credibility" (validity, acceptance, good standing)? Your answer to that question will often reveal something (besides Jesus) in which you find righteousness.
When we are not firmly rooted in the gospel, we rely on these false sources of righteousness to build our reputation and give us a sense of worth and value. (Think of anything that gives you a sense of being "good enough" or better than others.) These sources of functional righteousness disconnect us from the power of the gospel. They allow us to find righteousness in what we do instead of honestly confronting the depth of our sin and brokenness. Furthermore, each of these sources of righteousness is also a way of judging and excluding others! We use them to elevate ourselves and condemn those who aren't as "righteous" as we are. In other words, finding righteousness in these things leads us into more sin, not less.
Do you picture God as disappointed? Angry? Indifferent? Does his face say "Get your act together!" or "If only you could do a little more of me!" If you imagined God as anything but overjoyed with you, you have fallen into a performance mindset. Because the Gospel truth is that in Christ, God is deeply satisfied with you. In fact based on Jesus' work, God has adopted you as his own son or daughter (Gal 4:7)! But when we fail to root our identity in what Jesus has done for us, we slip into performance driven Christianity.
Performance-driven Christianity is actually a minimizing of God's holiness. Thinking we can impress God with our "right living" shows that we've reduced his standards far below what they actually are. Rather than being awed by the infinite measure of His holy perfection, we have convinced ourselves that if we just try hard enough, we can merit God's love and approval.
Our subtle tendencies toward pretending and performing show that failing to believe the gospel is the root of all our more observable sins. As we learn to apply the gospel to our unbelief to "preach the gospel to ourselves" we will find ourselves freed from the false security of pretending and performing. Instead we will live in the true joy and freedom promised to us by Jesus.
Pretending minimizes sin by making ourselves out to be something we are not.
Performing minimizes God's holiness by reducing His standard to something we can meet, thereby meriting His favor.
Both are rooted in an inadequate view of God's holiness and our identity.
Because of indwelling sin, we are prone to forget the Gospel. When we are not anchored in the truth of the Gospel, our love for Jesus and our experience of His goodness become very small. We end up "shrinking the cross" by either pretending or performing.
If we are not resting in Jesus' righteousness, this growing awareness of our sin becomes a crushing weight. We buckle under it's load and compensate by pretending that we're better than we really are. Pretending can take many forms : dishonesty ("I'm not that bad"), comparison ("I'm not as bad as those people"), excuse making ("I'm not really that way"), and false righteousness ("Here are all the good things I've done"). Because we don't want to admit how sinful we really are, we spin the truth in our favor.
If we are not rooted in God's acceptance of us through Jesus, we compensate by trying to earn God's approval through our performance. We live a life on a treadmill, trying to gain God's favor by living up to his expectations (or our mistaken view of them).
To discern your subtle tendencies toward pretending, ask yourself this question: what do you count on to give you a sense of "personal credibility" (validity, acceptance, good standing)? Your answer to that question will often reveal something (besides Jesus) in which you find righteousness.
When we are not firmly rooted in the gospel, we rely on these false sources of righteousness to build our reputation and give us a sense of worth and value. (Think of anything that gives you a sense of being "good enough" or better than others.) These sources of functional righteousness disconnect us from the power of the gospel. They allow us to find righteousness in what we do instead of honestly confronting the depth of our sin and brokenness. Furthermore, each of these sources of righteousness is also a way of judging and excluding others! We use them to elevate ourselves and condemn those who aren't as "righteous" as we are. In other words, finding righteousness in these things leads us into more sin, not less.
Do you picture God as disappointed? Angry? Indifferent? Does his face say "Get your act together!" or "If only you could do a little more of me!" If you imagined God as anything but overjoyed with you, you have fallen into a performance mindset. Because the Gospel truth is that in Christ, God is deeply satisfied with you. In fact based on Jesus' work, God has adopted you as his own son or daughter (Gal 4:7)! But when we fail to root our identity in what Jesus has done for us, we slip into performance driven Christianity.
Performance-driven Christianity is actually a minimizing of God's holiness. Thinking we can impress God with our "right living" shows that we've reduced his standards far below what they actually are. Rather than being awed by the infinite measure of His holy perfection, we have convinced ourselves that if we just try hard enough, we can merit God's love and approval.
Our subtle tendencies toward pretending and performing show that failing to believe the gospel is the root of all our more observable sins. As we learn to apply the gospel to our unbelief to "preach the gospel to ourselves" we will find ourselves freed from the false security of pretending and performing. Instead we will live in the true joy and freedom promised to us by Jesus.
