Basic Christianity - Chapter 1 "The Right Approach"

John Stott makes many excellent points in the first chapter of his Basic Christianity. All of these points, however, can be summarized in four ...

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I. The Infiniteness of God
Our finite brains will never be able to fully wrap themselves around the greatness of God. His being is too magnificent for us to even begin to comprehend. Job 11:7 sums it up well by stating,"Canst thou by searching, find out God? canst thou find out the Almighty unto perfection?"  That which is mortal cannot truly understand that which is immortal and that which is imperfect cannot really grasp that which is perfect. Our knowledge is limited and short-reaching when it comes to Jehovah. "Great is our Lord, and of great power: His understanding is infinite," says Psalm 147:5. Our understanding isn't infinite, however, and the sooner we understand that we can't understand, the better.

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II. The Finiteness of Man. 
Contrast the Almighty God with Man, and you cannot fathom the gulf which separates them. That gulf was created when Adam and Eve willfully rebelled in Eden, fell into sin, and were consequently driven from the presence of God. Hence, as descendants of Adam, we are all conceived in sin, born in sin, live in sin, and die in sin. Job 15:16 speaks of man as an "abominable and filthy" creature that "drinketh iniquity like water". Furthermore, Romans 6:23 says that "the wages of sin is death". God, in His justice, will in no wise allow sin to escape punishment; rather, His wrath "is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men" (Romans 1:18). 

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III. The Redeeming Work of Christ
As I said before, God's justice requires satisfaction against sin. This satisfaction - incomprehensibly heavy and terrible as it is - is completely beyond mankind's ability to pay. We are helpless, unable to do the littlest thing to appease the Almighty's wrath; as Psalm 130:3 declares, "If thou, Lord, shouldest mark iniquities, O Lord, who should stand?". Yet God did not leave us in this state of miserable condemnation, though He would have been entirely justified in doing so. Instead, He sent His Son, Jesus Christ, into this fallen world to be a Saviour to us by enduring God's wrath in our stead. Christ is the only way by which men escape eternal punishment. He is "unto us wisdom, and righteousness, and sanctification, and redemption" (1 Corinthians 1:30).

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IV. Man's Response to Redemption 
Left to himself, however, man does not want anything to do with the redemption bought by Christ. He would rather remain in his muck than be lifted out of it. There is nothing inherently in man that would cause him to desire Christ or what He has to offer. For "the imagination of man's heart is evil from his youth" (Genesis 8:25) and "all we like sheep have gone astray; we have turned every one to his own way" (Isaiah 53:6). Before a man may be redeemed by the atoning work of Jesus, God must first draw him to Himself and open his eyes to his own rottenness. Then, and only then, can a man yearn after the forgiveness that comes with being washed in the perfect blood of Christ. As 2 Corinthians 3:5 states, "Not that we are sufficient of ourselves to think anything as of ourselves; but our sufficiency is of God".

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Persevero,

Scribe