How People Change

Yesterday I began reading How People Change by Timothy Lane and Paul Tripp.

If the first chapter is indicative of the rest of the book, it should be a very helpful book.

For instance, "if we do not live with a gospel-shaped, Christ-confident, and change-committed Christianity, that hole will get filled with other things." What kinds of things? Things like:

• formalism — a structured attempt at "worship" without a real desire and passion for Christ.
• legalism — a rigid attempt to keep personal rules in a vain attempt to curry the favor of God.
• mysticism — a pursuit of the experience of God over (and often apart from) the truth of God.
• activism — "defending" Christ's cause without enjoy fellowship with Christ, because the "evil outside you is greater than the evil inside you."
• Biblicism — a knowledge and study of theology and Scripture without an enjoyment and pleasure in Christ.
• "psychology-ism" — Christ is a therapist more than a Savior.
• "social-ism" — Christ is given to fulfill our personal social and relational ills and desires, making the church a club rather than context for worship and service.
  

These will appeal to our self-righteousness, selfishness, environmentalism (believing the sin around us is greater and more problematic than the sin within us), and independence (lying to us that we are not as weak and blind spiritually as we really are).

I look forward to the rest of the book. Pick up a copy and "read it with me" (you'll probably here more about it in these pages in days to come).