We have talked much about salvation by faith, but there has been little realization that all real faith involves discipline. Faith is not a blithe “turning it all over to Jesus.” Faith is such confidence in Jesus that it takes seriously his summons, “If any [one] will come after me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross, and follow me.”
We have loudly proclaimed our dependence upon the grace of God, never guessing that the grace of God is given only to those who practice the grace of self-mastery. “Work out your own salvation with fear and trembling for God is at work in you both to will and to work his good pleasure.” People working out, God working in—that is the NT synthesis.
Real discipline is not vain effort to save one’s self. It is an intelligent application to the self of those psychological principles which enable the self to enter into life-giving fellowship with God who is our salvation. In all Christian literature there is no writer who had a clearer conviction concerning salvation provided only in Christ than has Paul. His self-despair ended in that marvelous, ageless insight, “I thank God, through Jesus Christ my Lord.” “I know whom I have believed,” he cried in an ecstasy of confident gladness, “and am persuaded he that he is able.” Paul was a salvationist, in the noblest sense.
But Paul was also a disciplinarian. “I beat my body to keep it in subjection.” “They that are Christ’s have crucified the flesh with its affections and lusts.” “Mortify therefore your members which are upon earth.” These are not words of a man who scorned discipline!
We must recover for ourselves the significance and the necessity of the spiritual disciplines. Without them we shall continue to be impotent witnesses for Christ. Without them Christ will be impotent in his efforts to use us to save our society from disintegration and death.
—Albert Edward Day, Discipline and Discovery
A rather provocative piece here. Is Day advocating a works righteousness or something else?
Heh. I see no reason for compliments here.
Yes, you are a curmudgeon ;-). And was this another test? You didn’t tell I’d be graded!
And yes, Jesus told us to pray, “Thy kingdom come, thy will be done, on earth as it is in heaven”. Did He give a time-frame?
Back to your original question–is Day advocating a works righteousness–it’s the same point to argue when considering James’ passage about faith without works being dead.
BTW, I just heard a teaching on Christian radio about the beginning of Day’s thesis, faith not being a “blithe ‘turning it all over to Jesus’ “. That teacher said that we can’t live as clueless Christians, seeing evidence of things happening, and anemically yielding all personal action in a situation which needs our attention (i.e. a teenager who does not obey house rules), because of “letting Jesus work it out”.
You get it regarding discipline. If I weren’t such a curmudgeon, I’d give you an A. But I am so I won’t. 🙂
I was really talking about the last sentence from Day’s excerpt when I used the term provocative. While God can and does use us to help bring about his kingdom here on earth (which can be a fair reading of Day’s last sentence), the biblical position is that only God can fully bring about his Kingdom, and that at his Second Coming.
Is it not the Christian disciplines (Bible-reading, prayer, fasting, etc.) which keep us focused on the author of our salvation, Jesus Christ, so that we don’t stray? And so that we can grow into greater Christ-likeness? As St. Paul again said: 2 Corinthians 10:5 “We demolish arguments and every pretension that sets itself up against the knowledge of God, and we take captive every thought to make it obedient to Christ.” Won’t this witness cause us to represent Christ better and more exactly to the world?