Knowing God: Chapter 21 - These Inward Trials

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Chapter 21 of Knowing God focuses upon the normal Christian life and how God’s grace works to accomplish it.

Two (2) Inaccurate Applications of the Gospel

Dr. Packer notes there are two (2) dangerous “inaccurate application[s]” of the gospel that lead to a misunderstanding of what the normal Christian life is:

  1. Over-emphasizing the positive aspects of the Christian life leading one to believe the gospel brings a life of ease
  2. Over-emphasizing the “rough side” of the Christian life leading one to believe “that Christian living is for the most part grievous and gloomy.”

Neither is healthy. But while the latter may lead one to a “surprise” that the Christian life is actually more joyous and pleasant than described, the prior is particularly “cruel” but not because of its motivation, for it is an “evangelical ministry” that is based in the “acceptance of the Bible as God’s Word” with the “aim...to bring people to new birth and from there to lead them on into the fullest possible experience of resurrection life.” It’s motivation is noble. Rather, it’s understanding of the Christian life is skewed, “pictur[ing] the normal Christian as trouble-free...bound to lead sooner or later to bitter disillusionment.” This guides people to believe that if their life as a Christian is not trouble-free that it must be an issue of sin or lack of faith in their life, when in reality hardship and trials are part of the Christian life due to “the world, the flesh, and the devil” and “the method and purpose of grace.”

The Will, Work, and Purpose of Grace

Grace is “the means of God’s love in action toward people who merit the opposite of love.” The “will of grace” is “God’s eternal plan to save.” The “work of grace” is “‘God’s good work in you’ (Phil 1:6), whereby he calls you into living fellowship with Christ (1 Cor 1:9), raises you from death to life (Eph 2:1-6), seals you as his own by the gift of the Spirit (Eph 1:13-14), transforms you into Christ’s image (2 Cor 3:18), and will finally raise your body in glory (Rom 8:30; 1 Cor 15:47-54).” And the “purpose of grace” is “primarily to restore our relationship with God...an ever deeper knowledge of God, and an ever closer fellowship with him.” The way “grace prosecutes this purpose” is “not by shielding us from assault by the world, the flesh and the devil, nor by protecting us from burdensome and frustrating circumstances, nor yet by shielding us from troubles created by our own temperament and psychology, but rather by exposing us to all these things, so as to overwhelm us with a sense of our own inadequacy, and to drive us to cling to him more closely...it is to ensure that we shall learn to hold him fast...to drive us out of self-confidence to trust in himself.” This is the normal Christian life and how the grace of God works in it. 

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