I am also very familiar with the writings of CS Lewis, as well and Arthur W. Pink, John Wesley?Most of them will say without a doubt that if a person is not striving to live for God they are none of his.
I have long been an admirer of John Wesley. Surely there was never a more erudite, compassionate, merciful, and even at times humorous Christian. He was also a social activist, starting a network of orphanages and being one of the first in England to oppose slavery. There is an excellent collection of his sermons available online:
gbgm-umc.org
For those who may not be too familiar with the work of John Wesley, he preached a type of "practical" Christianity, an amalgam of grace, works of piety, works of mercy, and above all by attempting to reach a state of what he called "Christian perfection" based upon (his words) "love, joy, peace, always abiding; by invariable long-suffering, patience, resignation; by gentleness, triumphing over all provocation; by goodness, mildness, sweetness, tenderness of spirit; by fidelity, simplicity, godly sincerity; by meekness, calmness, evenness of spirit; by temperance, not only in food and sleep, but in all things natural and spiritual."
Chris, John Wesley would not have disagreed with your contention that if a person is not striving to live for God, they are are not "of God." This is a basic tenet of most mainline Protestant denominations since Luther. However, I think he would have taken strong issue with your "Ya better watch out" brand of zealous fulminations, and particularly with your (I believe unwittingly) prideful sanctimoniousness in seeing fit to adjudge yourself whether Edwarda, or anyone else for that matter, has made it to Heaven. Wesley was very specific in preaching how Methodists should act towards others:
"See that the manner also wherein you speak be according to the Gospel of Christ. Avoid everything in look, gesture, word, and tone of voice, that savors of pride or self-sufficiency. Studiously avoid everything magisterial or dogmatical, everything that looks like arrogance or assuming. Beware of the most distant approach to disdain, overbearing, or contempt. With equal care avoid all appearance of anger; and though you use great plainness of speech, yet let there be no reproach, no railing accusation, no token of any warmth but that of love. Above all, let there be no shadow of hate or ill-will, no bitterness or sourness of expression; but use the air and language of sweetness, as well as gentleness, that all may appear to flow from love in the heart. And yet this sweetness need not hinder your speaking in the most serious and solemn manner; as far as may be, in the very words of the oracles of God (for there are none like them,) and as under the eye of Him who is coming to judge the quick and dead."
On judgment:
"No man can choose for, or prescribe to, another. But every one must follow the dictates of his own conscience, in simplicity and godly sincerity. He must be fully persuaded in his own mind and then act according to the best light he has. Nor has any creature power to constrain another to walk by his own rule. God has given no right to any of the children of men thus to lord it over the conscience of his brethren; but every man must judge for himself, as every man must give an account of himself to God.
On overzealousness:
"Evil-speaking is the more difficult to be avoided, because it frequently attacks us in disguise. We speak thus out of a noble, generous (it is well if we do not say,) holy indignation, against these vile creatures! We commit sin from mere hatred of sin! We serve the devil out of pure zeal for God! It is merely in order to punish the wicked that we run into this wickedness. "So do the passions" (as one speaks) "all justify themselves," and palm sin upon us under the veil of holiness!"
In addition, he devotes an entire sermon to the nature of genuine versus false Christian zeal:
gbgm-umc.org
It makes for good reading. |
