John Piper exhorts cult members to police each other.
Eternal Security Is a Community Project
Today’s Sermon of the Day: https://t.co/CzRqKLTmiQ
— Desiring God (@desiringGod) March 4, 2016
How Does the Church Help Us Avoid an “Evil Heart of Unbelief?”
The answer is that we must be the church for each other. And what is the main thing that the church does for each other? We speak to each other in ways that help us not be deceived by the allurements of sin. Or to put it positively, we speak to each other in ways that cause us to have hearts of faith in the superior value of Christ over all things. We fight to maintain each other’s faith, by speaking words that point people to the truth and value of Jesus. That’s how you guard against an evil heart of unbelief. Unbelief means failing to rest in Jesus as your greatest treasure. So helping each other believe means showing people reasons why Jesus is more to be desired and trusted and loved than anything else.
Right here is one explanation why God would ordain that the Christian life be a life of individual and community vigilance, and why he would plan for eternal security to be a community project. The explanation is that this way of living the Christian life makes the glory of Christ the center of all our interaction.
It is a sign of my acute, innate wickedness, I suppose, that reading this is enough to convince me that you’ve got to be out of your mind to join any church.