★★★★★ 3
Solid and Helpful but left me wishing for a little more
Format: Paperback
I loved the first 8 chapters - the last three fizzled out for me. It makes me wonder if even the first eight chapters could've been abridged and the whole thing reduced to a pithy booklet.
That being said, the first eight chapters contain some excellent material that I will be incorporating not only into my own life, but into my toolbox of material to use in helping others. The best material for me was in:
> Ch. 6, "What Changes You?" - He has a simple, practical grid of the basic "Five Factors of Sanctification."
- Foundationally, God changes you.
- Secondly, The Word of Truth changes you.
- Third, Wise People change you.
- Fourth, Suffering and Struggling changes you.
- Finally, You change.
"Constructive change occurs through the interplay of these five factors: God, Scripture, other People, Life Circumstances, and the Human Heart."
"Foolishness either overcomplicates or oversimplifies."
> Ch. 2, "Is there One Key to Sanctification?" This is his great critique of the idea that there's a master-key to the Christian life, some fool-proof, secret principle that changes everything for everyone. We tend to think that the thing that revolutionizes everything for me, must be "the key" for everyone. But we're too complex and the Word and life is too diverse for there to be one master key solution. "Theological fads and fashions come and go" - but part of the counsel of God was never intended to give us the benefits of "the whole counsel of God." New days come and new challenges arise, and we have to keep on pressing on. Our variety of needs and the varieties of helps necessarily defy "reductionism." There is no single key.
"Progressive sanctification is about how we live in between God's laying the cornerstone and setting the capstone."
> Ch. 3, "Truth Unbalanced and Rebalancing" - If I might reword David's principle, slightly, In ministry, we over-emphasize one aspect of truth for the sake of application. In David's words, "Ministry unbalances truth for the sake of relevance; theology rebalances truth for the sake of comprehensiveness." We can only say one thing at a time and a person, practically, can only work on one thing at a time. So we make much of a single thing, and then always try to bring it back into alignment with the whole of life and the whole counsel of God.
"You do not build a house with only one tool in your toolbox when God gives you a truckload of tools. But you use your tools one at a time, the right tool for the right job."
"In the long run, a single truth harped on will disappoint even its devotees."
> 5. "We Are Sanctified By Remembering Our Justification." Throughout the book, David Powlison has been coming back to the concrete, recent example of a sanctification key, advocated by many: Remember the past grace of justification; Repreach the gospel to yourself every day; Realize that you are accepted by God because of the merits of Christ, not your own. In this chapter he highlights that this is certainly one of the tools in our toolbox - sometimes this is the very thing we need for progress in sanctification. But it is but one part of a larger whole. A greater point to always have in mind is that God is for us: He was, is, still is, and always will be for us. Don't just look to past grace, but also to present grace and future grace, as well as many other useful motivations.
David's personal testimonies in chapters 7 and 8 are rich. He weaves in the interplay of the five agents of change. Very good.
"There is a reason that 'Don't be afraid" (in all its variants) is the most common command in all of Scripture."
There is also a beautiful section in the last chapter describing the contrast between the peace of the believer exemplified in a text like Psalm 23, and the "anti-psalm" emptiness of the unbeliever whose life ends at the end of the valley of the shadow of death.
Very good, but a bit disappointing to me. Powlison is true physician of the soul. When he speaks I want to listen.
I would recommend Kevin DeYoung's, "The Hole in Our Holiness: Filling the Gap between Gospel Passion and the Pursuit of Godliness" as an additional and very satisfying book on this subject.
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Reviewed in the United States on June 14, 2017
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