nemcsak a bűnbocsánathoz, hanem a keresztény élethez is ugyanúgy Krisztusra van szükségünk; az előbbi egyszeri alkalom, az utóbbi folyamatos; tökéletes vagy semmi: házaspárok, akik azt gondolták, hogy az ő kapcsolatuknak kell lenni a legjobbnak, és mikor ebben csalódtak, az egészet feladták ahelyett, hogy legalább egy jó házasságot építettek volna

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1. true spirituality: internal, not external; 10th commandment: internal, we break this before breaking any other; when does proper desire become coveting? -> two tests: a) love GOD enough to be content (-> practical test: thankfulness) b) love MEN enough not to envy (-> practical test: do I have inward pleasure if s/he suffers a loss?); “As Christians we say we live in a supernatural universe and that there is a battle […] If we really believe this, first we can be contented and yet fight evil and second, surely it is God’s right to put us as Christians where he judges best in the battle. (p.12)”

2. rejected, slain, raised (Lk 9,22) -> this is the order for every Christian; culture: don’t say no <-> Christ: say no to self (if you don’t feel the tension, probably you are romanticizing Christ’s teachings)

3. Christ’s death & resurrection was a historic event (happened in space-time); accepting Christ is a space-time event too; we are to live as if we had already died, been to heaven, and come back again as risen (-> perspective changes)

4. two equal reality: 1) Christian dead are already with Christ 2) Christ really lives in Christians; Eastern mysticism = loss of personality <-> Christian mysticism = communion with Christ; active passivitiy ~ Mary’s reaction to angel

5. physical reality is not all -> supernatural is part of reality too

6. what we do is just as important as how we do it; justification is complete (you can’t be more or less justified) ~ birth/marriage; justification has no degrees, but sanctification does; SALVATION = JUSTIFICATION (past, once for all) + SANCTIFICATION (present, moment-by-moment) + GLORIFICATION (future); justification can never be based on our faith, it is based on the finished work of Christ; “Sanctification and assurance are comparable. A man may be saved and not know he is saved because he does not raise the empty hands of faith at this particular moment and believe God’s promises. And a man may lack in sanctification all that God means to him to have in the present life because even though Christ has purchased it for him upon the cross he fails to believe God at this place and raise the empty hands of faith moment by moment.”

7. Christians can still produce the fruit of the devil - this shows their unfaithfulness (e.g. married couple of one color/race have child of a different color/race -> sign of adultery); grieveing the Holy Spirit = offending the Divine Guest; real sin: faithlessness -> not doing things by faith; “In justification, we must see, acknowledge, and act upon the fact that we cannot save ourselves. In sanctification we must see, acknowledge, and act up on the fact that we cannot live the Christian life in our own strength, in our own goodness.”; justification: guilt of sin, once for all <-> sanctification: power of sin, moment by moment; you can only live the Christian life moment by moment -> we must believe God’s promises in this very moment in which we are; Christian life can never have a mechanical solution; “Eve doubted God, and I as a child of God am now to do exactly the opposite: I am to believe him. […] To believe him, not just when I accept Christ as Savior, but every moment, one moment at a time: this is the Christian life, and this is true spirituality.”

8. there is no victory apart from Christ; “Indeed, it is only as we consciously bring each victory to his feet, and keep it there as we think of it - and especially as we speak of it - that we can avoid the pride of that victory, which can be worse than the sin over which we claim to have had the victory. The greater the victory, the greater the need of placing it consciously (and as we speak of it, vocally) at his feet.”; two dangers: 1) perfectionism 2) talking about sin lightly/abstractly; temptation != sin; if you sinned: 1) acknowledge it was a sin 2) be specific of your sin 3) “not my will but thine be done”; God is a person - not just a doctrine; sin can have subconscious part too but we are to take to God whatever we comprehend to be sin; “There is no sin so great that our fellowship cannot be restored, if we humbly call it sin, and through faith bring that specific sin under the blood of Christ. When my heart condemns me and cried, ‘You have done it again’, I am to believe God again as to the value of the finished work of Jesus Christ.”; “thank you for the completed work” of Jesus Christ (both when accepting him & accepting his forgiveness); after you repented, your sin is covered by Jesus’ blood -> it is not honoring God to worry about it (apart from restoring relationships with others); conscience ~ big black dog, ready to devour me -> after repentance I should turn to him and say: “Down! Be still!”; perfectionism is no reality - the reality if sins forgiven is; you don’t need to wait for God’s chastising (not penalty!) before restoring your relationship with God; it’s much better not to sin - but if you do, hurry back to God so he doesn’t have to chastise you (1Cor 11:32-33); God’s gift: freedom from the tyranny of conscience;

9. true spirituality: matter of thoughts - the external is the result; “So here we move on in our understanding of true spirituality in the Chrisitan life. Basically it is a matter of our thoughts. The external is the expression, the result. Moral battles are not won in the external world first. They are always a result flowing naturally from a cause, and the cause is in the internal world of one’s thoughts.”; internal comes before external & internal produces external & morally the internal is central; God’s creation: not extension of his essence but does exhibit who he is ~ table isn’t the extension of carpenter’s essence but it does show something of it; L’Abri: we are interested in ideas and not personalities or organizations;

10. problem of existence: without infinite, personal reference point (=God), you cannot move out of your intellectual cocoon of your own existence (=knowing anything outside of myself); man’s own rationality condemns himself -> separation; same with morality: “he is crashed and damned by what he is”; “Thus, in rebellion, not staying within the circle of what man is but trying to move into the circle of the existence of God, man falls crushed within himself at every turn.”; man can go back (he doesn’t want to) to be a creature of go lower (he rather chooses this) to the level of animals and machines; man wants to be God but cannot (he is finite) but he can’t hide among animals/machines; man is separated from himself (cf death); psychological guilt != true guilt (but both exists) -> after salvation only the former remains but not always possible to sort them out…; good news: we do not always need to sort them out either (-> iceberg: just focus on the point above the surface); experience: if we are honest with the visible part (ie. confessing known sins), God takes care of the invisible part and the Spirit lets us see deeper into ourselves;

11. substantial healing != perfect health; if we don’t accept our limitations, we might lose even what we have; marriage: can be smashed just because ppl set a proud standard and refuse to have the good marriage they can have; “perfect or nothing” -> you will end with “nothing”; if we carry what we cannot, we will blow out like a tire; fear: of 1) impersonal (<-> God is there) 2) non-being (<-> existence in God) 3) death (<-> resurrection); feeling superior/inferior to others: “My validity and my status are found in being before the God who is there. My basic validity and my basid status do not depend upon what men think of me.”; instead of putting myself at the center of the universe, I must rather think after God and will after God; false integration points: alcohol, entertainment (even good ones can become destructive if they replace the place of God), material things, even good music/good art, sex, intellectual pursuits, right doctrine -> they cannot be our final point of integration, only God can!

12. God is Trinity -> when he is center of universe, he can still love and communicate; but when man does the same, he cannot; “I can enjoy that which is beautiful in a relationship, without expecting it to be perfect.”; we must demonstrate God as personal being (e.g. evangelism); “Every time I see something right in another man, it tends to minimize me, and it makes it easier for me to have a proper creature-creature relationship. But each time I see something wrong in others, it is dangerous, for it can exalt self, and when this happens, my open fellowship with God falls to the ground. So when I am right, I can be wrong. In the midst of being right, if self is exalted, my fellowship with God can be destroyed. It is not wrong to be right, but it is wrong to have the wrong attitude in being right.”; I shouldn’t rejoice in other’s iniquity (1Cor 13); parent-child: legal relationship but still on a personal level; “My child, while he is still a minor, is my fellow creature created on my own level; I am not intrinsically higher than he is. […] And more than this, if he becomes a Crhistian while he is my minor child, I must not forget that then he is not only my fellow creature, but he is also my brother or my sister in Christ.”; legal “offices” must be personal too; humanists tend to “love” humanity as a whole but forget about the individual - Christians must be the opposite; multiple divorce: why? why not just promiscuous affairs? -> men seek more than sex! but they can never find in finite human relationships; if you try to find everything in marriage, you will destroy your spouse and your relationship too;

13. body: means to communication to the world ~ church too!; purpose of church: to be humanity before a lost humanity; real unity is not organizational unity but unity with the Head, not with other parts; if you block the head; the parts cannot find each other because they don’t have direct connection to each other (and they don’t need to); “Throughout Church history, one is aware that the danger always comes at a time of emergency. An emergency arises which causes us to cut off the exhibition of faith, and discount the possibility of God guiding through financial matters. There always seems to be a legitimate reason for reaching out and steadying the ark. As Uzzah reached out the steady the ark, he thought he had good reasons for disobeying the word of God. At this point, he no longer trusted God to steady the ark. Might it not fall? Might not something of God’s work and the glory of God be shaken? This danger often comes in organizational and financial emergencies, when it would seem for a moment that the glory of God is jeopardized.”; organization: not wrong but can become an obstacle; simplicity should be preferred but this can become an idol too; “How many times do we find that in doing the business of the Lord Jesus Christ, there is a rapid opening prayer, a rapid closing prayer after half the people have left, but in between there is no difference between doing the Lord’s business and the business of the well-organized business enterprise?”; loyalty: increasing scale: 1) God as a person -> 2) Christian principles -> 3) Church organizations -> 4) human leadership; final goal: loving God & others -> not what we are against, but what we are for