"You are not my main problem. My parents were not my main problem. My enemies are not my main problem. I am my main problem. Not my deeds, and not my circumstances, and not the people in my life, but my nature is my deepest personal problem."
Brilliantly true. Taken from Finally Alive by J.Piper
I strongly suggest this book if there is confusion in your understanding of Salvation/New Birth in Christ Jesus.
Grapples with the heart of who we are. Sinful and fallen. The book doesn't leave you there but drives you back to the written Word, the Bible.
"I did not first have a good nature and then do bad things and get a bad nature. 'Behold, I was brought forth in iniquity, and in sin did my mother conceive me' (Ps. 51:5). This is who I am. My nature is selfish and self-centered and demanding and very skilled in making you feel like the problem. And if your first response to that statement is I know people like that, you may be totally blind to the deceitfulness of your own heart. Our first response should not be finger-pointing. That's part of the problem. Our first response should be contrition."
Having purified your souls by your obedience to the truth for a sincere brotherly love, love one another earnestly from a pure heart, since you have been born again, not of perishable seed but of imperishable, through the living and abiding word of God; for "All flesh is like grass and all its glory like the flower of grass. The grass withers, and the flower falls, but the word of the Lord remains forever." And this word is the good news that was preached to you. So put away all malice and all deceit and hypocrisy and envy and all slander. Like newborn infants, long for the pure spiritual milk, that by it you may grow up to salvation- if indeed you have tasted that the Lord is good. 1 Peter 1:22-2:3
This past weekend I was able to make a quick trip down to North Carolina to visit my college roommate and her sweet family. Her baby boy turned two and acts like it more than ever.
