Gospel Prism

As I continue to read John Owen, I have to spend time in prayer repenting for my lack of desire to worship Christ. His words explain so much about the heart’s condition that it strikes me why more preachers and theologians do not refer to him more. His insights into the human condition and the believer’s lack of faith is so rich, I just wish I had read Owen earlier in my walk of faith.

He writes:

[Some people] profess their desire to behold the glory of Christ by faith; but they find it, as they complain, too high and too difficult for them. They are at a loss in their minds, and even overwhelmed, when they begin to view his glory. They are like the disciples who saw him in his transfiguration; they were filled with amazement, and knew not what to say, or said they knew not what. (p. 91)

I must admit that I am prone to such failures. There are times when thoughts of Christ’s glory is so wondrous and yet I minimize it in my mind. Or I think of it as so vast that I do not wish to even focus on it because I think that to dwell there might be overtaxing (as in reading this book). But what a lie of the Enemy this is. He keeps me and so many others from seeing and basking in the glory of Christ because we deem such an act to be “too much work.� So it is far too easy to turn on the television to “wind down� then it is to read a book like Owen. We have imagined that to actually be challenged in our spirit to adore Christ keeps us tense and over-burdened. How guilty I am of loving Christ far too little than I do. How great He is in loving me far more than I deserve, hence the grace of God.