Tag: Jerry Bridges

Holiness is Not Optional for the Christian

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The Pursuit of Holiness and The Practice of Godliness by Jerry Bridges

“Pursue holiness…without which no one will see the Lord (Hebrews 12:14).

“The pursuit of holiness must be anchored in the grace of God, otherwise it is doomed to failure.”

“There is no higher compliment that can be paid to a Christian than to call him a godly person. He might be a conscientious parent, a zealous church worker, a dynamic spokesman for Christ, or a talented Christian leader; but none of these things matters if, at the same time, he is not a godly person.”

Author, teacher, and speaker Jerry Bridges (1929 – 2016) served in ministry with the evangelistic organization The Navigators for over 50 years before he passed away in 2016. He authored about 20 books, the first and one of his best-known being The Pursuit of Holiness, published in 1978. I read this book many years ago, but my church has just started going through it in our men’s and ladies’ monthly breakfasts, so I am looking forward to reading it again. In The Pursuit of Holiness, Bridges talks about the importance of striving after holiness in obedience to God (“Be holy, for I am holy, says the Lord.”), that we are to be making the effort to not be in conformity to this world, and to be putting off the old self and putting on the new (Eph. 4:22-24). This is not something that is just done once when we are first saved; it is ongoing throughout our lives. Bridges suggest three main reasons that Christians struggle with what it means to be holy and why it is so important:

  1. Our attitude toward sin is more self-centered than God-centered.
  2. We have a misunderstanding of what it means to “live by faith.”
  3. There is some sin that we don’t identify as sin and/or don’t take seriously. (For more on this, I highly recommend Bridges book Respectable Sins)

I recently reread The Practice of Godliness, the companion book that followed The Pursuit of Holiness about 5 years later, and found it very profitable, helpful, and convicting. Bridges explains at the beginning of the book that the process of sanctifying, which begins at regeneration, is initiated and carried out by God the Holy Spirit. He gives this helpful definition of sanctification:

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Sin by Any Other Name (is Still Sin): Respectable Sins

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RespectableSins-bookcoverRespectable Sins: Confronting the Sins We Tolerate by Jerry Bridges

“It’s fine to be told sin no longer has dominion over me, but what about my daily experience of the remaining presence and activity of sin? Does the gospel cleanse me from that? Can I hope to see progress in putting to death the subtle sin of my life?”


Warning: If you have no desire to identify, expose and root out sin in your life, then this book is not for you.

Little white lies. Guilty pleasures. Errors in judgment. Recently on the Food Network, one of the chefs prided himself in his specialty: cooking with what he called “seven culinary sins.” These are just a few examples of how the language of modern-day society softens and trivializes the seriousness of sin. When was the last time you heard someone said they fornicated? No, instead they say they “slept with” someone; now doesn’t that sound nice and cozy? Saying that two people are “having an affair” sounds so much more pleasant that saying they’re committing adultery. We are told to be sensitive and tolerant of the faults of others. We don’t want to hurt someone’s feelings, damage their self-esteem or cause them to feel guilty, let alone take responsibility, for their sinful behavior so we label the behavior a character flaw or even a disorder. But never mind the character flaws, weaknesses and sins of others; what we need to be concerned with is our own sin. Continue reading “Sin by Any Other Name (is Still Sin): Respectable Sins” →