Advent

I am currently reading the Old Testament Evangelistic sermons of D. Martyn Lloyd-Jones. Advent is traditionally the time in the Anglican Church when we call our hearers to consider not only the incarnation (the first coming) but judgement (the second coming). One of the first signs of a softening doctrine is one that neglects this reality of the gospel. This is not something you could ever accuse Lloyd-Jones of.

"You know the final tragedy is due to the fact that man turns away from God, instead of turning to him in his trouble and misery. In his folly man has put his own ideas in place of God's and thought nothing of this idea of judgement; but when he begins to awake to the knowledge that somethings is wrong-when he hears the voice of God-then his instinct is to get away from him. This is the greatest tragedy of all."

Sermon on Genesis 3.

Other books on the go are the wonderful Letters of C S Lewis and a grace-filled book by Brennan Manning called A Glimpse of Jesus. Manning offers the superb idea of a year of jubilee for all those who have been rejected by the church. Would it be so.

"If you don't have to be afraid of God, you don't have to be afraid of anything." Brennan Manning

Brennan Manning and Lloyd-Jones in the same post? Grace and Judgement surely working together.