The Imperfect Disciple: Grace for People Who Can't Get Their Act Together

by Jared C. Wilson

Dear Sir: Regarding your article “What’s Wrong with the World?” I am. Yours truly, G. K. Chesterton

(Rom. 7:18–23)

“Why We Can’t Get Our Act Together.”

he may be speaking to his post-conversion life, as he has elsewhere said that the unsaved don’t even understand the things of God

and that the unrighteous aren’t wrestling with the truth but suppressing it

I read Romans 7 and think, Man, Paul, you get me—you really get me.

Here’s a plainer way to put it: I do things that I know are bad and I avoid doing things that I know are good.

Jesus is looking specifically for the people who can’t get their act together.

“Wretched man that I am! Who will deliver me from this body of death?”

This is exactly the kind of self-despair Jesus is listening for.

Every day, I wake up into Romans 7.

How do we get out of this mess? We can’t. But God does what we cannot do.

It is the good news for all of us who can’t get our act together. We are exactly the kind of people God is looking for.

Every day you drift naturally into Romans 7. You don’t need any help with that. It’s just that your wheels are naturally out of alignment.

turn on the light of Romans 8. You bring Romans 8 into Romans 7 and you say, “Look what I found, everybody!”

You introduce the truth of Romans 8 to every corner of the room, every dark place in your heart, as often as you can, as much as you can, as fiercely as you can.

It has to happen every day.

we’re trekking across Romans 7 in a three-legged race with our pride through thigh-deep mud.

Romans 8 turns the boosters on. Romans 8 is like walking on water.

the problem Romans 7 highlights—which is echoed throughout the Bible—can only be overcome with the antidote Romans 8 presents—which

you never feel quite fixed.

This is how I like to think about discipleship, then—not just following Jesus, but refollowing Jesus every day.

The prophet Isaiah says that “all we like sheep have gone astray”

Sheep tend to go astray because they are dumbly distracted.

Self-help is like sticking your broken hand in the blender, thinking that’ll fix it.

Our souls need a good looking at. Most people don’t and won’t do this.

The soul is a tricky thing, and needy. We have to feed it well, keep it well-nourished and well-lubricated.

Some of us like to call this work “preaching the gospel to ourselves.”

In the end, as in the beginning, it is not our good intentions or even our good deeds that will get us out of the muck of ourselves. It is God’s rescuing hand.

I take a look at my messed-up soul every day. I feel completely overwhelmed and underequipped. And so I hold on to the gospel. I pour some gospel into my soul. I am good to go another day. I might be crawling through that day or I might be balled up in my bed, unwilling to charge the Valley of Elah that is my life, but the smile of God is over me continually. Day and night his steadfast love sustains me.

The problem is the same every day but the mercies are new, and the disciples of Jesus will plunder them with abandon. He wants us to!

The soul is a complicated thing. The soul is a wormhole, multidimensional, polyhedral.

It’s a great comfort to know that the announcement of the finished work of Christ is specifically designed for this inner-spatial mission.

My soul is not much to look at but it is safeguarded by the One who paid himself for me.