I made many great efforts, after reading and underlining many of the points he makes, thinking I understood them.

But I did not, for just the primary reasons he points to here which as he points out are false motives, not hating sin as sin, that is, not primarily because it troubles God my Father, and Christ my savior and Friend and the Spirit He sent to teach and comfort me, but because there were a couple of sins that bothered me, so it was with me, but I did not realize it. The rest of them, I could more easily overlook, and did, but this is not acceptable to God.

Owen rightly points out that unless our efforts at mortification are universal they will fail, and so He sometimes let’s fools such as myself fail in their attempts at mortification of one or two, but not all sin, as a means to teach us our error.

He also points out that it is only The Spirit, through Christ, that any succeed; and by that he means in part by meditation on Christ’s suffering because of our sins, for the very purpose, not only that we might have His Righteousness imparted to our account, which is most glorious, but ALSO SO WE CAN INDEED HAVE VICTORY OVER OUR SINS HERE, not perfectly of course, but certainly for all practical purposes essentially so. He proves this from scripture so clearly, that I had read, but because of the deceitful nature of my lusts, I never really saw until, by experience, I found out the painful truth, precious, when it awakens and leads to repentance not to be repented of.

Owen also opens up many of the ways that our sins and lusts lie to us, and evade our efforts at true mortification.

This is a profoundly helpful, clearly written, (thank You Lord for Richard Rushing) and most encouraging work for any who have lost battle after battle in their war with sin and had no idea why.

I would just add, that this work deals with the Truth and gets to the root of the matter, without which failure is sure, but with which, because He has promised it, and provided all the means, including His Spirit, victory is even more sure.

Thank You Lord, for my brothers John, and Richard for showing me My Way, more clearly, and for Your Spirit Who directed me to them and helped me see their meaning, and Who will help me put into practice Your Will, setting aside my blind, corrupt will by nature.

1. John Owen gives a biblical balance between human responsibility and divine power. It seems that there are two ditches in approaching a Christian’s sin life, and everything I have read on the subject usually falls into one. Some authors/preachers ONLY emphasize human responsibility. They say “Stop!” but they never say how. Therefore, all the burden of dealing with sin is laid on inadequate shoulders. This is not only a problem in literature, but in the mindset of many conservative evangelicals. Christians are told to deal with sin, to just stop doing it, without any exhortation to trust in God. Grace has not part in the mortification process. Therefore they become weary and the end result is moral failure (even among leadership). The other ditch is an emphasis only on divine grace. Many voices are saying, in regards to sin, to “Let go and let God.” This emphasis on God’s power that ignores human responsibility leads men to a quetistic faith which disengages both the will and the mind, and can lead to many other errors.

Owen, however, looks to Scripture and draws careful conclusions, and gives the reader the full scope of dealing with sin. “Stop, because God will enable you to stop.”

2. John Owen goes far deeper than most books and sermons on a Christian’s sin life, and examines the motives. This subject comes up over and over again in the book. He expounds on the many and varied wrong motives, and shows that if any of these are behind our repentance (or false repentance) than we are not really experiencing “godly sorrow.” This issue of motive is something I have never really seen dealt with in books of this nature, but Owen shows the immense significance of it.

This was the first book I have read by Owen. I’m looking forward to see how this great saint of the Lord will help me in the future.