One of the most prevalent errors made when discussing holiness is to slide into the view that we are somehow justified before God by our holiness. Ryle is careful to observe throughout this book the distinction between sanctification and justification. Justification is by faith alone in Christ alone. But those who have been justified bear the fruit of the Spirit and grow in holiness. In other words, they are sanctified by God. They are now to love Christ and the things He loves. This is very easy to forget in our day and age when walking an aisle is equated with conversion and walking in the light is considered optional.

In the early centuries of the church’s existence, Christian apologists would sometimes appeal to the distinctively holy lives of Christians as evidence for the truth of Christianity. Would such an appeal be of any use today? According to numerous surveys, the behavior of professing Christians is not discernibly different from the behavior of those who profess other religions or no religion at all. The phrase one often hears on the lips of pagans who observe contemporary Christian behavior is: “The church is full of hypocrites.” This should not be. We worship a holy God who calls His people to be holy and who has provided the means by which they may be holy.
The problem of lax and hypocritical Christianity is not a new one, and one of the best treatments of the entire subject is a classic written by J.C. Ryle (1816–1900), who served as the Anglican Bishop of Liverpool for twenty years. Ryle was a deeply committed and non-compromising evangelical Christian. In fact, Charles Spurgeon referred to him as an “evangelical champion.” His book Holiness has been reprinted numerous times since its original publication in 1879. It is deservedly considered a Christian classic on the subject of sanctification. It ranks up there with the work of John Owen on the mortification of sin.
I first read Bishop Ryle’s Holiness some twenty years ago. The book was deeply convicting and made a lasting impact on my thinking. Ryle’s work is convicting because he does not appeal to silly gimmicks and other manmade answers to the problem of sin. He appeals over and over to Scripture, to the Word of the living God, and he drives the Word of God home through careful and direct application. If you are complacent in your sin and do not want to be disturbed in your enjoyment of it, do not read Ryle. This is a book about the necessity of sanctification, the necessity of holiness. It deals with weighty subjects, the weightiest in fact: God, sin, Jesus Christ, the gospel, the Holy Spirit, justification, sanctification, heaven, and hell. It is a book for those who want to move beyond milk and get to the meat of the Word.
Frankly, some older Christian books are difficult to read because of the style of writing that was common in previous ages. To contemporary readers, many of these works seem dry and wordy, tedious and dull. I have run across many such books myself. Ryle does not fall into that category. Ryle’s writing is more comparable to that of someone like Charles Spurgeon. He writes with such an intensity and passion that the reader cannot easily become bored.
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The Apostle Paul makes a stunning claim: because Jesus was in the form of God in eternity past (when), accomplished salvation (what), and returned to heaven (where) bearing the name above all names (who), He is—as God the Son—worthy of worship from all corners of heaven and earth (why) (Phil. 2:5–11).

Few people today doubt that Jesus existed as a man walking the earth. Most are aware that Christians embrace Him as Messiah. But they balk at the claim that He is truly God. Most moderns have heard that Jesus’ divinity was invented by some fourth-century church influencers. But the New Testament is clear that this belief did not evolve but is rooted in the life of Jesus and His early followers. We can address this issue by tracing how the New Testament answers the six big questions about Jesus: who, what, when, where, why, and how.

Who? Virtually overnight, Jesus’ followers refer to Him as Lord (Greek kyrios). By the first century, many Jews had started using a Greek translation of the original Hebrew Scriptures, and one of their practices was using kyrios to translate both the Hebrew Yahweh (God’s covenant name) and the Hebrew Adonai (God’s title “Lord”). The Christians adopted this practice as a way to express who Jesus is: the “Lord” of God’s people (1 Cor. 8:6). Yet Jesus is not some sort of second deity added to the pantheon. He regularly refers to Himself as the unique “Son” of the Father (Matt. 11:27; Luke 10:21–22), and He stands in special relationship to the divine Spirit as well (Luke 24:49; Acts 2:32–33; Rom. 8:9). Father-Son-Spirit—Jesus Himself implies the concept of the Trinity, even if He does not use the word (Matt. 28:19). Finally, the Father even addresses Jesus as “God” (Heb. 1:8).

What/How? If Jesus is on the divine side of the line, it should be no surprise that He does what only God can do.

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If we wish to attract and grow genuine disciples, we must offer much more than inspiring civil religion, spiritual pep rallies, and pageantry. We must demonstrate a kind of faith known not for power and “success” but for weakness; scandalous not for hypocrisy but for hardship.
The church stands in need of reformation once again. Our pastors and our people need revival.
I say this as a Lutheran who has never been a fan of the slogan ecclesia reformata, semper reformanda (the church reformed, always being reformed). I do not think churches should always be reforming. Our profession and liturgy are often just right. I’m a rather traditional guy. I think the summaries of Scripture in our Protestant confessions remain relevant today—and, for the most part, true. They’re revisable, of course, based on the Word of God. They do not bear the authority that Holy Scripture does. But only modernists believe we should always be reforming them. Only the most trendy and rootless evangelicals want to reinvent the church incessantly.
I also say this as a historian of Christianity. I teach students all the time about seasons of despair and renewal in the church. I’m not the first to point out problems to God’s people. Church history is full of “prophets” pushing gloom and doom on others, making outsized claims about their generation’s sins.
Our Churches Are in Crisis
Still, our churches have taken a special kind of beating in recent years. And even traditionalists like me think revival is required when so many of us suffer from cheap grace, tribalism, spiritual laziness, and “gospels” that have displaced the cross with self-absorption. Since the time of the Reformation, we have debated when and in what conditions we need change—difficult change that requires hard work and a risky sort of witness. It’s been concluded that in times of acute persecution, when the gospel is at stake, when the church is on the ropes, we must stand up and fight for costly discipleship.
This debate dates back to the mid-16th century row when Lutherans, especially, wondered whether they had arrived at a status confessionis (“a situation of confession”). This is such a time. Many churches are in crisis—especially in the West, but in other places too. Attendance has dropped. An alarming number of young people doubt whether church membership even matters. Some of their elders seem to care more about wealth and power, their status and control of worldly narratives and systems, than about following Jesus. Of course, idolatry is not unique to seniors. Its tentacles are reaching into every generation.
Many Christians, young and old, have misplaced priorities. Many of us spend more time on sports than we do reading the Bible. We make more time for media than meeting others’ needs. We pray very little, and not very hard. Our plans for retirement are mostly R&R. We are hedging our bets regarding life in the world to come, investing more of our free time and excess income in mundane pastimes than in the kingdom of God. Many of us today would pay as much we can afford to extend our worldly lives for just a few more months. To use the language of the Puritans, we don’t seem to have weaned our affections from the world.
This is not lost on others. Many wonder how to account for the discrepancy they see between what Christians profess and what we do with our lives. They wonder just how deeply we believe what we say. And if we don’t believe it, why should anybody else? Maybe churches aren’t worth all the time they require. There are better ways to live our best life now than spending hours per week in institutions that too often apply a thin coat of God-talk and tepid spirituality to weak and rotting boards.
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