Page 25 - The Poetic Books - Student Text

We must give Zophar credit for his passionate altar call. He is bold. He is determined. He has great
conviction of his own, and he is unafraid to speak them. Certainly, life has situations where such
boldness is appropriate, necessary, but what if we always speak like Zophar?

The greatest threat to Christ-centered witness even in churches that formally affirm
sound teaching is what British evangelical David Gibson calls “the assumed gospel.” The
idea is that the gospel is necessary for getting saved, but after we sign on, the rest of the
Christian life is all the fine print: conditional forgiveness…. We got in by grace but now
we need to stay in (or at least become first-class, sold-out, victorious, fully surrendered
Christians) by following various steps, lists and practices. There was this brief shining
moment of grace, but now the rest of the Christian life is about our experience, feelings,
commitment, and obedience. We always gravitate back toward ourselves: “Prone to
wander, Lord, I feel it; prone to leave the God I love.” We wander back toward self-
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confidence just as easily as into more obvious sins.

cannot answer him. They cannot help him spiritually out of his predicament. If he would follow their
advice, he would have to admit fault. He did something to deserve all this suffering. Yet Job knows, and
we the readers know, he was innocent at the very beginning. Their message of sin and more sin and even
more sin as the reason for Job’s suffering is simply wrong. There must be more to spiritual life than this,
otherwise the prosperity gospel is correct, and the path for all to take.

The third step to a renewed mind is a mind filled with an orientation to success.
You must permeate your mind with a victory consciousness, and an abundance
consciousness. God never fails. So, if it is God’s thoughts you are receiving, you will
always to successful. God never loses a war, for He is the eternal victor; you should have
victory consciousness. This consciousness is important. If you have inferiority
consciousness, poverty consciousness, sickness consciousness, or failure consciousness,
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God can never work.

33 Michael Horton, Christless Christianity (Grand Rapids: Baker Books, 2008), 119-120.
34 Paul Yonggi Cho, The Fourth Dimension (Plainfield: Logos International, 1979), 147.
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