The Deeper Things of Christ - T.A-Sparks

As you may guess by the title of the thread, I find great spiritual depth and understanding in the writings of T. Austin-Sparks. In a generation where 'me' and 'my problems' and feeling good about oneself is the prominent focus of the church, we NEED those who can minister the meat of the Word of God in season and out. T. Austin-Sparks is a true minister of the Word and I encourage you all to read some of his messages (all transcribed as I don't think he ever wrote but ministered to small groups). I am primarily seeking to correspond (on the boards or by email) with those who feed on the words Sparks has been given by God to deliver to those of His Flock.

For those interested, there is a website out there that goes by his last name (hyphenated). Try a good search engine (like Google) and you should find it fast. It has most of his writings.

One that it doesn't have is "The Blessedness of the Unoffended"  (Matthew 11:16 and John 16:1). This is a powerful message on going on UNOFFENDED IN CHRIST !

 Maybe to start off, does anyone have any thoughts on not being offended in Christ?

 

30th January 2003 at 02:58 PM Serving4Christ said this in Post #2

This is the first I have heard of T. Austin-Sparks. I went to his web site and find it to be very informational. I'll have to do more research into his words of wisdom. The site looks great though. Thanks for sharing!

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 One of the best works of Sparks to begin with is "Pioneers of the Heavenly Way". Sparks saw much that a church dwelling in the outer court cannog. He gets into real meat here. I will be rereading it myself now, so any discussion would be most welcome - if you so desire.

You can email me if you do so desire.

 Blessings.

Today at 04:04 PM sbbqb7n16 said this in Post #4

My thought:
Why would you be offended at the man who died for you?

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 An excellent question sbbqb7n16 (interesting name!). And one that I can't fully answer. But it is safe to say that there are many who are offended in Christ and who turn from Him. Even the disciples did not remain faithful, but turned from Him when they thought He let them down in His death.

 That offence in Christ, as I see it, is a thing of pride. We come to Him full of ourselves (in various measure) and He calls us to lay ALL that down. Only the one who gives up ALL that he loves, and all that he lays claim to will rid himself of the pride of life and of self. It is when we hold to something closer than we hold to Christ that we risk being offended IN Him.

As Sparks puts it in his Blessedness of the Unoffended:

One of the greatest perils of the Christian life lurks in the common pathway of discipleship. It is the peril of being offended in CHRIST. The fellowship to which the gospel summons us inevitably brings a constant new and humiliating discovery of self; an unvarying disturbance of established order in our lives, as His will corrects and opposes our own; and a ceaseless effort to attain to the idea; that is, to make our lives as followers increasingly correspond with His as Forerunner. And the danger is that we are apt to break down under the test and training of it all, to go back and walk no more with Him, to become, in fact, offended in Him. It is always possible, despite every sincere profession of the soul, that what GOD meant for blessing should become blight to us by our misconceptions. It is always perilously possible that the light of today may become deep and impenetrable darkness tomorrow, by our failure to obey and keep step with Him, by our lagging behind or turning aside from the compelling guidances of CHRIST's companionship. Men have, in this way, unconsciously and imperceptibly put themselves far out of the range of CHRIST's ordinary influences; and have become, like the derelicts of the ocean, occasions of danger and disaster to countless other lives.