If there were such a thing as a "second conversion," this would sum up mine:
Too many Christians practice the disciplines of the Christian life with the intention of turning God's face toward them and inclining his heart to favor them. They forget that God has loved them with an eternal and infinite love. He turned his face from our sin when he placed that sin on his dying Son, but now he never looks away from us and his heart never ebbs in affection for us. Every act of providence is for our eternal good and flows from his infinite love. Communing with God in prayer, understanding his ways through his Word, and embracing his glory and goodness through Christian fellowship and worship are means by which enabling grace fills our lives. These disciplines of grace are nourishments of the faith that we need in order to act in accord with God's purposes. They do not force or leverage God's hand but enable us to see it, grasp it, and receive the blessings it provides. The Christian disciplines do not earn blessings but guide us into the paths where God's grace has planted his blessings.
In grace-based preaching, the rules do not change; the reasons do. We serve God because we love him, not in order to make him love us. . . .He releases us from the performance treadmill that (falsely) promises to provide holiness through human effort, but the effect on the heart is love that is more constrained to please him.
(
Christ-Centered Worship<, by Bryan Chapell. pgs. 248, 242)
