As we start a new year together, these words from J.D. Greear’s book, Just Ask, are convicting and challenging to me. Greear asked counselor Paul David Tripp about so many ministry leaders who had fallen, and Tripp indicated two consistent patterns he saw in these lives:
This book is worth reading if you want to strengthen your prayer life.
First, they had become separated from authentic (and local) community and from true peer relationships—that is, from people who could look them in the eye and say, “That’s bad, and you need to change.”
Second, he said, they forgot the power of indwelling sin, which made the lack of peer community lethal. They forgot that just because you are spiritually “mature”… just because you’re a pastor… just because your ministry is fruitful… it doesn’t mean that you are not a sinner, with nothing good dwelling in your flesh. They had not remembered Paul’s warning: “Let anyone who thinks that he stands take heed lest he fall” (1 Corinthians 10:12)—and so sin had overcome and destroyed them. They had stopped saying daily to God, “Father, lead me not into temptation, and deliver me from evil—because if you don’t, I will self-destruct.”
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J. D. Greear, Just Ask: The Joy of Confident, Bold, Patient, Relentless, Shameless, Dependent, Grateful, Powerful, Expectant Prayer. The Good Book Company. Kindle Edition location 1330-1336.