Impossible Christianity: Kevin DeYoung

I think people are sometimes, as Christians, we're too hard on ourselves to think, I didn't do anything.

What do you mean you didn't do anything? You brought a meal every time somebody in the church needed one. You raised these kids to be good workers, good citizens, to be godly people. You loved your husband or your wife.

You prayed all the time. This is a godly life. Welcome to Family Life Today, where we want to help you pursue the relationships that matter most. I'm Shelby Abbott, and your hosts are Dave and Ann Wilson. You can find us at familylifetoday.com.

This is Family Life Today. So I'm holding a little book in front of me that has a maze on the front. Did you tell me you had a maze on the front? It has a maze on the front. Did you try to do the maze?

Yeah, last night I thought, I've just got to keep working at it. You can't get out. You can't even get in. Seriously, did you notice that? You can't get to the center and you can't from the center get. So, and the title of the book is Impossible Christianity.

That's a great visual. Yeah, it is. Because it feels like Christianity can be the same way.

I think a lot of people feel like that. I'm not going to pursue that. It's impossible.

Nobody can live that life out. Yeah, fortunately, we've got the author here who'll tell us what this all means. Kevin DeYoung, welcome back to Family Life Today. Thanks.

Great to be with you. And sorry about the maze, but that was purposeful. Was that your idea? I don't know.

I think probably someone at Crossway, they went through some different cover iterations and said, that's great. A maze that has no way out. Yeah. Because that's not what Christianity is supposed to feel like. Well, and the subtitle is Why Following Jesus Does Not Mean You Have to You ready for this? Keep going. Yeah, change the world, be an expert in everything, accept spiritual failure and feel miserable pretty much all of the time.

What a great subtitle. So we've already had, you know, a conversation about some really good stuff about Christianity isn't impossible, although it can feel like it's impossible. Walk us through. I know you're going through this with your staff. Yeah. So when you start presenting this kind of stuff to your staff and other people. As a pastor.

Yeah, as a pastor in North Carolina. Right. What is the pushback? I would say two kinds of pushback. One is from the person or the kind of person who it just feels unsafe a little bit. It's just dangerous. Like talking about maybe we'll get to it here, talking about devotions or evangelism or like, don't let up, you know, don't make this, are we going to send people out in an antinomian direction?

And then I think there's a concern sometimes related to that. Well, isn't the answer really to, shouldn't we be telling people to go attempt impossible things for God, to go out and and give your life away? And so I try to be clear. This isn't a book telling people you no longer risk or you don't have to carry a cross or you never have big dreams, you never attempt great things for God. That's not the point of the book.

The point of the book is really thinking about ordinary Christian faithfulness. Is it possible to be obedient? Or when Jesus said in the Great Commission that we teach people to obey everything I commanded, he really didn't mean it. He really meant, ha ha, you can't obey, but just do your best.

And I know you'll fail, but I love you. That's that's not what he said. Jesus sure seemed to have a category of you can obey, not perfectly. But truly, think about the Sermon on the Mount. He ends with all of those those contrasting pairs, a good tree, bad tree.

And do you build your house on the rock or on the sand? The one who builds on the rock is the one who hears these words of mine and puts them into practice. So biblically, we need a category. There are people, they're called Christians, who hear God's word and put them into practice. And yet I think many of us instinctively recoil from that, like, hmm, that doesn't sound very spiritual. Yeah, I mean, it sounds like impossible. Christianity is this is what I this is my reality.

It is impossible. I know when I came to Christ in college, I'll never forget one of my first ever. You know, I wasn't a Bible study guy. So now I'm in a Bible study and with the other guys on the football team. And I won't say his name, but I can remember I almost said his name. But he's probably not listening. But one of the guys, I call him Joe, comes to their Bible study.

And it was spring. And one of the things we had just talked about was something that was very well known in crew circles because Bill Bright wrote it in a book called Spiritual Breathing. Have you ever heard that? It's this idea, basically, Bill was saying you confess or exhale the sin and inhale God's forgiveness. So you and so it's just a way to think about, man, you sin, just confess it.

You are forgiven, receive his forgiveness. And he came in, Joe came in the Bible study. He goes, dude, have you walked on campus today?

Like, yeah, why? He goes, girls are wearing nothing. You know, the sun's out.

They're wearing nothing. He goes, I wasn't spiritual breathing. I was hyperventilating. And he was sort of trying to say, this is impossible. Right. Trying to be a pure man with my eyes as a college kid on a college campus. It felt impossible, but it isn't.

It isn't on a college campus or anywhere. I'm not saying it isn't a struggle for whatever your temptation is. But what you're saying is that maze, you actually can get through that maze, even though it feels like you never get there. Right.

Yeah. And the maze, to be clear, is not earning our way to God, finding the right turn so that we get to heaven. And God says, yes, you your good deeds outweighed your bad.

Now you're in heaven. No, I would die for justification by faith alone. All right. I believe in that and teach that with all my heart.

But we're talking about are we resigned that, OK, you're justified. Jesus loves you. You're going to heaven. You're forgiven. Now, congratulations.

Live the rest of your life. You're terrible at being a Christian. That's just what it's going to be. You'll go to heaven, but you'll never be good at this thing called Christianity.

So just get used to it. That's not the attitude or the mood at all in the New Testament. And so somehow we've done that on our on ourselves or to be honest, preachers can do that because we feel like people need to feel bad about everything all the time to the uttermost. And it's been really remarkable how many times, even just since the book came out or in talking about it, that people have been Christians a long time will say, I've just been living with this burden.

And somehow I never felt like God could be pleased with me. And it's often very serious Christians and some of the people like listening to this or watching this who really, really want to please God. They really want to live a life of faithfulness. And they just feel like it's never enough. Are they weighed down with sin, with feeling like they can never attain it and you're giving them like the gospel of grace?

Yeah. So I think there's two categories. There's one, someone who maybe really is living with unconfessed sin or they confess it and they don't really know God's forgiveness. So there's that. Then there's also the person who has so defined obedience to mean no smidge of possible, you know, ill motivation in my heart.

A.W. Tozer once said, we tend to view God as austere, peevish and short. Like he's just always mad at us.

You know, the coach, you can never do anything to please him. And so one of the illustrations that always resonates with me because I have a gaggle of kids. Nine. Yeah. You know, you did this, too. You know, I have pictures that my kids draw for me.

And there's one, you know, I don't know how old she was when she drew at five or something. And, you know, my hands in her hand, my daughter. And I don't say I'm not blue. Look at my face looks terrible.

My head is as big as the rest of my body. You don't know how to draw a picture. This is terrible.

This doesn't look like us at all. No, this is my daughter out of love, who's given this picture from her heart of me with my hand in hers. I say, thank you.

You know what? I'm going to put this up right on my office. I love this picture. Or just yesterday before I came here, my 14 year old went out to mow the lawn and we had a big yard.

That's a good thing right there. He's on the John Deere riding lawnmower and he does a nice job. Now, does he do it as perfectly as I would, you know, as well as I could? Maybe not, but I would be a terrible father if I just, if he came in, he did it of his own. He did it cheerfully. And I just said, Paul, you see that? I see the clumps all over.

What are you doing? This is a terrible job. Now, if anyone has that kind of father, you are that sort of father, shame on you. I mean, but then we think that God, whatever we do, God just tuts, just points a finger and it's never enough.

He would never smile upon us like a good father. If we sinful fathers do that, surely God does when we give him our heartfelt, sincere obedience. Now, do you feel like when you're saying impossible Christianity, are you saying it is impossible, but it isn't?

Because here's what came to my mind. And maybe you've heard Tim Keller say this years ago. I remember him talking about preaching. I think I was at a conference and I'm putting together messages every week. And I'm like, man, I love the way Tim preaches.

I went to a RTS class with Tim and just was blown away by his intellect. But I remember him saying something like this, and I hope I'm getting this right. But he's like, every sermon that Tim Keller preaches, he said, I want to present. This is the call of God in your life. Here's the text.

Let's go through it. This is the high standard God calls us to. He goes, and most sermons end with, OK, now go do it. Go go out there and we'll see you next week.

Have a whole week trying to reach that standard. He goes, that's the wrong way to preach. Cast God's standard from the word of God.

Before that sermon ends, say this. You'll never do it. It's impossible. You don't you don't even go home and try.

You're not going to do it. But let me tell you, Jesus has done it. You can walk with him. He can empower you to do it.

But if you go home and try harder, you're going to come back frustrated next week. And I'm going to give you the same sermon again. He said every sermon should end with the gospel, which is basically you can't. He did.

He can do it in you if you let him. Something like that. So there's a lot there. Here's what I want to agree with in that. Yes, if preaching just ends or is in its essence, here's stuff you got to do.

Ten Commandments, go out and do it. Try harder. Yeah, try, try harder.

Yeah. Yeah, that that's not gospel preaching. Where I might demure is to say we preach the meaning of the text in the mood of a text. And not every text has the mood that says, hey, you just you're going to fail, but come to Christ.

Of course, that's always true. But the example I give is if you're preaching through Second Samuel 11, David's sin with Bathsheba, that chapter ends, the thing David had done displeased the Lord. Now, if I'm preaching through that, I certainly want there to be the gospel because there are sinners out there. I want them to know how they can receive grace and forgiveness.

At the same time, that has a mood that should be chilling to people, that it should land on people. David displeased the Lord. So I don't want to be too quick to pull that punch back so that every sermon ends with, but you know what, there's David's greater son and you'll never do it. And but praise God, there's Jesus.

And and I know that's not what you were saying, what Tim was saying. But in a clumsy way, some preaching can end up sounding like that. You can never obey anyways. So there's Jesus. So what I want to say is, yes, Christianity is impossible if by Christianity, we mean perfectly obeying God's commands and earning his favor. Impossible. Not impossible, however, if we mean by the gospel of Christ, through faith in Christ, by the spirit of Christ, I can have victory to become increasingly like Christ.

That's possible. And to tell people to go out and make every effort toward that, Second Peter one is a biblical injunction, provided we're not saying do it self will your own strength, you're doing it according to the promises of God. So talk about you. You mentioned this in the book that your devotional life as it applies to this walk with Jesus. So I try to hit some of these evangelical Christian staples, which are so important to us.

So giving, sharing our faith and devotional life, because those those are the three that can feel like the the never enough. I say in the book, I've never actually seen The Greatest Showman. Never, never. But I know the song.

You have a good voice. Yeah, later. But that's what it can feel like. There are certain commands of the Bible, like, OK, you know, don't lust. That's really hard. But I don't have to put that, you know, in my calendar.

It's just don't do that. You know, the virtues, there's the fruit of the spirit. I want to grow in love, joy, peace. And then there are other ones that feel like, well, do I need 40 hours in the day to be a faithful Christian? Whenever we find ourselves saying, well, I could obey Jesus if only I had 40 hours in the day. No, the problem isn't Jesus.

The problem is we have we have not conceived of the Christian life in the right way. So with great fear and trepidation on those three things, devotional life, evangelism and generosity, I try to put lots of caveats in the book. Lest people say this is the best book ever. I don't have to read my Bible. I don't have to share my faith. I don't have to give anything away.

I don't want that. At the same time, I think a lot of Christians can feel like I'm not crushing my Bible reading. I missed five days sharing my faith after all these years is still scary. And I'm not a real extrovert. And I don't like talking to, you know, customer service, let alone telling people about Jesus.

It's really hard. And boy, I tithe. But I do have two cars and I took a vacation and all of those things where if we actually look at what God says in his word, many of those, like when the disciples say, Jesus, teach us to pray. He didn't say, here's what time you have to get up.

Here's how many minutes it is. He said, yeah, I'll teach you how to pray. God's your father. He gives you everything.

Here's what you ask for. So he taught us the how when we can be fixated on the how long and the when in all of those specifics. So without negating those important elements, I do think some of us in the Christian life have taken these good Christian disciplines and habits of grace. And because they can always be more, you know, you're going to get to the end of your life in the hospital and you're going to wish you had prayed more. Well, yeah, you're going to wish you had shared your faith. OK, well, that's a kind of defeating way to live your your life. What about God will work through you imperfect though you are throughout your whole life, if you will give yourself to him and if you will be faithful.

And part of my burden as a pastor is I think most of the people in my church are living a life that's honoring to Christ. Do they have sins? Yes. Do they need to grow? Yes.

Should they do some more? Yes. But most of them, most of the time, I think are living a life of obedience to Christ. And I don't know how many Christians hear that from their pastors. No, I don't think that's common at all. Do you say that to them?

Yeah, I do. I think it took me a while in ministry before I knew that people needed to hear that. I mean, I'm thinking about if I hear that in comparison to like, man, you guys are failing. If you feel like you're failing, you don't want to come back. But if you feel encouraged, like, am I? Wow, that's really encouraging.

I want to be back. And I feel like Jesus is an encourager. So when you're talking specifically about your devotional life, what do you say to the people in your church or your nine kids?

What are the things that you want them to know? Well, I certainly am all for the things we've all been hopefully taught about reading your Bible, spending some time in prayer. And I'm a big believer that doing a little something consistently is better than doing big something's inconsistently. So reduce the size rather than, you know, eliminate the habit. So if you if you only can do five minutes, you know, we think, why even exercise today? Because my schedule got off.

You know what? You could do push ups for 10 minutes and you'd probably feel a lot better and you're reinforcing that habit. It's the same thing with devotional time. So I liken it to other relationships. You know, my relationship with Tricia, who came down on this trip with me, is out shopping somewhere, doing wonderful things all by herself. If my relationship with Tricia just consisted of, OK, this 30 minutes in the morning, you and I, we're going to be talking. And if I don't do that, then our relationship is done for the day. If I do do that, then I'm a good husband for the day.

If it was just that kind of mechanic, you feel like, oh, you've got to breathe a little bit. On the other hand, if I said, oh, let me tell you how much I love Tricia, I never want to hear from her. I don't ever want to spend time with her.

I never talk to her and say, I'm not sure you do love her. So, you know, with God, I want to hear from him in his word. That's what we hear from God and pray to him and spend time. And in the context of corporate worship and others, we often hear this devotional thing and we think, oh, that's just me and myself, extemporaneous praying to God.

No, it's church counts, small group counts. We're talking about fostering the kind of life where you hear from God in his word and speak to him in prayer because you love him and he loves you. And of course, you want to have that relationship. And it'd be interesting, too, because Dave and I, we work together, so we're with each other a lot. All the time. It's wonderful and it's all the time. But we don't wake up in the morning and have, even if it's a five-minute conversation or a 50-minute conversation, I'm talking to him all throughout the day. And I think that's important for people to know with God. Like, it's not just you have to pray right then, it's that you get to, but you can do it all day.

I find myself praying all day long because he's with me, he's in me, and I'm conversing with him continually, as Paul said, pray without ceasing. And I think that's especially, I'm thinking about Tricia, your wife, with nine kids. She probably has hardly any time to herself. And so she's probably, as I learned as a young mom, oh, but I may not have that chunk of time, but I can listen to God's word and I'll put the Bible in different places. But I can talk to him any time, all day long, whenever, because he's always with me.

Yeah. We forget about all of the other ways that God means for us to be with him. So when in the New Testament, when Jesus, of course, Jesus went off to pray privately, but when he talks about the disciples going out and praying, they're probably praying the Hillel Psalms in Holy Week.

They're probably doing some set Jewish rituals. We tend to think quiet time only counts if it's extemporaneous prayer. You know, I couldn't read a prayer back to God. I couldn't sing a hymn as prayer to God.

None of that counts. I couldn't do it with other people. I often say, think about you get up in the morning and if somebody says, okay, 10 minutes after you get up, you got a cup of coffee. I want you to give a really meaningful, excellent talk for 20 minutes. Go. Who's ready to do that about anything?

And yet if we think, well, that's that's devotional time. Okay, 20 minutes right now. Go talk to God. We're all going to need helps.

I need helps. I'm going to need books to help me and prayer books to help me and hymns to help me. And I'm going to need to write down some prayer cards and and I'm going to wander. Just forget about feeling guilty for your mind wandering.

It will happen just when you come back, say, thank you, God, you brought me back. It's just going to happen. You're going to get distracted. Your mind's going to wander, just like it does sometimes when Dave's talking to you, probably. Yeah, yeah.

Her mind never wanders when I'm talking. I mean, you just mentioned guilt. Chapter five. What a chapter titled The Infinite Extensibility of Guilt. What does that mean?

So I get this from and I mentioned this article from he's now at Hillsdale, actually, a professor there. And it's talking about the the way the world has shrunk. And because technology can connect us to everything, everywhere you think about Jesus telling the Good Samaritan. I preached on this a year or two ago. And again, I had a lady in the church with a Christian a long time and she just said, oh, thank you. I've never heard the Good Samaritan that didn't feel like just the worst, you know, just guilt because because we're not because I'm not the Good Samaritan. And again, I don't want to take away. Jesus is calling us to be a neighbor to people in need. And yet it was a specific need at a specific moment when you were when he was the only person.

The need was extreme, immediate, in his face, all of those things. Well, how do we live life when you can see now tsunami victims on the other side of the world? You know, every time there's a mudslide, every time there's a fire, let alone the intractable problems in our own country. What are you doing for racism? What are you doing for climate change, if that's your thing?

All sorts of so it can feel like, well, yeah, you know, you pray with your kids and you take them to youth group and you sing in the choir and you give a tithe. But what are you doing about this? Which tends to be the sort of problems that are the most difficult to solve, which is why they haven't been solved yet and take an extreme amount of time and effort. And I'm not saying some people don't have that specific call on their life.

But what is the person who's shuttling their kids to school, trying to get into soccer, trying to get their lunches made, trying to help them with their homework, that mom? And then you say, well, are you doing anything to to solve the problem of racism in our country? Please don't hear me saying racism isn't a sin.

It is. But see, there's a difference between saying if you have that sin, you should repent of it. Or how can you be reconciled to others or how could you be a friend to your neighbor? And then saying, how can you repair what's broken in our whole society?

Well, I don't know how to get at that. That's the infinite extensibility of guilt. Our world has the residual Christian impulse of guilt without the Christian mechanism to forgive and offer grace for that guilt.

Go to Twitter or X. Lots of guilt. No way to be forgiven for your sins.

That's so true. Well, that kind of leads us into the last chapter, which is called A Quiet Life. You know, I told Dave we were traveling and I was looking.

I think we were in the Midwest and there's just cornfields and there are no houses except miles apart. And I have this thing in me is like, I'm supposed to change the world. And I said to him, what would it have been like just to raise your kids?

Just like, were they fulfilling the Great Commission? What's that quiet life? Is it OK to lead a quiet life? So the verse 1 Timothy 2, first of all, then I urge that supplications, prayers, instructions and thanksgivings be made for all people, for kings and all who are in high positions, that we may lead a peaceful and quiet life, godly and dignified in every way. So the Bible is a big book. This isn't the only thing it says about the Christian life, but it's one thing it says. And to your point, Anne, I think if you ask somebody, tell me what your goal is in life. And you said, I would like to live a quiet and peaceful life, godly and dignified in every way.

Most college ministries are going to tell you wrong. Oh, I would probably have said you need to change the world. Yeah. But who's to say that living that quiet, peaceful life, godly and dignified in every way isn't a major influence in changing the world? Yeah.

What do you mean by that? You know, when I look at the Christian family that's loving their kids, providing a normal, you know, what we do for our kids that's most important is we're giving them what normal looks like. And if normal looks like mom and dad love each other and I go to church and there are Christians and there's a Bible and Jesus is king and there's sins and lots of things, but that's normal. I want to say to people, that's not what's wrong with the world.

Now, is it true that those sorts of Christians, myself included, can be too comfortable and could say, I got a nice job. I got enough money. I got my family. We're good. I don't want to be bothered with your problems.

Yes, there's the other side of it. But to raise those sorts of kids, I think people are sometimes as Christians, we're too hard on ourselves. I didn't do anything. What do you mean you didn't do anything? You brought a meal every time somebody in the church needed one. You raised these kids to be good workers, good citizens, to be godly people.

You loved your husband or your wife. You prayed all the time. This is a godly life, quiet and peaceful. And I at least, I end the book that way because I at least want to offer to people, this too is a verse in the Bible and we should not be ashamed that we might live a quiet life, godly and dignified in every way. Yeah, you mentioned Jeremiah 29.

I'll read it. It says, build houses. God is saying this, build houses, settle down, plant gardens and eat what they produce. And many ministries would say, no, no, no, no, that's not enough. And this is where you guys have traveled a lot, too, to know there is something about American evangelicalism that has not been true at all times in all places.

And some of that is a strength. You know, I go to other places and they're like, you guys just, American evangelical, you just are entrepreneurial, you go after it, you get it done, you think of new ways, you build things, that's great. But there can be the danger of a kind of hyperactivity that the good, real Christian is probably super extroverted, talking to people all the time, lots of activity. And there are people quietly in our churches who just feel like, I don't fit in with that, I'm absolutely exhausted. It tends to be a church life of high degrees of activity and activism and much good is done through that. And yet without this message to also be in the counterbalance, we run the risk of giving people a version of Christianity that they just feel like they can never achieve.

I mean, as we wrap up, I mean, I think that's encouraging for a lot of listeners. It's like, we're not saying be lazy, it's not that at all, but it's like, live a quiet life, be diligent about what God called you to be. And it could be build a house, plant a garden, influence your neighborhood through that medium. Because, of course, you know, Jeremiah 29, seek the shalom of the city.

We know that part, but how do you do it? Well, it's those earlier verses. This is what you're going to do to seek the peace of the city. Settle down, you're going to have a garden, you're going to have a family, you're going to attend to the normal things of life because, and you're going to pray for the city because as the city goes, so will you.

But as you go, so will the city. And if you're not healthy and you're not living this kind of life, then you're not going to be much good for anyone else around you. And you're going to be so worn out with this impossible version of Christianity, you're not actually living in the joy of the Lord, which is supposed to be our strength. I know for me, often the times I feel how good God is, like taste and see the Lord is good, is when I still myself and get quiet.

And I don't, I run pretty hard and you even run harder. No, but you're right. But when you settle and rest. Yeah, when we talk about the quiet life and even Psalm 34 of taste and see that the Lord is good, when I go on walks and I don't put in my headphones and I just look at who God is by his creation, feels good, doesn't it?

Yep. Take a walk today, sit and experience the goodness of God. I'm Shelby Abbott and you've been listening to David Ann Wilson with Kevin DeYoung on family life today. Kevin's written a book called Impossible Christianity, and it really helps believers answer the question, can we please God and live a happy life in this anxious age? You might just, you know, instinctively say yes.

But do you do you really mean it when you say yes? Well, Kevin helps to answer that question and you can pick up his book by going online to familylifetoday.com and clicking on the today's resources link. Or you could get the link in the show notes or you could give us a call at 800-358-6329 request your copy there.

Again, the number is 800 F as in family, L as in life, and then the word today. So if you know anyone who needs to hear conversations like the one you heard today, would you share this program from wherever you get your podcasts? And while you're there, you can really help others learn more about family life today by leaving us a review. Now, hey, I know that some of you have actually already been to a family life weekend to remember marriage getaway, but we just wanted to make sure that you've heard that there is a lot that has changed from the past. We have a new speaker lineup, an entirely different guidebook, and so much of the getaway has been changed and intentionally curated for you and your spouse to grow together like never before. So right now would be a great time to head back to weekend to remember. And now through January 22nd, all of our weekend to remember getaways are 50 percent off. So you can find a date and a location that works best for you at weekend to remember dot com. Now, tomorrow, many of us would say that we kind of drag a lot of emotional baggage into our marriages.

In fact, I'd say most people say that. Well, tomorrow, David and Wilson are going to be joined by Deborah Faleta to talk about just that, addressing emotional baggage and building stronger foundations within our marriages. That's tomorrow. We hope you'll join us. On behalf of David and Wilson, I'm Shelby Abbott. We'll see you back next time for another edition of Family Life Today. Family Life Today is a donor supported production of Family Life, a crew ministry helping you pursue the relationships that matter most.