Do you want a book to challenge your spiritual life?
Backsliding may not be a word that occurs in the New Testament but it is, nevertheless, a very real and up-to-date issue in the life of every believer. As the writer puts it, ‘We can still assemble ourselves in corporate worship each week, still serve God in some teaching/preaching or witnessing capacity and our hearts can be as far from him as night from day’.
E. A. JOHNSTON approaches his subject with candour and fervour starting with ‘The Telling Marks of a Backslider’ and finishing with ‘Hearts on Fire for God’. Moving through this relatively slim volume, he deals with the difference between repentance and confession, ‘Knowing the Heart of God’, and the race that is before the believer. The fourth chapter on repentance is worth reading alone as it will challenge all. The book is peppered with lengthy quotations from scripture showing the overall issue to be thoroughly scriptural and its resolution essential for the spiritual growth of the individual.
This book is not comfortable reading but deals with an issue that the writer approaches with passion and a genuine desire to rekindle our love for the Lord. As JOHNSTON concludes, ‘When a believer re-enters a right relationship with God, everyone sees it’. Is that true of me?
