“The man who has faith is the man who is no longer looking at himself, and no longer looking to himself. He no longer looks at anything he once was.

He does not look at what he is now. He does not [even] look at what he hopes to be as the result of his own efforts. He looks entirely to the Lord Jesus Christ and His finished work, and he rests on that alone.

He has ceased to say, ‘Ah yes, I have committed terrible sins but I have done this and that…’ He stops saying that.

If he goes on saying that, he has not got faith… Faith speaks in an entirely different manner and makes a man say, ‘Yes, I have sinned grievously, I have lived a life of sin… yet I know that I am a child of God because I am not resting on any righteousness of my own; my righteousness is in Jesus Christ, and God has put that to my account.’”

- D. M. Lloyd-Jones, quoted by Timothy Keller in The Message of Romans (Redeemer Presbyterian Church, 2003), 59.

I got in an argument with my wife. I was promoting my cause with conviction and impressive verbosity. In basketball it would be a slam dunk. In football, it would be a touchdown. In baseball, it would be a grand slam.

In reality, it was stupid.

I forgot the Gospel.

Actually, I didn’t forget the Gospel. Even while I was parading my “rightness” in the matter in front of my wife by slamming her with my air tight arguments, there was a still small voice going off in my head reminding me of the Gospel.

I thank God for the back traffic conversation he was having with me while I was flaunting my ignorance in front of my bride. It was the back traffic chat in the heat of the moment that was reminding me who the biggest sinner in the room really was.

Unfortunately, I forgot the four catholic nones. But God is kind. He reminded me of…

Romans 3:10-12 As it is written, There is none righteous, no, not one: There is none that understandeth, there is none that seeketh after God. They are all gone out of the way, they are together become unprofitable; there is none that doeth good, no, not one. (KJV)

The Gospel realigned my thinking. I am not righteous. I am not right. I am not better than my wife. I put Christ on the tree, therefore I have no right to act as though I’m righteous and she is not. Outside of the Cross of Christ I’m the chief of sinners.

A Gospel orientation levels the playing field. I repented. She forgave me and God is good!

(The word catholic means universal.)

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