Such a static and detached understanding of the Christian
life encourages Christians to “hold on,” wait, and endure
the pathos of the present, because the past is forgiven and
the future is assured. It misreads the gospel as a heavenly
fire-insurance policy for the avoidance of hell. The
objective of participating in Christianity and the Christian
life is not just to avoid hell and get passage to heaven, but
to allow the dynamic expression of the life of Jesus Christ
by His Spirit to function in human behavior to the glory of
God on the way to heaven (if such is to be perceived
merely as locative and future). Regeneration of spiritual
condition is but a crisis with a view to a living process!
Christian living is not generated, produced or
manufactured by the Christian in response to, or
appreciation of, Christ’s redemptive work or spiritual
presence. Jesus’ physical behavior and ministry on earth
was not generated by His own initiative (John 8:28; 12:49),
but by the divine presence of the Father abiding in Him and
doing His works (John 14:10), and likewise the Christian
life is not self-generated by the initiative of the Christian,
but is enacted by the dynamic expression of the life of
Jesus Christ through the Christian. Thomas Merton
explained that “Jesus creates it (the Christian life) in our
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