Going beyond work-harder sermons

Here's a follow-up to Monday's post on the futility of sola bootstrapa. Bob at Gratitude and Hoopla has been writing this week about better alteratives to you-can-do-it sermons. This past Saturday, Bob looked at the NT concept of Kingdom rest. Monday, Bob took on "Christian to-do lists" and made this trenchant obervation:

We cannot transform ourselves. To try to do so is to find ourselves among "enemies of the cross." So it seems the message here is Christ-centered and cross-centered, not race-centered. In the final analysis, we cannot strain after perfection; it must be given us.

From reading Bob's blog I'm continually reminded of the need to keep the cross of Christ in view during preaching, praying, studying, and living in general. Bob posted another cross-centered essay today, "On Holding Fast and Drawing Near." Good stuff.