Conversion, repentance, the purpose of the law

Grateful today for solid Biblical teaching on salvation, and the need for repentance and conversion last night at my church.  There is an "ear-tickling" thing going on in the Body of Christ about, "you just need to change your way of thinking."  Joel Osteen is leading that charge and the platform that he has to speak from is incredibly large.  There is a death in a true and deep conversion experience that can not be included in a simple "changing of your mind."  This is not about the power of positive thinking.

Reggie Kelly makes these excellent points, and like my Spurgeon post from this morning, I can do no better so I will simply quote him.

There is an implicit divine strategy implicit in the words, “The law came by Moses, but grace and truth by Jesus Christ.” Just as God sent John ahead of Jesus to prepare the way, even so He sends a prophetic company ahead with the prophetic Word of judgment, since grace is always revealed where judgment has been justified as just and necessary.

Paul’s statement, “Christ is revealed at the end of the law,” is more than a statement concerning a change of dispensation. It is a divine principle. Christ is revealed at the end of the law, precisely because He is revealed at the end of human strength.

The law requires nothing less than Christ.

That is to say, human self sufficiency hinders the light of revelation that transforms and imparts a new nature. In other words, there must first be a humbling and an emptying as the Spirit uses the Word to make us sensible of our condition and need. The purpose of the law is to remove the lie that anything in man can accommodate the exceedingly high requirement of the law, because the law requires nothing less than Christ. In this way, the awakened sinner is “shut up” or crowded to Christ.