The news is even better

At least for one Evangelical and one Baptist I have corresponded with, the notion of ascribing any value to our own effort is unthinkable. Even born-again humans are so depraved that any good we do is purely a fruit of the Holy Spirit and does not involve human effort. That puzzles me, and my understanding is more in line with this noon reading from today's Liturgy of the Hours:

[Deuteronomy 30:11 - 14] This Law that I enjoin on you today is not beyond your strength or beyond your reach. No, the Word is very near to you, it is in your mouth and in your heart for your observance.

This comes from a long discourse from Moses, encouraging Israel in the covenant they find themselves in. The following words are particularly heartening:

[6] The LORD, your God, will circumcise your hearts and the hearts of your descendants, that you may love the LORD, your God, with all your heart and all your soul, and so may live. .. [8] You, however, must again heed the LORD'S voice and carry out all his commandments which I now enjoin on you. .. [11] "For this command which I enjoin on you today is not too mysterious and remote for you. .. [14] No, it is something very near to you, already in your mouths and in your hearts; you have only to carry it out. .. [16] If you obey the commandments of the LORD, your God, which I enjoin on you today, loving him, and walking in his ways, and keeping his commandments, statutes and decrees, you will live and grow numerous, and the LORD, your God, will bless you in the land you are entering to occupy.

There is a certain dread (perhaps Occamite in influence) in the notion of man's total depravity, which, I think, compromises the fullness of God's love for his children. The bleak view of man's fallen nature actually compromises the Christian hope in God's salvation, not only in the promise of Heaven, but also here and now in the promise of sanctification. I've always wondered why Evangelicals settle for Luther's snow-covered dunghill, when the promises of God are nothing less than to purify us, whiter than snow, and to pour upon us his own Holy Spirit. A baptist once scoffed at my allusion to free will, which he maintains is not supported by Scripture. Well it is, and the good news is better than what the notion of total depravity allows: the Lord's precepts are "not too mysterious and remote." A life of holiness is within reach, because it is he who circumcised our hearts, and it is his life, his holiness, which we partake in. Even better, in his graciousness, our Father entrusts the doing to us: "it is something very near to you, already in your mouths and in your hearts; you have only to carry it out." And we grow with the doing: "If you obey the commandments of the LORD, your God, which I enjoin on you today, loving him, and walking in his ways, and keeping his commandments, statutes and decrees, you will live and grow numerous, and the LORD, your God, will bless you in the land you are entering to occupy."

The afternoon reading goes:

[Isaiah 55:10 - 11] As the rain and the snow come down from the heavens and do not return without watering the earth, making it yield and giving growth to provide seed for the sower and bread for the eating, so the word that goes from my mouth does not return to me empty, without carrying out my will and succeeding in what it was sent to do.

His Word does not return empty, and the Word made flesh gives life, and in him, we are born again, sons and daughters of the most high, circumcised in our hearts by the waters of baptism. And as he declares, so it is true, for his Word is never uttered in vain. He declares us justified, and so we are. He calls us temples of the Holy Spirit, and so we are. He refers to us as holy ones, saints, and so we are, "loving the LORD, your God, heeding his voice, and holding fast to him."