I grew up in a church setting that was really into “higher life” teaching. This teaching goes by many different names, including “victorious Christian living,” “the exchanged life,” and “the crucified life.” A particular stream of higher life teaching that continues to be influential is known as the Keswick Movement (pronounce KES-ik), named after an annual Bible conference that has been taking place in Keswick, England each year since the late nineteenth century. One key aspect of higher life teaching is probably traceable even further back to a movement referred to as Quietism, popular in Italy, France, and Spain during the seventeenth century. If you aren’t familiar with any of these labels, it is still likely that you are familiar with a slogan that gets used in connection with various strands of this teaching, namely, “Let Go and Let God.” Said differently, the key to the Christian life is to “let go of reliance on yourself and let God do the work in you.”

So much of what is taught in evangelical higher life circles is right and helpful, and I want to affirm much of it. The emphasis on surrendering oneself to Christ, the importance placed upon overcoming sin and living in holiness, and the awareness of the need for empowering by the Holy Spirit to defeat sin, spread the good news, and live a life pleasing to God are all praiseworthy. Higher life emphases have also been affirmed by many who have been catalysts for significant missionary thrusts during the past couple centuries. Actually, the reason it sometimes gets referred to as “higher life” teaching is because these brothers and sisters are unwilling to settle for the mediocrity they see among so many professing Christians. They know that the Scriptures teach something better. On these points, for sure, I could not agree more.

But there exists in the idea of “letting go and letting God do it” an implicit passivity. Surprisingly, many people who strongly emphasize “releasing their wills to God” and “allowing him to do his work in and through them” are not passive at all in their own lives. Nevertheless, a form of passivity is present in their teaching, and the Apostle Paul would have nothing to do with it if he were here.

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