Ten Sweeter, Stronger Looks; How Examining Self Illuminates Christ
“For one look at yourself, take ten looks at Christ!”
This memorable line from Robert Murray M‘Cheyne (1813–1843) has drawn many Christians out of the cellar of morbid introspection. Some of us once lived in that cellar — bent down double, curved concave, scrutinizing, analyzing, paralyzing. For every one look at Christ, we took ten at self.
But then the Spirit began to unbend us, convex us. He sent a friend, gave us a passage, or perhaps used M‘Cheyne’s famous line to lift us up and out to Christ. Self-scrutiny gradually gave way to Christ-scrutiny. We dared to believe that taking ten looks at him was better and safer than taking ten looks within. So, we looked and looked and looked — ten times and more.
I have no desire to discourage such “looking to Jesus” (Hebrews 12:2). At the same time, however, I do wonder if M‘Cheyne’s quote has sometimes been taken in ways he didn’t quite intend. We might read his counsel and think he gave little or no place to introspection — that he countered every inward turn with “Christ! Look to Christ!” And so we might strive for the same attitude.
But for all of M‘Cheyne’s remarkable Christ-centeredness, the man was not afraid to examine himself, and often with surprising rigor. In fact, M‘Cheyne believed that the right kind of introspection could actually serve his sight of Christ. He knew that one good look at self has the potential to make our ten looks at Christ all the sweeter, stronger, and more wonderfully specific.
Godly introspection is a road, not a room, that ever takes us to the same glorious place: Jesus. And as we learn from M‘Cheyne, some of the best sights of Christ come at the end of that road.
One Look Within
“I am persuaded that I ought to confess my sins more,” M‘Cheyne wrote near the end of his life. “I think I ought at certain times of the day — my best times — say, after breakfast and after tea — to confess solemnly the sins of the previous hours, and to seek their complete remission.” He goes on, “I ought to take all methods for seeing the vileness of my sins” (Memoir and Remains of Robert Murray M‘Cheyne, 150).
Those who have felt trapped in the prison of introspection may tremble at such words; we may hear in them the clink of former chains. We might also wonder, Is this really the same man who told us to take ten looks at Christ — the same man who said, “Do not take up your time so much with studying your own heart as with studying Christ’s heart” (279)? Yes, the same man. He treated the command to “keep a close watch on yourself” with utter seriousness (1 Timothy 4:16).
We might imagine that such precise self-examination would leave M‘Cheyne feeling like a constant spiritual failure. But remarkably, it didn’t. Those who read his biography find a man often exuberant with joy, regularly relaxing in God’s love. “Oh, how sweet to work all day for God, and then to lie down under his smiles!” he wrote in his journal (56). His looks at self did not steal his sense of God’s steadfast favor.
How? Well, for one, M‘Cheyne was aware not only of indwelling sin but of indwelling grace; when he looked within, he could notice the ways his life pleased God. But even more significantly, he grasped that seeing self (even the worst parts of himself) was not an end but a means of seeing Christ more clearly, of beholding his glories more intimately and particularly. And so he surrounded his self-examination and confessions of sin with celebrations of Jesus.
Ten Sweeter, Stronger Looks..." from the article: Ten Sweeter, Stronger Looks
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