September 1943
327.
of life is the same for each? Each has b,een brought into living, vital oneness with the Lord Jesus Christ, each has been given the blessed gift of the Holy Spirit to do the same work in each, and yet there is such a difference in the quality of the lives of Christians that in God’s Word He calls the one a carnal -Christian, and the other a spiritual Christian. And we are told that the carnal Chris tians are those that remain babes in Christ. They never grow up. There is very little evident spiritual growth. Then, in contrast, there is the spir itual Christian, who is the full-grown, mature, ever-growing Christian. He is the one who, no matter how spiritual he is, is becoming more spiritual all the time; knowing .the Lord Jesus' Christ better, loving Him better, re vealing Him more perfectly in his life day by day to others, having the pow er of the Lord manifested in his life, having the passion of the Lord for souls. - Friend, if ' you are a believer in Christ, which type of Christian are you? You are either one or the other.1 Which are you—a carnal Christian or a spiritual Christian? Every one of us ought to know which kind he is. Other people know. Your family knows, your friends know, your church" knows. You and I should know. And we should be willing to face honestly that question. A carnal Christian is a sick Chris tian. Why is it that we care so much more for physicaLhealth than for spir itual health? Why is it that we care so much' more for the filthy lucre of the world than we care for the un searchable riches of Christ? How to Change Classifications The surest way to become a spiritual Christian is to acknowledge that you are carnal, When once you say it and frankly acknowledge that you now ■ care more for the things of earth and time and sense than you care for the things of heaven and eternity and Christ, you have taken the first step toward getting out of a life of car nality into a life of spirituality. That is the hardest step to take. We cannot bear to acknowledge what we are. Is this not true? Friends have come to me to talk over their
spiritual condition, and it takes about half an hour, as a rule, to get them to admit that they are what they know they are. They came to talk it over because they were that, blit they just cannot1come to the point of actually saying out and out, “Yes, that is what I am.” ’"That is just the issue the Lord is having with most of us all the tim e/W e will not admit the presence within us of that hideous, hateful thing called “self,” that great big capital “I.” Oh, how clearly we see it in the other fellow and go around telling everyone else how bad it is in other people. We have long sight but no' short sight—we are not shortsighted enough to see that ugly thing in our selves that others see in us as clearly as we see it in them. That is just where our trouble begins, and we will never get out of Romans 7 to live in Romans 8 until we are willing to ac knowledge our presence in Romans 7 and start from there. What do we find in Romans 7? it is a picture of a carnal Christian, de feated, discouraged, yes, despairing; one who comes to cry out from the depths of his innermost being,- “O .wretched man that I am! who shall deliver me from the body of this death?” (v. 24). Have you come to that place? L believe we must get to the end of Romans 7 before we can get into Romans 8. Or it may be we reach the end of Romans 7 and stay there instead of going on into Romans 8, because we do not know the way. A Question of Relationships Other times, the difficulty is that we are unwilling to pay the price of the transfer from one experience to the other. The Christian has to. make a choice. He must choose between the rulership of self and the Lordship of Jesus Christ. No Christian can pos sibly live a life of victory without making that choice. The root reason for every defeat in your life and mine lies right there. There must be a defi nite, intelligent, final choice of Jesus Christ as Lord if there is going to be a life of victory with its resultant, peace and rest and power. In Romans 7, as we go on to the next verse after
that anguished cry, we read,' “ I thank God through Jesus Christ our Lord.” There is the way of victory as far as our relationship to Christ is con cerned. We give to Him the absolute, undivided Lordship over our lives. Have you done that? Do not say. you do not know whether you have yielded Him Lord- ship or not. Friend, if you do not know, you have not done it. If you have triily crowned Christ Lord, you know. Within a half day after you do it, you will know, because the Lord will exercise His Lordship. That is the reason He, wants sovereignty over you and me, and the moment He begins to exercise it, you—your self life—begin to kick, to rebel, to resist. You will know whether He is exercising His Lordship or not. Then we mus^ come into a new adjustment with the Hoiy Spirit, in order that there may be complete and continuous victory over our three enemies—Satan, the world, and the flesh. You and I have but a twofold concern. Our concern is that we are in a right arid full relationship to the Lord Jesus Christ, and a right and full adjustment to the Holy Spirit. When we aré, we do qot have to be parleying with the devil. Our defeat often lies here. We try to deal di rectly with the devil, and we in our selves are no match for him, and we never will be. He already has been dealt with at the cross, and we need . only to utilize 'Christ’s victory. Furthermore, we are trying to deal with the world in every little allure ment and enticement it brings up and to decide whether we should do a spe cific thing this time. I hear this, “Oh yes, I do not go to 'any-but just cer tain elite movies. And I choose the kind of movie to which I go." Conse quently, every time you have to find out whether it is the right kind of movie. You think it is; and when you get there you find it is not! At Cal vary, the' “world”—that Satan-domi nated system that is opposed to God —has been taken care of; the flesh has been taken care of. Your concern is to see that you are rightlj) con- [Continued on Page 358]
There are two laws—the law of sin and' the law of the Spirit, and we make a choice as to which we will be under. We are under one or the other. The law of sin always takes us Satanward, earthward, downward, and backward. It cannot do otherwise. The law of the Spirit always takes us Christward, upward, heavenward, and onward. It can take us no other way.
"There is therefore now no condemnation to them which are in Christ Jesus, who walk not after the flesh, but after the Spirit. "For the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus hath made me free from the law of sin and death." —Romans 8:1, 2.
*
Made with FlippingBook - Online magazine maker