it. For the true Christian suffers as much from broken fellowship with God, as he enjoys moments of spiritual consolation. Through all this he will learn that the victorious Christian life is not a myth, but depends on the actual state of the surrendered will. Many Christians think they are surrendered, but are proven wrong whenever temptation strikes. God, however, never fails to honor an actually surrendered will with the necessary grace to meet any situa tion. The work of the Spirit is primarily an unconscious process, leading and molding man into the image of Christ. But sooner or later, this unconscious process man ifests itself in new desires and in certain conscious effects, of which the most common are: a desire for prayer, a desire to study the Word, a desire to witness and a need for Christian fellowship. A recent study by Dr. Ernest White ( The Chris tian L ife and. the Unconscious, Harpers) makes an excellent at tempt to analyze this process. Spiritual Transparency This in turn will lead to a state of spiritual transparency, to “Koin- onia,” to fellowship and communi ca tion on a meaningful level. Christians will not be afraid to share their victories or defeats, for love, not fear, will be dominant. “ If thine eye be single, thy body shall he full of light,” said Jesus. You will be simple, transparent and in genuine fellowship with man and God. “ But if we walk in the light, as he is in the light, we have fellowship one with another, and the blood of Jesus Christ his Son cleanseth us from all sin.” The issue is clear; which will it be? The Spirit of God, or the Spirit of the world? “ 7 call heaven and earth to wit ness against you this day, that I have set before thee life and death, the blessing and the curse: there fore choose life, that thou mayest live, thou and thy seed.” END.
Holy Spirit. This leading of the Holy Spirit is the only antidote against an impossible burden, the attempt to live a victorious Chris tian life in the face of the over whelming impact of the Spirit of the world. When this spiritual element has been lost, however, the young Christians often welcome this lib eral solution as an opportunity to give vent to pent:up resentments against existing hypocritical situa tions. Of course, in this case inte gration of belief and practice is not achieved until the young Chris tian is in the liberal camp. For as long as the doctrinal core is ortho dox, it will conflict sharply with the standards of natural man. This is the general pattern in which most Christian schools have actual ly developed, from orthodoxy to liberalism. SPIRITUAL ORTHODOXY. As we have already seen Christians are bom, not made. But once regeneration has occurred the development of the victorious life depends on the re sponse of man to the indwelling Holy Spirit. This will lead to a daily challenge of total surrender (I die daily), to a realization that trials, temptations and even fail ings, though sometimes unavoid able, should never become norms for compromise, but rather, means by which man’s dependence on God is strengthened. This could be furthered by a Christian fellow ship of such an open nature that it would strengthen man’s desire to have any broken fellowship with God restored as soon as possible. For close Christian fellowship is always conducive to spiritual res toration. It leads to the insight that discouragement in itself is sin which Satan constantly uses to de feat the children of God. It teaches that man can learn as much from failings as from victories; the first provides him with negative, the second with positive, verifications concerning the reality of the Spir
dience accepts the cross. The theol ogy of complacency, however, tries to avoid spiritual endeavor. The Christian has to develop some way or other, but the “ growing process” is interpreted in terms of the in crease in amount of intellectual doctrinal knowledge. This process, may sooner or later lead to doc trinal clashes on unessentials, since the inner life of the Spirit and the absolutely essential qualities of love and humility have not de veloped p r o p o r t io n a lly . “ And though I have the gift of prophecy, and understand all mysteries, and all knowledge; and though I have all faith, so that I could remove mountains, and have not charity, I am nothing” (1 Cor. 13:2). Smug ness, bigotry and pharisaism are often the results. Of course, a basic doctrinal core is absolutely essential to evangeli cal Christianity. There is always, however, a point in the intellec tual analysis of doctrine beyond which the spiritually sensitive per son will be afraid to venture dog matically realizing its unproduc tive and destructive potential. The revolt against this dead orthodoxy in turn leads to liberalism. Histor ically the sequence has always run from spiritual orthodoxy to dead orthodoxy to liberalism. LIBERALISM. By accepting the Spir it of the world as normative, an attempt is made to use the social sciences, psychology and sociology, to explain away feelings of guilt as being results of wrong religious conditioning. Of course, psychology has done a lot to enlighten man’s conscience on a naturalistic level, and to free man from much mean ingless and often harmful condi tioning. However, psychology deals exclusively with statistical surveys of behavior patterns found in un regenerate natural man and knows nothing of the reality of the Spirit. However, it is the born-again man who is led on many vital issues in terms of pleasing or grieving the
JUNE, 1956
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