H OW DO
I t may be w ith you , as is true in the case of many of us when we first discover true spiritual beauty, and when it becomes a part of our lives, that we need to know to what use it can be placed in order to do the most good. There is a practical ana logy in the physical realm, for the reason people strive for human beauty is that they may call attention to them selves. This, of course, is basically pride. We all want to be favorably accepted in the society in which we travel. And while it may sound strange on the surface, the reason we strive for spiritual beauty is also to draw attention to ourselves, but for a dif ferent reason. There is no vanity in volved here. Since the Lord Jesus Christ is in heaven, it is our obligation to repre sent Him here on earth. This is the reason why each of us as believers should desire to be conformed to the image of the Saviour. This is the only way many people are ever going to know Him. If all they have to see of Him is in us, what kind of im pression will they have? We are the agents of the Lord Jesus Christ rep resenting Him here on earth until He returns. In addition to calling atten tion to ourselves, it is, therefore, in variably. true that we will call atten tion to Him. In the great high priestly prayer of our divine Lord, recorded in John
17, we find these words, “As thou hast sent me into the world, even so have I also sent them into the world” (verse 18). This means that the Sav iour is sending us on a mission to make contacts for Him. Christ’s pur pose in coming to earth was to seek out the1souls of men and to redeem all those who would believe on Him through His sacrificial death. We need to be adequately prepared for this important task by putting on our available spiritual attire (Ephesians 6:11-18). It is strange to me, there fore, to see so many evangelicals flee ing from the world. Now, I am not talking about so-called worldly pleas ures and the importance of separation. But with our strictness over secular and spiritual we have neglected our commission and have hampered our effectiveness f o r th e Lord Jesus Christ. Spirituality cannot exist in a vac uum. The Saviour didn’t pray that we would be delivered “out of” the world, but that we would have an effective testimony in it. Have you ever stopped to realize that the Gospel is to be lived in two dirty places. The two are the world and the flesh. This is what Paul means in Galatians 2:20 when he says “Christ liveth in me, and the life that I now live in the flesh. . . .” When one stops to think of what he is personally, there can be no doubt
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