Tells How to Live a Life of V ictory and Peaee 9 Rest and Power
have come to me to talk over their spiritual condition, and it takes about one 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, but they just cannot come 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 time. We will not admit the presence within us of that hideous, hateful thing called self, that great capital 7. 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 will ing to acknowledge 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, “ 0 wretched man that I am! who shall deliver me from the body of this death?” (v. 24). Have you come to that place? I 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 Ro mans 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 possibly live a life of victory with out making that choice. The root- reason for every defeat in your life and mine lies right there. There must be a definite, 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 relation ship to Christ is concerned. We give to Him the absolute, undivided Lord- ship 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 truly crowned Christ' as 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 must come into a new adjustment with the Holy 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 and full relationship to the Lord Jesus Christ, and a right and full adjustment to the Holy Spirit. When we are, we do not 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 specific thing this time. I hear this, “Oh yes, I do not go to any but just certain elite mpvies. And I choose the kind of movie to which I go.” Consequently, 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 Calvary, the “world”—that Satan-dominated system that is op posed to God—has been taken care of; the flesh has been taken care of. Your concern is to see that you are rightly connected and related to the Lord Jesus Christ, who has taken care of it all, and rightly adjusted to the Holy Spirit who is in you to keep you satisfied, by keeping you occupied with Christ.
Where Do You Live? In First Corimhians, the carnal Ghristian and the spiritual Christian are the same in position. The car nal Christian is both in Christ and in the Spirit, the same as is the spiritual Christian. But there is a marked, evident contrast in their con dition. What is the reason for this? There is conflict all the way through Romans 7, with the result of defeat and discouragement and despair. There is conflict in Romans 8. As long as we live, even up to the last breath we breathe, we will be conscious of that conflict, and we will be a part of it because the flesh remains. There is no point to a great deal that is said in the first part of Romans 8, if the flesh is not still there. But there is conquest in con flict. There is victory, there is rest fulness, there is joy, there is peace, and there is an emancipation in Ro mans. 8. So Romans 8 is the home of the spiritual Christian. Is it your home? Is it where you habitually live? In traveling in Europe, my co worker and I had one very great difficulty. As soon as we arrived in a city, we were presented with a police blank to be filled out in de tail. Most of the questions we could answer quite easily, but one of them was difficult: “What is your per manent address?” We do not have one, so what could we put down? I always wanted to write, “With Christ in the heavenlies,” but I was afraid that if I did this I might be arrested as an international spy. So I could answer that question only in a gen eral way. My permanent address is “With Christ in the heavenlies.” It ought to be yours. Is it? The permanent residence of every Christian is, in God’s thought, “ In Christ in the heavenlies.” That is the place where you and I should live habitually. We are just pilgrims down here. God says so. I wonder whether some of us who are looking forward to the Lord’s return are “All packed and ready to go,” or are held down by the cables of earthly posses sions. All the mere things of earth will have to be left behind. But if you are already up yonder, in spirit and thought, It is not going to be continued on page 33 7
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