THE KING’ S BUSINESS
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the season, already it is time for you to awake out o f sleep: for now is salvation nearer to us than when we first believed, especially the last clause. The word “ salvation” is used in a variety- o f senses in the New Testament. It is used first of all o f the salvation that one receives the moment he believes on the Lord Jesus Christ, when he is justified from all things (Acts 13:38, 39), when all his sins, are forgiven and made as if they never had been committed (Acts 10:43), - when he obtains eternal life (John 3:36), and becomes a child o f God (John 1:12). It is used in the second place o f the salva tion that comes to us day by day as we are delivered from the power o f sin, arid it is also used o f that complete salvation that shall be ours when our Lord comes and the body itself is raised from the dead and we enter info our 'full blessedness and sal vation that is not yet ours, but “ ready to be revealed in the last time” (1 Peter 1:5; cf. Rom. 8:23, 24, R. V .). O f course, if is salvation in this last sense that is referred to in Rom. 13:11 as being “nearer” “than when we first believed.” From the various senses in which the word “ salvation” is used in the New Testament it is perfectly proper for a man to say he is already saved, or.has been saved (cf. Eph. 2:8, R. V .). It is also proper for him to say that he is being saved, i. e., that he is being delivered day by day from the power o f sin by the indwelling Ghrist, and it is also proper for him to say that he expects to be saved, i. e., to enter into his full blessing as a son by the redemption o f his body at the return o f the Lord.
become the righteousness in Him (2 Cor. 5:21). The'penalty o f the broken law was death; this Christ bore for us, so the believer never dies (Jno, 8:51), at what appears to be his death, his spirit departs to be with Christ in conscious blessedness, and his body in due time will be raised from the dead (Phil. 1:23; 1 Cor. 15, entire chapter; 2 Cor. 5:1-8). But this is hot to say that the believer never suffers for his sins, he may suffer even to the extent o f his earthly life being brought to an end (1 Cor. 11:30-32). A believer may suffer in many ways here on 'earth for his sins, but he is saved from the eternal con sequences o f sin through the death of Christ in his place. “Whom the Lord I ovt eth, He chasteneth.” , Heb. 12:6. How would you meet this argument? "Mary, being a descendant of Adam, had a depraved nature, and she must have imparted a like nature^unto her Son. There fore Jesus, on His mother's side, was not absolutely sinless.” This question is answered in Luke 1 :35. Jesus fvas begotten, not in the ordinary way, but by the Holy Spirit coming upon Mary, and the power o f the Most High overshadowing her, therefore, the one who was born o f her did not partake.of her depraved nature, but received a wholly sinless nature from the Holy Spirit, who kept every taint o f sin out o f our Lord from the yery beginning o f His becoming a man. In this, as in other things, we see the abso lu te necessity o f the truth o f the virgin birth o f our Lord. Please explain Rom. 13 : 11 : “Knowing
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