"God . . . made us alive together with Christ . . . for by grace
have ye been saved through faith; and that not of yourselves,
it is the gift of God; not of works, that no man should glory."
Ephesians 2:4, 5, 8, 9
To My Readers:
MY BLESSING
I thought to wish that God might truly bless you:
But that, I see, He's clearly bound to do:
He is Himself the fountain of all blessing,
And loves to bless His children -- therefore you!
I thought to wish that for your earthly journey
God would supply your need (could He forget?):
But now I see that He has clearly promised
To meet all need -- and so it shall be met!
Then I might ask that God Himself might guide you;
But this is needless, since He is your Guide:
Since He has promised constantly to guide us
Until we reach, at last, the other side.
What shall I ask then -- what indeed is left me;
What say to gladden as you journey here;
How can I help to comfort, strengthen, hearten,
As you tread nobly through each passing year?
How can I, save that, gently, I remind you
Being His child you are supremely blest:
And that whate'er may come -- of joy or sorrow --
All that He gives or sends is, aye, the BEST.
-- Author Unknown
Sincerely yours and His,
Art Gordon, Editor
Be sure to read the article by Dr. Barnhouse which begins on this page. It should cause all of us who name the name of Christ to do some introspection, and some housecleaning. Let's make sure as we read that we use a rake and not a shovel -- taking the truths to our own hearts, not tossing them to someone else. -- Ed.
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LOGS & SPLINTERS
By Donald Barnhouse
First take the log out of your own eye (Matthew 7:5).
THE Lord Jesus Christ certainly had a sense of humor. What is a sense of humor? The Oxford Dictionary defines it thus: "the faculty of perceiving what is ludicrous . . . or expressing it." The dictionary further states that humor is distinguished from wit, as being less purely intellectual, and as having a sympathetic quality in virtue of which it often becomes allied to pathos." James Russell Lowell, in My Study Windows, says, "Humor in its first analysis is a perception of the incongruous." With such a definition we can certainly say that the Lord had a sense of humor. A camel in a bowl of soup (Matthew 23:24), pearls before swine, figs from thistles, the blind leading the blind.
Above all, this sense of the incongruous gives fire to our text. Christ pictures one man rushing up to another and saying, "Oh, you poor thing, you have a splinter in your eye! Let me help you take it out!" And everyone sees that the man who offers this help has a log sticking out of his own eye. The full text reads as follows: "Why do you see the splinter that is in your brother's eye, but do not notice the log that is in your own eye? Or how can you say to your brother, 'Let me take the splinter out of your eye,' when there is the log in your own eye? You hypocrite, first take the log out of your own eye, and then you will see clearly to take the splinter out of your brother's eye (Matthew 7:3-5).
I have adopted the words splinter and log because modern scholarship has established their meaning from the classics and the papyri. The German scholar Wilhelm Dittenberger, has given us the entire account-book of a Greek temple in which all purchases were listed, together with the prices paid. Among the items were listed great beams, on which the ordinary boards were laid. Our New Testament word dokos is used for these beams and the price paid for them was so great that we know they were large. We use the word log rather than beam, because the younger generation, hearing of someone with a beam in his eye might mistake it for a gleam in the eye. The picture set before us is a humorous one, but akin to pathos because it is such a revelation of a common characteristic of human nature and because it calls forth such a judgment from our Lord.
It is very easy to see the faults of our neighbors, and very difficult to see our own. This text is rarely preached upon, perhaps because it probes the heart of the speaker. In my library I have shelf after shelf of bound volumes of sermons, a hundred and fifty volumes of a series begun in England in 1870, and another fifty volumes of a series begun about the beginning of my own life time. There are more than 100,000 pages in these encyclopedia-size volumes, and a careful search of the index shows only one sermon on the text, preached by the Vicar of Wighill, in Yorkshire, in 1892, and that of comparatively little use.
HOUSECLEANING
The words of the text are so simple that anyone, even a child can understand them without explanation. Since this is so, it is all the more important to look at them carefully so that their apparent simplicity will not cause us to pass them by. The idea might be reduced to the statement that we are to set our own house in order before we attempt to do it for someone else.
Our text is found in the Sermon on the Mount and we may begin by asking ourselves why Christ gave these ethical truths. Through all His early years He had lived a life of simplicity among His neighbors. He saw them through divine eyes and He saw them through human eyes. He was the God-Man. Even when some began to follow Him, "He did not trust Himself to them, because He knew all men and needed no one to bear witness of man; for He Himself knew what was in man" (John 2:24-25). This statement, shows that Christ saw past all outward form and pretense. This is why He could speak as He did, and why His words carry such acid. But at the same time, He was love. He came to take our humanity that He might transform it like unto His own, the only perfect humanity, and this is why His words carry such healing balm.
Christ knew that people commonly talk about people. Neighbors talk about their neighbors, and almost always, such talk has a shade of malice. The Hindu proverb says, "The whisperer is a liar," and "The snake bite is like a needle when it goes in and like a plowshare when it comes out." The Malgash says: "Scandal is like an egg; when it is hatched, it has wings." In Kenya, in Africa, the Kikuyu say, "Gossiping and lying are brother and sister."
What do people commonly talk about? Someone answers, "I am interested in people; you are rather nosey; she is a dirty gossip." Or, "I just tell the truth about people; you make a lot of nasty remarks; he is a back-biting scandal-monger." I have heard people twit bald men on their baldness; stout people on their fatness; even cripples on their infirmity. And when someone has a reverse of fortune there are those who are quick to say, "He had it coming to him!" or, "She deserved every bit of it!" or, "It served him right!" There seems to be in human nature a savage desire to hurt others. This is manifested to the extreme in nicknames that are given to people. Almost two hundred years ago William Hazlitt said, "A nickname is the hardest stone that the devil can throw at a man." Walter Savage Landor wrote, "Nicknames and whippings, when they are once laid on, no one has discovered how to take off."
CARRYING NEWS
Jesus Christ says that those who follow Him are to have no part in this filthy traffic between mouth and ear. For the ear is as much a part of this evil as is the mouth, and it is the heart that connects the two. There is some mathematical logic here that needs to be set forth. A man tells a lie, and another man criticizes him for it. The Lord tells us that the lie is a splinter and that talking about it is a log. A woman falls into grievous sin and commits adultery. Someone finds it out and begins to talk about it. The Lord calls the adultery a splinter, and talking about it, a log. This would seem to be a new form of mathematics, and perhaps there is a good explanation for it. The Lord said that his ways were not our ways and that His thoughts were not our thoughts. He also said that His ways and thoughts were as much above ours as the Heavens are above the earth (Isaiah 55:8,9). How logical is His rating of criticism a worse sin than the sins it criticizes?
Perhaps we could find an analogy in the story of the woman who cast her two mites into the treasury. At the same time, wealthy people giving large sums were there. "And he (Jesus) called His disciples to Him, and said to them, 'Truly, I say to you, this poor widow has put in more than all those who are contributing to the treasury. For they all contributed out of their abundance, but she out of her poverty has put in everything she had, her whole living' " (Mark 12:43,44). Certainly Christ was not claiming that two pieces of money, each worth less than an eighth of a cent in our currency, was a larger sum than the thousands of shekels being cast into the temple treasury. The answer is that He was not using the mathematics of the adding machine, but the mathematics of the heart. This is more advanced than the study of conic sections of the calculus. If we compare mites and motes, we come up with the conclusion that the important thing is the motive that prompts a person. He knew the motive of the woman who gave her all. And the solemn thing is that He knew the motives of those who were guilty of criticism, backbiting, and slandering. Such people always speak from ignorance, for they do not know the motives which prompt people.
Some time ago I heard of a man who was an elder in a certain church which allowed its contributions to be published. this man's contributions were comparatively small, and there were those who severely criticized him because they knew that his income was about a thousand dollars a month, while his contributions to the church amounted to not more than two or three hundred dollars a year. The critics whispered rather loudly that he should not be on the session because the smallness of his gifts showed a greedy spirit. Since he did not live ostentatiously, his detractors said that he must be storing it up in stocks and bonds. When his will was probated, after his death, it was discovered that he left practically nothing, that he had been paying more than a hundred dollars a week for many years, to support an insane sister in a private asylum.
CARPING CRITICS
It is also certain that mote seekers are professional reformers. They have given themselves a D.D. degree ("doctrine detective") and they go to church only to discover whether or not the minister is orthodox. They snatch at the least straw of deviation, and blow it up to an apostasy. They stir up trouble and start division. Such a man tells people that faithfulness to Christ demands that they join him in criticism and he condemns his target with continuing and increasing venom. The study of psychology and psychiatry is still in its infancy, but we are learning certain things about the abysmal recesses of the human spirit that make it possible to understand the professional reformer, the mote-finder, the doctrine detective. Very often their work is a cloak to cover hidden desires, a defense mechanism or an effort to build themselves up by tearing others down.
There is an old proverb current among the Kashmiri, "The dogs bark, but the caravan passes." The critic, the gossip, the backbiter, does not realize that his yelping classifies him with the pack, and not the procession. In psychology this is called a "transfer." The man who looks at motes in another can avoid looking at his own logs. It is understandable, then, that the Lord Jesus called such people hypocrites. Why were they attacking others? Does such criticism arise because there is profound grief over sin? Is the critic moved by the fact that God is outraged and that great wrong is done? Actually, the critic has no sensitivity for sin at all. If his accusations of his neighbor are discovered to be false, and the neighbor innocent, the critic looks for something else to criticize. Nor is it because of a great love for the neighbor that the critic makes his accusations and carries his tales. Love covers a multitude of sins. Love does not expose sin. "Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things." Love does not fail. Since we see that there are no positive motives for the criticism, and since the Lord says that the critic is a hypocrite, it follows that the critic is moved by envy, jealousy, selfishness, and all other evil motives that put the poison sac of the asp under the human tongue (Romans 3:13).
"BEWARE LEST YE FALL"
The critic should also understand that everything he says is ultimately coming back upon himself. "Curses are like young chickens, they always come home to roost." Alexander Maclaren had well illustrated this. He said, "A carping spirit of eager fault-finding necessarily tinges people's feelings towards its possessor, and he cannot complain if the severe tests which he applied to others are used on his own conduct. A cynical critic cannot expect his victim to be profoundly attached to him or ready to be lenient to his failings. If he chooses to fight with a tomahawk, he will be scalped some day, and the bystanders will not lament profusely. But a more righteous tribunal than that of his victims condemns him. For in God's eyes the man who covers not his neighbor's faults with the mantle of charity has not his own blotted out by divine forgiveness.
"This spirit is always accompanied by ignorance of one's own faults, which makes him who indulges in it ludicrous. So our Lord would seem to intend by the figure of the mote and the beam. It takes a great deal of close peering to see a mote; but the censorious man sees only the mote, and sees it out of scale. No matter how bright the eye, though it be clear as a hawk's, its beauty is of no moment to him. The mote magnified, and nothing but the mote, is his object; and he calls this one-sided exaggeration 'criticism,' and prides himself on the accuracy of his judgment. He makes just the opposite mistake in his estimate of his own faults, if he sees them at all. We look at our neighbor's errors with a microscope, and at our own through the wrong end of a telescope."
The New Testament everywhere proclaims that the Lord cannot effectively work in us if we do not forgive others. It is therefore, imperative that we face this problem and take a sharp and severe inventory of our state of mind. If we have an enemy, is it our fault? Have we forgiven any and everything that he may have done to us? Have we gone the second mile to overlook incidents that we might have considered slights?
Job lost everything material that he possessed and in addition his body was afflicted with boils, and, to make it worse, his wife nagged him. On top of it all, his so-called "comforters" came with hollow arguments and vapid meanderings until God intervened, saying, "Who is this that darkens counsel by words without knowledge?" (Job 38:2). After the divine revelation, Job began to pray for those who had despitefully used him, and it was then that the Lord turned his captivity, and "gave him twice as much as he had before" (Job 42:10).
LIVING FOR CHRIST
In the light of all this, it is important that we consider our conduct, keep our tongues yielded to the Lord, and do everything that we possibly can for the good of those who we think have done us evil.
We must begin by applying all this to our own selves. We must follow the conduct of the disciples in the upper room. When the Lord announced that one of them would betray Him, they did not let their curiosity take over. Not one of them asked "Lord, is it Peter?" "Lord, is it Andrew?" "Lord is it Thomas or James?" Rather, each asked the profound, soul-searching question, "Lord, is it I?"
The disciples were in the presence of that all-holy light, the Lord Jesus Christ. There was no place in that upper room for any curiosity which would be, at the same time, a declaration of innocence. In every heart there was the certain awareness of the possibility of guilt. Unhappy the Christian who does not know the treachery of his nature. "Let him who thinks he stands take heed lest he fall" (I Corinthians 10:12). When we realize that we are capable of these deep, hypocritical sins, we can come to the Lord and ask Him to cleanse us, and give us the positive asset, an ever-growing love for Himself, that will make it impossible to go about picking splinters from the eyes of others. If we love Him we shall be occupied with Him. A man who truly loves his wife is not going to spend his time examining the flaws in another woman's face. A man who truly loves the Lord Jesus Christ is not going to be concerned about the actions of others. We expect nothing from unbelievers, and therefore we are not astonished when their quiz-shows are rigged. We expect everything from Christ and we are delighted when we see Him at work in fellow believers. We read in Ephesians one how Paul burst into praise at the news of another group of believers. "Because I have heard of your faith in the Lord Jesus and your love toward all the saints, I do not cease to give thanks for you, remembering you in my prayers" (Ephesians 1:15,16). To the Philippians, he says, "I thank my God in all my remembrance of you, always in every prayer of mine for you all making my prayer with joy, thankful for your partnership in the gospel from the first day until now" (Philippians 1:3-5).
When the heart is filled with love for the Lord, there will be growing love for all who belong to Him. When we begin to love our neighbor as we love ourselves, and as we love our Lord, our tongues will be employed in prayer for them, and in delight that the Lord is working in their lives, and we glorify Him for what He is doing. Then He looks at us and says, "With the same measure that you measure to others, I will measure out to you." And suddenly we discover that our cup is running over.
When the lumbermen began their great logging operations in the north and west of our continent, they soon learned that the logs had to be floated down the stream to the mills that were built nearer the centers of civilization, where their lumber could be used. During the spring floods they filled the streams with great timbers, and occasionally there was a log jam. The most expert of the rollers took over and, leaping nimbly from log to log they broke the jam and started the whole cut running down the stream. If you discover that there is a log jam in your own eye, remember that the Lord counseled the church of Laodicea to secure from Him, "salve to anoint your eyes, that you may see" (Revelation 3:18). The salve of His love will take the beam out of your eye. Then you will see Him, and all others will become the objects of your love in Him.
(Copyright 1961 by The Evangelical Foundation, Inc., Philadelphia, PA)
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THE REFINING FIRE
By Nathanael Olson
CHRISTIAN FRIEND, are you going through a severe trial? Do you wonder why this had to happen to you?
Job said, "When he hath tried me, I shall come forth as gold" (Job 23:10). He had confidence that he would not be burned.
Someone has said, "The goldsmith is never far away when the gold is in the fire." What a comforting thought this is! And let us remember that the goldsmith is not trying to destroy the gold but the dross.
Also, it is said that the goldsmith in the olden times looked longingly into the molten metal for the reflection of his own face. When he saw that, he turned off the fire.
Perhaps the Lord wants to see more of Himself reflected from your life. We all have carnal "dross" which our Heavenly Goldsmith must remove. Why? Because some day He wants to present us faultless to God the Father.
"The Lord certainly must love me," a Christian said.
"Why?" asked his friend.
"Well, He surely chastises me!" replied the afflicted one. Then he mentioned the Scripture: "For whom the Lord loveth he chasteneth, and scourgeth every son whom he receiveth . . . Now no chastening for the present seemeth to be joyous, but grievous: nevertheless afterward it yieldeth the peaceable fruit of righteousness unto them which are exercised thereby" (Hebrews 12:6,11).
Never forget that trials, troubles and temptations are not necessarily signs that you are out of the will of God. In fact, they may often be proofs that you are in the will of God.
"The faster you go (in the right direction) the more friction you make."
Moses was in God's will but he still had headaches and heartaches by the hundreds.
Job, the most godly man in his day, lost his health and wealth. But he was still in God's will.
Paul, the Apostle, was buffeted by an unpleasant "thorn in the flesh." But through this trial he discovered: "(God's) grace is sufficient for thee: for my strength is made perfect in weakness" (2 Corinthians 12:9).
Jesus Christ did "the will of the Father" perfectly. Yet He was tempted and tested more severely than we could ever be.
Unless your Heavenly Father definitely reveals that you are out of His will, don't let Satan make you feel that your troubles mean that you are a disobedient child of God. Trials and sorrows face every true child of God. You are not alone in the refining fire.
God is for you. God is with you. God is in you, if you are His child through faith in the Lord Jesus Christ. Therefore, lift up your head and say: "Oh God, help me to hold steady until I learn what lesson you have for me through this trial. Let this refining fire burn up the dross in my heart. Make me pure gold so that I may reflect Thy love, peace, patience and joy."
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SERMON SERIES
Romans 8
No. 3
what the
LAW
could not do --
GOD
did
"For what the law could not do, in that it was weak through the flesh, God sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh, and for sin, condemned sin in the flesh: that the righteousness of the law might be fulfilled in us, who walk not after the flesh, but after the Spirit."
Romans 8:3,4 AV
WHAT THE LAW could not do, needed desperately to be done. Had not God undertaken for us we would find ourselves in a most unenviable condition, "having no hope, and without God in the world."
FOR WHAT THE LAW COULD NOT DO . . .
The law was given by God to Israel. But there were definite limitations to the law. There were things the law could not do, things God never intended it to do. Two of these things are pointed out in our text. In the last part of verse three, the law could not condemn sin in the flesh. In verse four, it could not fulfill righteousness in us.
Rather than condemning sin, the law condemned the sinner. It had not the power to deal with sin and put it away, it could only reveal sin and thus declare the sinner guilty and pronounce sentence against him. Paul said, "I had not known sin, but by the law." "For by the law is the knowledge of sin." "Sin, by the commandment," he says again, "became exceeding sinful." So the law of Moses in the Old Testament could not accomplish what mankind needed so desperately -- deliverance from the penalty and power of sin in mortal flesh. The sin question was never answered by the law. Even in the elaborate sacrificial system under the law, "there is a remembrance again made of sins every year."
Neither could the law fulfill righteousness in us. It demanded righteousness of the sinner. It showed him how to act and do. It placed before him specific and general requirements. But it did not supply the power to perform what it required. As a result man always miserably fell short of the perfection demanded. The law said "Do" but the poor sinner did not. The law said "Don't" but invariably man did what was forbidden.
The fault was not in the law God had given, however. The fault was in man. Paul said, "The law is holy, and the commandment holy, and just, and good." And again: "For we know that the law is spiritual: but (here is the difficulty) I am carnal, sold under sin." In our text Paul declares that the law could not effectively deal with sin and could not fulfill in us its holy requirements, "in that it was weak through the flesh." It was weak because of OUR sinful flesh. It was holy but we were unholy; it was just but we were unjust; it was good but we were evil; it was spiritual but we were carnal, wholly given over to the desires of the flesh, sold under sin, captive to the law of sin which was operating in our members. "For I know that in me (that is, in my flesh,) dwelleth no good thing: for to will is present with me; but how to perform that which is good I find not."
This has been man's plight from the beginning of history; this is the plight of every human on the face of the earth; this is man's plight today -- "to will is present with me; but how to perform that which is good . . . " HOW! HOW MAY I BE RID OF MY SIN? HOW MAY I HAVE RIGHTEOUSNESS FULFILLED IN ME? HOW TO PERFORM THAT WHICH IS GOOD? I want to be and do right, BUT HOW? If this is your problem, and it is if you will only recognize it, then be assured God has the answer. And since we must all appear before God some day in judgment, it behooves us to find His answer to our problem.
God knew our plight. He has not left us without a solution. What the law could not do, in that it was weak through the flesh, God did.
GOD . . . CONDEMNED SIN IN THE FLESH: THAT THE RIGHTEOUSNESS OF THE LAW MIGHT BE FULFILLED IN US . . .
God dealt with the sin question. He judged it, passing the death sentence upon it. The law had judged the sinner, passing the death sentence upon him. But God has turned the tables and dealt effectively with our old enemy SIN -- condemning it in the flesh. Hallelujah! "Sin shall not have dominion over you." "God be thanked, that ye were the servants of sin, but . . . being made free from sin, ye became the servants of righteousness."
Yes, God has also dealt with the righteousness question. Not only has He condemned sin in the flesh, but also fulfilled in us the righteousness demanded by the law. The law demanded righteousness of the sinner, saying, "As He which hath called you is holy, so be ye holy," and "Be ye therefore perfect, even as your Father which is in heaven is perfect." What can we say to this? "Oh, Lord, this is too high for us! What can we do? How shall we comply?" If He should have told us to compare ourselves with one another, it wouldn't have been so bad, for we can always find someone a little worse than ourselves. But to be holy AS HE IS HOLY, to be perfect AS HE IS PERFECT . . . "Lord, this is out of the question; who can comply?" Or is it out of the question? Yes, in ourselves this is beyond us, but God has not left us to ourselves, to our own resources, to strive for this in our own strength. God Himself has fulfilled righteousness. We could not; the law could not because of our weakness; but God did.
But now for the question: How did God condemn sin and fulfill righteousness? He did it through a Person. "God, sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh, and for sin, condemned sin in the flesh: that the righteousness of the law might be fulfilled in us . . . " Through His own Son, the Lord Jesus Christ, God accomplished this hitherto unaccomplishable task. Note, it says that God sent His Son "in the LIKENESS of sinful flesh," not IN sinful flesh. Though He became a Man, He did not become a sinful man. There was no sin in Him; He never committed sin.
For Christ to perform this important work for mankind there had to be some changes made. From eternity past the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit dwelt together in wonderful fellowship in the heavenlies as Spirit Beings. Only from time to time did the Godhead manifest itself to earthlings in adopted visible forms. God had no permanent physical form in which to dwell.
Man in his dilemma on earth, condemned by the law a sinner and unrighteous, needed God's help. But God was in heaven -- man on earth. God was high -- man was low. There was no such thing as death with God in heaven, yet death as a consequence of sin hung like a thick cloud over man on earth continually. God's law declared "there is none righteous." "All have sinned." "The wages of sin is death." "The soul that sinneth, it shall die." The death penalty for sin had to be paid. God, as Spirit, could not die for man; one man could not die for another man nor the race of men, for all had sinned and each must die for himself, and that, eternally. What could be done? God had the solution. God sent His own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh.
God the Son came into our world as a Man. "The Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us." He made His entrance into the world as a baby through the womb of the Virgin Mary. Throughout the Gospels He is called Son of Man and Son of God. He was truly Man -- truly God. As the God-Man He was at the same time acceptable to the Father and acceptable for mankind. Equal with the Father, He became one with us. He could reach up to the Father and down to us. He was divine and human at the same time. Deity and humanity in one Person. This was God's answer to our perplexing problem. He was just what we needed . . . God incarnate.
But still, God in human flesh was not enough. "Christ must needs have suffered." His holy life was indeed an example to us of what a human life ought to be. But this only served to condemn us even more, for who could live up to His example? What we needed was someone to pay the penalty for our sins, someone who could and would die in our stead. And that's why He came. Our text says He came "for sin," that is, "as an offering for sin." He was "the Lamb of God, which taketh away the sin of the world" Sinful and unrighteous man needed a spotless and righteous sacrifice for sin; Christ became this innocent Sacrifice, "Who . . . offered himself without spot to God . . . as of a lamb without blemish and without spot." "For Christ . . . hath . . . suffered for sins, the just (or righteous One) for the unjust (or unrighteous ones), that he might bring us to God, being put to death in the flesh."
It would be impossible to number the animals offered in sacrifice by the Jews under the law, but add these all together with all the other offerings man has made throughout the ages, and with any we might make today, and we always come up with the same result: these offerings "can never . . . make the comers thereunto perfect . . . for it is not possible (through these offerings to) take away sins." "But this Man (Jesus Christ, God's Son) . . . offered one sacrifice for sins for ever. For by one offering He hath perfected for ever them that are sanctified." "And," says He, "their sins and iniquities will I remember no more."
"For in Him (i.e. in Christ) dwelleth all the fulness of the Godhead (-- His deity) bodily ( -- His humanity). And ye are complete in Him . . . you, being dead in your sins, hath He quickened together with Him, having forgiven you all trespasses; blotting out the handwriting of ordinances that was against us, which was contrary to us, and took it out of the way, nailing it to His cross; and having spoiled principalities and powers, He made a shew of them openly, triumphing over them in it (i.e. in the cross) ." And so the God-Man rescued the condemned human. His cross effected the cure. As an offering and sacrifice for sin, the holy Lamb of God once and for all "condemned sin in the flesh," making it possible "that the righteousness of the law might be fulfilled in us." This work of Christ is available to all who believe. For "the righteousness of God . . . is manifested . . . even the righteousness of God which is by faith in Jesus Christ unto all and upon all them that believe."
When we trust in Christ as our Saviour, God imputes to us a righteousness we could never get otherwise. At the very moment we believe, He applies to us the accomplishments of Christ on the cross. He counts or reckons us wholly free from sin and perfectly righteous in His sight. He sees us in Christ. He looks at us through the blood. He forgives and forgets our sins. He buries them. He accepts us in the Beloved. He is perfectly satisfied with His own Son's offering for sin and has accepted Him into eternal fellowship, and He accepts us in Him. This is wonderful, and causes the heart to rejoice, but this is not all, God has given us even more.
Not only has He sent a Person to deal effectively with the penalty of sin and our lack of right standing with Himself, but He also has sent a Person to deal with the power of sin in our daily lives, and to produce in us a practical righteousness. The Holy Spirit has come to dwell with us and in us to see to our having day-by-day victory over sin and continual righteousness for God's glory. And this is available to all "who walk not after the flesh, but after the Spirit." "This I say then, Walk in the Spirit, and ye shall not fulfill the lust of the flesh." "Know ye not, that to whom ye yield yourselves servants to obey, his servants ye are?" "Neither yield ye your members as instruments of unrighteousness unto sin: but yield yourselves unto God." "Your body is the temple of the Holy Spirit which is in you, which ye have of God, and ye are not your own, for ye are bought with a price: therefore glorify God in your body, and in your spirit, which are God's."
Christ is God's answer for the problem of our salvation. The Holy Spirit is His answer for the problem of our living a life consistent with our profession. Believe in Christ; yield to the Holy Spirit. "Wherefore then serveth the law? It was added because of transgressions (i.e. in order that sin might be made manifest as transgression). If there had been a law given which could have given life, verily righteousness should have been by the law. But the scripture hath concluded all under sin, that the promise by faith in Jesus Christ might be given to them that believe." "For Christ is the end of the law for righteousness to every one that believeth."
Would you be rid of your sin, and right with God? Is that your sincere desire? Do you long to live as you know you should? God dealt with your sin and offers you a righteousness acceptable to Himself through the Lord Jesus Christ. And through His Holy Spirit He offers you the power to live accordingly. May God open your heart to give attention to His Word.
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