Keys to the Storehouse – Knock! Knock! Knock!

With all of the distractions that are drawing our attention, it is very hard for many to be aware that Somebody is knocking at the door. “Behold, I stand at the door and knock.” Revelation 3:20.

What are these knocks?

  • “Every warning, reproof, and entreaty in the word of God, or through his delegated messengers, is a knock at the door of the heart; it is the voice of Jesus, asking for entrance.” The Review and Herald, November 2, 1886.

What happens when you do not listen to these knocks?

  • “With every knock unheeded, your determination to open becomes weaker and weaker.
  • If the voice of Jesus is not heeded at once, it becomes confused in the mind with a multitude of other voices,
  • the world’s care and business engross the attention, and
  • conviction dies away.
  • The heart becomes less impressible, and
  • lapses into a perilous unconsciousness of the shortness of time, and of the great eternity beyond.” Ibid.

Are you listening to that knock?

“The heavenly Guest is standing at your door, while you are piling up obstructions to bar His entrance. Jesus is knocking through the prosperity He gives you. He loads you with blessings to test your fidelity, that they may flow out from you to others. Will you permit your selfishness to triumph? Will you squander God’s talents, and lose your soul through idolatrous love of the blessings He has given?” Ibid.

The last appeals are now being made by the knocking.

“Christ is making His last appeal to hearts. … how reluctant He is to give you up to separation from His love and presence forever! Still is heard the step of Him who waiteth at your door; His voice is yet pleading for entrance; but there is a point beyond which His forbearance will not reach. Shall the words be written over the doomed doorway,

  • ‘Ephraim is joined to idols: let him alone’ (Hosea 4:17) …
  • He is joined to his idol of earthly treasure: let him alone?
  • He is joined to his idolatry of self: let him alone?” Ibid.

No time to loiter!

  • “You have no time to loiter, no time to consult your convenience. It is now, even now, that you are to be zealous and repent. Oh, it is peace that you need—Heaven’s forgiveness, peace, and love in the soul.
  • Money cannot buy it,
  • intellect cannot procure it,
  • wisdom cannot attain to it;
  • but Jesus offers it as a gift.

It is yours if you will but reach out your hand and grasp it. … We cannot be satisfied with a form of godliness. We must have the deep movings of the Spirit of God in the soul.” Ibid.

“Open your doors, says the great Merchantman, the possessor of spiritual riches, and transact your business with me. It is I, your Redeemer, who counsels you to buy of me.” Ibid., August 7, 1894.

Father: I thank You for showing me that every warning, reproof, and entreaty in Your word or through Your messengers is a knock at the door of my heart, that it is the voice of Jesus asking for entrance. I do not want to be joined to these idols. Please give me spiritual discernment so that I may hear Your knock and grant me the grace to remove all obstructions so that I may open the door to You. Amen.

Lord’s Prayer Series – Surrender Your Will

Inside the heart or mind of man there occurs tremendous conflicts. The greatest of these is over the issue of control. The eternal destiny of each one of us will be determined by the outcome of this battle.

The majority of Christians do not realize what, in fact, they ask for when they pray that God’s will be done on earth as it is in heaven. In heaven, God’s will is supreme. There was only one time that His will was challenged and subsequently violated. For the sake of peace and harmony, Lucifer, who became Satan, was cast out. An account of this war in heaven is recorded in Revelation 12:7–9, which tells us that the devil and his angels fought against Christ and his angels. The controversy that began when our first parents sinned in the Garden of Eden is still raging today between Satan and his followers and Christ and His followers. When we pray that God’s will be done on earth, we are asking that our obedience to the divine will should measure up to the obedience of heavenly beings and those who live in the unfallen universe.

At times we are inclined to excuse ourselves from perfect obedience because we live in the middle of a crooked and perverse generation (Philippians 2:15). Heaven recognizes the challenges we face, but our extremities are God’s opportunities, and He never asks of us to do anything according to His will without providing the power needed to accomplish it. The beings in heaven perform God’s will cheerfully, with constancy and perfection.

This world would be a different place if His will were done here. When the gospel has completed its mission and God’s eternal purpose has been fully carried out, the entire world will be in complete submission to His will. Then the earth will again be a part of heaven and God’s moral law will be perfectly obeyed in this world as it is in the heavenly universe.

Some astronomers have said that the earth, in making its yearly journey around the sun, takes a little over 365 days. In each revolution, one ten thousandths of a second of time is lost. The heavenly bodies fulfill the will of God with precision. The strictness of their obedience, however, is no greater than that of the celestial beings.

The Bible describes the measure of obedience by the unfallen beings in heaven:

“The Lord has established His throne in heaven,

And His kingdom rules over all.

Bless the Lord, you His angels,

Who excel in strength, who do His word,

Heeding the voice of His word.”

(Psalm 103:19, 20).

To do God’s will is the greatest pleasure of the angelic host, as well as the highest service that can engage their powers. They do not render this service with a spirit of legality but because of the loving relationship they have with their Creator. Their allegiance to Him is a joy and this is the relationship for which Jesus told His disciples to pray.

Indeed, when you study obedience in the Bible, you will find that the only obedience that God accepts or even recognizes is that which is impelled or prompted by the motive of love. On the night of His betrayal, Jesus affirmed that when He said, “If you love Me, keep My commandments.” John 14:15.

It is the love of Christ that constrains us to obey Him, to follow Him and to do His will. Love keeps us from doing evil. Obedience, therefore, is not just a test of discipleship or citizenship in the kingdom of heaven. It is also the evidence of whether we really love God. Jesus said, “ ‘He who loves Me will be loved by My Father, and I will love him and Manifest Myself to him.’ Judas (not Iscariot) said to Him, ‘Lord, how is it that You will manifest Yourself to us, and not to the world?’ Jesus answered and said to him, ‘If anyone loves Me, he will keep My word; and My Father will love him, and We will come to him and make Our home with him. He who does not love Me does not keep My words; and the word which you hear is not Mine but the Father’s Who sent Me.’ ” John 14:21–24.

It is not the greatness of the work that you do for God that counts but the motive behind the act that determines its value. It is the service of love that God highly esteems. When love is lacking, all you have is a form of godliness. All of the rites and ceremonies of religion may be performed, but it is an offense to Him when performed without the service of love.

The disciple spoken of in the gospels as the disciple that Jesus loved defines our love to God and man like this: “By this we know that we love the children of God, when we love God and keep His commandments. For this is the love of God, that we keep His commandments. And His commandments are not burdensome.” I John 5:2, 3.

When motivated by love, the service is never drudgery, something that you have to do, or a list of do’s and don’ts. When you are in love with the Lord, His will is your delight. This is why Paul wrote at one time, “Love is the fulfillment of the law.” Romans 13:10.

To love God with all my heart, soul, and mind is to refrain from following any other god. This is the first commandment. In respect for Him, no one will bow before or worship an image or an idol. That behavior is forbidden in the second commandment. I will not dream to take His name in vain. That is covered by the third commandment. And I will not work when he says to rest, which is the fourth commandment (Exodus 20:3–11).

When asked which of the commandments was the greatest, Jesus said, “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, soul, and mind. The second commandment is, You shall love your neighbor as yourself” (Mark 12:30, 31 literal translation). If I love my neighbor as myself, I will not dishonor my father and mother. I will not kill him or steal his wife. I will not steal his goods or possessions or lie to him. I will not covet what belongs to him. Instead, I will be glad for what he has that he can enjoy. God’s love abiding in the heart reflects in the way a man responds to his neighbors. It is called the Golden Rule – Do unto others as you would have them do unto you.

Love for God is the fulfilling of the law. The principles within the Decalogue become a man’s motivation. Jesus’ life demonstrated the law of love. Concerning the Messiah, Psalm 40:8 says, “I delight to do Your will, O my God, and Your law is within my heart.”

With the law of God written in His heart, it was Jesus’ delight to do the will of His Father. That delightful obedience to the law, which is written in the heart, is the very essence of what is called righteousness by faith, or being born again. Isaiah 51:7 says, “Listen to Me, you who know righteousness, you people in whose heart is My law.”

This is the new covenant experience of Hebrews 8:10, which actually quotes from Jeremiah 31:33: “But this is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those days, says the Lord: I will put My law in their minds and write it on their hearts; and I will be their God, and they shall be My people.”

If you claim Him as your God, then His law must be written in your heart. Paul said the same thing in Hebrews 10:16–18: “ ‘This is the covenant that I will make with them after those days, says the Lord: I will put My laws into their hearts, and in their minds I will write them,’ then He adds, ‘Their sins and their lawless deeds I will remember no more.’ Now where there is remission of these, there is no longer an offering for sin.”

Is that your experience? Is the law of God being written in your heart and in your mind? The evidence that you have been born again is having received a new heart by the action of the Holy Spirit. He writes the law of God in your heart. As a result, you want to do what is right and pleasing to God.

Salvation by works is an attempt to meet the demands of the law written only on stone. But, in the new covenant, the law is written not on stone but in the fleshly tables of the heart (II Corinthians 3:3). The difference between the old and the new covenants is the difference between seeking justification by works of obedience to an external law written on tables of stone and seeking justification by faith when the law is kept due to a change in the heart.

It is never what you do that saves you; it is Whom you know (Jesus). Then, Whom you know changes what you do as Paul wrote in Romans 8:1–4: “There is therefore now no condemnation to those who are in Christ Jesus, who do not walk according to the flesh, but according to the Spirit. For the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus has made me free from the law of sin and death. For what the law could not do in that it was weak through the flesh, God did by sending His own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh, on account of sin: He condemned sin in the flesh, that the righteous requirement of the law might be fulfilled in us who do not walk according to the flesh, but according to the Spirit.”

When we surrender our will to God, we commit our talents to Him to be used for His glory. Submission to His will includes willing obedience to the commission to do our part in spreading the final warning message to the world before Jesus returns. God has given to every man his work. The Bible does not teach that everyone will accept the truth and be saved, but it does say that the gospel is going to be preached to all nations as a witness so that they have an opportunity to make a decision.

The place of the greatest struggle in the Christian warfare is the surrender of the will. By nature, man is stubborn and self-willed. Man is described by the prophet Isaiah in the Bible as being obstinate, with a brow like brass and a neck like iron sinew (Isaiah 48:4). It seems almost impossible to change the mind of man or to turn him from his course, because he obstinately carries out his own will and does as he pleases, regardless of the consequences.

One person said, “The will of man is invariably opposed to his own salvation and to God.” But it is the human will that either shuts or opens the gate to the kingdom of God. The will might be called the hinge on which the gate of destiny swings.

Because we were created free moral agents with the power of choice, the Lord will never force our will. Jesus said, “If anyone wants [wills] to do His will, he shall know concerning the doctrine, whether it is from God or whether I speak on My own authority.” John 7:17.

Today, there are many professed Christians who hope that God will work things out without any cooperation or effort on their part. This is a futile hope. The doctrine of predestination, or foreordination, often becomes an excuse for human indifference and indolence. Our wills must be brought into harmony with God’s will and our lives must come into conformity with His character. In this work we have an important part to act.

Revelation 22:17 says, “And the Spirit and the bride say, ‘Come!’ And let him who hears say, ‘Come!’ And let him who thirsts come. And whoever desires, let him take the water of life freely.”

The benefits of the gospel and the issue of the conflict with sin depend completely upon the action of your will. God will not save you against your own will for that would be a violation of your choice. It was over the surrender of the will that Jesus had to fight that terrible battle in the Garden of Gethsemane. Would He yield Himself to be scourged, to be crucified, to die for the sins of the world, to go through that awful night and day of torture? Three times He prayed, “Father, if it is Your will, remove this cup away from Me; nevertheless not My will, but Yours, be done.” Luke 22:42.

Likewise, the greatest battle that is ever fought in our world, the greatest battle that can ever be fought by man, is the surrender of self to the will of God, the yielding of the heart to the sovereignty of love.

It is therefore our greatest need to understand the true force of the will. There are many people who will lose eternal life while they are hoping and desiring to be saved because they do not now choose to be Christians.

The Philippian jailor asked Paul and Silas, “ ‘Sirs, what must I do to be saved?’ So they said, ‘Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ’ ” (Acts 16:30, 31). Believe means to make a commitment. Choose Jesus as the Lord of your life and Saviour from sin. He never loses a case that is fully committed to Him.

The power of decision is the power that governs your life and in the end, your eternal destiny. Joshua said, “Choose for yourselves this day whom you will serve.” Joshua 24:15 KJV.

Have you chosen to serve the Lord?

(Unless appearing in quoted references or otherwise identified, Bible texts are from the New King James Version.)

Pastor John J. Grosboll is Director of Steps to Life and pastors the Prairie Meadows Church of Free Seventh-day Adventists in Wichita, Kansas. He may be contacted by email at: historic@stepstolife.org, or by telephone at: 316-788-5559.

Keys to the Storehouse – The Greatest Battle

Each day when I arise, the battle begins and continues all day until I retire in the evening. It is the battle with self and it is one of the greatest battles we will ever fight. I must give praise to God because truly His grace is sufficient when I allow it to take charge.

“The warfare against self is the greatest battle that was ever fought.

  • The yielding of self,
  • surrendering all to the will of God,
  • and being clothed with humility,
  • possessing that love that is pure, peaceable, and easy to be entreated, full of gentleness and good fruits, is not an easy attainment. …” Gospel Workers (1892), 376.

Have you ever tried to be pure, peaceable and easy to get along with while under stress? Only through God’s grace is that possible!

“The Christian life is a battle and a march. But the victory to be gained is not won by human power. The field of conflict is the domain of the heart. The battle which we have to fight—the greatest battle that was ever fought by man—is

  • the surrender of self to the will of God,
  • the yielding of the heart to the sovereignty of love.

The old nature, born of blood and of the will of the flesh, cannot inherit the kingdom of God. The hereditary tendencies, the former habits, must be given up.” Thoughts from the Mount of Blessing, 141.

In other words, we must give up self or we cannot inherit the kingdom of God. The devil loves it when you refuse to surrender self to Jesus because then he can manipulate you. When you surrender yourself to Jesus to walk in the spiritual kingdom, the devil is angry and you can expect the following:

“He who determines to enter the spiritual kingdom will find that

  • all the powers and passions of an unregenerate nature, backed by the forces of the kingdom of darkness, are arrayed against him.
  • Selfishness and pride will make a stand against anything that would show them to be sinful.

We cannot, of ourselves, conquer the evil desires and habits that strive for the mastery. We cannot overcome the mighty foe who holds us in his thrall. God alone can give us the victory. He desires us to have the mastery over ourselves, our own will and ways. But He cannot work in us without our consent and co-operation. The divine Spirit works through the faculties and powers given to man. Our energies are required to co-operate with God.

“The victory is not won without much earnest prayer, without the humbling of self at every step. Our will is not to be forced into co-operation with divine agencies, but it must be voluntarily submitted.” Ibid., 141, 142.

Are you ready to yoke up with Jesus in the greatest battle ever fought? Let us together enroll under the banner of Christ Emmanuel—I am ready and willing.

Father: I earnestly humble myself before Thee and surrender all. I choose to walk with Thee. Please give me the victory over my evil desires and ugly habits that will keep me out of heaven. Give me the mastery over self that I may stand at all times for the right so that I may be part of the heavenly kingdom. I choose to yoke up with Jesus, to die to self, and to cooperate with You in the battle against self. Amen.

The Surrender of Self

How do you see yourself in your Christian journey? Are you stronger in the things of God than you have ever been before? Every day with Jesus should be sweeter than the day before. Each moment should find us moving up in our experience with a deeper sweeter faith than we had the moment before.

Yet I hope no one is satisfied that God has finished His work of growth and sanctification in the life. This very moment He wants to lead us out deeper into the waters of surrender and consecration. There are still victories to be won; there are sins to be put away, and there is a drawing together that needs to be accomplished by the Holy Spirit. God really means what He says in the fantastic promises of Romans six. No other chapter of the Bible is so lavishly excessive in giving assurance to a struggling Christian. Consider these extravagant phrases for example:

“Shall we continue in sin? … God forbid” (verses 1, 2). “We that are dead to sin” (verse 2). “Henceforth we should not serve sin” (verse 6). “Freed from sin” (verse 7). “Dead indeed to sin” (verse 11). “Let no sin therefore reign” (verse 12). “Being made free from sin” (verse 18).

There is certainly nothing ambiguous about any of those texts. But is there some secret meaning or perhaps some hidden reservation which might not apply literally to us in these promises? We are tempted to believe so because of the almost fanatical element of certainty in each verse and line.

Some people are frightened by the book of Romans simply because it describes the perfect work God wants to do in sanctifying us from our sins. Many people are also afraid of that word “perfect.” They are fearful that God will ask them to do something that they are not willing to do.

God will never do anything in our spiritual lives that we are not willing for Him to do. He never coerces the will or pressures us into any actions to which we have not given consent. So we can totally disabuse our minds of being forced into any life choices which we are not free and sovereign.

But now we come face to face with the basic root weakness which has led millions into discouragement and defeat. They simply have not been reconciled to giving up the enjoyment of their sins. There is a certain shallow, short-lived pleasure in sin which dances over the emotions and seeks to capture the mind through the sensory pathway of the flesh. In every case there must be a decision of the will to forfeit those temporary physical “pleasures of sin for a season” (Hebrews 11:25). Until that choice is made and acted upon, there can be no real victory over sin in the life.

Are you resigned to the stripping away of all your darling indulgences and prepared to accept all the results of a complete surrender to Christ? There are only two possible reasons for a person holding back and failing to gain the victory over sin. Either he is not willing to give up the enjoyment of the sin or else he does not believe that God will give him deliverance from it. Being willing, of course, is our problem, but seeing it done is God’s part alone. We must be willing, but we can never be able. Let us now look at these two great mental blocks which have stolen the victory from so many of God’s people.

Self—The Greatest Enemy

Most of us are aware that self is the greatest enemy we face. Once we have settled it with the old man of the flesh who seeks to rule over us, all the other victories will come in their course.

God has given every one of us a powerful personal weapon to use in combating the self-nature. The will is our only natural reserve weapon, and absolutely everything depends on the right action of this resource. The ultimate sin in the eyes of God, the final factor that will cause a soul to be lost, is to deliberately say no to the will of God. We become whatever we choose to be. We are not what we feel, or what we might do or say in a simple impulsive moment of our life. We are what we will to be. We cannot always control our emotions, but we can control our will.

Feelings have nothing to do with the truth of God. It is not your feelings, your emotions, that make you a child of God, but the doing of God’s will. Perhaps you had a headache or arthritis pain when you woke up this morning, but does that change the fact that God loves you? Does it alter the truth that the seventh day is the Sabbath? Whether you feel good or bad, the truth remains exactly the same.

Some people can feel wonderful during an evangelistic crusade or a special revival weekend, but when the meetings are finished, their faith plummets to rock bottom. It is a yo-yo effect with everything tied to emotions generated by circumstances.

We must recognize the fact that our will and God’s will, at some point, must come into violent collision. Either we let Him have His way or we choose our own course. And when it happens, most people are not willing to admit the true cause behind the raging conflict. They do not see the battle as primarily linked to the self-nature.

Hundreds of “reasons” are given for not going all the way with Christ. It may be because of Sabbath work, or doubts about the Bible, or opposition of relatives. But none of those things are the true reasons. It goes much deeper than the words they are uttering. There is a basic nature problem behind their lack of commitment. They talk about twigs and leaves when the real problem is the roots. The truth is that God wants something that self is not willing to give up. They love something more than they love God.

Have you ever wondered why Jesus made that strange statement in Matthew 16:24, “If any man will come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross, and follow Me?” Why didn’t the Master finish the sentence by spelling out the thing to be denied? “Let him deny himself”—what? Drugs, alcohol, tobacco, Sabbath-breaking? No. Just deny himself, period. Jesus knew that self was behind every angry battle against the truth. Once that victory is gained, all other victories will also be won.

Multitudes are outside the will of God and outside the church because they are not willing to give up something that they love more than they love God while thousands are in the church and are perfectly miserable because something in their life has been fighting the will of God for years. To be a true Christian requires surrender above everything else.

Do you recall the time that your desire and God’s will met in fearful conflict? There was a titanic struggle. The old self-nature hardened itself and resisted every impulse to turn away from rebellion and sin. Under deep conviction you wrestled and agonized against the powers of the flesh, but to no avail. Then, finally, you surrendered your stubborn will and the battle was over. Peace flooded into your heart, and glorious victory was immediately realized.

What happened to change the picture? Did you finally manage to drive back the devil? Definitely not. Your battle was with self, and when you became willing, God gave you the victory over that carnal enemy. “Thanks be to God, which giveth us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ” (I Corinthians 15:57).

It may sound foolish, but it is still true: before you can have, you must give away; before you can be full, you must be empty; before you can live, you must die; and before you have the victory, you must surrender.

I don’t believe anyone ever felt so defeated, depressed, and cheated as eleven men did on a Friday night almost two thousand years ago. Jesus had promised them the world. They were going to sit on thrones and rule kingdoms. Life would be marvelous for them. They were important. Then, suddenly, Jesus was arrested, tortured, and crucified. The world had come to an end for them. Nothing will bring us as low as the cross brought them. Not even crippling disease, financial failure, desertion of friends, death of dear ones, or injustices of life. But was it defeat? On the contrary, it was the most glorious moment of victory this world has ever known.

Is Trying the Answer?

We have to admit that we fight an enemy who is stronger than we are. In the weakness of the flesh we find ourselves bound in mind and body by the superior strength of our spiritual enemy. We resolutely struggle to extricate ourselves from the bondage, but the harder we try the deeper we sink into the mire.

We do not need instruction in theology to acquaint us with the facts about our fallen nature. All of us have struggled with memories of failure and compromise. We have desperately tried to blot out scenes of unfaithfulness from our minds, but every such effort has ended in utter defeat.

I heard of a holy man in India who traveled from village to village laying claim to special creative power. As a result of his Himalayan pilgrimage, the sadhu professed to hold the secret for making gold. He would fill a large caldron with water and then stir the contents vigorously while uttering his sacred incantation. But in the process of stirring he also slyly slipped some gold nuggets into the water without being detected.

The head man of one village wanted to buy the secret for making gold and the holy man agreed to sell it for 500 rupees. After explaining the stirring and the prayers to be repeated the priest took his 500 rupees and started to leave. Then he turned back and gave a final word of warning, “When you are stirring the water and uttering the prayers you must never once think of the red-faced monkey, or the gold will not come!”

As you can imagine the headman never could make the formula work because every single time he stirred the water, there was the red-faced monkey sitting at the edge of his mind, grinning at him.

We have absolutely no natural ability to keep the thoughts and imagination under control for the simple reason that they are rooted in our sinful natures. Only when the mind has been regenerated through the process of conversion can the individual subjugate the lower, physical powers and bring them under the effective control of the Holy Spirit. Only in this way may the very intents of the heart be sanctified and brought into harmony with Christ. Without the transforming grace of the new birth, “the carnal mind … is not subject to the law of God, neither indeed can be” (Romans 8:7).

Controlling the Inner Spirit

Have you noticed that it is always easier to deal with external actions than with internal dispositions? Well-disciplined people can force themselves to act correctly on the outside, even when the inward desires are at war with the outward conduct. The Bible teaches that this conflict must cease between how we think and how we act. A true Christian will be the same in both mind and body.

All of us have seen drivers dutifully slow down to fifteen miles per hour through the school zones. They appear so submissive and law-abiding as they creep along in front of the uniformed traffic patrol lady. Yet those drivers are usually seething with internal anger and rebellion because of missing an appointment. Self is behind that angry battle, and the stubborn will has simply not yielded to the idea of obedience. Here is where the desperate need lies for those who claim to be in the family of God. Almost anyone with minimum acting skills can force conformity to the rules (especially if they think someone is watching) but almost no one can force himself to be sweet about it. We can try till our dying breath and we will never be able to alter the unconverted disposition by dint of determination. Such a major shift requires the creation of new attitudes and thought patterns.

Many are convinced that they are Christians just because they act in a certain way and conform to biblical rules and principles. In other words, their lifestyle and behavior identifies them as not of this world. Or does it? Can we always recognize a true child of God by his conduct? Perhaps we can over a period of time, but pretenders are able to deceive most of us for a good while. Eventually the nature behind the good works begins to appear and the charade is seen for what it really is.

Isaiah wrote, “If ye be willing and obedient ye shall eat the good of the land” (Isaiah 1:19). Some people are obedient without being willing, and their fruit is soon exposed as artificial. This teaches us that two mistakes can be made concerning those who keep God’s law carefully. We might wrongly assume they are legalists because they look so seriously upon the slightest disobedience, or we might wrongly assume they are true Christians just because they show zeal for conforming to the law.

Judging the Outward Actions

No one can read the motives of another. Therefore, it is a dangerous, judgmental attitude to deprecate the apparent caring concern that a fellow Christian has for keeping the commandments. If his works indeed are based upon principles of self-effort and do-it-yourself salvation, the truth will be exposed soon enough. But if he has a genuine love relationship with Christ which constrains him to be meticulous in obedience, then he deserves commendation instead of criticism.

So we must conclude that it is a fatal delusion to depend upon trying harder and struggling longer to get the victory over sin. The secret is trusting instead of trying, and time will only make a young sinner into an old sinner. Finally, we must admit that we are not as strong as our adversary, and as we surrender our dependence upon human strength and effort, God provides the glorious gift of victory.

Jesus said, “Without Me ye can do nothing” (John 15:5). That is a tremendous truth, but we must go far beyond the negativism of this statement and experience the positive reality of Philippians 4:13, “I can do all things through Christ which strengtheneth me.” The difference between “all things” and “no thing” is Christ.

This does not imply that we sit back in relaxed idleness while God assumes all the responsibility of overcoming sin. One belongs to God and the other to us. The possibility rests with God and the responsibility rests with us. And as we begin to act against the sin in our life, God provides the power to actually break with the sin.

How far may we go in utilizing that faith method of claiming the victory? John declares that “this is the victory that overcometh the world, even our faith” (I John 5:4). By submitting to that higher power which reaches down from above, the soul is able to bring every thought into captivity to Christ (2 Corinthians 10:5).

Perhaps it can be clarified with an illustration. Suppose a farmer walks along his garden path and looks down at the soil beneath his feet. Aloud he wonders whether the minerals in that dirt could ever be transformed into vegetables. The human answer immediately fills his head. “Of course not. There are only three categories: vegetable, mineral, and animal; and they always remain distinct and recognizable.”

Soon afterward the farmer laid out neat rows by the garden path and carefully planted the cabbage seed according to the instructions on the package. Then the gentle rains slowly moistened the ground, and the warming rays of the sun began to exercise their particular magic on the tiny seeds. They began to germinate and grow, and under those favorable influences from above, the root system began to draw the actual mineral elements into the leaves of the cabbage. By some mysterious process still not fully comprehended by the scientist, the iron, phosphorus, and magnesium were incorporated into the plant and transformed into the vegetable form of the cabbage. The mineral had become a vegetable.

Later, as the farmer stood in the path admiring the rows of well-formed heads the question came to him: Could these vegetables ever become animal? And the answer from his human reasoning was clearly, “No. Vegetable is vegetable and animal is animal, and they are two distinct and separate categories.”

But a few days later the farmer carelessly leaves the bars down on the nearby pasture, and the cows wander into the garden. As they consume the succulent young cabbage a truly remarkable thing happens within their bodies. The vegetable leaves are assimilated into the organs of digestion and in very short order the vegetable has literally been turned into animal. What a miracle! And it did not happen because of any effort put forth by the cabbage. It merely yielded to the higher power which reached down from above, and the miraculous change was effected.

How Far Can We Go in Victory?

Now we take the illustration one step further and ask the question: Is it possible for the animal, or the physical, to ever become spiritual? Again the obvious answer would be: “No. That is another sphere, and could never happen in this world.” But I submit to you that this kind of transformation is not only possible, but it has actually happened to everyone who has accepted Jesus as Lord and Saviour.

By yielding our will to the higher powers from above, we can be delivered from the bondage of the flesh. The entire being is made captive to the Spirit of God, and we are able to think His thoughts after Him. Paul declares that we partake of the divine nature and have the mind of Christ. Again, and again, the process is described as a surrendering of the will, and a giving up of our own way. “Neither yield ye your members as instruments of unrighteousness unto sin: but yield yourselves unto God, as those that are alive from the dead, and your members as instruments of righteousness unto God” (Romans 6:13).

Paul further described the surrender process as a literal crucifixion of the self-nature. He said, “I am crucified with Christ” (Galatians 2:20); again, “I die daily” (I Corinthians 15:3). This constant subjection of the will is not achieved by any decision or effort which we can manufacture from within ourselves. Self will never make the choice to put itself to death. Only the Holy Spirit can create the desire to escape from the domination of a sin-loving nature. Only He can bring us to the point of being willing to give up every indulgence of that corrupt, fallen nature.

As the mind and will cooperates with the Holy Spirit, a faith-reckoning renders the death blow to the old man of sin. The life opens up to the sweet, triumphant in-filling of a new spiritual power. Little idols disappear as they are dethroned from the heart. There are no more secrets from God, no longer anything to hide or to be ashamed of, no more defeatism as a way of life. Joyfully we put aside the ornaments of self and the world to allow more capacity for the loving character of Christ to be revealed.

Although there are brief superficial pleasures in a life of sin, those indulgences cannot be compared with the delight of following Jesus. Self makes the Christian path seem dark and fearsome; but when self is surrendered and crucified, the narrow road is filled with joy unspeakable.

The Enigma of Miserable Christians

Every time you see an unhappy Christian you are looking at someone who has not surrendered self to the cross of Christ. That inward life of the flesh, that self-nature, has been allowed to survive; and there can be no peace in a divided loyalty. Those who have not submitted to be crucified with Christ still carry their religion like a heavy burden. They remind me of the Hindu processions I observed, again and again, on the crowded streets of India. The priests and devotees staggered along bearing the heavy idol on their shoulders. Occasionally they stopped to rest, and it was an obvious relief to put down their god momentarily to relieve themselves of the burden.

Isaiah described the same thing in his day as he must have watched similar scenes. He wrote, “They lavish gold out of the bag … and he maketh it a god: they fall down, yea, they worship. They bear him upon the shoulder, they carry him, and set him in his place, and he standeth; from his place shall he not remove: yea, one shall cry unto him, yet can he not answer, nor save him out of his trouble” (Isaiah 46:6, 7).

How accurately this describes what I observed in India. Their god was so helpless that they had to carry it from place to place. They wearied themselves with the effort to move it to another location. It was a burden which they were relieved to be rid of when they stopped to rest.

What kind of religion is it that must be painfully endured and borne like some miserable weight? I’ve seen professed Christians with that same kind of experience. They have a religion that seems to do nothing for them but to make them weary and disgruntled. They are like the man with the headache. He didn’t want to cut off his head, but it hurt him to keep it. These people don’t want to give up their religion, but it is painful to keep it.

There is only one explanation for this kind of bizarre situation. It is abnormal in the extreme. Christians should be the happiest people in the world. If they are not, it is because self has not been surrendered and crucified.

Come back now to the text in Isaiah where the prophet described the idol processions of his day. In truth it is not Isaiah speaking but the Lord God Himself. In verse 7 He said, concerning the idol god, “they carry him.” Now read verse 4 where God declared to Israel, “And even to your old age I am He; and even to hoar hairs will I carry you: I have made, and I will bear; even will I carry, and will deliver you.” [Emphasis added.]

Which god do you serve today? What kind of religion do you profess? You can only serve God or self. When you unreservedly surrender that spoiled, greedy, indulgent self to be put to death, you may reckon yourself dead to the sins which self promotes. Trying to live a Christian life without dying to self is just as miserable as struggling to carry a pagan god. In fact, when self has not been given up to the death of the cross, it comes between you and the Saviour, becoming a real god. The constant strain of trying to subdue that self-god by human effort can wear out the most determined saint.

What happens then when faith claims the victory over the world, the flesh, and the devil? We are relieved of the strain, because God promises to carry us. “Thanks be to God which giveth us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ” (I Corinthians 15:57). “And this is the victory that overcometh the world, even our faith” (I John 5:4). “I have made, and I will bear, even I will carry, and will deliver you” (Isaiah 46:4).

It is not hard to imagine that Satan’s strongest efforts are aimed at the exaltation of self. He can only control the individuals who continue to feed the carnal nature. I have often imagined that our great enemy has a computer list of self-related indulgences which he constantly holds out to the human race. Each category has been honed and adapted to exploit the particular weakness of the self-nature which Satan recognizes so easily in every member of Adam’s family. Perhaps some of the most appealing subtitles in his list would include self-righteousness, self-dependence, self-seeking, self-pleasing, self-will, self-defense, and self-glory.

Because he is the temporary prince of this world, the devil has inspired an avalanche of material which focuses on developing the love of self. Counselors of every stripe and hue urge us to improve our self-worth and our self-esteem. Even ministers preach sermons around their interpretation of loving our neighbors as we love ourselves. Are these perversions of the biblical admonitions to “crucify self” and “deny self”? How can we seek to esteem and exalt that which we are told to subdue and put to death?

There is a sense, of course, in which we need to recognize our value in the sight of God. He counted every one of us as more precious than His own life. But that objective recognition is entirely distinct from the basic self-centeredness of the fallen human race. God can love us in spite of our genetic weaknesses and indulged carnal appetites, but the closer we come to Jesus, the less charmed we should be by our own perverse ways. In fact, as we enter into the converted life through the Holy Spirit, the confidence we placed in the flesh will be wholly shifted to the Saviour. In describing the new birth experience, Paul compared it to spiritual circumcision. “For we are the circumcision, which worship God in the spirit, and rejoice in Christ Jesus, and have no confidence in the flesh” (Philippians 3:3).

As we have noted already, the great apostle equated this conversion experience to the crucifixion of self. The truth is that the egocentric nature of every baby, child, and adult is to have their own way. This nature must be crucified, and under the mastery of the new spiritual nature, the affections are set upon Jesus. Self is no longer important. The flesh has no strength to control the life or fulfill its own will. The song of the soul now is, “Have Thine own way, Lord, have Thine own way. Thou art the potter; I am the clay.” Have Thine Own Way, Lord, Adelaide A. Pollard, 1907. God grant us this experience.

In 1965 Joe Crews founded the ministry Amazing Facts. His original objective was to reach out to both Christian and non-Christian listeners via daily 15-minute programs by opening with a scientific or historic fact, and how it applies to the overall Biblical messages. Later, the program offered Bible study courses and books written by himself. He passed away in 1994.