Think of the closer-than breathing, bone “of his bones” (Eph. 5:30) relationship of life we have with the very Creator and Sustainer of the universe. Although He is seated in glory at our Father’s right hand, He is not far off—His life is in us where we are, and our life is in Him where He is. Absolute oneness. “He that is joined unto the Lord is one spirit with Him.” “For we are His workmanship, crated in Christ Jesus. . . . Now in Christ Jesus ye who once were far off are made nigh . . .” (1Cor. 6:17; Eph. 2:10, 13).
He Is Our Head: When we see Jesus Christ as the sovereign Lord of the universe, we acknowledge Him to be the ruler of our personal lives and our circumstances. He is our Head; we are His body on Earth. Our Father “hath put all things under His feet, and gave Him to be the head over all things to the Church, which is His Body, the fullness of Him that fills all in all.” “He is the head of the Body, the Church: Who is the beginning, the firstborn from the dead; that in all things He might have the preeminence. For it pleased the Father that in Him should all fullness dwell” (Eph. 1:22, 23; Col. 1:18, 19).
He Is Our Intercessor: The better we know Jesus in His glory, the more fully we will depend on Him as our personal Intercessor. “Wherefore He is able to save them to the uttermost that comes unto God by Him, seeing He ever lives to make intercession for them.” “Who shall lay anything to the charge of God’s elect? It is God that justifies. Who is he that condemns? It is Christ that died, yes rather, that is risen again, who is even at the right hand of God, who also makes intersession for us” (Heb. 7:25; Rom. 8:33, 34).
When the believer sins, his relationship to the Father is not affected, but his fellowship with Him is impaired. It is for this self-induced exigency that we need the Lord Jesus at the Father’s right hand as our Advocate and Intercessor. He is Jesus Christ the righteous, our defender in heaven against all the accusations of the Adversary. Since we have been “the righteousness of God in Him” (2Cor. 5:21), He justly and continually clears us from all charges. And because He “of God is made unto us . . . righteousness” (1Cor 1:30), He is never our prosecutor. Again, though our sins in no way affect our position in the light, or alter His thoughts of love toward us, they can and do affect our thoughts and attitude toward our Father. They can never cloud His view of our Advocate, but they can and do obliterate [to make imperceptible by obscuring] our vision of His advocacy. They immediately hinder our communion and fellowship with the Father and the Son. The dark cloud of guilt and conviction of sin settles down on our heart and conscience, unless we learn to judge ourselves and willingly confess our sins before God. “for if we would judge ourselves, we should not be judged” (1Cor. 11:31).
When we fail to confess our sins, or to judge ourselves in the matter of sin, we must be chastened. When our Father’s child-training is applied, it is always well deserved and for our good. Our Lord Jesus bore all the wrath against sin on the cross, therefore we grow by means of the chastening. “Now no chastening for the present seems to be joyous, but grievous: nevertheless afterward it yields the peaceable fruit of righteousness unto to them which are exercised thereby” (Heb. 12:11).
There are many Christians who feel that confession of sin is unnecessary. They reason that if their sins are already fully forgiven, why bother to confess them? It is true that we need not ask for forgiveness when we sin; rather, we are free to thank Him for that forgiveness provided at Calvary and received in Christ. But it is necessary to honestly confess our sins, thus siding with Him against ourselves (old selves), else how can we enjoy true fellowship with the One who is holy and hates sin perfectly? (Parentheses mine)
The primary ministry of the Holy Spirit is to reveal to us the Lord Jesus as our new life and to occupy our minds and hearts with Him. When we step down into the old life and consequently sin, the Spirit is grieved and must occupy us with ourselves (old selves) until our honest confession of sin to the Father brings restoration of fellowship. (Parentheses mine)
Yes, frank and immediate confession of sin is vital. Think for a moment of someone who observes a loved one sinning against him. Wounded, but ever loving, he forgives and says nothing. Meanwhile the loved one, although knowing there is forgiveness, does not confess his sin. Forgiveness is there, love is waiting. But now where is the fellowship and integrity of this relationship?
“But if we walk in the light, as He is in the light, we have fellowship one with another and the blood of Jesus Christ His Son cleanses is from all sin. If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves [not Him] and the truth is not in us. If we confess our sins, He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness” (1Jhn. 1:7-9).
He Is Our Life: By now we should be seeing more clearly the wonderful truths concerning the fact that the Lord of Glory is our life and that we are, as individuals, new creations in Him. There is but one place, one position, where we are to abide and that is in Him where He is. The resources and motivations of our daily lives are in the Son who is seated at the right hand of the Father. The expression of our new lives here is the indwelling life of Jesus manifested in our mortal flesh.
Our position and our resources as new creations are certainly not in the old man. Our death on the Cross now and forever separates us from the reign of sin and we are free to reckon on that fact. Our mind does not have to dwell on and become involved with the indwelling sinful nature—death is there; life is in the Lord Jesus.
We are looking in the wrong direction, whether we dwell on the old man and are pulled down in depression and defeat by its sinfulness, or conversely consider that nature to be quite harmless and good. We have to slip past the Cross and violate our identification with Him in His death to sin, in order to traffic in that realm. Paul asks, “How shall we who died to sin still live in it” (Rom. 6:2)?
Our position as new creations is not in this sin-cursed world. We are traveling through it, but not abiding in it. How is that the growing believe can rest and be at peace in the midst of this world of death, free to hold forth and share the Word of life? It is simply because his anchorage and source of life is in another Person in another world. Keep looking down! [As now being seated with Him in heaven; Eph 2:6].
The death of the Cross stands not only between us and the old nature, but also between us and this world system. “But may it never be that I should boast, except in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, through which the world has been crucified to me and I to the world” (Gal. 6:14).
There is nothing here for us to rely on: there is everything there for us to depend on. On earth, death; in glory, life. “For if while we were enemies we were reconciled to God through the death of His Son, it is much more [certain], now that we are reconciled, that we shall be saved [daily delivered from sin’s dominion] through His [resurrection] life” (Rom. 5:10).
If today the roots of your life are in the old nature and therefore in the world, absorbing the poison and death of those cross-condemned sources, it is time to move! There is a quiet and restful abiding place just where our Father has positioned us. Our communion is with the Father and the Son, where they are.
Is it not time to hide from the old by hiding in the new? In that attitude of faith and walk of fellowship our Lord Jesus will have another life through which to reach and replenish others. Therefore, “if any one preaches, let it be as uttering God’s truth; if anyone renders a service to others, let it be in the strength which God supplies; so that in everything glory may be given to God in the name of jesus Christ, to whom belongs the glory and the might to the Ages of Ages. Amen” (1Pet 4:11).
Fellowship with the old life results in nothing but sin and chastening; fellowship with the Lord Jesus results in love and love for others!
He Is Our Head: When we see Jesus Christ as the sovereign Lord of the universe, we acknowledge Him to be the ruler of our personal lives and our circumstances. He is our Head; we are His body on Earth. Our Father “hath put all things under His feet, and gave Him to be the head over all things to the Church, which is His Body, the fullness of Him that fills all in all.” “He is the head of the Body, the Church: Who is the beginning, the firstborn from the dead; that in all things He might have the preeminence. For it pleased the Father that in Him should all fullness dwell” (Eph. 1:22, 23; Col. 1:18, 19).
He Is Our Intercessor: The better we know Jesus in His glory, the more fully we will depend on Him as our personal Intercessor. “Wherefore He is able to save them to the uttermost that comes unto God by Him, seeing He ever lives to make intercession for them.” “Who shall lay anything to the charge of God’s elect? It is God that justifies. Who is he that condemns? It is Christ that died, yes rather, that is risen again, who is even at the right hand of God, who also makes intersession for us” (Heb. 7:25; Rom. 8:33, 34).
When the believer sins, his relationship to the Father is not affected, but his fellowship with Him is impaired. It is for this self-induced exigency that we need the Lord Jesus at the Father’s right hand as our Advocate and Intercessor. He is Jesus Christ the righteous, our defender in heaven against all the accusations of the Adversary. Since we have been “the righteousness of God in Him” (2Cor. 5:21), He justly and continually clears us from all charges. And because He “of God is made unto us . . . righteousness” (1Cor 1:30), He is never our prosecutor. Again, though our sins in no way affect our position in the light, or alter His thoughts of love toward us, they can and do affect our thoughts and attitude toward our Father. They can never cloud His view of our Advocate, but they can and do obliterate [to make imperceptible by obscuring] our vision of His advocacy. They immediately hinder our communion and fellowship with the Father and the Son. The dark cloud of guilt and conviction of sin settles down on our heart and conscience, unless we learn to judge ourselves and willingly confess our sins before God. “for if we would judge ourselves, we should not be judged” (1Cor. 11:31).
When we fail to confess our sins, or to judge ourselves in the matter of sin, we must be chastened. When our Father’s child-training is applied, it is always well deserved and for our good. Our Lord Jesus bore all the wrath against sin on the cross, therefore we grow by means of the chastening. “Now no chastening for the present seems to be joyous, but grievous: nevertheless afterward it yields the peaceable fruit of righteousness unto to them which are exercised thereby” (Heb. 12:11).
There are many Christians who feel that confession of sin is unnecessary. They reason that if their sins are already fully forgiven, why bother to confess them? It is true that we need not ask for forgiveness when we sin; rather, we are free to thank Him for that forgiveness provided at Calvary and received in Christ. But it is necessary to honestly confess our sins, thus siding with Him against ourselves (old selves), else how can we enjoy true fellowship with the One who is holy and hates sin perfectly? (Parentheses mine)
The primary ministry of the Holy Spirit is to reveal to us the Lord Jesus as our new life and to occupy our minds and hearts with Him. When we step down into the old life and consequently sin, the Spirit is grieved and must occupy us with ourselves (old selves) until our honest confession of sin to the Father brings restoration of fellowship. (Parentheses mine)
Yes, frank and immediate confession of sin is vital. Think for a moment of someone who observes a loved one sinning against him. Wounded, but ever loving, he forgives and says nothing. Meanwhile the loved one, although knowing there is forgiveness, does not confess his sin. Forgiveness is there, love is waiting. But now where is the fellowship and integrity of this relationship?
“But if we walk in the light, as He is in the light, we have fellowship one with another and the blood of Jesus Christ His Son cleanses is from all sin. If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves [not Him] and the truth is not in us. If we confess our sins, He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness” (1Jhn. 1:7-9).
He Is Our Life: By now we should be seeing more clearly the wonderful truths concerning the fact that the Lord of Glory is our life and that we are, as individuals, new creations in Him. There is but one place, one position, where we are to abide and that is in Him where He is. The resources and motivations of our daily lives are in the Son who is seated at the right hand of the Father. The expression of our new lives here is the indwelling life of Jesus manifested in our mortal flesh.
Our position and our resources as new creations are certainly not in the old man. Our death on the Cross now and forever separates us from the reign of sin and we are free to reckon on that fact. Our mind does not have to dwell on and become involved with the indwelling sinful nature—death is there; life is in the Lord Jesus.
We are looking in the wrong direction, whether we dwell on the old man and are pulled down in depression and defeat by its sinfulness, or conversely consider that nature to be quite harmless and good. We have to slip past the Cross and violate our identification with Him in His death to sin, in order to traffic in that realm. Paul asks, “How shall we who died to sin still live in it” (Rom. 6:2)?
Our position as new creations is not in this sin-cursed world. We are traveling through it, but not abiding in it. How is that the growing believe can rest and be at peace in the midst of this world of death, free to hold forth and share the Word of life? It is simply because his anchorage and source of life is in another Person in another world. Keep looking down! [As now being seated with Him in heaven; Eph 2:6].
The death of the Cross stands not only between us and the old nature, but also between us and this world system. “But may it never be that I should boast, except in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, through which the world has been crucified to me and I to the world” (Gal. 6:14).
There is nothing here for us to rely on: there is everything there for us to depend on. On earth, death; in glory, life. “For if while we were enemies we were reconciled to God through the death of His Son, it is much more [certain], now that we are reconciled, that we shall be saved [daily delivered from sin’s dominion] through His [resurrection] life” (Rom. 5:10).
If today the roots of your life are in the old nature and therefore in the world, absorbing the poison and death of those cross-condemned sources, it is time to move! There is a quiet and restful abiding place just where our Father has positioned us. Our communion is with the Father and the Son, where they are.
Is it not time to hide from the old by hiding in the new? In that attitude of faith and walk of fellowship our Lord Jesus will have another life through which to reach and replenish others. Therefore, “if any one preaches, let it be as uttering God’s truth; if anyone renders a service to others, let it be in the strength which God supplies; so that in everything glory may be given to God in the name of jesus Christ, to whom belongs the glory and the might to the Ages of Ages. Amen” (1Pet 4:11).
Fellowship with the old life results in nothing but sin and chastening; fellowship with the Lord Jesus results in love and love for others!