On the other hand, you must not take the attitude that you are “going to die,” but that you “have died.” If you put it in the future tense, the full benefit of Christ’s death is not wrought in you experientially. As the outward man perishes, so the inward man is renewed day by day (2 Corinthians 4:16). There is always a perishing of the outward, and always a renewing of the inward. This persistent appropriating of the truth of Romans 6 destroys the power of the devil in your life and environment. Your experience does not destroy his power, but the death of Christ does. It would never do to rely upon our experience. We are delivered, not by our death but by Christ’s death applied to us by the Holy Spirit. The finished work of Christ is not only that “he bore our sins in his own body on the tree,” but also that “our old man” (i.e., that part of our being which causes us to sin) “was crucified with him.” How much of our “old man”? Ninety-nine parts? No, no! Christ’s work was complete, and when he died, our “old man” was crucified in entirety.
|
CategoriesArchives
August 2021
|