Stay on the Cross

            “Come down from the cross” (Matt. 27:40)

            With these words a sneering crowd taunted Jesus.  But Jesus did not answer.  He took the dare and refused to be moved from His course.

            After all, for Him the cross represented an accomplishment, not frustration and failure.  “I have a baptism to be baptized with, and how am I straightened until it be accomplished!” (Luke 12:50)

            With set face Jesus traveled toward Jerusalem and with unhesitating step He marched to the cross.  Not indeed because he disregarded or loved suffering and death, but because of the the joy of the resurrection and ascension, Pentecost and the spread of the church.  Ahead He saw the final victory of the Church and the welcoming of the bride into the New Jerusalem.  These glories so filled His soul that He could endure the cross and despise its shame!

            The Man on the cross had “saved others.”  He had lifted burdens from the weary, given a song to the sad, spoken peace to the troubled and given hope to those whose years were no better than tattered rags.  He had saved the conspirator Barabbas from the cross but He refused to come down.  He clung to the cross because He knew that only by His suffering could come our healing.

            The crowd asked that he demonstrate His faith by descending from the cross.  He proved His faith by staying on the cross.  Only one whose faith is in God and in eternal things can see the gain in the cross.

            There’s only one way to leave the cross; that is to “Come down.”  Christians on the cross prick the world today.  There demonstrations of meekness, self-surrender, of sacrifice for God—all these irritate the world.  The cry about us today is to leave the cross, to join the crowd.  But if we do, fellow believers, will lose the “savor” from the salt; our lives will be unredemptive.  Oh, let us not shrink from the cross; let us rather embrace it, “its shame and reproach gladly bear.”

--George E. Failing

A Burning Light

Cause the lamps to burn continually. Leviticus 24:2

            A lamp is designed to give light.  Within the Holy Place of the tabernacle, where priests daily ministered, it was dark.  Heavy curtains hung on four sides, and various skins covered the top.  Light from the golden candlestick with its seven branches made it possible for the priests to see to minister.

            The lamp might have seemed rather unimportant.  The table of showbread boasted the “bread of the Presence.”  The altar of incense often smoked with clouds of priestly intercession, and was often sprinkled with the blood of atonement.  The altar and the table seemed to be the most important pieces.  But without the candlestick, no priest could minister.

            The lamp of God’s Word, the warmth of God’s spirit, must “burn continually.” Just as physical life is maintained by the “combustion” of food, so spiritual life must have its regular intake of food for burning.  It’s up to us to “cause the lamps to burn continually.”

--George E. Failing

Allegory

            Mr. Crittenden was once engaged in defending a man who had been indicted for a capital offense.  After an elaborate and powerful argument he closed with the following beautiful and striking allegory:

            When God in His eternal council conceived the thought of man’s creation, He call to Him the three great ministers who wait constantly upon the Throne-Justice, Truth and Mercy-and addressed them: “Shall we make man?”

            Then said Justice, “O God, make him not, for he will trample upon Thy law.”

            Truth answered also, “O God, make him not, for he will pollute Thy sanctuaries.”

            But Mercy dropped upon her knees, looking up through her tears, and exclaimed, “O God, make him.  I will watch over him through all the dark paths which he may have to tread.”

            Then God made man and said to him, “O man, thou art the child of Mercy.  Go and deal with thy brother.”

The Divine Provision

            God Has Provided for our sanctification just as He has provided for our justification on the grounds of the blood of Christ.

            What is sanctification?  In its complete definition, sanctification may be considered as the crises by which God breaks the power and destroys the activity of the nature of sin in man, followed by the process of building a holy character-all received by faith, inwrought by the Spirit on the grounds of Christ’s sacrifice.

            With regard to sanctification, there is a position, a provision, and an experience.

            Sanctification a position.  At the moment when he was justified (regenerated) the sinner consented to die to all sin and positionally did die to all sin.  For justification implies sanctification.  “Shall we continue in sin” after justification?  “God forbid.”  “How can we, who died to sin (in position at our justification), go on living in sin?”  So reasons Paul.

            Writes John Wesley:  “When we are born again, then our sanctification, our inward and outward holiness begins….  The new birth, therefore, is the first point in sanctification.”

            Writes Dr. A. A. Hodge (a Calvinist):  “Any man who thinks he is a Christian, and that he has accepted Christ for justification, when he did not at the same time accept Him for sanctification, is miserably deluded in that very experience.”

            More happened at regeneration than pardon.  In and by that act of faith we accepted Christ.  We did not take just so much of Him; we took Him as a complete Savior.  In taking Him as Savior, therefore, we positionally took Him for sanctification as well as for justification.

Sanctification, The Provision.

            A careful study of Romans 6:6 reveal this truth.  “Knowing this, that our old man has been crucified with Him.”  The Authorized Version wrongly translates “is crucified.”  Though it is true that sin’s nature may be crucified in us (Gal 5:24; 2:20; 6:14), the emphasis in Romans 6:5 is on what Christ’s death on the cross did for us.

            Than death not only bought pardon, it bought cleansing and crucifixion.  When Jesus cried, “It is finished” (John 10:30), the price was paid to forgive and cleanse all sin—“For by on offering He hath perfected forever them that are sanctified” (Heb 10:14).  If Jesus had not take the curse of sin’s transgression, then Calvary did not make full provision for the believer.  But it did!

            In Christ’s sacrifice “our old man was crucified.”  He is called old because sin’s nature is as old as the race, and he is called man because sin’s nature seems sometimes to operate as a person within us.

Sanctification, The Experience.

            The work of grace of holiness is inwrought by the Holy Ghost.  The new birth is of the Spirit, and the spiritual baptism in Ephesians 4:5 is by the Spirit.

            Here is the reason why man, educated man, religious man, cannot make himself holy.  The earth could not create itself.  Man could not breathe into his own dusty form a breath of life.  Neither can man restore to himself the moral likeness he has lost.  The struggles of chapter seven show the utter inability of the enlightened to purge itself from dead works, and thus to please God.

            Sanctification severs sin from the believer and the believer from sin.  When Christ was dying for us on the cross, he maintained a position to sin; sin was active to Him and He active in relation to sin.  True, His activity was one of conquest over sin and not subjection to sin.  But when he died to sin on the cross, he ceased to have any further active relation to sin or sin to Him.  In the words of Sanday: “He became insensible and inaccessible to sin.”  And so may the believer.  Thanks be unto God for such a provision of grace.

What Is Your Part In This?

a.     “Reckon yourselves to be dead indeed unto sin.”  Here a commitment.  This is the mental processes of faith.  Understand what Christ died to purchase for you and there your position to claim “all that He purchased for you.”

b.    “Let not sin reign.”  Here is excision, the cutting off of any opportunities for sin and sinning.  This is to sanctification what repentance and restitution is to conversion.

c.     “Yield yourself unto God.”  That is, your will, your love, and your body.  Here is consecration.  Connect this with Romans 12:1,2 where the word “present” is translated from the same Greek word as the translated “yield” in Romans 6.

d.    “Yield your members as instruments of righteousness.”  Here is cooperation.  Sanctification is viewed here as a positive and continuing service, providing “fruit unto holiness and the end, everlasting life.”

--George E. Failing, 1959

Gentleness

            The Comforter is gentle, tender, and full of patience and love.  How gentle are God’s dealings, even with sinners!  How patient His forbearance!  How tender His discipline with His own erring children!  How he led Jacob, Joseph, David, Elijah, and all His ancient servants, until they could truly say, “Thy gentleness hath made me great.”

            The heart in which the Holy Spirit dwells will always be characterized by gentleness, lowliness, quietness, meekness, and forbearance.  The rude, sarcastic spirit, and brusque manner, the sharp retort, the unkind cut—all these belong to the flesh, but they have nothing whatever in common with the gentle teaching of the Comforter.

            The Holy Dove shrinks from the noisy, tumultuous, excited, and vindictive spirit, and finds His home in the breast of the peaceful soul.  “The fruit of the Spirit is gentleness, meekness.”

--A. B. Simpson

Single-File Saints

            Every human heart cries out for companionship.  God possessed this longing when He made Adam for Himself.  It was prophesied of Christ that He “trod the winepress alone.”

            One does not walk with God very long before he realizes that if he would know Christ for himself, often he must go alone.  It Is expected that the worldly-minded will separate themselves from us when we unite with Christ.  But it is true that even brethren will walk no more with us when we seek to know Christ “in the fellowship of His sufferings.”

            Single-file saints may feel they are misfits in this age, but in every generation God’s saints have been misfits.  They see Him who is invisible and have followed the call of the impossible.  They are like mystics who are not quite catalogued.  One ca catalogue ideas, but it is a toubh job to catalogue ideals.

            Abraham, the Bible say, “went out, not knowing whither he went.”  What a senseless thing to do!  But from his going out has come seed as the stars of the sky.

            Noah built an ark and was considered ridiculous.  But by faith he condemned the world and because the heir of righteousness.

            Moses threw down a rod.  Gideon’s army broke pitchers.  Samson wielded a jawbone of an ass.  What solitary warriors these were but how mighty they became under God!

            Elijah prayed and “shut up the heavens.”  He prayed again and the heaven s gave rain.  He thought of himself as a single-file saint.  Alone he won the battle over Baal.

            May God include us in the company of single-file saints because our eyes have seen the invisible and our spiritual desire is for the impossible.

--Don H. Polston

Christ On The Margins

            Demons are the undetected false gods of our modern idolatrous culture and living.

            Modernist scholars hardly knew what to do with them; if the world gets better and better, as they thought, demons must be consigned to the past; better yet, get rid of them as superstition and myth.  This same modernist scholarship, however, emphasized at least that Jesus is the best example of right religious insight and adjustment.  But Jesus Himself believed in the reality of Satan and demons.  This was not a matter merely of accommodation on His part to the temper of the times, for he corrected the prevailing theological errors of His contemporaries.  If He merely pretended to cast out demons, can He be defended against the charge of pretension and deception?  He spent forty days in the wilderness, tempted of Satan and victorious over him; indeed, He represented His whole ministry as the rout and doom of Satan and his hosts, and He casts demons out by the power of His word.  Under the pressures of the time in which we live, men speak against wide areas of the demonic in modern life, although they shy away from the reality of Satan and demons.  Jesus reminds us that the world is under the sway of Satan and his hosts, and that we need supernatural rescue.

--Carle F. Henry

The Spirit-Filled Life

   On every hand a lack of something is being felt and expressed by God’s people. Their Christian experience is not what they expected it would be. Instead of expected victory, it is oft-recurring, dreaded defeat; instead of soul satisfaction, it is soul hunger; instead of deep, abiding heart rest, it is disquiet and discontent; instead of advancing, it is losing ground. Is this all Christ meant when He said, “Come unto me”? Is this life of constant disappointment the normal life of the Bible Christian? To these sad questionings the Divine Word answers with an emphatic “No,” and the testimony of an ever-increasing number of God’s children answers “No.”

THE BELIEVER’S BIRTHRIGHT

   For this widely felt, though sometimes inarticulate demand, the Divine supply is the fullness of the Spirit; and the Fullness is the birthright of every believer, his birthright by virtue of his new birth. Sometimes we hear it said Christian privilege; but birthright is a stronger word. Reader, it is your birthright to be filled with the Spirit, as Peter was filled, as Stephen was filled, as the one hundred and twenty men and women in the upper room were filled (Acts 2:4), as the men and women in Cornelius’ house were filled (Acts 10:44-47). “And ye shall receive the gift of the Holy Ghost. For the promise is unto you, and to your children, and to all that are afar off” (Acts 2:38-39).

   What have you done with your birthright? Have you claimed it? Are you living at this moment in the possession and enjoyment of it? Or, are you, Esau-like, “despising your birthright”? (Gen. 25:34)-or, if not despising, are you neglecting it? Esau’s eyes were ultimately opened to his folly in parting with his birthright for “one mess of meat,” and he then desired to inherit the blessing, seeking it “diligently with tears”-but alas, his awaking came too late (Heb 12:16-17). May every reader of these lines have the desire graciously awakened (if it has not yet been awakened, and satisfied) to inherit his birthright blessing, while a place of repentance is found. May the prediction be fulfilled in our glad experience: “The house of Jacob shall possess their possessions” (Obad. 17).

A COMMAND TO BE OBEYED

   But lest some one should think, “It is optional with me whether I claim my birthright or no; no doubt it would be a very fitting thing for some people to be filled with the Spirit, but I need not trouble about it”-in case anyone should be tempted to speak and act like this, let us learn that to “be filled with the Spirit” (Eph 5:18) is a command to be obeyed, a duty to be done.

   Many of God’s people are acknowledging that they do not know that to “be filled with the Spirit” is a command; but it is, and there is no excuse for not knowing. You will notice that in Ephesians 5:18 there is a double command, a negative, “Be not drunk,” and a positive, “Be filled.” The positive command is as authoritative as the negative, and was binding on just as many of those Ephesian Christians as was the negative command. Now, what was true for those believers there in Ephesus long ago is equally true for all believers today.

   Is it a sin for a believer today to disobey the command, “Be not drunk?”-and is it then a virtue to disobey the equally authoritative command, “Be filled”? If it is a sin for a Christian to be drunk, it is surely a sin not to be filled. We are commanded and expected to live a Spirit-filled life, to be filled, not with wine, the fruit of the vines of the earth, but with the new wine of the Kingdom, the fruit of the “true Vine.”

   Reader, if you are asked, Do you obey the command, “Be not drunk with wine,” what is your answer? If it is, “Yes,” that is obedience. Now, if you are asked, do you obey the command, “Be filled with the Spirit,” what is your answer? If it is, “No,” that is disobedience; you are guilty of breaking one of God’s plainest commandments. You have no more license to break this command than you have to break any command in the Decalogue. Had you not better confess your sin and tell the Master that you purpose in your heart new obedience?

EVERYBODY’S NEED

   Some have the idea that this blessing of the Fullness is only for a favored few, for such as have some special work to do for God, but not for ordinary folk. Surely this is one of the devil’s champion lies! Alas! Alas! That it has found such credence! The infilling is what makes this promise true, “He that is feeble among them at that day shall be as David; and the house of David shall be as God” (Zech 12:8), so that “one man of you shall chase a thousand” (Josh 23:10). This means defeat for the devil, so no wonder that he strives to keep us back from the Fullness! We are here on earth that through us Christ may be glorified; but there is only one Person that can glorify Christ, and that the Holy Ghost. “He shall glorify Me” (John 16:14). To the glorifying of Christ as He ought to be and might be glorified, the filling with the Spirit is necessary.

   Mothers in the home, “with thronging duties pressed,” need the Fullness to enable them to glorify Christ as surely as the Apostle needed it; the washerwoman needs it as well as the pastor; the tradesman as well as the evangelist. To live the Christ-glorifying life in the station in which God has placed us, we individually need to be filled” (Acts 2:4)-men and women the one hundred and twenty in the upper room, the rank and file as well as the Apostles. They all received because they all needed. Do we not all need? Why then should we not all receive? And if we do not receive, we will suffer loss, the Church will suffer loss, and, above and beyond all, Christ will suffer loss.

--John MacNeil

A Vacation from Temptation

            “The devil … departed from him for a season” (Luke 4:13).

            It’s in the Gospel of our Lord’s humanity (Luke) that these words are recorded.  Luke calls repeated attention to the “humanness” of Jesus—His weariness, His dependence on His Father, His need for prayer, His prayer struggle in the Garden.

            Jesus was human enough to be tempted.  We know that “God cannot be tempted with evil” (Isa. 1:13), but in the Incarnation God placed Himself within range of Satan’s darts.

            Jesus felt the dead weight of temptation; He “suffered, being tempted” (Heb 2:18).  Temptation is no picnic or midsummer night’s dream.  And it is only fair to add that Jesus knew the force of temptation to a degree that we shall never know it.  He could bear the heaviest thrusts of evil which Satan did not hesitate to launch against Him.

            Jesus knew the sustained power of temptation—“forty days tempted of the devil.”  I don’t know that I have ever suffered that prolonged a season of unrelenting satanic pressure.  It must have seemed to Jesus that it would never let up.   To make it more severe, that unceasing attack had three separate and sharp spearheads, all-out blitzkriegs!  Let us be reminded that Jesus never won a cheap victory, never got off easy, never avoided the inevitable clash between Himself and the devil.

            But Jesus resisted the devil.  That is precisely what we are to do:  “Resist the devil” (James 4:7).  Put up a fight.  Launch an all-out counter offensive at Satan’s first assault, and never waver (“stand your ground,” as Ephesians 6:13 may be translated) in the faith that complete victory is yours for the taking.  Jesus resisted evil even unto the cross; we “have not yet resisted unto blood, striving against sin” (Heb 12:4).

            Jesus’ courage and faith wore out the devil.  Satan retreated!  And Jesus enjoyed a well-earned vacation from temptation “for a season.”

            You can say “No” to the devil, and mean it so wholeheartedly and so persistently that Satan will have to yield on that particular point.  Satan had two great tries at Job and retreated in confusion after each struggle.  You don’t have to fight the same battle indefinitely—you can fight it out and remain victor on THAT battle field!

--Oliver G. Wilson, 1959

George Muller on Faith

            Faith is confidence that God will act according to what He has declared in His Holy Word.  It is reliance on God’s Word through the assurance that He will act truthfully.  It is based altogether on His character.

            Welcome the trials of faith.  It grows by the exercise trial gives.  But if we do not welcome the discipline, we get little from it but suffering.  To repine at affliction is to miss the most ennobling joy, to incur the most needless distress, and to lose faith besides.

            Seek acquaintance with God as He is revealed in the Bible.  Trust will be spontaneous if we really know Him.  The notions of God which the world, and even many in the church, entertain are not true.  God is the most lovable Being.  Is not this the language of your inmost soul?  If not, you are not acquainted with God as He is revealed in Scripture.  Seek above all to know God, so that you shall from you inmost soul says, “Though he slay me, yet will I trust in him.”  (See also Ps 9:10).  If one is really acquainted with God of the Bible, he is so satisfied that he will not complain of anything but will rejoice in all things.

--Medical Missionary Record 1959

The Holy Life

There is a faith unmixed with doubt,

A love all free from fear,

A walk with Jesus, where is felt

His presence always near.

There is a rest that God bestows,

Transcending pardon’s peace,

A lowly sweet simplicity,

Where inward conflicts cease.

There is a service God-inspired,

A zeal that tireless grows,

Where self is crucified with Christ

And joy unceasing flows.

There is a meekness free of pride

That feels no anger rise

At slights, or hate, or ridicule,

But counts the cross a prize.

There is a patience that endures

Without a fret or care,

But joyful sings, “His will be done,

My Lord’s sweet grace I share.”

There is a purity of heart,

A cleanness of desire,

Wrought by the Holy Comforter

With sanctifying fire.

There is a glory that awaits,

Each blood washed soul on high,

When Christ returns to take His Bride—

With Him beyond the sky.

--Olin Pfautz

Suggestions on How to Pray

Pray where you are. God is present everywhere and ready to listen.

Pray when possible in a quiet spot where you can be alone.  It is well to fix your mind deliberately on God, apart from confusing distractions.

Pray to God simply and naturally as to a friend.  Tell Him what is on your mind.

Pray remembering the good things God has done for you.  Reckon up your blessings from time to time and give thanks for them.

Pray for God’s forgiveness for the unworthy things that you may have done.  He is near to a humble and contrite heart.

Pray for the things that you need, especially those that will make your life finer and more Christ like.

Pray for others, remembering the situations they confront and the help they need.

Pray above everything else, that God’s will may be done in you.  His purposes are deeper and wiser than anything you can imagine.

Pray and then start answering your own prayer.

--Deane Edwards

Does Jesus Believe You?

            In John 2:23-24 these interesting statements are made: “Many believed in his name … but Jesus did not commit himself unto them.”

            Now the Greek verb translated in the first clause “believed,” is the same word translated in the second clause “commit.”  Translate with the same English word an you get the full force of these statements:  “Many committed themselves to his name … but Jesus did not commit himself to them,” on “Many believed in his name … but Jesus did not believe them.”

            Jesus had some true followers, of course.  But then He also had His popular followers, who followed Him to observe His miracles or to benefit by His miracles.  “Seeing is believing,” so they believed!  But they did no surrender themselves to Him.

            Jesus was not deceived by these followers who loved signs and miracles.  He knew what was in their hearts.  He could not believe their expressions of faith.

            We can know that Jesus believes in us by the witness of the Spirit.  And there is no greater joy than to say, “I am my Beloved’s, and his desire is towards me” (S. of Sol. 7:10).

            If the Holy Ghost does not bear witness, Hebrews 10:15, that we are walking in faith of Christ, we should repent.  For it’s not what we say we believe about Christ that will save us finally; it will be whether Christ believes in us.  “The Lord knoweth them that are his” ( II Tim 2:19)

--George E. Failing, 1959