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We are our human selves. We are
privileged to have the Spirit of Christ in us. He is not we and we are not
He, but we are expressions of Him in our personalities and in our
situations. Of course, life is no smooth flow. If the Bible says it is
from faith to faith, and from grace to grace, then it is also from problem
to problem!
Our human pressures and involvements
are the way by which God through humanity can reach humanity. It is the
principle of the incarnation, and the reason why it is God’s predestined
plan that we should be fully humans in every kind of human situation. Jesus
was “tempted in all points as we are”.
This gives full meaning and intelligent incentive to our acceptance of
James’s word, “Count it all joy when you
meet various trials”. They have a vital purpose, every one of
them.
What do problems or pressures do to
us? Or temptations? They consciously involve us in situations. We cannot
float quietly along and just ignore them. We have to do something about
them. When problems come into our lives we respond. Aroused humanity is
where God can express Himself as God. There are many, many situations of
the world around us in which we have no participation and we can make no
contribution. They do not affect us, and we do not affect them. But where
we are personally involved, there we have an effect or God has an effect by
us.
Paul speaks of us having “this
treasure in earthen vessels that the excellency of the power may be of God
and not of us.” He so clearly saw this fact and principle, when
he told how he had a thorn in the flesh that God did not remove though he
besought Him three times. Instead God said, “My
grace is sufficient for thee: for my strength is made perfect in weakness:”
and Paul added that, therefore, he took actual pleasure in unpleasant
situations, “infirmities, necessities,
distresses, persecutions,” because “when
I am weak then am I strong.”
In other words, all our awkward
situations and our normal negative reactions to them – dislike, fear,
unwillingness, inadequacy, or frustration – are always present opportunities
to give evidence of our humanity. We can act or react from the provisions
of Christ in us or from our own self-efforts independent of Him. We as mere
humans reacting give no evidence of God’s Presence in us. But we who are at
home in the fact of our true identity – the
not I, but Christ in me – accept pressures, trials, temptations
as springboards to faith. We dislike a person, so we take a step of faith.
We move over and say, “I don’t like this person, but You are love in me.
You love him, so with Your love, I love him.” When we fear, we affirm His
courage in us and push forward. When we have doubts; we say “God is my
God. That is settled for me.” When we don’t have what it takes, we say,
“God’s ways are perfect. I accept and praise.”
But what makes it possible for us to
respond in a way other than what is natural to humans is knowing Him. Our
humanness does not change when we are regenerated. We will be disappointed
if we look to ourselves and expect to see a change in ourselves. No, we
affirm Him and go forward: the effect on ourselves is not the point. The
expression of Christ in us is the important thing, the excellent choice.
But, why do we, as “new creations”
still have the same initial reactions to situations? Our negative human
reactions are necessary to God. The positive must have its negative for
its manifestation. You cannot know light except in contrast to dark, or soft
except in contrast to hard, or yes without no. Light is invisible unless it
is reflected against a non-light body, such as the moon or earth, and
swallows it up. Then you don’t see the moon but the glory of the light, or
the earth except as clothed with all the colors of the light. A soft bed
must have a hard framework, but the mattress must conquer the bedstead!
Flesh must have bones; a decisive yes derives its strength from a conquest
of the alternative no’s. So we are God’s polar opposite. We are the
“are-nots” in relation to God’s “I am.”
We do not, therefore, blame or
condemn ourselves because we are the “have-nots” and guiltily feel we are
wrong to react as we do. Our human reaction sets the stage, then what we
choose is what matters. We are what we are and what we are meant to be.
We may well laugh at ourselves, but not throw ourselves out with disgust.
We are not God’s liabilities; we are God’s assets. We either choose to
remain in the human reaction, independent of Him, and thus go on to sin; or,
we choose to express Christ in the situation and rely on His strength in
us. We are then “strong in the Lord and the
power of His might.”
The secret is always replacement.
We don’t work hard at pushing darkness out of a room. We turn our backs on
the darkness and switch on the light – then where is the darkness? We
transfer our attention from ourselves to Him. That is the secret. Not
resistance, but replacement.
Let us have it clear: our humanity
is for the manifestation of Deity. We are not Deity, but “He
has given us His very great and precious promises, so that through them you
may participate in the divine nature and escape the corruption in the world
caused by evil desires.” For this
to be possible, we humans are to be involved in the whole of human
existence. Personal involvement in any situation generates personal
reactions. I participate. I feel. I react. I am now an aroused human in
that situation. But my responses are negative, not yet sin, but negative.
I have not the courage, the ability, the love, the wisdom, the answers.
Frustrations, opposing personalities, wrong doing, or misfortune disturb me.
This is exactly as it should be. Now I am a conditioned human – conditioned
for the step of faith. I am not God, but God is not at a distance, we are
joined – one spirit. My human-self expresses Christ in me.
So when I move over in my inner
center from my personal reactions to affirming Him, recognizing Him for what
He is for every situation; then I go forward right in the situation, just
the same human in myself to all appearances, but actually it is God on the
scene, God working, God manifested, God glorified.
However, I do not always step
forward in faith under my pressures. I sometimes step back. That is when I
sin. My initial human reactions, though negative, are not sin. (“Then
when lust hath conceived, it bringeth forth sin”) They become sin
when I follow them through negatively: my dislike for a person, instead of
being replaced by God’s love, continues unchecked as hate: I fear, and
instead of exchanging fear for faith, I take flight and run away from God’s
will: a feeling of impatience or resentment is expressed in the angry word
or lost temper, instead of being swallowed up by God’s patience or quiet
acceptance of His way. Anger is right when expressing genuine concern for
others: it is wrong when, as so often, it is to compensate my own hurt
feelings. Pride is expressed in magnifying Christ (“making by boast in the
Lord”) or it can be in making much of myself.
We are our real selves as well as it
being Christ in us: therefore, we do have pleasure as well as being His
pleasure: we do have motives as well as being motivated by Him.
The way back from sinning is as
simple and plain as on our first coming to Christ. If there is quick
sinning, there is quick cleansing. It has to start at the point of my
personal freedom, where I went wrong and I must express that freedom in
honest confession. That is all I can do about it, but that I must do and
that means my brokenness. It may involve confession to man or restitution,
but it certainly means admission to God of my sin. God said He would
forgive me and cleanse me and He does.
We can be tripped up by some subtle
temptation. Having stepped down, we must not stay down. We must not pour
on the condemnation. We must, therefore, know how, when tripped, to get up
quickly, to get standing again in the armor of God and keep walking.
Faith is the means. Faith which is action and by which we boldly thank
God that the sin is no more. We may go on felling guilty or stained, but we
turn our attention away from the feelings and we replace them by faith.
We replace guilt by praise and walk on with Him as before.
This is walking in the Spirit.
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