Life on the Highest Plane
Christ Our Lord
Crossing God's bridge of salvation the believer enters into a totally new sphere which requires the enthronement of a new Sovereign over his life. The Head of the new creation must become its Lord if all things are to become new.
When the risen Christ ascended to Heaven His Father exalted Him to the place of Lordship over the universe and He included within that sovereignty the enthronement of Christ as Lord over the individual believer. To understand better the absolute necessity for such a change of sovereigns let us study these two spheres more in detail.
The Characteristic Mark of Each Sphere
These two spheres are the exact antitheses of each other so that life in the one precludes life in the other. They may be readily distinguished because each has a characteristic mark.
Romans 8:5, "For they that are after the flesh do mind the things of the flesh; but they that are after the Spirit the things of the Spirit."
Romans 8:9, "But ye are not in the flesh, but in the Spirit, if so be that the Spirit of God dwell in you. Now if any man have not the Spirit of Christ, he is none of his."
The characteristic mark of the old sphere is the "flesh" and of the new sphere the "Spirit." The unbeliever is "in the flesh" and the believer is "in the Spirit." The Bible teaches very plainly that "the flesh" and "the Spirit" are mutually irreconcilable enemies in totally diverse camps.
Romans 8:6, "For to be carnally minded is death: but to be spiritually minded is life and peace."
Galatians 5:17, "For the flesh lusteth against the Spirit and the Spirit against the flesh; and these are contrary the one to the other; so that ye cannot do the things that ye would."
Man became "flesh" through Adam's sin.
Genesis 6:3, "And Jehovah said, my spirit shall not strive with man forever, for in their going astray they are become flesh."
The flesh is the whole natural man, the life of nature, whether good or bad, received through the first birth. It is the earthward, sinful life received through human generation. It is all that I am as a son of Adam.
John 3:6, "That which is born of the flesh is flesh; and that which is born of the Spirit is Spirit."
God invariably describes "the flesh" as the cause of sin's power, of the law's weakness, and as enmity toward Himself. God declares "the flesh" to be irreconcilably lawless.
Romans 7:25, "I thank God through Jesus Christ our Lord. So then with the mind I myself serve the law of God but with the flesh the law of sin."
Romans 8:3, "For what the law could not do, in that it was weak through the flesh, God sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh, and for sin, condemned sin in the flesh."
Romans 8:7, "Because the carnal mind is enmity against God: for it is not subject to the law of God, neither indeed can be."
God sees nothing good in "the flesh." Even the very best product which physical generation can produce He casts away as altogether useless.
Romans 7:18, "For I know that in me (that is, in my flesh) dwelleth NO GOOD THING for to to will is present with me; but how to perform that which is good I find not."
Paul's estimate of the flesh as given in this verse is God-inspired as any one must readily admit who knows his former high regard for himself (Phil. 3:4-6). Through human generation Paul was indeed richly endowed. Yet inspired by the Holy Spirit he wrote "I know that in my flesh dwelleth no good thing." When he entered into the sphere of the Spirit he saw that the finest and best thing in him, his righteousness, was as "filthy rags" because it, too, was permeated and defiled by sin - it was self-righteousness. No, God sees no redeeming feature in any son of Adam. The flesh offers nothing which is acceptable to God. Indeed the flesh is the soil in which satan works to keep the sinner alienated from God.
So there is but one possible attitude which God can have toward the flesh. It is the attitude of condemnation and rejection. God refuses to deal with the flesh on any terms for it is irretrievably displeasing to Him. "They that re in the flesh CANNOT please God" (Romans 8:8).
Regeneration opens the way for man to become spiritual. At the new birth, as we have already seen, it is the Holy Spirit who quickens our human spirit and then comes to dwell therein to make our entire life spiritual and supernatural, heavenly and holy. It is the Holy Spirit in us who causes sin's power to be broken, God's law to be kept, and love of God to be supreme.
Romans 8:2, 4, "For the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus hath made me free from the law of sin and death. That the righteousness of the law might be fulfilled in us, who walk not after the flesh, but after the Spirit."
Romans 5:5, "And hope maketh not ashamed: because the love of God is shed abroad in our hearts by the Holy Spirit, which is given unto us."
~Ruth Paxson~
(continued with # 1 - "The Reign of the Old Man")
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