Dethronement of the Old Man - Co-crucifixion with Christ
Few people are willing to admit that "the old man" sits upon the throne and rules the whole being with despotic power. Even among Christians there is gross ignorance of and indifference to the subtle, insidious workings of the old "I". If the grosser "works of the flesh" are absent from the life, the individual rests in a complacent sense of goodness failing altogether to apprehend how obnoxious to God are the more refined and less openly manifest sins of the spirit and how they separate one leagues upon leagues from His pure holiness. No man living, except the one who through the enabling Spirit has seen Christ in His righteousness and holiness, will ever willingly say, "I know that in me (that is in my flesh) dwelleth NO good thing."
Let us, then, pause for a moment to take a full-length portrait of this hideous, heinous Self; let us face honestly his manifold operations and see if we are not forced to accept God's estimate of him and to acquiesce in the method of deliverance from his sovereignty. The foundation of life in the natural man is foursquare; self-will, self-love, self-trust, and self-exaltation, and upon this foundation is reared a superstructure that is one huge capital "I". Self-will is the corner-stone and self-exaltation is the cap-stone.
Self-will - "We have turned every one to his own way." The flesh wants its own way and is determined to have it even if it defies and disobeys God and over-rides others. "I will" is the alphabet out of which self fashions its language of life.
Self-centeredness - "the old man" feeds upon himself. He is the beginning and the end. Life presents little that interests or affects him except as it relates to himself. He is the center of the world in which he lives and moves and he always looks out for number one.
Self-assertion - "the old man" believes that every one is as interested in him and as fascinated by him as he himself is, so he protrudes and projects himself into the sight, hearing and notice of others continually. He monopolizes conversation and the theme is always "I", "my", and "mine." He walks with a swagger and expects the world to stop work and look at him. And he never dreams how offensive his self-importance is to others.
Self-depreciation - "the old man" is very versatile and sometimes it suits his purpose better to clothe his pride in a false humility. He curls up in his self-depreciation and shirks a lot of hard work which other people have to do. He magnifies his littleness and feebleness to his own advantage, yet with strange inconsistency he resents others taking his professed estimate of himself and treating him accordingly.
Self-conceit - "the old man" lives so much in himself that he does not know how big the world is in which he lives and how many other really intelligent people there are in it, so he has little regard for the opinions of others, especially if contrary to his own. He looks with proud and supercilious pity upon those less favored and gifted than himself.
Self-love - "the old man" loves himself supremely, one might say almost exclusively. He loves God not at all and his human love for others is tainted more or less with selfishness, jealousy, envy or impurity. Indeed "the old man" makes an idol of himself which he not only loves but worships.
Self-indulgence - "the old man" eats, drinks, and is merry. For him to want anything is equivalent to having it. He pampers and coddles himself; he can even indulge his extravagant, fleshly appetites while others starve to death before his eyes.
Self-pleasing - "the old man" chafes under discomfort and deprivation and is grumpy and peevish unless everything in the life of his day ministers to his real or imagined needs. He lives only for one person whose name is SELF.
Self-seeking - "the old man" is on a quest: he is after whatever will advance the cause of self. He seeks with feverish ambition and activity praise, position, power, prominence, and anything that checks his gaining them is attributed to others.
Self-pity - "his love for himself often creates within "the old man" rebellion against his circumstances or relationships; he exaggerates his own possible suffering, discomfort or sorrow and makes himself and others miserable by his habitual murmuring.
Self-sensitiveness - "the old man" is extremely hard to live with because he is covered with wounds and is continually being hurt afresh. He is not very companionable because usually he is dissolved in tears, shrouded in silence, or enjoying a pout.
Self-defense - "the old man" is very jealous of his rights and busy avenging his wrongs. He indulges freely in lawsuits. In his pursuit of his own vindication and justification in cases of disagreement and estrangement with others he is blinded by his own sin.
Self-trust - "the old man" is very self-confident and feels no need of one wiser and stronger than himself. Trusting in his own powers and resources he is prone to say "Though all men shall deny Thee, yet will not I."
Self-sufficiency - the self-confidence of "the old man" fosters an egotistical, smug self-satisfaction which leaves him stagnant. He has neither desire nor sense of need for anything beyond what he already possesses.
Self-consciousness - "the old man" never forgets himself: wherever he goes he casts a shadow of himself before. He is constantly occupied with photographing himself and developing the plates. He is chained to himself and as he walks one hears the clank of the chains. He is often morbidly elf-introspective.
Self-exaltation - "the old man" is absorbed in his own excellencies: he overestimates himself and his abilities: he thirsts for admiration and praise and he thrives on flattery. He secretly worships at the shrine "Self" and he wishes others to do so publicly.
Self-righteousness - "the old man" loves to dress himself in the garments of morality, benevolence and public-spiritedness. He even patronizes the Church and often assists in drives for raising money for philanthropic and religious purposes, heading the list of donors with a handsome gift. He keeps a double entry book - both with the Church and with the world and expects a reward both on earth and in Heaven.
Self-glorying - perhaps "the old man" resents this plain delineation of himself as he really is and thinks the condemnation too sweeping. Immediately he begins to enumerate his good qualities, his amiableness, geniality, tolerance, self-control, sacrificial spirit and other virtues. In doing so he takes all the credit to himself for what he is, exhibiting ill-concealed pride and vanity.
All that we have desired to say of this hideous ugly Self is said most tellingly by Gerhard Tersteegen in the following lines:
"Apart from Thee
I am not only naught but worse than naught,
A wretched monster, horrible of mien!
And when I work my works in self-vain strength,
However good and holy they may seem,
These works are hateful - nay, in Thy pure sight
Are criminal and fiendish, since thereby
I seek, and please, and magnify myself
In subtle pride of goodness, and ascribe
To self the glory that is Thine alone.
So dark, corrupt, so vile a thing is self.
Seen in the presence of Thy purity
It turns my soul to loathing and disgust;
Yea, all the virtues that it boasts to own,
Are foul and worthless when I look on Thee.
Oh that there might be no more I or mine!
That in myself I might no longer own
As mine, my life, my thinking, or my choice,
Or any other motion, but in me
That Thou, my God, my Jesus, might be all,
And work the all in all! Let that, O Lord,
Be dumb, forever die, and cease to be,
Which Thou doest not Thyself in me inspire,
And speak and work."
~Ruth Paxson~
(continued with # 3)
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