Life On The Highest Plane
But this is not always so and oftentimes the hardest place to live one's Christian life is in the home and one's greatest enemies are those of his own household. One knows many instances of heart-breaking experiences and intolerable situations caused by the ridicule,opposition and persecution of Christians by members of their own family. Many a boy or girl has been disowned by parents for no other reason than that he became a Christian! Many a young person has had to go to the mission field over the wishes of parents or friends. To have chosen to do the will of God when it went counter to the will of loved ones has been the severest test in Christian experience. But God has never failed to honor love that expresses itself in sacrificial obedience to Himself. And Christ knows how to sympathize with and to succor all who are so tested. He met opposition in His own family and His mother and brothers tried to dissuade Him from the path that led to Calvary. This action called out from Him that remarkable statement that those children of God who were united in doing the will of their heavenly Father were more closely bound together than those who are put together by family ties. The blood of Christ unites His own by a tie that supersedes that made through human blood.
Matthew 10:36, "And a man's foes shall be they of his own household."
Matthew 12:50, "For whosoever shall do the will of my Father which is in heaven, the same is my brother, and sister, and mother."
Strength to suffer and to endure, to bear and to forbear will be given to the one who gives Christ the supreme place in his affections. God will cause him to triumph and to be a sweet savor of Christ unto Him in every place. Love to God, preeminent and paramount, is rewarded by victory and fruitage. His love in us manifested even in silence will be like a light shining in a dark place.
2 Corinthians 2:14-16, "But thanks be unto God, who always leadeth us in triumph in Christ, and maketh manifest through us the savor of his knowledge in every place ... For we are a sweet savor of Christ unto God, in them that are saved and in them that perish; ... to the one a savor from death unto death; to the other a savor from life unto life."
The relationship of the spiritual man to God is marked also by loyalty. By virtue of sonship in God's family he has citizenship in God's Kingdom. Loyalty to his heavenly country and to the interests of his Father's Kingdom takes precedence over citizenship in his earthly domain and supersedes the nationalism which is earth-born.
While acknowledging that "the powers that be are ordained of God," while submitting obediently to the laws of the country in which he lives, while taking his full responsibility for support of that government during his sojourn on earth, yet the man who lives his life on the highest plane discerns clearly that his real home center is in the heavenlies and that his first allegiance must be to the Kingdom of God.
Titus 3:1, "Put them in mind to be subject to principalities and powers, to obey magistrates, to be ready to every good work."
Romans 13:1, "Let every soul be subject unto the higher powers. For there is no power but of God: the powers that be are ordained of God."
Phil. 3:20, "For our citizenship is in heaven."
The spiritual man must acknowledge the sovereignty of his Lord over all other rulers. To him Christ Jesus is already the King of kings and the Lord of lords and his prayer to the Father invariable breathes forth the intense desire to see God's sovereignty extend from sea to sea until His will is done on earth as it is in Heaven.
The Christian serves his Master in an official capacity. Disloyalty is treason. He is a servant of the Lord of Heaven and God requires uncompromising faithfulness in a servant. He is a soldier in the army of Christ and a soldier dare not be enmeshed in entangling alliances. He is an ambassador of the King at the court of a foreign country and an ambassador must maintain absolute loyalty to the statutes of his own country.
Romans 1:1, "Paul, a servant of Jesus Christ, called to be an apostle, separated unto the gospel of God."
2 Timothy 2:3-4, "Thou therefore endure hardship, as a good soldier of Jesus Christ ... No man that warreth entangleth himself with the affairs of this life; that he may please him who hath chosen him to be a soldier."
2 Corinthians 5:20, "Now then we are ambassadors for Christ, as though God did beseech you by us: we pray you in Christ's stead, be ye reconciled to God."
An ambassador of Christ has definite instructions from his Sovereign and he cannot act independently of them. He has had committed unto him the Gospel of Christ as a sacred trust and loyalty to Christ requires loyalty to this Gospel.
1 Timothy 1:11, "According to the glorious gospel of the blessed God, which was committed to my trust."
Romans 15:16, "That I should be the minister of Jesus Christ to the Gentiles, ministering the gospel of God."
~Ruth Paxson~
(continued with # 3)
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