(This Post will make more sense if you read its companion Post, "The Three Salvations", first.)I must say that one of the most important things I've learned over the years is that I'm not very good, not at all good, at fixing myself. At best, I can do a little around the edges, adjust around some weakness, put on a happy face, maybe make a new and improved habit or two, but I can't really fix the underlying parts of my essence that still need fixing. These are the deep parts of me that should pass away but don't. They keep hanging around, contaminating how I feel and think and act.
No matter how well we cover and disguise it, what's inside of us will come out some way some how, yes it will. No matter how difficult it is for these things to be fixed, I'm not excused from trying to fix them. I have to try -- woe is me if I don't try! -- but I also recognize that I'm really dependent upon the Holy Spirit to clean the inside of the cup. To be sure, there are days that I can make the outside of the cup look pretty good, but the inside? Let's be transparent and honest.
As Jesus put it in Matthew 23:25-26: "Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you cleanse the outside of the cup and dish, but inside they are full of extortion and self-indulgence. Blind Pharisee, first cleanse the inside of the cup and dish, that the outside of them may be clean also." I may not be full of extortion and self-indulgence (okay, maybe a little self-indulgence), but there's still things on the inside of my cup that could stand to be cleaned up. Some of them -- maybe a lot of them -- are grayed out and disguised so that they're more like personalized blind spots. I don't like thinking of myself as a blind Pharisee, but as the saying goes, if the shoe fits, wear it.
So, the question is, how do we get through this middle part of Salvation, this sanctification thing? It's the stage we're in now and it can be quite hard! Cleaning the inside of the cup is about far more than 4 steps for this or 6 steps for that or however many steps you want to come up with. Cleaning the inside of the cup is about far more than behaviour modification. Cleaning the inside of the cup is about far more than learning the rules, trying harder, and being more disciplined than you've ever been.
As Proverbs 20:9 puts it, "Who can say, 'I have made my heart clean, I am pure from my sin'?" The answer, of course, is that no one can say that. Imagine for a moment that you're washing dishes and all you have is a greasy, filthy rag for wiping and drying. Those dishes may look different after being washed, but they'll still be dirty. That's the position we're all in and the illustrates the reason we can't make our own hearts clean and can't purify ourselves from our sin.
I'm not disparaging trying harder and applying more self-discipline. It's true that some of us are far better at self-discipline than others. Human-driven self-discipline is a great thing and a very good place to start -- but it's not God's final answer for our predicament. The Christian life isn't ultimately about greater self-discipline and the sin-management that self-discipline strives for.
God intends for our lives to be truly free from the impulses and driving forces that feed the roots of sin. He wants you to be transformed at the level of your very essence. It's about having the inside of the cup cleansed by the Holy Spirit so deeply that the impulses and driving forces feeding the roots of sin are no longer there.
Proverbs 20:24 tells us that "A man's steps are of the LORD; How then can a man understand his own way?" If you can't even truly understand your own way, how can you fix yourself? There's only one conclusion: On your own, you cannot pull off a deep job of Sanctification no matter how hard you try.
We can learn all about Godly ways and habits from Scripture, from Christian books, from each other, parents, Pastors, and Sunday School teachers, and even Seminary Professors. All of those can be good. Nonetheless, without active imprinting from the Holy Spirit, none of the learning will be as effective as God intends.
The Holy Spirit wants to write so deeply in your soul that you gain freedom and victory in the deep places that are the breeding ground for sin. The Holy Spirit will take a transforming lesson and driver it deeper. A work that deep can only be implanted directly by God.
Teaching driven by the Holy Spirit is the best teaching. His is true transformational teaching. In whatever way God's lessons initially reached your life, that kind of depth occurs only when the Holy Spirit becomes directly involved, taking the lessons and driving them home. The transformation occurs when God Himself cleans the inside of the cup, so to speak. Psalm 119:102: "I have not departed from Your judgments, For You Yourself have taught me."
As you try to follow Jesus, are you experiencing a difficult yoke and heavy burden, trying but failing to be the best Christian you can be? These verses indicate that Religious Rules don't have the intended result. In Acts 15:10, Paul says to the other Apostles "Now therefore, why do you test God by putting a yoke on the neck of the disciples which neither our fathers nor we were able to bear?"
It takes more than the rules. The rules may be wonderful, but they're just rules, and if you're trying to live up to the rules by trying harder with more self-discipline, you're under a very difficult yoke and a very heavy burden indeed. You need Jesus working through the Holy Spirit's sanctification process to make real progress and lighten your load. In Matthew 11:29-30, Jesus said "Take My yoke upon you and learn from Me, for I am gentle and lowly in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For My yoke is easy and My burden is light."
Here's my conclusion for my life. I must try to be free from sin, I must learn His truth and must do my best to conform to it. But I can't stop there. I must cry out for His transforming grace! I must cry out for His involvement at the deepest levels of my being. He WANTS to complete this work He has begun in me, so I must trust Him do it, however and whenever He chooses. I must trust Him even when He is pruning and chastening me, even when He is using hard times and deep valleys to accomplish His purposes. I must keep short accounts with God, confessing and repenting as I see my failures and my need. I must try my best, but nonetheless recognize that I am fully dependent upon Him for a successful outcome. Come, Holy Spirit! Have Your way in me!
Some of the truths in this message are reflected in following passages:
Romans 6:5: For if we have been united together in the likeness of His death, certainly we also shall be in the likeness of His resurrection,
Luke 14:14: And you will be blessed, because they cannot repay you; for you shall be repaid at the resurrection of the just."
John 15:1-2: "I am the true vine, and My Father is the Vinedresser. Every branch in Me that does not bear fruit He takes away; and every branch that bears fruit He prunes, that it may bear more fruit.
Heb 12:5-8, 11: And you have forgotten the exhortation which speaks to you as to sons: "MY SON, DO NOT DESPISE THE CHASTENING OF THE LORD, NOR BE DISCOURAGED WHEN YOU ARE REBUKED BY HIM; FOR WHOM THE LORD LOVES HE CHASTENS, AND SCOURGES EVERY SON WHOM HE RECEIVES." If you endure chastening, God deals with you as with sons; for what son is there whom a father does not chasten? But if you are without chastening, of which all have become partakers, then you are illegitimate and not sons...Now no chastening seems to be joyful for the present, but painful; nevertheless, afterward it yields the peaceable fruit of righteousness to those who have been trained by it.
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