OKAY, we have looked at Reckoning from the perspective of Romans Six, Seven, and Eight. Now we come to Chapter 48 in The Complete Green Letters, Part 4 – The Realization of Spiritual Growth, and an excellent summary in how this ought to be applied. My introduction is brief so you can take the time to prayerfully consider our author’s words. But please make a mental note of a few key points and gems you will find:
“looking upon the death of the Cross as separating me from the influence of sin and self“
“I now count upon my relationship to the heavenly Adam to conform me to His image“
“but [where] there was only miserable failure. Now we finally stop struggling, and begin to trust“
“our reckoning concerning self is to become our heart-attitude“
“consistently applied to self, and our resultant emancipation becomes progressively confirmed“
WITH that, let us go to our next chapter, The Self-Life and Reckoning.
In the inexorable riches of Christ,
Joe
Neh. 8:10, Isa 30:15, Jas 1:2; Prov. 21:30
********
Chapter 48—The Self-life and Reckoning
To be perfectly scriptural, it must be said that the reckoning of Romans 6:11 has nothing whatsoever to do with the self-life. We are certainly not to reckon the old man to have “died unto sin,” any more than we are to reckon him to be “alive unto God in Christ.” The reckoning of this key verse applies to the “new creation in Christ Jesus.”
It is as a “new man” in Christ that I am to reckon myself to have died unto the principle of sin, and to be alive unto God in Christ Jesus. While God knew me as a lost individual in Adam, He also foreknow me as a believer in Christ. At Calvary, He not only identified the Lord Jesus with my sins by making Him “to be sin for us” (2 Cor. 5:21), but He also identified me, the sinner, with the Lord Jesus. As Redeemer, He died there in payment for the penalty of my sins; as Life, He died unto (outfrom the jurisdiction of sin. In my identification with Him, the death of the cross separated me from the power and tyranny of the principle of sin.
As Life, and having fully paid the penalty of our sins, the Lord Jesus arose from among the dead. Being identified with Christ, I, as an individual cut off from sinful Adam, was created anew in Him. Romans 6:11 calls upon me, as a new creation in Christ, to reckon myself alive unto God in Him, having died unto sin at Calvary. By faith in these facts, I am to rest in my eternal position—alive in the risen Lord—looking upon the death of the cross as separating me from the influence of sin and self.
I am a new creation in the Last Adam. Judicially, the old things of the first Adam have passed away, both as to their penalty and their power. “The first man is of the earth, earthy; the second man is the Lord from heaven… And as we have borne the image of the earthy, we shall also bear the image of the heavenly”(1 Cor. 15:47, 49). My history in the earthy Adam having been brought to an end at Calvary, I now count upon my relationship to the heavenly Adam to conform me to His image.
Our reckoning has to do with our position in Christ, not our condition in the body. Although the Adamic life is not the source of my Christian life, that source is still active in my mortal body. When I fail to reckon upon, and abide in, the Lord Jesus as my new life, the old life expresses itself by “the works of the flesh” in my members. Paul’s alternative to this is, “Neither present your members unto sin as instruments of unrighteousness; but present yourselves unto God, as alive from the dead, and your members as instruments of righteousness unto God” (Rom. 6:13, ASV). When we yield to sin and the old life, the result is unrighteousness; when we yield our “alive-from-the-dead” life unto God, there is righteousness. “I beseech you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that ye present your bodies a living sacrifice … unto God” (Rom. 12:1).
“But thanks be to God, that, whereas ye were servants of sin, ye became obedient from the heart to that form of teaching [identification] whereunto ye were delivered; and being made free from [the tyranny of] sin, ye became servants of righteousness… But now being made free from [the power of] sin and become servants to God, ye have your fruit [of the Spirit] unto sanctification”(Rom. 6:17, 18, 22, ASV). In reckoning, we are thereby yielding ourselves to our risen Lord, and the fruit of His life is manifested in us by growth in His image. When we fail to count upon His life, the old Adamic source exercises its sinful influence and power throughout our being, making us carnal, self-centered believers.
Romans 6:6 (ASV) affirms that the Adamic source of life within was crucified on the cross: “Knowing this, that our old man was crucified with him.” We may have tried for years in our Romans Seven struggles to overcome and crucify self, but there was only miserable failure. Now we finally stop struggling, and begin to trust. We reckon upon what was done with that source on Calvary, thereby enabling the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus to free us from the law of sin and death.
When we have sinned, or are about to be overcome by the old man, it is too late then to reckon. No, our reckoning concerning self is to become our heart-attitude. We know that the old source was crucified at the cross, and we continually count on that fact—it is to be the set of our mind. We begin the day in that attitude of heart; we do not wait until a need arises. In this way, the influence of the cross is more consistently applied to self, and our resultant emancipation becomes progressively confirmed. …to be continued
