My little children, for whom I labor in birth again until Christ is formed in you, Gal. 4:19
WE turn to the final pages and finish our study through The Principle of Position by Miles Stanford. I truly pray you’ve found this study helpful.
THE verse above came to mind as I read the closing paragraphs below, especially the opening verse to our final consideration. There we find a critically important reference to Rom. 8:28 and 29 and the authors statement that our Father’s purpose for us is that we become conformed to the image (character) of His Son. To that end, all things are being “worked together”. Paul reiterates this premise in Gal 4:19, in the using the word “travail” in the KJV to explain this process to which Christ is being formed in us. I can recall many occasions speaking to troubled saints going through difficult times, struggling with sin or disorienting heartaches, showing them these verses to reorient them to the path and process their loving heavenly Father has set them upon to bring them to that predestined “well-pleasing place.” This the way to being conformed to the image of his Son, the firstborn among many brethren. When we understand just where the providential winds are blowing and directing us, where God has us purposely headed and why, such encouragement makes the travel less dumpy and arduous, even a welcomed journey.
READ carefully these closing paragraphs. As I said last week there is an interesting closing comment I want to expand up. I don’t know that I’ve ever seen or heard this comment anywhere else but here. Although of late, I seem to be seeing it surface from time to time.
SO, let’s get to it, and finish this chapter. After this, we are going to commence another study in the sequel to The Principle of Position, Miles Stanford’s The Green Letters, that looks at how these things are to be adopted and applied.
IN the joy of the Lord,
Joe
Neh. 8:10, Isa. 30:15 & Job 2:10
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Chapter 10—Sins and Confession – continued and concluded
Our Father’s purpose for us is that we become conformed to the image (character) of His Son. To that end, all things are being “worked together” (Rom. 8:28, 29). In our position in Christ, our Father has already perfected us, made us complete in Him. In our walk, He by His Spirit is fashioning us after that blessed pattern, “that the life also of Jesus might be made manifest in our mortal flesh” (2 Cor. 4:11).
“He that saith he abideth in him ought himself also so to walk, even as he walked” (I John 2:6). In the first place, the Lord Jesus walked in the light, in fellowship with His Father. “…The Son of man which is in heaven” (John 3:13). Secondly, He walked in full dependence upon the Holy Spirit. “Then was Jesus led up of the Spirit into the wilderness…” (Matt. 4:1). “…Who through the eternal Spirit offered Himself without spot to God…” (Heb. 9:14). Likewise, our life is hid with Christ in God, and we walk in the light of God’s presence during our earthly course. Our dependence is expressed as we “walk in the Spirit,” that we may not “fulfil the lust of the flesh” (Gal. 5:16). We are to “…worship in the Spirit of God and glory in Christ Jesus and put no confidence in the flesh” (Phil. 3:3, NASB).
One of the Father’s means of teaching us the Spirit-dependent walk in the light is to let us flounder in the darkness of self. The Lord Jesus also patiently waits to show us that all our sins have been cleansed by His blood. Coupled with our sins is the crushing weight of an evil conscience, which is often endured for years. And He continues to wait for us to acknowledge our position in Him in the light, so that we may rest in what He has already done about our sins. “Let us draw near with a sincere heart in full assurance of faith, having our hearts sprinkled clean from an evil conscience…” (Heb. 10:22, NASB).
“How much more shall the blood of Christ, who through the eternal Spirit offered himself without spot to God, purge your conscience from dead works to serve the living God?” (Heb. 9:14). Laboring under a load of unconfessed sins, we are disqualified from fellowship with our Father, as well as from usefulness to others: we are, rather, a burden to all. It is such believers whom He urges to “come boldly unto the throne of grace, that we may obtain mercy, and find grace to help in time of need” (Heb. 4:16). The need is ever present, the work is forever done! He has placed us in His Son, having “made us sit together in heavenly places in Christ Jesus” (Eph. 2:6). All that is required is that we confidently abide where we have already been placed.
We are not to abide in our present condition, counting upon help from Him in heaven for our walk and service. Just the opposite! He has shown us our position in order that we may abide in our risen Lord, in the light and presence of the Father. It is from that vantage point that we become involved in the needs of this world. In John 3:13 our Lord Jesus referred to Himself as “he that came down from heaven, even the Son of man which is in heaven.” He shared heavenly life in a world of need. If He is to do the same and more today through us, we must abide in heaven as we sojourn on earth. Only life lived in the light of glory can overcome the world of darkness.
In summary, (1) we count ourselves to have died unto sin, and to be alive unto God in the Lord Jesus (Rom. 6:11); (2) we accept our position in the light when we know ourselves to be new creations in our risen Savior (Eph. 2:6), (3) we enjoy His blessed fellowship as we judge ourselves in confession of our sins (1 John 1:7, 9). Then it is that our Lord can work through us in the lives of others, “to open their eyes, and to turn them from darkness to light, and from the power of Satan unto God, that they may receive forgiveness of sins, and inheritance among them which are sanctified by faith that is in me” (Acts 26:18).
Keep Looking Down
“For you have died and your life is hidden with Christ in God.” Col. 3.3, NASB
Closing comment to be continued………
