REACTIVE or proactive; getting out front of the curve; avoidance tactics – there are all kinds of terms which talk to avoiding the “too late” our author described in the last paragraph in the previous section of review; heading off the unintended consequences of our failure to “enter into that rest” that Christ has so wonderfully provided.
LATELY, I’ve been thinking much on, and discussing at length with others, the art of Spiritual Disciplines; being proactive in the lost art of living the Christian life deliberately. This is but another term for the Reckoning that Counts.
AS we continue our reading in Chapter 48, The Self-Life and Reckoning, here is a reminder of one definition we’ve heard regarding the nature of true of confession: Confessing sin: “Taking Gods side against ourselves.”
In the inexorable riches of Christ,
Joe
Neh. 8:10, Isa 30:15, Jas 1:2; Prov. 21:30
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Chapter 48—The Self-Life and Reckoning- Part 2
“Christ suffered in the flesh—for us, was crucified for our sin. Therefore arm yourselves with the same purpose (to suffer rather than to sin), for he whose mortal nature has suffered (in Christ’s Person and been crucified) has done with sin—has obtained a ceasing from (the domination of) sin. So that he can no longer spend the rest of his natural life living by (his) human appetites and desires, but (he lives) for what God wills” (1 Pet. 4:1, 2, Amp.). In reckoning, our attitude becomes one of a firm stand against self, cost what it may. The price of birth is His death for us; the price of growth is our death with Him.
It is difficult for us to realize and acquiesce to the fact that suffering is one of the main factors in our spiritual growth. In the first place, we are in union of life with a suffering Savior whose earthly ministry was expressed in sacrifice for others. Secondly, there is the suffering we go through when we fail to abide in Him, but walk in the flesh—the suffering of sin and its inevitable consequences. Thirdly, there is the suffering that results from our day-by-day emancipation from the influence of the self-life by means of crucifixion. ………to be continued
