Dec 11
10
Of God is Christ Jesus made unto Us Sanctification
Sanctification is holiness. Without holiness no man shall see the Lord. The Lord Jesus told the thief on the cross he would be with him that day in glory. But the thief had his hands and his feet nailed to the cross? Holiness is not in the hands and the feet but in Christ. The Spirit of Christ in the believer makes us one in Christ so that we are no more in the flesh but in the Spirit; though our bodies are yet flesh (Romans 8: 8-10.) This takes away the self-sanctifiers boasting in himself and in what he constrains others to do (Gal 6: 13.) But when of God Christ is made unto us Sanctification then the believer is made a new creation so that we glory only in the Lord (Gal 6: 14-15.) Nothing mortifies the lusts of our flesh, like this glorious good news, in Christ every believer is a saint as fit right now to enter into God’s presence as those saints already there (Col 1: 12.) — Clay Curtis
Absolutely Sovereign Clay Curtis
Psalm 76:10: Surely the wrath of man shall praise thee: the remainder of wrath shalt thou restrain.
If we deny the absolute sovereignty of God we do not deny it because we think it belittles God. Whether we know it or not we do it TO BELITTLE GOD AND EXALT SELF. Though most argue against God’s absolute authority and power claiming concern over God being accused of being the author of evil, the true concern is that I’ll be found out to be the author of all my sin.
If we confess that God can remove his restraining hand from a man, harden a man’s heart, so that the sinner commits evil in a city all to accomplish God’s purpose then we have to confess that it is only by God’s direct hand and purpose that sinners are not venting more evil than we do now. By nature evil is what we are. The only thing keeping me from committing the vilest act right now is the sovereign power of God.
Yet, all the evil acts that sinners have ever committed on this earth have praised God. One only has to look at the most sinful act of all. At the cross we behold God bringing praise to his name from the unrighteous wrath of man through the death of his own Son. If everything which happened to God’s own Son was according to God’s determinate council then who are we to question him as to what he does from his throne in glory to us worms called men. Praise him that he has not given us our just due in removing his hand from all of us. Sinful man apart from God’s restraining hand is hell.
God’s absolute sovereignty is the very definition of who God is. It gives great peace to the sinner who has been made to see him in truth. I am thankful my God is truly God.
LOOK TO CHRIST-NOT THE LAW
A friend of mine once asked a certain divine in London what he thought of the law as the believer’s only rule of life? He replied, “The believer must look with one eye to Christ, and with the other to the law.” But he brought no more proof from the word of God than this author has, who attempts to prove it by the fitness of things. My friend replied, “Then every believer must squint.” However, there is no call for squinting in this matter; Christ says, “Look unto me, and be saved, all ye ends of the earth;” and adds, “I will keep that man in perfect peace whose mind is stayed on me ” and Paul tells us to “run the race set before us, looking unto Jesus, the author and finisher of our faith.” Looking with one eye to the law, and with the other to Christ, is erring from wisdom’s rule of direction; which is, “Let thine eyes look right on, and let thine eyelids look straight before thee. Ponder the path of thy feet, and let all thy ways be established.”
NOT WITHOUT DIRECTION AND A DIRECTOR
God has not left His people without sufficient directions nor yet without a director. “In all thy ways acknowledge God, and He shall direct thy paths.” Wisdom is profitable to direct; “I will direct their work in truth, says God; “and I will make an everlasting covenant with them,” Isa. 61:8. “It is not in man that walketh to direct his steps.” “I will instruct thee, and teach thee in the way which thou shalt go; I will guide thee with mine eye. Be ye not as the horse or as the mule which have no understanding,” Psa. 32:8,9. “I will bring the blind by a way that they know not; I will lead them in paths that they have not known; I will make darkness light before them, and crooked things straight: these things will I do unto them and not forsake them.”
Sending the citizens of Zion to Sinai for rules of life and direction, is a contempt of Mount Zion, and of the heavenly Jerusalem, to which the Spirit of God leads all believers, (Heb. 12:22) and is no less a contempt of the King of saints, whom God hath set on that most holy hill. Making the letter the only rule of life, is sending the saints wrong, for as much as the Lord hath said unto them, they shall henceforth return no more that way, Deut. 17:16. They have compassed that mount long enough, Deut. 2:2,3. Moses is dead and buried, Josh. 1:2. Joshua is to take the lead. It is bewitching the people; (Gal. 3:1) it is sending them to the old yoke of bondage, Gal. 5:1; which is a contempt of the Savior’s yoke. (Matt. 11:29) It is turning back upon grace; it is abusing their liberty; it is making Christ of none effect to them, Gal. 5:4; and that should profit them nothing. (Gal. 5:2)
Elijah, who traveled forty days into the wilderness in order to go to Horeb, instead of going to Mount Zion, was asked twice, by way of reproof, first in a storm, and then by a still voice, “What doest thou here, Elijah?” 1 Kings 29:9,13; which was attended with an earthquake, whirlwind, and a fire; God would not take him to heaven from that mount, though he requested to die there; that is not the new and living way, Heb. 10:20; he must go back to the Holy Land, over the river Jordan again, and into the plains of Jericho, where Joshua, typical of our Captain, first took the lead, before the fiery chariot appeared to take him to heaven, 2 Kings 2:11.
THE SAINTS’ ALL-SUFFICIENT RULE
If the covenant of grace does not afford the believer a rule of life, it must be very deficient; however, Paul could bring a rule from thence sufficient for the believer to live by, walk by, worship by, and converse by. God’s sovereign will is man’s rule; and to the saints God makes known the mystery of His will according to His good pleasure which runs thus: “This is the will of him that sent me, that every one which seeth the Son, and believeth on Him, may have everlasting life: and I will raise him up at the last day.” This mystery is called by way of distinction from the law, God’s good will toward men which brings peace upon earth, and glory to God in the highest, Luke 2:14; and it is the good will of Him that dwelt in the bush. Deut. 33:16. When this is revealed to men’s hearts by the Holy Ghost it is called the mystery of faith in a pure conscience, 1 Tim. 3:9; and this is the saints’ All sufficient rule; by faith the just man is to live; by faith, and not by sight, is the just man to walk; in the Spirit, not in the letter, is the just man to serve; in Spirit and in truth to worship; he that is faithful unto death shall have a crown of life; the end of faith is salvation of the soul.
William Huntington (extracts from “Believers rule of life”)