Five Operations of the Holy Spirit Part 21
We must apprehend (lay hold on) that for which we have been apprehended. It is the "sword of the Lord and of Gideon," so to speak. God has done His part; we must continue to do our part, being careful to depend on the wisdom and strength of the Holy Spirit.
We know we are the children of God if the fruit of righteousness is coming forth in our behaviour. If the lust and strife of the flesh is all we can show for years of following Jesus, we are well advised to return to Christ and determine whether we are walking in the appetites of the flesh or in the Spirit. Not everyone who cries Lord! Lord! will enter the Kingdom of Heaven.
We can be perfect in doctrine, calling Jesus "Lord," and still be rejected. The question is, whether we are doing the will of the Father. The will of the Father is that we walk in love as dear children, bringing forth the fruits of holiness that are the fragrance of His beloved Son, the Lord Jesus Christ.
The mark of the true Christian is not the naming of Christ but the fruit of the Spirit. "By their fruits you shall know them."
After bringing to our attention the goal of the dealings of the Holy Spirit in us, which is the perfecting of the members of the Church in spirit, soul, and body, Paul turns back to his testimony to the saints concerning the justifying authority and power that are in Christ.
Who shall lay any thing to the charge of God's elect? It is God that justifieth. (Romans 8:33) The idea here is that it is the supreme Judge who has declared us guiltless and has dismissed our case. Every accusing voice is silenced because the Judge has rendered His decision.
There is a lesson for us in the returning of Paul to the doctrine of justification, after bringing us up to the high plane of the redemption of the material creation. The three deaths and three resurrections of which we are writing are not like grades in an elementary school or rungs on a ladder. Rather, the Holy Spirit sweeps back and forth, working into us the many dimensions of the grace of God.
We do not leave one level and go on to the next. We are being made in one piece just as the garment of Christ, which was not sewed together but woven as a whole. The three deaths continually are working in us and the three resurrections continually are working in us.
When first we accept Christ we receive the fullness of God Almighty because all God's Fullness abides in Christ. Then we wander through the wilderness, so to speak, as the Holy Spirit weaves the grace of God throughout our being. Back and forth, back and forth, in and out, in and out, the Life of Christ is woven into us.
Back goes Paul to justification so we may keep in mind that all our progress in sanctification and glorification is founded on the work of justification wrought on the cross of Calvary.
We have examined briefly the teaching of the Apostle Paul concerning the redeeming work of Christ in removing the guilt, tendencies, and effects of sin.
The Apostle John also commented on the relationship of the Christian to sin, and gave some practical guidelines for the disciple who is being redeemed from sin by the working of the Holy Spirit of God.
This then is the message which we have heard of him, and declare unto you, that God is light, and in him is no darkness at all. If we say that we have fellowship with him, and walk in darkness, we lie, and do not the truth: (I John 1:5,6)
Walking in darkness is the same as walking in the appetites of the flesh. If we Christians yield to sin, obeying its lusts, we are walking in darkness. God is holy and righteous and we cannot have fellowship with Him and continue walking under the control of the sin that dwells in our flesh.
Sometimes the teaching of the first chapter of I John is applied to the unsaved. "If we are unsaved," it is held, "we cannot have fellowship with God. If we accept Christ we can have fellowship on the basis of the righteousness of Christ imputed (ascribed) to us."
It certainly is true that the unsaved cannot have fellowship with God, and that we do come into the favour of God on the basis of the righteousness of Christ that is imputed (ascribed) to us. However, the first chapter of I John is addressed to Christians, and its meaning is that if we Christians walk in sin and claim to have fellowship with God we are in error.
But if we walk in the light, as he is in the light, we have fellowship one with another, and the blood of Jesus Christ his Son cleanseth us from all sin. (I John 1:7)
God dwells in the light of absolute purity of action, speech, and thought. If we begin to enter God's purity, by the strength and wisdom that the Holy Spirit imparts to us, we are eligible for fellowship with God. The further into the Divine holiness we come, the greater is our fellowship with God.
Because a period of time is required for us to learn to walk in holiness, some kind of provision must be made in order to take care of the guilt of our bondages that have not as yet been broken. This provision is the blood of the Lord Jesus Christ.
As long as we are following the Holy Spirit, stepping along in the light given us each day, the blood keeps on cleansing that part of us that has not as yet been delivered from sin.
We are part holy and part unholy as far as our behaviour is concerned. We could not have fellowship at all with God the Father except that the blood of the Lord Jesus keeps on cleansing the part of us that still is not righteous, holy, or obedient to God.