And this occurs five times in verses 13,
16, and 19.
Many have taken this word present to imply
consecration without looking carefully into its content.
Of course, that is what it does mean,
but not in the sense in which we
so often understand it.
It is not the consecration of our old
man with his instincts and resources, and natural
wisdom, strengths, and other gifts to the Lord
for him to use.
This will be at once clear from verse
13.
Note there the clause, as alive from the
dead.
Paul says, present yourselves unto God as alive
from the dead.
This defines for us the point at which
consecration begins.
For what is here referred to is not
the consecration of anything belonging to the old
creation, but only of that which is passed
through death to resurrection.
The presenting spoken of is the outcome of
my knowing my old man to be crucified.
Knowing, reckoning, presenting to God.
That is the divine order.
When I really know I am crucified with
him, then spontaneously I reckon myself dead.
And when I know that I am raised
with him from the dead, then likewise I
reckon myself alive unto God in Christ Jesus.
For both the death and the resurrection side
of the cross are to be accepted by
faith.
When this point is reached, giving myself to
him follows.
In resurrection, he is the source of my
life.
Indeed, he is my life.
So I cannot but present everything to him,
for all is his, not mine.
But without passing through death, I have nothing
to consecrate.
Nor is there anything God can accept.
For he has condemned all that is of
the old creation to the cross.
Death has cut off all that cannot be
consecrated to him.
And resurrection alone has made consecration possible.
Presenting myself to God means that henceforth, I
consider my whole life as now belonging to
the Lord.
Let us observe that this presenting relates to
the members of my body.
That body which, as we saw earlier, is
now unemployed in respect of sin.
Present yourselves and your members, says Paul.
And again, present your members.
God requires of me that I now regard
all my members, all my faculties, as belonging
wholly to him.
It is a great thing when I discover
I am no longer my own, but his.
If the 10 shillings in my pocket belong
to me, then I have full authority over
them.
But if they belong to another who has
committed them to me in trust, then I
cannot buy what I please with them.
And I dare not lose them.
Real Christian life begins with knowing this.
How many of us know that because Christ
is risen, we are therefore alive unto God,
and not unto ourselves?
How many of us dare not use our
time or money or talents as we would,
because we realize they are the Lord's, not
ours?
How many of us have such a strong
sense that we belong to another, that we
dare not squander a shilling of our money,
or an hour of our time, or any
of our mental or physical powers?
On one occasion, a Chinese brother was traveling
by train, and found himself in a carriage
together with three non-Christians who wished to
play cards in order to while away the
time.
Lacking a fourth to complete the game, they
invited this brother to join them.
I'm sorry to disappoint you, he said, but
I cannot join your game, for I've not
brought my hands with me.
Whatever do you mean, they asked in blank
astonishment.
This pair of hands does not belong to
me, he said.
And then there followed the explanation of the
transfer of ownership that had taken place in
his life.
That brother regarded the members of his body
as belonging entirely to the Lord.
That is true holiness.
Paul says, present your members as servants to
righteousness unto sanctification, holiness.
Make it a definite act, present yourselves unto
God.
What is holiness?
Many people think we're become holy by the
eradication of something evil within.
No.
We become holy by being separated unto God.
In Old Testament times, it was when a
man was chosen by God to be altogether
his, that he was publicly anointed with oil
and was then said to be sanctified.
Thereafter, he was regarded as set apart to
God.
In the same manner, even animals or material
things, a lamb or the gold of the
temple could be sanctified, not by the eradication
of anything evil in them, but by being
thus reserved exclusively to the Lord.
Holiness, in the Hebrew sense, meant something thus
set apart.
And all true holiness is holiness to the
Lord.
I give myself over wholly to Christ.
That is holiness.
Presenting myself to God implies a recognition that
I am altogether his.
This giving of myself is a definite thing,
just as definite as reckoning.
There must be a day in my life
when I pass out of my own hands
into his.
And from that day forward, I belong to
him and no longer to myself.
That does not mean that I consecrate myself
to be a preacher or a missionary.
Alas, many people are missionaries, not because they
have truly consecrated themselves to God, but because
in the sense of which we are speaking,
they have not consecrated themselves to him.
They have consecrated, as they would put it,
something altogether different, namely, their own uncrucified natural
faculties to the doing of his work.
But that is not true consecration.
Then to what are we to be consecrated?
Not to the Christian work, but to the
will of God to be and do whatever
he wants.
Lord, I give myself to thee with this
desire alone, to know and walk in the
path thou hast ordained.
That is true giving.
If at the close of a life we
can say with Paul, I have finished my
course, then we are blessed indeed.
There is nothing more tragic than to come
to the end of life and know that
we have been on the wrong course.
We have only one life to live down
here, and we're free to do as we
please with it.
But if we seek our own pleasure, our
life will never glorify God.
A devoted Christian once said in my hearing,
I want nothing for myself, I want everything
for God.
Do you want anything apart from God?
Or does all your desire center in his
will?
Can you truly say that the will of
God is good and acceptable and perfect to
you?
For it is our wills that are in
question here.
That strong, self-assertive will of mine must
go to the cross, and I must give
myself over wholly to the Lord.
We cannot expect a tailor to make a
coat if we do not give him any
cloth, nor a builder to build us a
house if we let him have no building
material.
And in just the same way, we cannot
expect the Lord to live out his life
in us if we do not give him
our lives in which to live.
Without reservations, without controversy, we must give ourselves
to him to do as he pleases with
us, present yourselves unto God.
If we give ourselves unreservedly to God, many
adjustments may have to be made in family
or business or church relationships, or in the
matter of our personal views.
God will not let anything of ourselves remain.
His finger will touch point by point everything
that is not of him, and he will
say, this must go.
Are you willing?
It is foolish to resist God, and always
wise to submit to him.
We'll admit that many of us still have
controversies with the Lord.
He wants something while we want something else.
Many things we dare not look into, dare
not pray about, dare not even think about,
lest we lose our peace.
We can avoid the issue in that way,
but to do so will bring us out
of the will of God.
It is always an easy matter to get
out of his will, but it is a
blessed thing just to hand ourselves over to
him and let him have his way with
us.
How good it is to have the consciousness
that we belong to the Lord and are
not our own.
There is nothing more precious in the world.
It is that which brings the awareness of
his continual presence, and the reason is obvious.
I must first have the sense of God's
possession of me before I can have the
sense of his presence with me.
When once his ownership is established, then I
dare do nothing in my own interests, for
I am his exclusive property.
Know ye not that to whom you present
yourselves as servants unto obedience, his servants ye
are whom ye obey.
Okay, the word here rendered servant really signifies
a bond servant, a slave.
The word is used several times in the
second half of Romans six.
What is the difference between a servant and
a slave?
A servant may serve another, but the ownership
does not pass to that other.
If he likes his master, he can serve
him, but if he does not like him,
he can give him his notice and seek
another master.
Not so is it with the slave.
He is not only the servant of another,
but he is the possession of another.
How did I become the slave of the
Lord?
On his part, he bought me, and on
my part, I presented myself to him.
By right of redemption, I am God's property,
but if I would be his slave, I
must willingly give myself to him, for he
will never compel me to do so.
The trouble about many Christians today is that
they have an insufficient idea of what God
is asking of them.
How glibly they say, Lord, I am willing
for anything.
Do you know that God is asking of
you your very life?
There are cherished ideals, strong wills, precious relationships,
much loved work that will have to go.
So do not give yourself to God unless
you mean it.
God will take you seriously, even if you
did not mean it seriously.
When the Galilean boy brought his bread to
the Lord, what did the Lord do with
it?
He broke it.
God will always break what is offered to
him.
He breaks what he takes, but after breaking
it, he blesses and uses it to meet
the needs of others.
After you give yourself to the Lord, he
begins to break what was offered to him.
Everything seems to go wrong, and you protest
and find fault with the ways of God.
But to stay there is to be no
more than just a broken vessel, no good
for the world, because you've gone too far
for the world to use you.
And no good for God either, because you've
not gone far enough for him to use
you.
You are out of gear with the world,
and you have a controversy with God.
This is the tragedy of many a Christian.
My giving of myself to the Lord must
be an initial fundamental act.
Then day by day, I must go on
giving to him, not finding fault with his
use of me, but accepting with praise even
what the flesh revolts against.
I am the Lord's, and now no longer
reckon myself to be my own, but acknowledge
in everything his ownership and authority.
That is the attitude God requires, and to
maintain it is true consecration.
I do not consecrate myself to be a
missionary or a preacher.
I consecrate myself to God to do his
will where I am, be it in school,
office, or kitchen, counting whatever he ordains for
me to be the very best, for nothing
but good can come to those who are
wholly his.
May we always be possessed by the consciousness
that we are not our own.
We have spoken of the need of revelation,
of faith, and of consecration, if we are
to live the normal Christian life.
But unless we see the end God has
in view, we shall never clearly understand why
these steps are necessary to lead us to
that end.
Before, therefore, we consider further the question of
inward experience, let us first look at the
great divine goal before us.
What is God's purpose in creation?
And what is his purpose in redemption?
It may be summed up in two phrases,
one from each of our two sections of
Romans.
It is the glory of God and the
glory of the children of God.
In Romans 3.23, we read, all have
sinned and fall short of the glory of
God.
God's purpose for man is glory, but sin
thwarted that purpose by causing man to miss
God's glory.
When we think of sin, we instinctively think
of the judgment it brings.
We invariably associate it with condemnation and hell.
Man's thought is always of the punishment that
will come to him if he sins.
But God's thought is always of the glory
man will miss if he sins.
The result of sin is that we forfeit
God's glory.
The result of redemption is that we are
qualified again for glory.
God's purpose in redemption is glory, glory, glory.
This consideration takes us forward into Romans 8,
where the topic is developed in verses 16
to 18, and again in verses 29 and
30.
Paul says, we are children of God, and
if children, then heirs, heirs of God and
joint heirs with Christ.
If so be that we suffer with him,
then we may be also glorified with him.
For I reckon that the sufferings of this
present time are not worthy to be compared
with the glory which shall be revealed to
us, Lord.
And again, whom he foreknew, he also foreordained
to be conformed to the image of his
son, that he might be the firstborn among
many brethren.
And whom he foreordained, them he also called.
And whom he called, them he also justified.
And whom he justified, them he also glorified.
What was God's objective?
It was that his son, Jesus Christ, might
be the firstborn among many brethren, all of
whom should be conformed to his image.
How did God realize that objective?
Whom he justified, them he also glorified.
God's purpose then in creation and redemption was
to make Christ the firstborn son among many
glorified sons.
That may perhaps at first convey very little
to many of us, but let us look
into it more carefully.
In John 1, 14, we're told that the
Lord Jesus was God's only begotten son.
The word became flesh and dwelt among us,
and we beheld his glory, glory as of
the only begotten from the Father.
That he was God's only begotten son signifies
that God had no other son but this
one.
He was with the Father from all eternity.
But we are told, God was not satisfied
that Christ should remain the only begotten son.
He wanted also to make him his first
begotten.
How could an only begotten son become a
first begotten?
The answer is simple, by the Father having
more children.
If you have but one son, then he
is the only begotten.
But if thereafter you have other children, then
the only begotten becomes the first begotten.
The divine purpose in creation and redemption was
that God should have many children.
He wanted us and could not be satisfied
without us.
In reading the story of the prodigal son,
most people are impressed with all the troubles
the prodigal meet.
They're occupied in thinking what a bad time
he's having.
That is not the point of the parable.
My son was lost and is found.
There is the heart of the story.
It's not a question of what the son
suffers, but of what the father loses.
He is the sufferer, he is the loser.
A sheep that is lost, whose is the
lost?
The shepherd's.
A coin is lost, whose is the lost?
The woman's.
A son is lost, whose is the lost?
The father's.
That is the lesson of Luke chapter 15.
The Lord Jesus was the only begotten son.
And as the only begotten, he had no
brothers.
But the father sent the son, in order
that the only begotten might also be the
first begotten.
And the beloved son have many brethren.
There you have the whole story of the
incarnation and the cross.
And there you have at the last the
purpose of God fulfilled in his bringing many
sons unto glory.
But how could God's only begotten son become
his first begotten?
The method is explained in John 12, 24.
Verily, verily, I say unto you, except a
grain of wheat fall into the earth and
die, it abideth by itself alone.
But if it die, it beareth much fruit.
Who was that grain?
It was the Lord Jesus.
In the whole universe, God had only one
grain of wheat.
He had no second grain.
God put his one grain of wheat into
the ground and it died.
And in resurrection, the only begotten grain became
the first begotten grain.
And from the one grain, there have sprung
many grains.
In respect of his divinity, the Lord Jesus
remains uniquely the only begotten son of God.
Yet there is a sense in which from
the resurrection onward through all eternity, he is
also the first begotten.
And his life from that time is found
in many brethren.
For we who are born of the spirit
are made thereby partakers of the divine nature,
though not, mark you, as of ourselves, but
only, as we shall see in a moment,
in dependence upon God and by virtue of
our being in Christ.
We have received the spirit of adoption whereby
we cry, Abba, Father.
The spirit himself beareth witness with our spirit
that we are children of God.
It was by way of the incarnation and
the cross that the Lord Jesus made this
possible.
Therein was the Father heart of God satisfied.
For in the Son's obedience unto death, the
Father has secured his many sons.
The first and the 20th chapters of John
are in this respect most precious.
In the beginning of his gospel, John tells
us that Jesus was the only begotten from
the Father.
At the end of his gospel, he tells
us how after the Lord Jesus died and
rose again, he said to Mary Magdalene, go
unto my brethren and say to them, I
ascend unto my Father and your Father and
my God and your God.
Hitherto in this gospel, the Lord had spoken
often of the Father or of my Father.
Now in resurrection, he adds, and your Father.
It is the eldest son, the first begotten
speaking.
By his death and resurrection, many brethren have
been brought into God's family.
And so in the same verse, he uses
this very name for them, my brethren.
He's not ashamed to call them brethren.
Christ arose in new form with a body
still, but in the spirit, no longer in
the flesh.
The last Adam became a life-giving spirit.
The Lord Jesus now has a resurrected body,
a spiritual body, a glorious body.
And since he is no longer in the
flesh, he can now be received by all.
He that eateth me, he also shall live
because of me, said Jesus.
Now that he is in the spirit, every
one of us can receive him.
And it is by partaking of his resurrection
life that we are constituted children of God.
As many as received him, to them gave
he the right to become children of God,
which were born of God.
God is not out to reform our life.
It is not his thought to bring it
to a certain stage of refinement, for it
is on a totally wrong plane.
On that plane, he cannot now bring man
to glory.
He must have a new man, one born
anew, born of God.
Regeneration and justification go together.
What we today possess in Christ is more
than Adam lost.
Adam was only a developed man.
He remained on that plane and never possessed
the life of God.
But we who receive the son of God,
not only receive the forgiveness of sins, we
receive also the divine life, which was represented
in the garden by the tree of life.
By the new birth, we receive something Adam
never had.
We possess what he missed.
God wants sons who shall be joint heirs
with Christ in glory.
That is his goal.
But how can we bring that about?
Turn now to Hebrews chapter two, verses 10
and 11.
It became him for whom are all things
and through whom are all things, in bringing
many sons unto glory, to make the author
of their salvation perfect through sufferings.
For both he that sanctifieth and they that
are sanctified are all of one, for which
cause he is not ashamed to call them
brethren.
For Jesus as man derived his life from
God and in another sense, but just as
truly, we derive our new life from God.
He was begotten of the Holy Ghost and
we were born of the Spirit, born of
God.
So God says we are all of one.
Do you realize that we have the same
life today that God has?
The life which he has in heaven is
the life which he has imparted to us
here on the earth.
That is the precious gift of God.
It is for that reason that we can
live a life of holiness for it is
not our own life that has been changed,
but the life of God that has been
imparted to us.
Do you notice that in this consideration of
the eternal purpose, the whole question of sin
ultimately goes out?
It no longer has a place.
Sin came in with Adam and even when
it had been dealt with as it has
to be, we are only brought back to
the point where Adam was.
But in relating us again to the divine
purpose, in as it were, restoring to us
access to the tree of life, redemption has
given us far more than Adam ever had.
It has made us partakers of the very
life of God himself.