From the TeachingtheWord Bible Knowledgebase |
Part seven of a series. Read part six.
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Editor's Note: As we continue presenting chapter three of Arthur Pink's Profiting From the Word, we are faced with another weakness in much of today's church: the tendency for professing Christians to often please themselves or those who are still in spiritual darkness, rather than acting upon a deepening desire to please Christ. The Holy Spirit through the Apostle Paul explains why this is true: "Because the carnal [i.e., fleshly] mind is enmity against God; for it is not subject to the law of God, nor indeed can be. So then, those who are in the flesh cannot please God. But you are not in the flesh but in the Spirit, if indeed the Spirit of God dwells in you. Now if anyone does not have the Spirit of Christ, he is not His" (Romans 8:7-9). - Dr. Paul Elliott
An individual is profited from the Scriptures when they beget in him a deepening desire to please Christ. "Ye are not your own...For ye are bought with a price" (1 Corinthians 6:19,20) is the first great fact that Christians need to apprehend. Henceforth they are not to "live unto themselves, but unto Him which died for them, and rose again" (2 Corinthians 5:15). Love delights to please its object, and the more our affections are drawn out to Christ the more shall we desire to honour Him by a life of obedience to His known will. "If a man love Me, he will keep My words" (John 14:23). It is not in happy emotions or in verbal professions of devotion, but in the actual assumption of His yoke and the practical submitting to His precepts, that Christ is most honored.
It is at this point particularly that the genuineness of our profession may be tested and proved. Have they a faith in Christ who make no effort to learn His will? What a contempt of the king if his subjects refuse to read his proclamation! Where there is faith in Christ there will be delight in His commandments, and a sorrowing when they are broken by us.
When we displease Christ we should mourn over our failure. It is impossible seriously to believe that it was my sins which caused the Son of God to shed His precious blood, without my hating those sins. If Christ groaned under sin, we shall too, and the more sincere those groanings be, the more earnestly shall we seek grace for deliverance from all that displeases, and for strength to do all that which pleases our blessed Redeemer.
Next: The Spiritual Profit of Longing for Christ's Return
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