1. What is the natural condition of all men morally?
From Sin to Righteousness
1. What is the natural condition of all men morally?
“For all have sinned, and fall short of the glory of God.” Rom. 3: 23. NOTE.—The root idea of “sin” is “missing the mark.” The mark is perfect righteousness, “the prize of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus,” eternal life in Him. The text does not imply that all are in the same depths of sin or iniquity, but that all in themselves have missed the mark. All are stricken with the dread disease,—the leprosy of sin. All cases are incurable. All fall short of the glory of God. 2. But has not man power to help himself or his fellows? “For I know that in me, that is, IN MY FLESH, DWELLETH NO GOOD THING: for to will is present with me, but TO DO THAT WHICH IS GOOD IS NOT. For the good which I would I do not: but THE EVIL which I would NOT, that I PRACTISE.” Rom. 7:18, 19. “None of them can by any means redeem his brother, nor give to God a ransom for him.” Ps. 49: 7. 3. Man being in the condition of sin, what is his inevitable doom? “And THE SIN, when it is full-grown, BRINGETH FORTH DEATH.” James 1:15. NOTE.—Sin is in its very nature deceptive. It does not come to us garbed in the habiliments of death; it does not show its repulsive features and nature. It comes to us at first seductively, sweet and enticing. It appears as much like righteousness as it is possible for sin to be. It makes itself so necessary to the natural heart of man that its indulgence seems almost a necessity to happiness. Yet in it are the seeds of death, and when full-grown it will produce death. It was no arbitrary sentence which God pronounced in the beginning, “In the day that thou eatest thereof thou shalt surely die.” The dying was in the very sinning. Sin separates man from God—the Source of all life; and separated from Him, life is bound to terminate. 4. By what is sin truly revealed to man? “Through THE LAW cometh the knowledge of sin.” Rom. 3: 20. “Howbeit, I had NOT KNOWN SIN, EXCEPT THROUGH THE LAW: for I had not known coveting, except the law had said, Thou shalt not covet.” Rom. 7: 7. 5. What does this law condemn? “Because the MIND OF THE FLESH is enmity against God; for it is not subject to the law of God, neither indeed can it be.” Rom. 8: 7. 6. Through what agency is this law pressed home upon the heart? “And He [the Spirit], when He is come, will convict the world in respect of sin, and of righteousness, and of judgment.” John 16: 8. NOTE.—The Spirit is the great Convictor of sin; but the Spirit uses God’s Word, and our knowledge of that Word, limited though it be, to press home upon the heart what the sin is. God’s Word and God’s Spirit always agree. We are not left to our own imagination as to what sin is. The Word very clearly reveals that “sin is the transgression of the law” which says, “Thou shalt not covet;” and the law of which that is a constituent part, is the Decalogue, found in Ex. 20:2-17. So the apostle James teaches the same great fact. “But if ye have respect of persons, ye commit sin, being convicted by the law as transgressors. For whosoever shall keep the whole law, and yet stumble in one point, he is become guilty of all. For He [the margin, “that law which said,” A.V.] that said, Do not commit adultery, said also, Do not kill. Now if thou dost not commit adultery, but killest, thou art become a transgressor of the law. So speak ye, and so do, as men that are to be judged by a law of liberty.” James 2:9-12. This the apostle tells us is “the royal law according to the Scripture.” And the Scripture in James’s time was the Old Testament Scripture; and the royal law is the law of the great King—the Ten Commandments. 7. What will this revelation of the law through the Spirit produce? Conviction. “And I was alive apart from the law once: but when the commandment came, sin revived, and I died.” “Sin, that it might be shown to be sin, by working death to me through that which is good;—that THROUGH THE COMMANDMENT SIN MIGHT BECOME EXCEEDING SINFUL. For we know that the law is spiritual: but I am carnal, sold under sin.” Rom. 7: 9, 13, 14. 8. What is the next step after true conviction of sin? “REPENT YE, and believe in the Gospel.” Mark 1:15. “REPENT YE therefore, and turn again, that your sins may be blotted out.” Acts 3:19. “Except ye turn, and become as little children, ye shall in no wise enter into the kingdom of heaven.” Matt. 18: 3. NOTE.—The Common Version has for “turn again,” “converted,” “except ye be converted.” The thought expressed is not something that is done for us, but something which we must do. Man must use his will, his purpose, in connection with becoming a child of God. As he is convicted of sin, and sees it in all its abhorrence, he must turn from it. Conversion in that sense is an act on his part. The term, however, is often used as embracing every step in the Christian’s progress from sin to righteousness; but it is used in this text and also in Acts 3:19 as having reference to the sinner’s part, which he himself must perform. He turns his back upon sin, upon his sinful course. He has been in the wrong way; he faces about. He has been guilty of sinful habits, which the law reveals; he forsakes them, cuts them off, turns from his old master, and yields himself to a new Master. In other words, he rejects the wrong; he chooses the right. 9. How is true repentance expressed? “I now rejoice, not that ye were made sorry, but that ye were made sorry unto repentance; for ye were made SORRY AFTER A GODLY SORT, that ye might suffer loss by us in nothing. For a GODLY SORROW worketh REPENTANCE UNTO SALVATION, a repentance which bringeth no regret: but the sorrow of the world worketh death. For behold, this selfsame thing, that ye were made sorry after a godly sort, what earnest care it wrought in you, yea what clearing of yourselves, yea what indignation, yea what fear, yea what longing, yea what zeal, yea what avenging! In everything ye approved yourselves to be pure in the matter.” 2 Cor. 7: 9-11. NOTE.—We do not know how true repentance could be more forcibly set forth. There are many who are sorry for their sin; but not because they have sinned against a kind heavenly Father, a just and true and wise God who has loaded them with blessings, but because of what sin brings them. It brings to the thief imprisonment. Of course he regrets his crime, because of the suffering it involves. It brings to the ordinary citizen more or less of disgrace and humiliation, and he regrets the sin because of the disgrace and the humiliation. Such is not true repentance. True repentance is sorrow for the sin, and it is a sorrow that will lead to all these things expressed by the apostle Paul against the sin. For the avenging and the indignation are against the iniquity. The longing is for that condition which is freedom from sin. 10. What will true repentance result in? “I acknowledged my sin unto Thee, and mine iniquity did I not hide: I said, I will CONFESS MY TRANSGRESSIONS unto Jehovah; and Thou forgavest the iniquity of my sin.” Ps. 32: 5. “He that covereth his transgressions shall not prosper; but whoso CONFESSETH AND FORSAKETH them shall obtain mercy.” Prov. 28:13. 11. What will true confession inevitably bring? “If we confess our sins, He is faithful and righteous to FORGIVE US OUR SINS, and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.” 1 John 1: 9. NOTE.—Confession is breaking partnership with sin. When a man has walked in sin all his lifetime, however short or long it be, it is but justice to God and to his fellow men that he should let them know that he has broken partnership with sin; that he has left it forever; that he has chosen another master. And that is what confession means. With true confession there is restoration, if it be possible for a man to restore that which he has taken wrongfully. This is taught very clearly in the 33d chapter of Ezekiel. Tho a man be in the very deepest of sin, “if the wicked restore the pledge, give again that he had robbed,” he shall live. This does not refer to what is considered ordinary stealing or robbing. There are thousands of people to-day who have by various forms of chicanery and trickery robbed their fellow men. They have glossed the truth; they have covered up that which was bad and sold it for good; they have scrimped in weights and measures; they have used time for their own pleasure for which they were paid; they have robbed hirelings in their wages. Of all this and many other things God takes account; and the man who breaks partnership with sin will, if it be in his power, restore that which he has taken. Justice demands it; his own conscience, if a good conscience, demands it; and progress in the heavenly life demands it. The breadth of the confession should equal that of the sin. He who has sinned against God and in general before the public, should make his confession general. He who has sinned against individuals to their knowledge, should make confession to them. It does not mean that the man who has committed sins before God, should publish to the world his vileness. There has been many times altogether too much of that. If his sins have been public and open, let his confession be public. If the sins have been in private against God, tell God all about them, and in the grace of5Christ, quit the sinning. He who does that, may know—absolutely know, because God can not fail—that his sins are forgiven. “He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins, and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.” 12. What is the power of that cleansing? “Already ye are clean BECAUSE OF THE WORD which I have spoken unto you.” John 15: 3. 13. What does the power of this Word do for the individual who thus yields himself to God? “Wherefore if any man is in Christ, he is A NEW CREATURE: the old things are passed away; behold, they are become new.” 2 Cor. 5:17. “Having been BEGOTTEN AGAIN, not of corruptible seed, but of incorruptible, THROUGH THE WORD OF GOD, which liveth and abideth.” 1 Peter 1:23. 14. How will the renewed soul regard God’s law, against which he was formerly at enmity? “For THIS IS THE LOVE OF GOD, that we KEEP HIS COMMANDMENTS: and His commandments are not grievous.” 1 John 5: 3. 15. What next step will the child of God take? “If thou shalt CONFESS WITH THY MOUTH JESUS AS LORD, and shalt BELIEVE IN THY HEART that God raised Him from the dead, thou shalt be saved: for with the heart man believeth unto righteousness; and with the mouth CONFESSION IS MADE UNTO SALVATION.” Rom. 10: 9, 10. NOTE.—God does not grant us forgiveness or salvation that we may keep it to ourselves. He who endeavors to hide within himself the life which God gives, perverts it and makes it death. Every blessing selfishly hoarded becomes a curse. It is utterly impossible for a growing Christian not to confess the Lord Jesus Christ; and every one who starts in the way of righteousness and life, ought to make it a principle in his life that wherever the Master gives him opportunity, there he will confess His name. 16. In what ceremony will confession be manifest? “Repent ye, and BE BAPTIZED EVERY ONE OF YOU in the name of Jesus Christ unto the remission of your sins; and ye shall receive the gift of the Holy Spirit.” Acts 2: 38. “For as many of you as were BAPTIZED INTO CHRIST DID PUT ON CHRIST.” Gal. 3:27. NOTE.—Baptism is, so to speak, before the world, the marriage ceremony between Christ and the believer. By that act the believer says that he has renounced all other lords and has taken Christ Jesus alone. “Buried therefore with Him through baptism into death: that like as Christ was raised from the dead through the glory of the Father, so we also might walk in newness of life.” Rom. 6:4. Being “risen with Christ,” he seeks the “things which are above, where Christ sitteth on the right hand of God.” He sets his “affection on things above, not on things on the earth.” He has given up the world with its follies, its pleasures, its sins. He has embraced the far larger world in Christ Jesus. See Col. 3:1-3. Neither can there be any question as to the mode of baptism, if the Scriptures be faithfully followed. The very word “baptism” itself signifies immersion, whelming. It is thus set forth as burial in Romans 6 and in Col. 2:12. The three great facts of the Gospel are Christ’s death, burial, resurrection. See 1 Cor. 15:1-4. In the public profession which the Christian makes of Christ Jesus in baptism, those three great facts are set forth, in the very act of baptism itself,—death to the world, burial, and resurrection, or rising to walk in newness of life. That baptism is not designed to be a ceremony for one time, a regenerating act in and of itself alone. It is to be just what the true marriage ceremony is between man and woman; a constant reminder of living union with Christ. For he who is truly baptized is baptized into the name of the Father, and into the name of the Son, and into the name of the Holy Spirit. Matt. 28:19. Baptized into the name of the Father is for righteousness (See Ex. 34:6, 7); into the name of the Son is self-emptying, the giving up of all for God (Phil. 2:5-7); and baptized into the Holy Spirit is for service. 17. What will the gift of the Holy Spirit do for those who receive it? “Now there are DIVERSITIES OF GIFTS, but the same Spirit . . . But ALL THESE WORKETH THE ONE AND THE SAME SPIRIT, dividing to EACH ONE severally even as He will.” 1 Cor. 12:4-11. “According AS EACH HATH RECEIVED A GIFT, ministering it among yourselves, as good stewards of the manifold grace of God.” 1 Peter 4:10. NOTE.—The true Christian will be a worker; he can not be otherwise. God has called us to serve. As we have served the world, as we have used our gifts and our powers in iniquity, even so now we are to present our members as “servants to righteousness unto sanctification.” Rom. 6:19, 20. But we may do this with the assurance that there shall be fruit of our labor and triumph in warfare. We plead with our readers who do not know the blessings and sweetness of companionship with Jesus Christ, to follow the simple Bible teaching; and then we may truly say with the apostle, “Thanks be to God, who giveth us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ.” And to those who are following Him, we would say in the language of the same apostle in the same connection, “Wherefore, my beloved brethren, be ye steadfast, unmovable, always abounding in the work of the Lord, forasmuch as ye know that your labor is not in vain in the Lord.”