Tuesday, January 24, 2006
Tuesday, January 17, 2006
The Blood of Christ as it operates Manward
The Blood of Christ operates manward also in the cleansing of our conscience...In the Epistle to the Hebrews we find that our 'hearts are sprinkled from an evil conscience' [Heb 10.22].
The Blood does not cleanse our hearts. The heart is 'desperately sick' [Jer 17.9] and therefore God does something more fundamental than cleanse it: He must give us a new one...
The 'flesh' is too bad to be cleansed; it must be crucified...So God says, 'A new heart will I give you, and a new spirit will I put within you.' [Ezek 36.26]
The cleansing work of the Blood...is in relation to the conscience. 'Having our hearts sprinkled from an evil conscience'... There is something intervening between myself and God...constantly reminding me of the barrier that stood between myself and Him. But now, through the operation of the precious Blood, something...has removed that barrier. My conscience is cleared and my sense of guilt removed.
Everyone knows what a precious thing it is to have a conscience void of offence in our dealings with God. A heart of faith and a conscience clear of any accusation are both equally essential to us, since both are interdependent. If our conscience is uneasy, our faith leaks away and we find we cannot face God. In order to keep going on with God, we must know the uptodate value of the Blood. God keeps short accounts, and we are made nigh by the Blood every day, every hour and every minute. It never loses its efficacy as our ground of access if we will but lay hold upon it. We enter the Most Holy Place only on the ground of the Blood [Heb 10.19].
By the Blood. I approach God through His merit alone and never on the basis of my attainment...A clear conscience is never based upon our attainment; it can only be based on the work of the Lord Jesus in the shedding of His Blood.
What is the basis of our approach to God? Do we come to Him on the uncertain ground of our 'feeling'? Or is our approach based on something far more secure, viz., the fact that the Blood has been shed, and God looks on that Blood and is satisfied? Our approach to God is always in boldness, because the Blood is ever-efficacious; it has never changed and it never will! Boldness to the throne of grace is ours through the Blood and never through our personal attainment or 'feeling'.
The matter of access to God has two phases, an initial and a progressive one. The initial is presented to us in Ephesians 2, where our standing with God is secured by the Blood, for we are 'made nigh in the blood of Christ' [Eph 2.13]. But thereafter our ground of continual access is still by the Blood, for 'having... boldness to enter into the [Most] Holy Place by the Blood of Jesus...let us draw near [Heb 10.19, 22].
Our prayer should be: 'Lord, I do not know fully what the value of the Blood is, but I know that the Blood has satisfied Thee; so the Blood is enough for me, and it is my only plea. Whether I have really progressed...or attained to something, is not the point. Whenever I come before Thee, it is always on the ground of the precious Blood.' Our conscience is cleansed by the Blood and we have boldness to enter into the presence of God.
[Extracted from the Normal Christian Life by W.N. with some abridgements.]
The Blood does not cleanse our hearts. The heart is 'desperately sick' [Jer 17.9] and therefore God does something more fundamental than cleanse it: He must give us a new one...
The 'flesh' is too bad to be cleansed; it must be crucified...So God says, 'A new heart will I give you, and a new spirit will I put within you.' [Ezek 36.26]
The cleansing work of the Blood...is in relation to the conscience. 'Having our hearts sprinkled from an evil conscience'... There is something intervening between myself and God...constantly reminding me of the barrier that stood between myself and Him. But now, through the operation of the precious Blood, something...has removed that barrier. My conscience is cleared and my sense of guilt removed.
Everyone knows what a precious thing it is to have a conscience void of offence in our dealings with God. A heart of faith and a conscience clear of any accusation are both equally essential to us, since both are interdependent. If our conscience is uneasy, our faith leaks away and we find we cannot face God. In order to keep going on with God, we must know the uptodate value of the Blood. God keeps short accounts, and we are made nigh by the Blood every day, every hour and every minute. It never loses its efficacy as our ground of access if we will but lay hold upon it. We enter the Most Holy Place only on the ground of the Blood [Heb 10.19].
By the Blood. I approach God through His merit alone and never on the basis of my attainment...A clear conscience is never based upon our attainment; it can only be based on the work of the Lord Jesus in the shedding of His Blood.
What is the basis of our approach to God? Do we come to Him on the uncertain ground of our 'feeling'? Or is our approach based on something far more secure, viz., the fact that the Blood has been shed, and God looks on that Blood and is satisfied? Our approach to God is always in boldness, because the Blood is ever-efficacious; it has never changed and it never will! Boldness to the throne of grace is ours through the Blood and never through our personal attainment or 'feeling'.
The matter of access to God has two phases, an initial and a progressive one. The initial is presented to us in Ephesians 2, where our standing with God is secured by the Blood, for we are 'made nigh in the blood of Christ' [Eph 2.13]. But thereafter our ground of continual access is still by the Blood, for 'having... boldness to enter into the [Most] Holy Place by the Blood of Jesus...let us draw near [Heb 10.19, 22].
Our prayer should be: 'Lord, I do not know fully what the value of the Blood is, but I know that the Blood has satisfied Thee; so the Blood is enough for me, and it is my only plea. Whether I have really progressed...or attained to something, is not the point. Whenever I come before Thee, it is always on the ground of the precious Blood.' Our conscience is cleansed by the Blood and we have boldness to enter into the presence of God.
[Extracted from the Normal Christian Life by W.N. with some abridgements.]
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