THE
INNER MAN OF THE HEART
Or, The Believer's Sphere of Life and Base of
Operations
There is no subject
more vital in relation to fulness of life and
effectiveness of service in Christ than this that we are
now to consider. It embraces all the practical meanings
and outworkings of the redemptive purposes of God in and
through the Cross of Christ.
The phrase "The
inner man" is not infrequently used in the Word of
God, and, as we shall see, is but one expression used in
connection with a theme of extensive range. But here at
once let it be seen as that which first of all
discriminates between the "inner" and the
"outward" man. This discrimination in the
scriptures, however, is not that made by the
psychologists or philosophers as such, whether they be
ancient or modern, pagan or "Christian." These
recognise but mind and matter: for them the "inner
man" is the soul, and the "outward man"
the body. Not so in the Word of God. There the
"inner man" is the spirit, and the
"outward man" the soul and the body, either or
both. These two terms or designations are respectively
synonymous with "natural man" and
"spiritual man," and these two are put asunder
by the sword of the Spirit, the Word of God
(Hebrews 4:12). It is just as dangerous to yoke together
what God puts asunder as it is to put asunder "what
God hath joined together," and in this particular
matter more chaos, paralysis, and defeat are due to the
confusing of these two than ever we shall be able to
measure in this life.
The only oneness of the
three, spirit, soul, and body, is in that they compose or
comprise one man. The literal translation of 1
Thessalonians 5:23, is "Your whole person," or
"Your whole man," or "The whole of you,
spirit, soul, and body"; and three distinct Greek
words are used, as elsewhere. The Word of God does not
use words at random, just for variety's sake. Basic
spiritual laws are involved in its words. The very word
"natural" as applied to man, as we know, is the
Greek word psuckekos, the Anglicised form of which
is psychical. "Spiritual" is the adjective of
"spirit," and "soulish" is the
adjective of "soul." In James 3:15,
"sensual" is used, but "soulish" is
more accurate, and it is interesting and significant to
note in passing that these two descriptions are given to wisdom.
That which makes man
unique in the whole realm of creation is not that he is
or has a soul, but that he has a spirit, and it may be
that the union in one personality of soul and spirit
makes him unique beyond this creation, in the whole
universe. Soul is never spoken of in relation to God as
God. Angels are spirits. Christ did not pour out His
spirit, but His soul unto death; His Spirit He handed
back to the Father of spirits. It is hardly necessary to
describe the soul here, although we want to help from the
very foundations.
What a great - and in
most people - almost complete place and dominance is held
by feelings and emotions. On the one hand, fear, grief,
pity, curiosity, pleasure, pride, admiration, shame,
surprise, love, regret, remorse, excitement, etc. Or in
another direction; imagination, apprehensiveness, fancy,
doubt, introspection, superstition, analysis, reasonings,
investigation, etc. Or in a third direction, desires; for
possession, knowledge, power, influence, position,
praise, society, liberty, etc. And still in another
direction; determination, reliance, courage,
independence, endurance, impulse, caprice, indecision,
obstinacy etc. These all in their respective directions
representing the emotional, the intellectual, the
volitional, are the components of the soul. Now consider
how much of this has its place in Christian life and
service, from the first step in relation to the gospel
through all the course of Christian activity. It is here
that we ask for patience in pursuing the subject when we
make the tremendous affirmation that all this - the sum
total of human feeling, reasoning, and willing may be
placed to the account of the matter of salvation, either
for ourselves or for others, and yet be utterly
unprofitable and of NO account.
We recognise that if
the full impact of this declaration, with all its
implications, was to come by revelation to the
"inner man" of Christian people and workers, it
would be nothing short of revolutionary in all methods,
means, and motives. Surely, for instance, we know by now
that remorse and regret for sin, leading to tears and
resolutions, does not mean salvation. Decisions,
confessions, and religious feelings, are no criteria, any
more than are reasoned conclusions, intellectual
convictions, mental acceptances, aspirations after the
sublime, the beautiful, the "good." Does
someone enquire then "do you rule out the intellect,
the reason, the emotions, the human will or
resolution?" and our answer is emphatically, we do
rule all this out as an initial and basic factor in the
matter of salvation; it is secondary, later, and even
then only a bond-slave and not a master.
Let us ask some
questions which will clarify the matter. What was it or
where was it that death took place when "death
passed upon all," and it came true that was said,
"in the day that thou eatest thereof thou shalt
surely die"? Was it the body? Obviously not. Was it
the soul? If our foregoing description truly represents
the soul, then, again, obviously not. Repudiating the
suggestion that the words were but a sentence of death to
be carried out at some future time, there remains but the
third part of man's "whole," namely his spirit.
That was the topstone of God's creative work. The organ
in man of all the Divine activity; the sphere and
instrument of all the operations of God. God is a spirit,
and only spirit can have access to or fellowship with
spirit.
Only spirit can know
spirit. 1 Corinthians 2:9-11.
Only spirit can serve
spirit. Romans 1:9, 7:6, 12:11.
Only spirit can worship God Who is Spirit. John 4:23,24.
Philippians 3:3.
Only spirit can receive revelation from God Who is
spirit. Revelation 1:10, 1 Corinthians 2:10. We shall
return to this later.
Let it be clearly
recognised that God determined to have all His dealings
with man and to fulfil all His purposes through man by
means of that in man which was "after His own
likeness," that is, his spirit; but this spirit of
man for all such Divine intentions must be kept in living
union with Himself, and never for one instant infringe
the laws of its Divine union by crossing over to the
outer circle of the soul at the call of any emotion,
suggestion, argument or desire coming from without. When
this took place death entered, and the nature of death,
as the word is used in the scriptures, is severance in
the Divine union of spirit. This does not mean that man
no longer had a spirit, but that the ascendancy of the
spirit was surrendered to the soul, and this at a time
when the soul had accepted from without by desire, and
reason, that which was intended to draw away from
fellowship with God.
"Drawn away by his
own lusts (desires)."
This is where the
"fall" begins, all else follows. From that time
the inclusive designation of man in a state of separation
from spirit union and life with God is "flesh."
When Paul speaks of the
"flesh" he does not refer to flesh and blood in
the natural body, but thus denotes the principle of human
life which takes the place of the spirit in its primary
state and purpose; and this "flesh" principle
or state - variably called "the old man,"
"the body of sin," "the body of
flesh," "the body of death," "the
natural man," is the centre of the residence of the
enmity against God. This enmity is there, even in such as
sing hymns, say prayers, delight in God after an outward
manner, go to church, have a passion or genius for
religion, and it only requires the true spiritual meaning
of the cross of Christ to be applied in order to make it
manifest. Death then, in scriptural meaning, is loss of
correspondence with God in spirit, and the spirit of man
falling out of that union ceases to be for man the
vehicle of God's revelation, the sphere of God's life in
man, and the instrument of God's activities through man:
and there is no other. This leads to another question:
What is the nature of the spirit? There are three main
departments or faculties of the spirit: conscience,
intuition, communion; but there are numerous other
capacities, as we may see later.
It is here that we
find the scriptural description of man runs entirely
counter to the conclusions of "scientific"
psychology. We have observed that the psychologist will
not allow the threefold description of man as spirit,
soul and body, but only soul - or mind - and body. And
yet now he has to confess to the existence of a third
element. He recognises it, finds his chief fascination
and interest in it, builds up a whole system of
philosophy around it, and often borders on calling it by
its right name. He, however, recoils and calls it
"the subconcious mind," "the subjective
mind," "the subliminal self," "the
secondary personality," etc. Listen to some of the
things which indicate the length to which such teachers
go: "The soul consists of two parts, the one being
addicted to the truth, and loving honesty and reason, the
other brutish, deceitful, sensuous."
"There is a schism
in the soul." "The existence of a schism in the
soul is not a mere dogma of theology, but a fact of
science." "Man is endowed with two minds,
each of which is capable of independent action, and they
are also capable of simultaneous action; but, in the
main, they possess independent powers and perform
independent functions. The distinctive faculties of one
pertain to this life, those of the other are specially
adapted to a higher plane of existence. I distinguish
them by designating one as the Objective Mind, and the
other as the Subjective Mind."
"Whatever
faculties are found to exist in the subjective mind of
any sentient being, necessarily existed potentially in
the ancestry of that being, near or remote. It is a
corollary of this proposition that whatever faculties we
may find to exist in the SUBJECTIVE MIND of man must
necessarily exist, in its possibility, potentially, in
the mind of God the Father Almighty."
When one reads things
like this, two things press for expression: first the
exclamation "O why don't you name it aright and call
it 'the spirit'?" The other, "What a tragedy
that such men should have gone to pagan philosophers such
as Plato, who never heard the men of the Bible or read
them, for the basis of their system, instead of going to
the Bible itself." What a peril it is for
"Christian" men to preach the results of human
research and learning and bring the Bible to these
instead of bringing them to the Bible!
For us here the Bible
name and nature of this third reality is held to. It may
be thought to be immaterial what it is called if the
result is the same, but we hold that it is vital to
recognise that we are dealing with two things absolutely
distinct and separate and not with two sides of one
thing. This will be seen as we go on.
There is a peril in
speaking of "Divine union in the upper reaches
of the soul," for there is no such thing.
Divine union is with spirit, "He that is joined to
the Lord is one spirit," and however highly
developed soul life is, there is no "Divine
union" until the spirit has been brought back to
life.
This then opens a
further question: "What is it that is 'born
again'": when that essential and indispensable
experience takes place? (John 3:3,5, etc.).
Nicodemus stumbles on
the physical question but is soon told that "that
which is born of the flesh is flesh, and that which is
born of the Spirit is SPIRIT."
It is not
the body then, neither is it the soul. "The sinful
body of the old man was destroyed" Romans 6:6, and
"They that are Christ's have crucified the flesh,
with the affections thereof." The passages
on this are too many to quote, but look up
"Flesh," "Old man," "Natural
man," etc.
The answer to the
question is emphatically that new birth is the
impartation of Divine life to the spirit of man. That
spirit, because of atonement made for the sin of the soul,
and the carrying away of the dominant flesh principle by
Christ into His death, is begotten again of God in the
resurrection of Christ from the dead to share His
resurrection - deathless-life. Only on the ground of
Christ's resurrection and our incorporation into it as
the superlative act of Almighty power is there union with
God, and this act initially takes place in our spirit.
From that time it is "in the newness of the
spirit," "walking in the spirit"; in
fact, as the Word makes clear, everything is to be in the
spirit for those that are now "spiritual."
So far we have done
little more than emphasise the fact that the supreme
concern of the Lord is with the spirit of His children,
for it is there that the fact and nature of sonship has
its beginning, its growth, and its expression. We shall
see more about this later, but for the moment it will be
as well if we dwell a little longer upon the nature of
the spirit. The body, we know, has its own threefold
components. The soul also is a trinity, i.e., reason,
emotion, and volition. We have also shown that the spirit
is tripartite. Its main departments or faculties being
conscience, worship (or communion with that which is
Spirit) and intuition.
Let us re-emphasise
that while all men have these in a greater or less degree
of consciousness, this does not set aside the fact that
all are "dead" in trespasses and sins apart
from the new birth. There is no salvation in the New
Testament sense of the word in having a conscience very
much alive, or in being keenly attuned to the spiritual;
and it is no argument that Divine revelation has been
imparted because intuitions have eventually proved true.
All this only shows that all men have a spirit which acts
independently of the rest of their being. For the spirit
in its different faculties to be the instrument of Divine
purposes it has, as we have said, to be joined to the
Lord, and the uniting factors are
1. The
indwelling life of God as a gift at new birth.
2. The
indwelling Spirit of God as the intelligent, executive
member of the Godhead.
There are
many passages in the scriptures which indicate the
difference between the outer "I" of the soul
and the inner "I" of the spirit. For instance
Paul says "my spirit prayeth, but my understanding
is unfruitful." 1 Corinthians 14:14.
Then in 1
Corinthians 2 the Apostle says that "The psychical
(soul) man receiveth not, neither can he know the
things of the Spirit of God, but God reveals them to the
spiritual (or spirit) ones, and only the spirit ones
discern them!"
This
distinction is very marked in Paul's recounting of the
reception of his special revelation. "I will come to
revelations of the Lord. I (the outer man) knew a man
(the inner man) in Christ above fourteen years ago;
whether in the body I (the outer man) cannot tell; or
whether out of the body I (the outer man) cannot tell;
God knoweth; such an one (the inner man) caught up to the
third heaven. And I (the outer man) knew such a man (the
inner man) whether in the body or out of the body, I (the
outer man) cannot tell: God knoweth. How that he (the
inner man) was caught up to Paradise, and heard
unspeakable words which it is not lawful for a man (the
outer man) to utter. Of such an one (the inner man) I
(the outer man) will glory; yet of myself (the outer man)
I (the outer man) will not glory."
Here we
see, amongst other things, that, unless the Lord gives
the gift of utterance the things revealed to the spirit
cannot be expressed by the outer man. In another place
the Apostle asked the prayers of the Lord's people that
he might have "utterance."
Many other
instances might be given, such as "I delight in the
law of God after the inward man," and Romans
7 as a whole, but this is sufficient to lead such as
desire to do so to follow this truth through. Here are
one or two references: 1 Cor. 16:17,18; 1 Cor. 6:20; Rom.
8:16; 1 Cor. 5:5; 1 Cor. 7:34; Heb. 12:23.
Now we
proceed to speak of the Lord's special concern with the
inner man. Firstly we must realise that His supreme quest
is for sons of His Spirit. The underlying and all
inclusive truth of what has come to be called the
"parable of the Prodigal Son," is the
transition from one kind of sonship, e.g., on the ground
of law, to another, e.g., that on the ground of grace.
From the flesh to the Spirit. There is a sonship of God
by creation on the basis of law. In this sense "we
are all the offspring of God." But by "the
fall," the "going astray" or
"deviating" (Genesis 6:3), all the Divine
purposes and possibilities of that relationship have
broken down, and that relationship is no longer of value.
"He has become flesh," hence is separated "from
God," in "a far country," and
"dead," as well as "lost." Here grace
enters and the Spirit through grace. The Spirit begins
operations in that realm of death and distance,
convicting of sin "against heaven" (the
only adequate conviction), compassing the end of the
works of the flesh in despair and destruction,
constraining, assuring, producing penitence and
confession, and at length bringing to the place of
forgiveness and acceptance. From death unto life, but not
the same life as before; there is no "again" in
the original of the last clause of Luke 15, it is a life
which never was before. "That which is born of the
flesh is flesh, and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit."
This man
is the product of the travail and energising of the
Spirit, and everything in the relationship afterward is
new. A "new robe," the robe of Divine
righteousness. "New Shoes," a walk and a way in
the Spirit. Rom. 8:2,4. A ring, the symbol of authority,
the jurisdiction of sons, John 1:12,13. The fatted calf;
food such as never was before, the best of the Father's
house. Each of these points has in the scriptures a whole
system of teaching.
The spirit
of man being then the place of the new birth and the seat
of this only true sonship (Galatians 4:5,6), it also
therefore being "The new man" - for it is
"in the newness of the Spirit" that we are to
live (Romans 7:6, etc.) - here it is that all the
operations of God in our education, fellowship, and
co-operation have their base.
The only
knowledge of God which is of spiritual value for
ourselves or for others is that which we have by
revelation of the Holy Spirit within our own spirit. God
never explains Himself in the first instance to man's
reason. Man can never know God in the first instance by
his reason. Christianity is a revelation or it is
nothing, and it has to come by revelation to every new
child of God, or their faith rests upon a foundation
which will not stand in the day of the ordeal.
"The
Christian Faith" embraced as a philosophy or a
system of truth, or as a system of moral or ethical
doctrine may carry the stimulus of a great ideal, but it
will not result in the regeneration of the life, and the
new birth of the spirit. There are multitudes of such
"Christians" (?) in the world today, but their
spiritual effectiveness is nil.
The
apostle Paul makes it very clear that the secret of
everything in his life and service was the fact that he
received his Gospel "by revelation." We may
even know the Bible most perfectly as a book, and be
spiritually dead and ineffective. When the scriptures say
so much about the knowledge of God and the Truth as the
basis of Eternal life, being set free, doing exploits,
etc., they also affirm that "man cannot by searching
find out God," and they make it abundantly clear
that it is knowledge in the spirit, not in the natural
mind.
Now it is
just here that we come to recognise the nature of
spiritual knowledge. How does God know things, by what
means does He come to His decisions, on what basis of
knowledge does He run the universe? Is it by reasoning
inductively, deductively, philosophically, logically,
comparatively? Does He think things out? Has Omniscience
a brain? Surely not! All this laboriousness is unknown to
God. His knowledge and conclusions are intuitive.
Intuition is that faculty of spiritual intelligence by
which all spiritual beings work. Angels serve the will of
God by intuitive discernment of that will, not by argued
and reasoned conviction. The difference between these two
is witnessed to by the whole monument of spiritual
achievement. If human reason, the natural judgment, and
"common sense" had been the ruling law, most,
if not all, of the great pieces of work inspired of God
would never have been undertaken. Men who had a close
walk with God and a keen spirit union with Him received
intuitively a revelation or leading to such purposes, and
their vindication came, not by the approval of worldly
human reason, but usually with all such positively
opposed. "Madness" was usually the verdict of
the wise. Whenever, like Abraham, they allowed themselves
to drop out of the spirit into their own natural mind and
reasoning, they became bewildered, paralysed, and looked
round for some Egypt of the senses to which to go down
for help. In all this we are "justified in the
spirit" not in the flesh. The spirit and the soul
act independently and, until the spiritual mind has
established the ascendancy and absolute dominion, they
are constantly in conflict and contradiction.
In all the
things which are out from God and therefore spiritual
"the mind of the flesh is death," "but the
mind of the spirit is life, and PEACE." This then is
the nature of spiritual knowledge, which is the only
saving knowledge. We said at the commencement that this
recognition of the difference between the "inner
man" and the "outward man" would be
absolutely revolutionary. Perhaps we can see this a
little more clearly now. A rich knowledge of the
scriptures, an accurate technical grasp of Christian
doctrine, a doing of Christian work by all the resources
of "worldly wisdom" or natural ability, a
clever manipulation and interesting presentation of Bible
content and themes, may get not one whit beyond the
natural life of men and still remain within the realm of
spiritual death. Men cannot be argued, reasoned,
fascinated, interested, 'emotioned,' willed, enthused,
impassioned, into the Kingdom of the heavens; they can
only be born, and that is by spiritual quickening. This
new birth brings with it new capacities of every kind,
and amongst the most vital is a new and different faculty
of Divine knowledge, understanding, and apprehension. But
some may ask, where does our brain come in? Do we
understand you to mean that our human intellectual
faculties are ruled out? No, not at all! But we do affirm
again that this is not primary but secondary. The human
intellect is not the first instrument of our apprehension
of spiritual things, the things of God, but its function
is that of giving them intelligent form to ourselves and
to others.
Paul's
intellectual power was not that which gave him his
knowledge of truth, but it was joined to the spirit for
passing that truth on to others. Someone has said that
the brain may act as a prism and give a spectrum of the
Eternal light, but it is not the first organ of spiritual
knowledge.
The spirit
of man is that by which he reaches out into the Eternal
and unseen. Intuition, then, is the mental organ of the
spirit. It is in this sense, that is, the deadness of the
spirit Godward, and the going on with religion in its
manifold forms of expression merely from the human mind,
that God says, "For my thoughts are not your
thoughts, neither are your ways my ways," and the
measure of the difference is the heaven from the earth;
the heavenly and the earthly. One of the chief lessons
that we have to learn, and which God takes pains to teach
us is that spiritual ends demand spiritual means. The
breaking down of our natural life, its mind, its
resources, its energies, in the bitterness of
disappointment through futility, failure,
ineffectiveness, and deadlock in real spiritual
achievement, is a life work; but the truth mentioned
above is the explanation and key to the whole thing. What
is true of spiritual knowledge is true in every other
connection and direction as we shall see.
Reverting
to our illustration in that transition which is the
underlying truth of the parable of 'The Prodigal Son,'
namely the transition from a relationship on the ground
of law, in the flesh, to that on the ground of grace, in
the spirit, we have come to see that his knowledge of the
Father in the spirit was such as he had never possessed
before. He never knew his Father before grace was
revealed and the gift and operation of the Father's
Spirit was manifested as he knew Him afterward. His
spirit had been brought from death, darkness, distance,
desolation, and now he had not merely an objective
knowledge of one whom he had termed Father, but a
subjective understanding and appreciation of the Father
because the spirit of sonship had now been put within him
whereby he cried "Father." There is no saving
relationship to, or knowledge of God, only through grace
and by new birth. Such knowledge is spiritual not
"natural."
So, then,
those who by being born again have become "little
children," Matthew 18:3, or "babes" in
spiritual things, 1 Corinthians 3:1 (not wrong if we do
not unduly remain so) have to learn everything afresh
because "all things are new," and - now -
"all things are of God," 2 Corinthians
5:17-18. Such have to learn a new kind of knowledge, as
we have shown. But before this, and ever and always, such
have to learn to live by a new life - "to walk in
newness of life." This life is always related
to the resurrection of Christ, and is "the life
whereby Jesus conquered death." This subject is
treated more fully elsewhere, especially in booklet No. 2
of 'Incorporation into Christ,'* and we shall do no more
than mention it here. The
Apostle Paul says that our conduct is to be "as
those who are alive from the dead," and so saying he
means that the manifestation in and by us is to be that
of the shared power and triumph of the mighty
resurrection life of Christ. Again, in order that we may
learn how to live by this life, which is a superlative
purpose of God concerning us, He is bound to bring our
natural life to an end in all its effectiveness and value
in the sphere of spiritual achievement, both in life and
service. WE cannot be or do what God requires: His life
alone can produce after its kind. But while this is a law
and a test, it is also a blessed truth that Christ came
that we might have this life and have it
abundantly. Read through your New Testament with the
object of seeing how the Divine life is manifested by and
in the enforced insufficiency of natural life, and you
will see it to be the secret of the romance of New
Testament accomplishments.
An element
of offence in this teaching is that it demands a
recognised and acknowledged weakness; it requires that we
have to confess that in ourselves, for all Divine
purposes, we are powerless and worthless, and of
ourselves we can do nothing. The natural man's worship of
strength, efficiency, fitness, ability, meets with a
terrible rebuff when it is confronted with the
declaration that the universal triumph of Christ over
hierarchies more mighty than those of flesh and blood was
because "He was crucified through weakness" -
God reduced to a certain impotence! - and "God hath
chosen the weak things to confound the mighty," 2
Corinthians 13:4; 1 Corinthians 1:25-27.
To
"glory in infirmity that His power may be the more
manifest" is a far cry from the original Saul of
Tarsus, but what an extraordinary change in mentality.
God has, however, always drawn a very broad line between
natural "might and power" on the one hand, and
"My Spirit" on the other, and for evermore the
law abides that He that hateth his life (psuche,
natural life) shall find it unto life eternal (aionian-zoe,
Divine life of the ages), John 12:25. This is said, of
course, in relation to the interests of Christ.
There are
two other lessons that we might mention as being set the
"new man," which are a part of the education
and training of the spirit or "inner man of the
heart." He has to learn a new walk. Many slips and,
perhaps, tumbles may be his experience here, but such are
honourable if they are marks of a stepping out at the
behest of God, rather than to sit still in fleshly
disobedience or fear. The "Prodigal's" new
relationship meant new shoes, and in later significance
this meant "walking after the spirit and not after
the flesh," Romans 8:4. We have shown that the
nature of this walk is that reason, feeling, and natural
choice are no longer the directive laws or criteria of
the spiritual man. For, such an one there are frequent
experiences of a collision and contradiction between soul
and spirit. The reason would dictate a certain course,
the affections would urge in a certain direction, the
will would seek to fulfil these judgments and desires,
but there is a catch somewhere within, a dull, leaden,
lifeless, numbed something at the centre of us which
spoils everything, contradicts us, and all the time in effect,
says no! Or it may be the other way round. An inward urge
and constraint, finds no encouragement from our natural
judgment or reason, and is flatly contrary to our natural
desires, likings, inclinations, preferences, or
affections; while in that same natural realm we are not
at all willing for such a course. In this case it is not
the judgment against the desire as is frequently the case
in everybody's life, but judgment, desire, and volition
all joined against intuition. Now is the crisis. Now is
to be seen who is to rule the life, or which road is to
be chosen. Now the natural man or the outer man of sense
and the spiritual or inner man have to settle affairs. To
learn to walk after the spirit is a life lesson of the
new man, and as he is vindicated - as he always will be in
the long run - he will come to take the absolute
ascendancy over the "natural" man and his mind,
and so by the energising of the Holy Spirit in the spirit
of the new man the Cross will be wrought out to the
nullifying of the mind of the flesh - which in spiritual
things always ends in death, and in the enthroning of the
spiritual mind which is life and peace, Romans 8:6.
This,
then, is the nature of the walk after the spirit, and its
application is many-sided. But we must remember the law
of this walk, which is faith. We "walk in
the spirit," but "we walk by
faith."
To walk by
faith there must, in the very nature of the case, be a
stripping off of all that the outer man of the senses
clings to, demands, craves for, as a security and an
assurance. When the spiritual life of God's people is in
the ascendant, they are not troubled by either the
absence of human resources on the one hand, or by the
presence of humanly overwhelming odds against them on the
other.
This is
patent in their history as recorded in the Scriptures.
But it is also true that when the spiritual life is weak,
undeveloped, or at the ebb, they look round for some
tangible, seen resource, upon which to fasten. Egypt is
the alternative to God whenever and wherever spiritual
life is low. To believe in and trust to the intuitive
leadings of the Holy Spirit in our spirit, even though
all is so different from the ways of men, and even though
such bring us to a Canaan which for the time being is
full of idolatry and where a mighty famine reigns; where
Satan seems to be lord, and no fruit is found; where all
is so contrary to what our outer man had decided must be
in keeping with a leading and a promise of God; to leave
our old sphere of life in the "world," to break
with our kindred, our father's house, for this - this!
and then have to wait through much continuous stripping
off of those means, and methods, and habits, and
judgments, which are the very constitution of the natural
man - this is the law of the spiritual walk, but this is
God's chosen and appointed way of the mightiest
vindication. Spiritual children and riches, and
fruitfulness, and service, permanence, and the friendship
of God are for such Abrahams of faith or such children of
Abraham in the spirit. God has laid a faith basis for His
superstructure of spiritual glory, and only that which is
built upon such a foundation can serve spiritual ends.
Let this be the test of our walk in all personal,
domestic, business, and church affairs. Here, again, we
have a principle which if applied would be revolutionary,
and would call for the abandonment of a tremendous amount
of carnal "natural," worldly stuff in our
resources and methods. "Faith without works is
dead," true, but the works of faith - of the spirit
- are not those of the flesh, the difference is
incomparable. The walk of the flesh is one thing but the
walk in the spirit is quite another. The things of the
Spirit are foolishness to the flesh. Men of faith see
what others do not and act accordingly. This also being
true of men who have lost their reason, the two are often
confused and the children of the flesh think the children
of the spirit mad or insane. They are unable to
discriminate between even the insanity of men and
"the foolishness of God which is wiser than
men."
Abraham
was fortified by his faith, but his walk in faith was
intensely practical, though so different from the walk in
the flesh. A writer has said that faith brings us into
difficulties which are unknown to men who walk in the
flesh, or who never go out in faith, but such
difficulties, placing us beyond the power of the flesh to
help make special Divine revelations necessary, and God
always takes advantage of such times to give such needed
education of the spirit. It is thus that the men of the
spirit are taught and come to know God as no others know
Him. Thus faith is the law of the walk of the new man -
the inner man - which brings him by successive stages
into the very heart of God, Who crowns this progress with
the matchless designation "My friend!" One
other thing in general has to be mentioned. The new man
of the spirit has to learn a new speech. There is the
language of the spirit, and he will have to realise
increasingly that "speech in the enticing words of
man's wisdom," or what man calls "excellency of
speech" (1 Cor. 2:1) will avail nothing in spiritual
service. If all the religious speech and preaching and
talking about the Gospel which goes on in one week was
the utterance of the Holy Spirit, what tremendous impact
of God upon the world would be registered. But it is
obviously not so and this impact is not felt. It is
impossible to speak in and by the Holy Spirit without
something happening which is related to Eternity. But
this capacity belongs only to the "born of the
Spirit" ones, whose spirit has been joined to the
Lord, and even they have to learn how to cease from their
own words and "speak as they are moved by the
Spirit." It is a part of the education of the inner
man to have his outer man slain in the matter of speech,
and to be brought to the state to which Jeremiah was
brought, "I am but a child, I cannot speak."
Not only as sinners have we to be crucified with Christ,
but as preachers, or speakers, or talkers. The
circumcision of Christ, which Paul says is the cutting
off of the whole body of the flesh, has to be applied to
our lips, and our spirit has to be so much in dominion
that on all matters where God cannot be glorified we
"cannot speak." A natural facility of
speech is no strength in itself to spiritual ministry, it
may be a positive menace. It is a stage of real spiritual
development when there is a genuine fear of speaking
unless it is in "words which the Holy Ghost
teacheth." On the other hand a natural inability to
speak need be no handicap. To be present "in
weakness and in fear, and in much trembling" (1 Cor.
1:3) may be a mood which becomes an apostolic, nay
rather, a Holy Spirit ministry. The utterance of God is a
very different thing in every way from that of men. How
much is said in the Scriptures about
"conversation," "the tongue,"
"words," &c., and ever with the emphasis
that these are to be in charge of the spirit and not
merely expressions of the soul in any of its departments.
If it is
true that only the quickened spirit can receive Divine
revelation, it is equally true that such revelation
requires a Divine gift of utterance in order to realise
its spiritual end.
Many there
are who preach or teach the truth as out from a mental
apprehension with the natural ability, but the vital
potentialities of that truth are not being manifest
either in their own lives or in the lives of those who
hear. The spiritual results are hardly worth the effort
and expenditure. The virtue of speech resulting in
abiding fruit to the glory of God, whether that speech be
preaching, teaching, conversation, prayer, is not in its
lucidity, eloquence, subtlety, cleverness, wit,
thoughtfulness, passion, earnestness, forcefulness,
pathos, &c., but only in that it is an utterance of
the Holy Ghost.
"Thy
speech betrayeth thee" may be applied in many ways,
for whether one lives in the flesh or in the spirit, in
the natural man or in the spiritual man, will always be
made manifest by how we speak and the spiritual effect of
the fruit of our lips.
O, for
crucified lips amongst God's people, and O for lips among
God's prophets touched with the blood-soaked fire-charged
coal from that one great altar of Calvary.
Having at
some length dealt with the difference, nature, and
characteristics of the inner and the outer man, we must
now come to some specific emphases. The first of these is
all inclusive, and relates to
The
Ascendancy of the Spiritual Man Over the Natural Man
This is
illustrated by the simple diagram herewith.
[Click here to view the diagram]. There is marked the creation
of man in his tripartite being, with his spirit as the
sphere of his union with God for all Divine purposes. The
nature of this union is set forth below, and is fivefold.
In the fall the soul was allowed to take the ascendancy
over the spirit; the spirit with conscience, communion,
and intuition being subjected to the soul with its
reason, desire, and volition. This ascendancy of the soul
made man what he is afterward called; the
"natural" i.e., soulish (Gk. psukikos) man,
and inasmuch as it was the reasoning and desiring and
choosing that were inspired and prompted by the devil,
and the capitulation was to him, and the spirit union
with God was rejected and violated in all its claims, the
result is that man is not only separated from God but in
his natural state is horizoned by a lower life than was
intended. But more, he is then called "flesh";
this is the active law of his fallen condition. It is not
something in him, it is himself, the real principle of
his being, and it is always set over against
"spirit" which is the real principle of life
re-united with God by re-generation.
Further,
as he capitulated, not only to the soul life, but to the
devil, he is ever after, until delivered by Christ,
actuated and influenced by "the god of this
age," whose methods are not always manifestly
against God, but are always in the place of God,
even to the extent of projecting a counterfeit religion,
with similar phraseology and means. The result of all
this, as we have seen, is spirit, or spiritual, death;
and the nature of death in the Bible is primarily the
separation of the spirit from God. All else that is
called death results from this. Lost likeness,
fellowship, knowledge, co-operation, dominion, with all
that God meant and intended by them - this is the
foundation of death. So thus "in Adam all died"
"death passed upon all." This may be
represented by lines which narrow down as they move
towards the Cross. This movement indicates how through
the Old Testament age God by types and figures is ever
preaching the fact that death is His sentence and must be
carried out. There may be seen also lines which widen out
from the point of the fall and death. These represent the
natural man's mind about himself. He refuses the Divine
verdict, and believing and preaching a gospel of the
inherent goodness of human nature, seeks to develop a
system of improvement by all manner of means. For him,
salvation is in himself, and civilisation, education,
social reconstruction, mutual improvement, &c., will
at length bring in a golden age. He refutes the word of
God which demands new birth. He makes sin and evil a
negative thing, and so on. Thus man's estimate of himself
is ever growing, and the opposite of the mind of God.
In the
centre of history God places the Cross and in the
representative Person of Christ gathers the whole race
under His own sentence and takes it into the full
outworking thereof in death. Down through the centre of
the Cross is a black zero line. This marks in God's
settled judgment the end of the natural man. From that
point God has nothing to do with man only on the ground
of that life which is begotten from the dead (Rev. 1:5).
He demands that there shall be both an acceptance of and
a witness born to the fact that when Christ died we died,
that we were "crucified with Christ," (Rom.
6:3-6; Col. 2:12, &c.). This has been dealt with at
length in "Incorporation into Christ," No. 1*.
Then we come to this side of the Cross and the lines
cross once again. First there is the beginning of the new
man - the inner man - the spiritual man. He is
"begotten again by the resurrection of Jesus from
the dead," 1 Peter 1:3. Here begins that spiritual
life, walk, knowledge, &c., of which we have spoken,
and here therefore begins that life process by which the
new or spiritual man takes the ascendancy over the old or
natural man by the power of the Cross.
As we
"walk in the spirit" we cease to "fulfil
the lusts of the flesh." Thus in the spirit by the
indwelling of God's Spirit there is, through Calvary, a
restoration, and more than a restoration, of the lost
likeness, fellowship, knowledge, co-operation, and
spiritual dominion.
As the
spiritual and inner man is renewed, strengthened,
educated, the natural and outer man is brought into
subjection and robbed of his dominance, until slowly the
soul is made the servant of the renewed spirit, and the
body is harnessed as the instrument for doing what the
soul has come to understand as the will of the spirit,
which in its turn has been "joined to the Lord One
Spirit."
There is
no time limit to this process or progress. Some have more
to unlearn than others. The spirits of many are not as
pure as some because they have been muffled and beclouded
by much mental and emotional apprehension. One often sees
people in a meeting to whose spirit very little gets
through because they are judging with their heads
according to some accepted tenets, or they are
prejudiced, suspicious, biased, or the slaves of a system
and not at liberty in the spirit. It is a joy to meet a
pure and open spirit. In this sense we have to "turn
and become as little children." How pure the spirit
of a child is! Therefore how true its intuitions or
discernment. Some of us remember now the judgment we
passed upon certain people when we were quite young. Our
conclusions were quite clear and definite, although we
could never have stated them, but looking back with the
larger understanding, how perfectly right we were, and
time has only corroborated our "feelings." We
did not arrive at these by reasoning, or knowledge, or
even studied observation, we could never have given our
reasons or explained ourselves in the matter. These were
the pure intuitions of an unbeclouded spirit. Such is to
be our state, not in the natural but in the Divine
realm. Lord, make us in this matter to have the spirit of
a child, for of such is the realm of the heavenlies!
We now see
why it is that the Lord is primarily concerned with our
spirit. It is here that the new life resides; it is here
that the Holy Spirit operates: it is here that our true
education takes place: it is here that we have fellowship
with God: it is here that we are to be made strong: it is
here that resistance of the enemy is to be established:
it is here that authority over malignant spiritual forces
is to function. It is this spirit possessed of the
resurrection life of Christ which is the germ of the
resurrection body; it is here that we are saved in trial:
it is here that that sinless, inviolate, life of God is
(1 John 3:9, 5:18) not in our "outer" or
"old man." It is only as we come to the outer
man that the enemy has power over us.
May we
just strike a note of warning here. There is a peril that
we might live too much in our own human spirit as a thing
by itself. For the born again child of God, the Holy
Spirit is the Divine indweller of the human spirit, and
it is not our spirit but His presence in our spirit that
has to be our direction and government. A larger reason
for this warning will be mentioned later, but as one very
vital principle for safety in this matter let us here
emphasise the corporate nature of the Holy Spirit's work.
He is essentially the gift to the Body of Christ as a
whole, and only indwells individual members relatively.
It is Christ corporate Who is anointed in this age to
fulfil the eternal purpose, and the Holy Spirit resting
in and upon the "Body" (1 Cor. 12:12) energises
and endows each member in relation to the whole and to
the "Head" (Eph. 1:22). Hence spiritual
guidance should be corporate, and the complement,
corroboration, and confirmation should be sought in the
spirits of "two or three" members. This
"discerning of the Body" (1 Cor. 10:16,17;
11:29) is important in the matter of service as in
fellowship. God is jealous of proper order in the Body of
Christ, and failure to note this is the traceable cause
of very much error, chaos, and disruption; as also of
failure, suffering, and shame. There are also
"joints of supply" in the "Body," and
while they do not compose a priestly or ecclesiastical
class or order, they are in - by the appointment of God
and the seal of the Spirit - a representative position
and capacity. God will not have these set aside, but
requires that those who are within the sphere of their
oversight (1 Peter 5:2, &c.) shall consult with them,
"comparing spiritual things with spiritual" in
the matter of service and conduct, as in matters of truth
and doctrine. Where this is possible God locks up His
direction to this law, and only trouble can follow sooner
or later if the law is ignored. We must not overlook the
Divine appointments within the "Body" (Eph.
4:11-14). These appointments were made and these personal
gifts were given for the "perfecting of the saints
unto the work of ministry, for the building up of the
Body of Christ till" - till when, the end
of the Apostolic age? - "till we attain... unto the
measure of the stature of the fulness of Christ,"
and that has not taken place yet.
HAVING
been so definite in pointing out that all the Divine
operations in the "New Man" are directed toward
the complete ascendancy of the spirit over the soul and
body, and that the anointing of God rests within and upon
the "Inner Man," we can only stress two things.
One is that whatever may appear to the contrary in
emotion, pleasure, gratification, enjoyment, activity,
resolve, etc., only that which comes out from the
Holy-Spirit-indwelt-spirit is spiritual and effects
spiritual ends. The natural - soulish-man can
make an oil which is an imitation of "The Holy
Anointing Oil," or fire which is "False
Fire," which seems to serve the same purpose and
produce similar results. Thus in the same meeting one may
speak by revelation under the anointing of the Spirit of
God, bringing those present face to face with issues of
tremendous significance, and another may launch out on to
a churning sea of beautiful ideas and strong emotional
currents, and capture the meeting, but for any
spiritually discerning people present. The pressure and
strenuousness of life lay many open to the peril of such
emotional, mental, and volitional stimulants, but it may
only be in the religious realm what alcohol or drugs are
in the physical realm. The pernicious results are that
people must have more and more, and they select such as
can produce them, and gather round a man. This is clearly
shown by Paul to be "carnal." It is the
opposite of "The anointing which ye have received
abiding within you, and ye have no need that any
should teach you." This makes necessary the second
thing, namely, spiritual discernment. We must seek more
and more from the Lord a quickening and purifying of
spirit, and we must walk after the spirit in whatever
discernment we have so that we are saved from the
imitation "oil" which deceives and at length
lands us either into error or gets us into a
spiritual cul-de-sac. Such are they that are
"carried about by every wind of
teaching." Spiritual discernment is one of the
most vital needs of God's people today. Nothing can
take its place, not even the wisest and best teaching or
counsel. Only those who have it will be saved from the
distraction and despair of the bewildering mass of
conflicting teaching, "manifestations," and
movements of these and the coming days.
There is another thing
that Christian workers should remember. It is always a
dangerous and paralysing thing to allow soulish human
feelings to come in and take precedence over the spirit
in relationships, where spiritual help is needed.
Compassion, love, sympathy, concern, interest, desire to
help, etc., must be absolutely under the control and
direction of the spirit. Failure to observe this law
has resulted in some of the most ghastly moral and
spiritual tragedies in the lives of Christian workers. If
we allow either natural attraction or human desire on the
one hand, or natural repulsion and human distaste on the
other to have any ruling place the consequences may be
disastrous, and the result will certainly be spiritual
failure. Very often even in the case of a loved relative
the human interest has to be made quite secondary -
sometimes ruled out altogether - before a spiritual issue
can be effected. OUR will and wish has to be surrendered
to God's.
Before closing there
are just two things which one feels should be mentioned.
Having seen that the basis of all fellowship and
co-operation with God is spiritual, in and through the
born-again spirit, we must realise that this at once
defines the real nature of our service. The background of
all cosmic conditions is spiritual. Behind the things
seen are the things unseen. The things which do appeal
are not the ultimate things.
"The whole world
lieth in the wicked one." There is a spiritual
hierarchy which, before this world was, revolted against
the equality of the Son with the Father in the Throne,
and in spite of the hurling out of heaven and the eternal
doom which followed, has been in active revolt and
antagonism to that "eternal purpose" right
through the ages. A certain judicial hold upon this earth
and the race in Adam was gained by Satan through the
consent of that first Adam, through whom the purpose of
God should have been realised on this earth.
Thus we have Paul
telling the members of the Body of Christ - The Last Adam
- that their "warfare is not with mere flesh and
blood, but with principalities, and powers, the
world-rulers of this darkness, and spiritual hosts of
wickedness in the heavenlies."
What a lot is gathered
up into that inclusive phrase "This darkness."
How much is said about it in the scriptures. The need for
having eyes opened is ever basic to emancipation (see
Acts 26:18). The cause of all "this darkness"
is said to be "Spiritual hosts of wickedness in the
heavenlies." Literally translated the words are
"the spiritualities" or "the
spirituals," meaning, spiritual beings.
"Wickedness" here does not just mean merely
inherent wickedness or evil, but malignance; destructive,
harmful.
"In the
heavenlies" simply means inhabiting a realm beyond
the earthly, not limited to earthly geographical
localities; moving in the realm surrounding the earth and
human habitation.
"World
rulers" means that these malignant spiritual hosts
are directing and governing the world wherever the
government of Christ has not been superimposed through
His Body - the spiritual Church.
"Principalities
and Powers" (authorities) represent order, rank,
method, system. Satan is not omnipresent, hence he must
work through an organised dividing of the world under
these principalities and authorities, and he himself
"goes to and fro in the earth," and has seats
here and there (Job 2:2, Rev. 2:13, etc.).
The
Apostle declares that the explanation of situations is to
be looked for in the unseen, behind the actual
appearance.
What looks
like the natural has its rise too often in the
supernatural. Man is always trying to give a natural
explanation and therefore to put things right by natural
means. But when he comes up against a situation in which
interests of the Christ of God are involved, he is
floored and beaten. Such situations are become the
commonplaces - nay more - the overwhelming order of the
day amongst "Christian workers" in these days,
both abroad and at home. We have no intention of dealing
with the subject at length here, but state the fact, and
remind the Lord's people especially that in more realms
than that of Divine activity, "What is seen hath not
been made out of the things which do appear," but
that multitudes of the things in daily life which are
inimical to spiritual interests must have their
explanation from behind. Let us emphasise that this
spiritual union with God in the super Cosmic significance
of the Cross of Christ means that our supreme
effectiveness is in the spiritual realm. We who are the
Divine "spirituals" are to be energised by the
Holy Spirit to take ascendancy in Christ over the Satanic
"spirituals," and thus know something more than mere earthly dominion but "seated together with Him in the heavenlies" (as to our spirit) we are to learn to reign in that greater "kingdom of the heavens" of which the earthly millennial kingdom is only an earthly counterpart.
Again, let us affirm, that all the energies of God in our spirit are toward a corporate spiritual union with Christ whereby the impact of His victory and sovereignty shall be registered among and upon the "principalities and powers," etc., and their domination paralysed, and ultimately destroyed.
The last word is to point out that it is because man has, and centrally is, a spirit that he can have intercourse with fallen spirits, We believe that this explains the whole system of spiritism (spiritualism) and that the supposed departed with whom spiritualists communicate are none other than these "spiritual hosts" impersonating the departed, whom they knew in lifetime. Leaving the many phases of this thing in its outworkings and issues at the end of the age, let us note the terrible nemesis in wrecked minds and bodies; haunted, driven, distraught, reason-bereft souls; crowded asylums, prisons; suicides, moral and spiritual wrecks, etc., is because that which was given to man specifically for union, communion and co-operation with God, namely the spirit of man, has been used as the medium and instrument for this demon invasion and control of his life. The tremendous warnings and terrible judgments associated with all kinds of spiritism; necromancy, witches, "familiar spirits," etc., are because of the spirit complicity, dalliance, consorting, with fallen spirits whose purpose is always to capture men and women through their spirits. This they will do even by adopting the guise of an angel of
light, and talking religion. Strange, isn't it, that
fifty years ago men threw off the belief in the
supernatural in the scriptures, and today they and their
school so strongly embrace spiritism? Surely this is
"the working of error" sent that they who
received not the truth for the love of it "might
believe A LIE" "in order that they might be
condemned" (2 Thess. 2:11).
It was the
spiritual background of their life which led to the
destruction of the Egyptians, Canaanites, etc., and this
was spiritism in different forms; but it was their being
joined to demons that involved them.
The most
spiritual people apart from new birth union with God are
in the greatest peril here, and even the Lord's own
people by reason of their very spirituality need to
constantly abide in the Cross of Christ that they shall
not become exposed to "The wiles of the devil."
First published in 1927 in A Witness and Testimony Magazine, also published as a pamphlet by Witness and Testimony Publishers. This version is from the booklet.