Liberty Not License
by Pastor Cornelius R. Stam
The fact that we are given perfect liberty in Christ does not mean that we should spend our lives in gratifying our own fleshly desires. Just the opposite is the case. Believers have been delivered from the bondage of childhood and given the liberty of full-grown sons in Christ (Galatians 3:24; 4:1-7), and this advance from infancy to maturity in itself implies the acquisition of a sense of responsibility.
The doctrine of our liberty in Christ does not support, it rather refutes, the false theory that those who are under grace may do anything they please. Paul was “slanderously reported” in this connection (Romans 3:8), but there were carnal believers then, as there are now, who actually did use their liberty as license to gratify their own desires. To turn from liberty to license in this way is fully as serious an error as to turn from liberty to law.
Many a believer, motivated only by his own fleshly desires and not at all by love for Christ or others, has indulged in pleasures of the flesh and of the world, justifying himself on the ground that he is under grace and has liberty in Christ. Taking others down with him in his spiritual declension he complains of any who would help him, that, “They are trying to put me under the law”.
Such are actually guilty of departing from grace, for “the grace of God…hath appeared”:
“Teaching us that, denying ungodliness and worldly lusts, we should live soberly, righteously, and godly in this present world;
“Looking for that blessed hope, and the glorious appearing of the great God and our Saviour Jesus Christ;
“Who gave Himself for us, that He might redeem us from all iniquity, and purify unto Himself a peculiar people, zealous of good works” (Titus 2:12-14).
Vance Havner Quote of the Day
“In our craze for bigness and our obsession for statistics, we have gathered a motley and unwieldy multitude. We have called it mobilization but it has really been mob-ilization. Our Lord was never impressed with the enthusiasm of a crowd. Many believed on His name but He did not trust them ( John 2:23-25). He sobered another throng with three “cannots” (Luke 14:25-33). He preached away another host who wanted to make Him king (john 6). He knew that one day a multitude would greet Him with hosannas and a few days later shout, ‘Crucify Him!”
The Christian’s Prayer Life
by Pastor Cornelius R. Stam
Prayer to God manifestly must hold great importance to those who would be truly spiritual. While God’s Word to us is always to have first place in our lives, prayer must certainly have second place; indeed, we must even study God’s Word with prayer for understanding and willingness to obey.
The Scriptures everywhere exhort God’s people to pray, and in the Epistles of Paul we find greater cause, greater reason and greater incentive than ever to pray — to pray “always,” “in everything,” “without ceasing.” The example of our Lord and of His apostles — particularly Paul — is a call to prayer. Every need, every anxiety, every heartache is a call to prayer. Every temptation, every defeat — yes, and every victory is a call to prayer.
Yet, merely praying, or even spending much time in prayer, is not in itself evidence of true spirituality. Many carnal Christians, still “babes in Christ,” and even many unsaved people, spend much time in prayer. But the truly spiritual believer will join the Apostle Paul in saying: “I will pray with the spirit, and I will pray with the understanding also” (I Corinthians 14:15). “With the spirit”: earnestly, fervently, pouring out to God my adoration, my supplications and my thanks. And “with the understanding also”: intelligently, with a clear grasp of what the Scriptures, rightly divided, say about God’s will and His provisions for my prayer life in this present dispensation of grace.
Vance Havner Devotion of the Day
When the Case Seems Impossible
I brought him to thy disciples, and they could not cure him. Then Jesus answered, and said…Bring him hither to me. Matthew 17:16, 17
“And they could not” – it is helpless disciples against a demon, a powerless church before a devil-possessed world, our plight before many a situation. But however much Christians and churches may fail, Christ does not fail – “Bring him hither to me.” What if the father, disappointed at the disciples’ failure, had taken the boy away?
When you face a case that seems hopeless bring it to Jesus. His touch has still its ancient power. And His power is available to us. When the disciples asked, “Why could not we cast him out?” Jesus answered, “Because of your unbelief: for verily I say unto you, If ye have faith as a grain of mustard seed, ye shall say unto this mountain, remove hence to yonder place; and it shall remove; and nothing shall be impossible unto you. Howbeit this kind goeth not out but by prayer and fasting.”
Faith and prayer will move the mountain and drive out the demon. “With God all things are possible.” “All things are possible to him that believeth.”
A.W. Tozer Devotional of the Day
Moving from Excess to Self-Control
Without doubt we are out of control and it may be that we have reached the point of no return. We may never recover from our mighty binge. It should be said, however, that if we alone are destroying ourselves by excess, it is because we are the only nation rich enough to do it successfully and to get such a whale of a lot of pleasure out of the job. Others have blown their brains out, but we can afford to blow the whole head off as well, and many of the nations that gaze on us with self-righteous horror are merely jealous of us. They would do the same thing if they had the money. We are all alike after all.
Well, all that I have said so far is but a circumlocutory way of getting at a well-known truth: that when mankind fell one effect of the fall was the loss of control. Those divinely implanted powers within him got out of hand and turned from their normal uses to become servants of the flesh and the devil.
It has been obvious to me that almost every sin is but a natural good perverted or carried to excess. Self-respect is turned into pride; natural appetite becomes gluttony; sleep goes on to become sloth; sex goes awry and turns to sodomy; love degenerates into lechery; praise sinks to flattery; determination hardens into obstinacy; a natural childish love of play grows up with the man and becomes a multi-billion dollar business wherein tens of thousands of able-bodied persons waste their lives playing for the amusement of the millions of bored adults who are more than willing to work hard to obtain money to watch them play.
Verse
But the fruit of the Spirit is . . . self-control. Galatians 5:22–23
Thought
Self-control delivers from excess. But control in certain areas of life often encourages excess in others. We ourselves are unable to master all of our tendencies and desires. It is as we submit to the Spirit’s control that we are empowered to exercise control.
Prayer
Spirit of God I submit to You. Will You produce within me the fruit of self-control.
Audio Sermons
(1 Peter – Part 11): Wherefore, Gird Up Your Minds and be Sober by A.W. Tozer
(1 Peter – Part 21): As Strangers & Pilgrims, Abstain From Fleshly Lusts by A.W. Tozer
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