Friday, November 17, 2017

Earned or a Gift

Every saved child of God at one time or another longs
for victory over sin. Yet many have sadly given up
hope of having a complete victory, mistakenly suppo-
sing that that blessing is only for the life after this.
They do not know how simple, and how immediately
available, is the victory for which they are not daring
to hope. It is right at hand in Christ, for all who let
Him undeceive them, and who will receive the victor-
ious life as the outright, supernatural gift of God.

The great truth that so many earnest surrendered
Christians have even yet failed to see is that salvation
is a twofold gift; freedom from the PENALTY of sin
and freedom from the POWER of sin. Most Christians
know that they are free from the penalty of sin, but
many have not realized that they may, in the same way,
by faith, be freed from the power of their sins. Even
though they know that their own efforts had nothing
to do with salvation, they are yet deceived by the
Adversary into believing that somehow their own ef-
forts must play a part in victory over their sins.

If we as Christians come to the Lord and say, "I want
to be saved from the power of my sins, and I will let
You save me provided You will let me share in the
work of overcoming their power, so that You and I
shall always know that part of this victory has been
accomplished by You, and part has been accomplished
by me." Christ Himself cannot save us from the power
of our sins? Think about it. When our Lord says to us
through Paul, "Sin shall not have dominion over you; 
for ye are not under law, but under grace," He wants
us to remember what grace is. Grace is not partly man's
work and partly God's work. It is wholly God's work
and exclusively God's work; and all that man can do is
to receive it as God's outright, undeserved, and wholly
sufficient gift.

The Lord wants our lives on earth to be one long Christ-
mas day of receiving His gift of Himself as our victory.
If we say that our experience refutes this, do we mean
that we have found through the help of our own efforts
a satisfying completeness of victory over all recog-
nized sin, so that impatience, irritation, unlove, impur-
ity, have all been taken out of our life, and we are able
to live from day to day not only free from our outward
expression of these sins, but free from their dominion
within us?

Our hope for victory over sin is not "Christ plus my
efforts," but "Christ plus my receiving." To receive
victory from Him is to believe His Word that solely
by His grace He is, this moment, freeing me from the
dominion of sin. And to believe on Him in this way
is to recognize that he is doing for us what we cannot
do for ourselves. When the Lord was in Nazareth He
could do "not many mighty works there because of--
"Their inactivity?" No; "because of their unbelief."
To attempt to share by our effort in what only grace
can do is to defeat grace.

"This only would I learn from you, Received ye 
the Spirit by the works of the law, or by the hear-
ing of faith? Are ye so foolish? Having begun in 
the Spirit, are ye now perfected in the flesh?...He 
therefore that supplieth to you the Spirit, and 
worketh miracles among you, doeth he it by the 
works of the law, or by the hearing of faith?...
For freedom did Christ set us free: Stand fast 
therefore in the liberty, wherewith Christ has set 
us free, and be not entangled again in the yoke 
of bondage...But I say, 'Walk by the Spirit, and 
ye shall not fulfill the lust of the flesh." 
Gal 3:2, 3, 5; 5:1,16

Let us never forget this simple truth: the faith which
lets Christ bring us into and sustain us in victory is
just remembering that Christ is faithful; that it is His
responsibility and duty to accomplish this miracle
in our lives. Charles G Trumbull

Reader, my prayer is that YOU GET THIS! Let me
know in the comment section if you have heard this
before, needed reminding, have never heard it but
intrigued. Pray for one another...



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