Deliverance from sin is not deliverance from human nature. There are things in human nature, such as prejudices, which the saint has to destroy by neglect; and other things which have to be destroyed by violence, i.e., by the Divine strength imparted by God's Spirit.

There are some things over which we are not to fight, but to stand still in and see the salvation of God; but every theory or conception which erects itself as a rampart against the knowledge of God is to be determinedly demolished by drawing on God's power, not by fleshly endeavour or compromise (v. 4).

It is only when God has altered our disposition and we have entered into the experience of sanctification that the fight begins. The warfare is not against sin; we can never fight against sin: Jesus Christ deals with sin in Redemption.

The conflict is along the line of turning our natural life into a spiritual life, and this is never done easily, nor does God intend it to be done easily. It is done only by a series of moral choices.

God does not make us holy in the sense of character; He makes us holy in the sense of innocence, and we have to turn that innocence into holy character by a series of moral choices.

These choices are continually in antagonism to the entrenchments of our natural life, the things which erect themselves as ramparts against the knowledge of God.

We can either go back and make ourselves of no account in the Kingdom of God, or we can determinedly demolish these things and let Jesus bring another son to glory .

This is another aspect of the strenuous nature of sainthood. Paul says, "I take every project prisoner to make it obey Christ." (Moffatt.) How much Christian work there is to-day which has never been disciplined, but has simply sprung into being by impulse! In Our Lord's life every project was disciplined to the will of His Father. There was not a movement of an impulse of His own will as distinct from His Father's - "The Son can do nothing of Himself." Then take ourselves - a vivid religious experience, and every project born of impulse put into action immediately, instead of being imprisoned and disciplined to obey Christ.

This is a day when practical work is overemphasized, and the saints who are bringing every project into captivity are criticized and told that they are not in earnest for God or for souls. True earnestness is found in obeying God, not in the inclination to serve Him that is born of undisciplined human nature. It is inconceivable, but true nevertheless, that saints are not bringing every project into captivity, but are doing work for God at the instigation of their own human nature which has not been spiritualized by determined discipline.

We are apt to forget that a man is not only committed to Jesus Christ for salvation; he is committed to Jesus Christ's view of God, of the world, of sin and of the devil, and this will mean that he must recognize the responsibility of being transformed by the renewing of his mind.

This is another aspect of the strenuous nature of sainthood. Paul says, "I take every project prisoner to make it obey Christ." (Moffatt.) How much Christian work there is to-day which has never been disciplined, but has simply sprung into being by impulse! In Our Lord's life every project was disciplined to the will of His Father. There was not a movement of an impulse of His own will as distinct from His Father's - "The Son can do nothing of Himself." Then take ourselves - a vivid religious experience, and every project born of impulse put into action immediately, instead of being imprisoned and disciplined to obey Christ.

This is a day when practical work is overemphasized, and the saints who are bringing every project into captivity are criticized and told that they are not in earnest for God or for souls. True earnestness is found in obeying God, not in the inclination to serve Him that is born of undisciplined human nature. It is inconceivable, but true nevertheless, that saints are not bringing every project into captivity, but are doing work for God at the instigation of their own human nature which has not been spiritualized by determined discipline.

We are apt to forget that a man is not only committed to Jesus Christ for salvation; he is committed to Jesus Christ's view of God, of the world, of sin and of the devil, and this will mean that he must recognize the responsibility of being transformed by the renewing of his mind.

“They swarmed around me like bees,” the psalmist says (118:12).

Every second we get a sting from some fiery shaft, some imagination, some memory, some foreboding, some fear, some care, and God lets us get them in order that they may be destroyed and we so armed against them that they can never hurt us anymore.

The only way to be armed against them is to refuse them and the source from which they come.

There is a world of truth here that most Christians have entirely overlooked. They give their spirits and hearts to the Lord, and they keep their heads to themselves. Our intellect must be sanctified by being slain and replaced by the mind of Christ.

The only remedy for bad thoughts is to stop thinking all our own thoughts, to be spiritually decapitated, and to be delivered from the natural mind as well as the natural heart. God will, therefore, put us to school in the difficult task of stopping thinking. We will not only try to think right, but we will stop our thoughts and wait for Him to give us His mind.

This may seem to you like annihilation, but you will come to it if you are going to enter into the deepest, sweetest, strongest life, until you shall be afraid to think at all until God first thinks in you.

Have you given your thoughts to God? Have you learned the meaning of that cry of David, “I hate thoughts, but thy law do I love”? (Psalm 119:113 KJV.) A. B. Simpson

Each sin has its door of entrance.

Keep—that—door—closed!

Bolt it tight!

Just outside, the wild beast crouches In the night.

Pin the bolt with a prayer, God will fix it there.

“BEES IN AMBER” BY JOHN OXENHAM

Carelessness with thoughts is as dangerous as toying with explosives!

Bolt that door!

He said not, “Thou shalt not be Tempested; Thou shalt not be Travailed; Thou shalt not be Afflicted”: But he said, “Thou shalt not be Overcome!” JULIAN OF NORWICK, A.D. 1373

We are not here to be overcome, but we are to rise unvanquished after every knockout blow and laugh the laugh of faith — not fear.

Tempested on the sea of life; Travailed sore, amid earth’s strife; Afflicted often, and sore dismayed; Look up, faint heart, be not afraid, Thou shalt not be overcome!

God’s ways are far beyond our ken; His thoughts are not the thoughts of men; And He knoweth what is best for you. Hope on, my friend, He will bear you through. Thou shalt not be overcome!

Though “The reason why” we cannot see, Our Father knows—’tis enough that we But trust His love, when our eyes are dim. Look up! Holdfast! though the fight is grim. We shall not be overcome!

MARY E. THOMPSON

Thou art fairer than the children of men: grace is poured into thy lips: therefore God hath blessed thee for ever.

The Lord GOD hath given me the tongue of the learned, that I should know how to speak a word in season to him that is weary.

His mouth is most sweet: yea, he is altogether lovely. This is my beloved, and this is my friend.

All bare him witness, and wondered at the gracious words which proceeded out of his mouth.

He taught them as one having authority, and not as the scribes.

Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly in all wisdom.

The sword of the Spirit . . . is the word of God.

The word of God is quick, and powerful, and sharper than any two-edged sword.

The weapons of our warfare are not carnal, but mighty through God to the pulling down of strongholds; casting down imaginations, and every high thing that exalteth itself against the knowledge of God, and bringing into captivity every thought to the obedience of Christ.

If ye will not drive out the inhabitants of the land from before you; . . . those which ye let remain of them shall be pricks in your eyes, and thorns in your sides, and shall vex you in the land wherein ye dwell.

Fight the good fight of faith.—The weapons of our warfare are not carnal, but mighty through God to the pulling down of strongholds; casting down imaginations, . . . and bringing into captivity every thought to the obedience of Christ.

Brethren, we are debtors, not to the flesh, to live after the flesh. For if ye live after the flesh, ye shall die; but if ye through the Spirit do mortify the deeds of the body, ye shall live.

The flesh lusteth against the Spirit, and the Spirit against the flesh; and these are contrary the one to the other: so that ye cannot do the things that ye would.—I see another law in my members, warring against the law of my mind, and bringing me into captivity to the law of sin which is in my members.—We are more than conquerors through him that loved us.