Putting on the Lord Jesus Christ Putting On

Putting on the Lord Jesus Christ

Putting On the Lord Jesus Christ I. Introduction II. Phase 1/Phase 2 Distinction III. Phase 1 – Salvation Foundation IV. Positional Truth V. Phase 2 – Spirituality VI. Conclusion

“Our Father's ultimate purpose in saving us is that we might be conformed to the image of His Son, not simply to keep us out of hell and get us into heaven. We have been born into Christ that He may be our life, not just our Savior” … ‘My little children, of whom I travail in birth again until Christ be formed in you’ (Galatians 4: 19). ” Part Four: The Realization of Spiritual Growth, Chapter 44, Service and Reckoning, p 200

“The reckoning that counts is made up of three essential steps. Most believers stop at the first, many stop at the second, but none can know the true results of reckoning apart from reliance upon all three factors. Our freedom from domination by the sinful Adamic life was completed positionally through our identification with the Lord Jesus on Calvary. There we shared His death unto sin, and from there we entered into His life unto God. From this eternal position in Christ, our experiential freedom and growth are carried out as we…: 1. Know and Reckon: When we first realize our identification with the Lord Jesus according to Romans 6: 1 -10, we begin to count upon these wonderful truths… 2. Abide and Rest: Each of us must become aware of our union of life in the risen Lord; we are a branch in the True Vine. It is by means of this awareness that we learn to abide. We simply rest where we have been newly created - in Christ… 3. Depend and Walk: The liberating principle is fully embraced by including the final step: walking in dependence upon the Holy Spirit… “Our reckoning becomes effective as we count on the Word, abide in the Lord, and walk in the Spirit. ” Part Four: The Realization of Spiritual Growth, Chapter 41, “Three Steps in Reckoning, ” pp 188, 189

The Holy Spirit Our Personal God and Agent of Understanding Truth • • • • John 6: 63 John 15: 26 John 16: 13 -14 Romans 2: 28 -29 Romans 7: 6 Romans 14: 16 -17 1 Corinthians 2: 4 -5, 10 -12 1 Corinthians 6: 19 2 Corinthians 3: 2 -6, 17 -18 2 Corinthians 13: 14 Galatians 5: 5 Ephesians 2: 19 -22 Ephesians 4: 30 Philippians 3: 3 1 Thessalonians 1: 5 James 4: 5

“To attempt to ‘climb up some other way’ is futile. God’s truth, ministered in God’s way by God’s Spirit, alone frees. ” Part Five: A Guide to Spiritual Growth, Chapter 56, Think Position!, p 255 “…the Spirit’s object is something far greater—to form Christ in us through the working of the cross. His goal is to see Christ inwrought in believers. So it is not merely that a man does certain things or speaks certain words, but that he is a certain kind of man. He himself is what he preaches. ” Part One: Principles of Spiritual Growth, Chapter 17, Cultivation, p 69 “Our object in sharing these truths of the Word is that we may be turned from all that God condemned unto a deep personal knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ. . . We are not to know the Lord Jesus in order to emulate Him as our example. Rather we are to behold Him in the Word and allow the Spirit of God to conform us to His image. Not imitation, but conformation. ” Part Three: The Ground of Growth, Chapter 38, That I May Know Him, p 175

“The witness of the Spirit is His witness to the Word wherein lies God’s revelation of our eternal position. And in that Word He testifies concerning the Lord Jesus, who is our position before God. Although the Holy Spirit abides within and witnesses to our spirit, we must remember that the human spirit lies beyond the range of consciousness. Therefore, assurance of salvation is not gained through the senses. As we rest in our position by faith in the scriptural facts, the Spirit of truth gives us a deep, inexplicable assurance that cannot be altered. We not only believe, we know; our knowledge is established in the eternal, Spirit-ministered Scriptures. ‘…For I know whom I have believed, and am persuaded that he is able to keep that which I have committed unto him against that day’ (2 Tim. 1: 12). ” Part Two: Foundations of Spiritual Growth, Chapter 20, Self, pp 87 -88

“We should remind ourselves that the written Word was designed specifically by God to bring us to know the Living Word. Never for a moment is the written revelation to be by-passed, or slighted in any way. We are to study, meditate, and count upon it through the ministry of the Spirit of Truth, in order that we may know the Lord Jesus. He is our all, by means of the Word… “Surely, it can be affirmed that the written Truth, authored and administered by the Holy Spirit, is the ‘vehicle’ by which the Father and the Son come to us, and we to them. Still, as to reckoning upon the specific identification truths centered in Romans Six, nearly all of us stop at the written Word. It is as though we stand there, with a death-grip on a handful of truth, repeating with conviction: ‘I believe this is true, and I reckon, reckon!’ “Much of the failure of our reckoning is due to erroneous expectation. We are not delivered by belief only in the liberation truths! Certainly we must believe and appropriate these truths, but the actual liberation comes as the result of our intimate, personal fellowship with the Lord Jesus through the Holy Spirit. Simply put, the principle is: liberation is in the Liberator. ” Part Four: The Realization of Spiritual Growth, Chapter 41, “Three Steps in Reckoning, ” pp 187, 188 “He not only reveals the scriptural truths concerning Christ and the Cross to our faith, but also transmits their reality to us. ” Part Five: A Guide to Spiritual Growth, Chapter 57, “Keep Looking Down!, ” p 257

“As newly created believers, we are in the Lord Jesus in the heavenlies, while at the same time we are in the Spirit of Christ here on earth. The Comforter is our environment in this sin-cursed world. ‘But ye are not in the flesh, but in the Spirit, if so be that the Spirit of God dwell in you’ (Rom. 8: 9). He it is who ministers the life of the Lord Jesus in us as our new life, and who develops the characteristics of that life in and through our new nature. “On the one hand, He applies the finished work of the Cross to the life of the flesh within. ‘Walk in the Spirit, and ye shall not fulfill the lust of the flesh’ (Gal. 5: 16). On the other hand, He causes the fruit of the Spirit to grow in our new life. ‘The fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, longsuffering, gentleness, goodness, faith, meekness, temperance’ (Gal. 5: 22, 23). ” Part Three: The Ground of Growth, Chapter 30, “Our History in the Last Adam, ” pg 145