All I need, God provides . . .

Tozer refers to a centuries old idea that the inner person that was made in the image of God is called the “ground” of the soul. This “mysterious primal stuff” makes itself felt in the world through imagination, reason, the faculty of speech and the creative powers.

While this is interesting, the Bible says that God reveals Himself to sinners and regenerates us as new creations by the power of the Holy Spirit. He does not ‘remake’ what was already there, but . . .

“Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation. The old has passed away; behold, the new has come.” (2 Corinthians 5:17)

In that new birth experience, we receive from Christ the nature of God and begin an amazing process in which the old fleshy person is stripped away and that new life becomes more of who we are and what we do.

“His divine power has granted to us all things that pertain to life and godliness, through the knowledge of him who called us to his own glory and excellence, by which he has granted to us his precious and very great promises, so that through them you may become partakers of the divine nature, having escaped from the corruption that is in the world because of sinful desire.” (2 Peter 1:3–4)

In other words, the old sin nature is not added on to, but replaced. It kicks and spits and tries to exert itself and retain its former control of things, but the power of Christ and that new life fights too, and is guaranteed to win. In this war, I am supposed to cooperate!

“But I say, walk by the Spirit, and you will not gratify the desires of the flesh. For the desires of the flesh are against the Spirit, and the desires of the Spirit are against the flesh, for these are opposed to each other, to keep you from doing the things you want to do. But if you are led by the Spirit, you are not under the law.” (Galatians 5:16–18)

Christians are told not to take the powers of the devil lightly, but also not to focus on this enemy who is determined to rule over us. The same could be said of our sinful flesh. Those who take it lightly might say, “Oh, this is just the way I am” without taking responsibility for their sinfulness. Those who focus on it too much also become ‘me-centered’ simply because Jesus Christ is not always on their minds.

I’m preaching to myself. Every now and then I feel as if God abandons me to my own devices and I quickly revert to a BC attitude. I know better. God is not the author of my sin problems. After I ‘wake up’ from a bad attitude, I am disgusted with myself and don’t want to ‘ever do that again’ — even though the experience usually makes me more dependent on God and more aware that I cannot live without Him. My attitudes of the flesh are largely invisible to others, yet they put me under the control of my spiritual enemy. I can hear him laughing and need to carefully read this again:

“His divine power has granted to us all things that pertain to life and godliness, through the knowledge of him who called us to his own glory and excellence, by which he has granted to us his precious and very great promises, so that through them you may become partakers of the divine nature, having escaped from the corruption that is in the world because of sinful desire.” (2 Peter 1:3–4)

God has given me all that I need to live in a godly way through knowing Him and through His amazing promises. I have His nature and able to escape all the junk that threatens to pulls me back. Only a fool, or a great lack of faith, would cause a free person to crawl back into prison.

^^^^^^^^^

Lord Jesus, You are working to reveal Yourself in me, despite my bad habits and the slippery slopes I step on. Day by day You bless me with light. I’m grateful. The only problem with light is that is also reveals the corruption that is not yet cleansed. Keep at it. I’m willing to change, to be more like You.