14 The Spiritual Man
and into what we lead them—from whence to where. If we help
people, negatively, not to sin and, positively, to be zealous; will that
be all the Lord wants us to do? Or is there perhaps something
deeper? I personally feel the Bible has given a most definite
judgment. God’s purpose is that His children are to be delivered
wholly from the old creation and are to enter fully into the new
creation. No matter how the old creation may appear to man, it is
utterly condemned by God. If we workers know what ought to be
destroyed and what ought to be built, then we are not the blind
leading the blind.
New birth—receiving God’s own life—is the starting point of all
spiritual life. How useless it is if the end result of all our exhortation,
persuasion, argument, explanation and study is but to induce some
understanding in the mind, some determination in the will, some
feeling in the emotion. It has not assisted people to receive God’s life
into their spirit. But if we who are responsible for preaching the
gospel truly perceive that unless people receive God’s life into the
depths of their beings we have not done anything profitable, then
what a drastic reformation will there be in our work! Indeed, such
knowledge will bring us to the realization that many who do profess
to believe in the Lord Jesus have never actually done so. Tears,
penitence, reform, zeal and labor: these are not the hallmarks of a
Christian. Happy are we if we know that our responsibility is to bring
man to receive God’s uncreated life.
As I recall how the enemy has tried to hinder me from learning the
truths written in the last volume, I cannot but be apprehensive that
some, though possessing the book, will be hindered by Satan from
reading it; or if they do read it, will be made to soon forget it.
Therefore let me warn my readers: you should ask God to keep Satan
from preventing your reading it. Pray as you read; turn what you read
into prayer. Pray that God will cover you with the helmet of salvation
lest you forget what you read or simply fill your mind with
innumerable theories.