7/29/2022 • Desk of Dennis Piller
Sin is a grave that is never satisfied!
As mature believers, we are assuredly freed from the current condemning power of sin, but we must make it our business every day of our lives to kill the indwelling power of sin. So the apostle said in Colossians 3:5 “mortify therefore your members while on the earth”… who is he speaking to? Those that are risen in Christ! in Vs. 1 such as we are dead with him in Vs 3: those who would appear with him in glory. Vs 4; That is you and me!
Mortify is such an ancient term. Who uses that today? I typed it in and my dictionary wanted to change it to modify. (Go figure.) Who says that? But my question for you is… do you? Do you make it your daily work; to always be at it, while you live; Are you someone who cannot miss one day from this vigilance?; because being dead with Christ is literally just being quickened in him… and he will not excuse us from this work. If that is you and I…we have a problem. We may know about these truths or heard them at some point, but are still failing miserably due to the lack of intentionality
and spiritual focus that it requires.
Our Savior tells us how his father deals with every branch that bears fruit. Yes, every true and living branch. He purges it that it/WE may bring forth more fruit. John 15:2 and that is not just for a day or two or on Sundays… but it will always be that way… until there are no more branches in this world. The apostle tells us what his practice was in; 1st Corinthians 9:27 “I do this daily… He says it is the work of his life! And if this was the work and business of Paul, who was so incomparably exalted in grace, light, revelations, enjoyment, and privileges, above the ordinary measure of believers, why might we be gifted an exception from this work and duty while we’re in this world?
Indwelling sin will always abide as long as we are in this world and therefore will always need to be mortified or killed. But there are the vain and foolish and ignorant among us who talk about achieving the perfect keeping with the commands of God and being holy and perfectly dead to sin…”I have grown so I rarely ever sin…but their thoughts are delusional and do not speak what the Scriptures teach.
As for us, who dare not think more highly of ourselves than we ought, or dare to think that we are wiser than what is written, we say that indwelling sin lives in us with some measure and degree while we’re in this world. We dare not speak as though we have already obtained or we’re already perfect.
Philippians 3:12 says “our inward man is to be renewed day by day.
2 Corinthians 4:16 says according to the renovation of the new man, there are still breaches and decays of the old.
1st Corinthians 13:12 says we know but In part. We have this remaining darkness that is gradually removed by our growth in the knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ”
2 Peter 3:18. The flesh lusts against the spirit, so that we cannot do the things that we would, and are therefore defective in our obedience as well as in our light”
Galatians 5:17; 1 John 1:8. We have a “body of death”.
Romans 7:24 from where we are not delivered but by the death of our bodies”
Philippians 3:21. So it is our duty to mortify, to be killing sin, and while it is in us, we must be at that work. When one is appointed to kill an enemy. If he does not finish the work, then he has only done half the work. Galatians 6:9; Hebrews 12:2; 2 Corinthians 7: 1.
Bottom line: Sin doesn’t just hide in us, but is still acting, still laboring to bring forth the deeds of the flesh. When sin lets us alone, we may let sin alone:
But as sin is never less quiet than when it seems to be most quiet, and its waters are for the most part deep when they are still…
so shouldn’t our attention and sensitivity in the spirit against it be vigorous at all times, in all conditions, even when there is the least suspicion? There is an old saying…keep your friends close but your enemies closer. Never take your eye off them…Your spiritual eye…your discerning eye…so you can see what God sees…So we can mature in the things of God because sin is a grave that is never satisfied.
Our flesh must die, so Christ may live in us!
United Ocean (Where feet may fail)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-XPKrM1Fstg
Excerpts are taken from John Owens's book. The Mortification of Sin.
