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Following Christ Part 3 By John McCallum

Matthew chapter 16, coming again to our passage in verse 24, the words of Christ to his disciples then said Jesus unto his disciples if any man will come after me let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow me for whosoever will save his life shall lose it and whosoever will lose his life for my sake shall find it.
Now we have been considering these words in general terms and we have been reminding ourselves of the need to begin to follow Christ and to respond to his invitation and to understand precisely what is involved in following after the Lord Jesus Christ. He tells us why it is, that it is important. It's a matter of life and death literally and ultimately and eternally if we do follow him we shall save our life forever. If we refuse to follow him and refuse to listen then we will lose our soul, we will lose our life and our whole life in this world will have been lived ultimately in vain. We spoke last time about following after Christ and we were trying to remind ourselves of some of the aspects that we need to keep before us, the obligation to follow Christ and so on. Well, and we were also speaking a member of the barriers, not by any means exhausting this topic, but there are real
barriers to this and that's why the Lord is reminding us of the more difficult, the more
stringent side of the Christian life because there are difficulties to overcome if we're
going to follow Christ and serve the King, but we must never be so occupied with the
difficulties that we forget the encouragement. There are many great and precious promises
in the scriptures that have ever encouraged and consoled the hearts of God's people and
that is of course what the scripture is intended to do, to make us wise unto salvation through
our faith in Christ. And the Apostle Paul reminds us in Romans chapter 15 that we through
a patience and a consolation of the scriptures that we might have hoped no matter what the
experience of life may be. Well, we want this morning to come to these words and to consider
some aspects, again by no means exhaustive, I'm not trying here to explain everything
about everything that's meant in following Christ in these terms, but simply to highlight
some of the fundamental and essential things. We come, as I said this morning, to consider
the aspect of self-denial. Christ says, if any man will come after me, and this applies
to everybody, it applies to you, young and old, in all places at all times in the history
of this world, any one boy or girl who wishes or considers to become a Christian, to follow
after Christ, the Lord is saying these are the terms and the first term that he mentions
is the term of self-denial. Now, when we come to consider self-denial, we mustn't be misled
concerning what the Lord Jesus Christ means, because it would be very easily, it would
be very easy to misunderstand what he in fact is teaching and I'm sure that you have heard
sermons and I have heard sermons too on this subject of self-denial and these sermons sometimes
are very different in their interpretation as to what the Lord Jesus Christ means by
self-denial. You find very often, for example, that the emphasis is made in terms of self-denial
that we are to deny ourselves things and that the Christian life is a series of giving up
things and that, of course, is a misunderstanding and a misinterpretation of what God's word
actually says. Self-denial may indeed include giving up things, but that is not the essential
point and I want to emphasize that for a very simple reason, not only because Scripture
doesn't teach that essentially, but because you will find that every religion in the world
that has ever been invented by men, as far as I can understand these things, and you'll
find all the cults, again, the inventions of men, they all emphasize these things. The
false religions, the pagan religions teach self-denial, but they teach self-denial in
a very different way to the way that the Scriptures teach self-denial. The foreign, the pagan
religions and the cults and so on, they teach that their devotees must give up certain things,
that they must spend perhaps certain days in which they don't eat meat or they don't
drink wine or they don't do whatever it is that normally they would do. And part of the
man-made religion is always this aspect of giving up some things for a season, things
that in the normal course of life we would take and enjoy and rightly so. Now, I'm suggesting
to you that when Christ says here that we must deny ourselves, he is not asking us initially
to deny ourselves things, the good things of life. It may indeed involve giving up things.
Indeed I would go further and say it most certainly does. We are to deny ourselves the
pleasures of sin, we are to deny ourselves our ungodly lusts, and we are to deny ourselves
those innate desires of the flesh and of the mind that by nature we would fulfill.
So there is the denying of ourselves things. But that is not what the Lord Jesus Christ
means. Indeed that's not even what the text says. He says we are to deny ourselves self.
He says a man or a woman or a boy or a girl is to deny himself. Not things, but self.
I am not to reign in the throne of my life. I am not to be the master of my own destiny.
I am not simply to say no to sinful things or lawful things. I am to say no to me. And
that is what the Lord Jesus Christ means. And we want this morning to try to explore
further the essential nature, the absolutely indispensable nature of denying self self
if we are going to be followers of Christ and servants of the King. Now before we begin
to look at this in detail, I want to make another general observation. When our Lord
Jesus Christ is describing the Christian life as he describes it in these verses, he is
not describing the Christian life as a series of segments or a part. He is not saying that
self-denial is one part and then taking up the cross is another part and losing our life
is another part and following after him is another part. The Christian life is not in
the scriptures constructed as something that is to be understood as a series of bits and
pieces. It is a harmonious organic whole and these things that our Lord Jesus Christ is
emphasizing here are simply different ways of looking at the same thing. Self-denial
is simply another way of looking at taking up the cross. Following Christ is simply another
way of looking at self-denial. Saving, losing our life for Christ is simply another way
of looking at following him, denying self self and taking up the cross. The Christian
life is an organic, it is a harmonious thing. It is a oneness of life in the Spirit and
you can look at it from different aspects. It has different nuances but we must never
isolate these things and say well I have denied myself and then somehow or other refuse
to fulfil the other aspect of taking up the cross and so on. And I am emphasizing these
things because we have hearts that are terribly deceitful and there may be areas in our life
where we are as it were denying ourselves and yet we have no interest and no ambition
whatever to take up the cross and to follow him. It may be that in certain areas we imagine
that we are following after Christ and yet really and in the depths of our being we are
not denying ourselves. We are not putting self in the place of a servant and putting
Christ as the King of our lives. And so I am emphasizing that because as we shall see
in a moment this, what Christ is emphasizing here is really the very heart. He is explaining
to us what it means to be a Christian and what it means indeed to serve the King. Well
as I say we are dealing with the subject of denying self. Now there are many things we
could say about this. I want to emphasize only three and they are I think fundamental
but they are not the whole picture. And the first thing I want to emphasize about self-denial
in the terms in which we are going to understand it and in which the scripture speaks about
it. The first thing I want to say is that self-denial is absolutely basic to Christian
faith. And what I mean by that is I mean you cannot exercise Christian faith without experiencing
at the same time and from the same moment this virtue of self-denial. Now what do I
mean by that? And why am I emphasizing the Christian faith? I am emphasizing Christian
faith because there are different kinds of faith that have to do with the Lord Jesus
Christ. The theologians of the past and the better ones of the present who have studied
these things they are very aware of biblical teaching and they are aware also of the condition
of the human heart and how we would embrace a kind of Christianity that is not really
the Christianity of the Bible. And these theologians they speak of faith in this particular way.
They remind us that there is such a thing as what they call historical faith. And historical
faith basically is that there are people in the world and they believe the facts of
the gospel. They believe that Jesus Christ lived. They believe that he died. They believe
that he rose again. Strange to say. They believe the history and they have no question in their
mind whatsoever that what the Bible says about the Lord Jesus Christ and indeed about the
creation and the exodus out of Egypt and so on. That all these things are historically
and literally true. They believe that in the beginning God created the heavens and the
earth and they believe the Bible. And they have that kind of faith. They accept without
argument that these things are true. But yet that does not mean that they who believe these
things are actually following after Christ. It doesn't mean that they are denying themselves.
And it doesn't mean that they are taking up the cross daily. In other words one can
believe the facts of the Christian message and still not be a Christian. Because it is
possible to have this kind of historical faith which is perfectly possible to the natural
mind. All you have to do is hear the message or read the message and when we read the Bible
we are reading the oldest history book in the world as far as I know. And we accept
that what it says is literally what took place as it is recorded in the pages of scripture.
And yet not be converted. The natural man can believe many things. Many things that
are true. And many things that are necessary to be believed and yet not be a Christian.
And we must be very clear therefore that when we are thinking of Christian faith or saving
faith we are speaking of something that has to do with spirituality and newness of life
and rebirth and the renewing of the mind and so on. So what I'm saying is that this self
denial is something that is concomitant with saving faith as opposed to temporal faith.
And then the theologians also tell us that there is another kind of faith that they call
a temporal faith. And that is where you have an individual who not only believes the message
but he comes forward perhaps or she comes forward for church membership and they are
interviewed by the elders of the church and they give the correct answer to the questions
that are put to them and their life is not a disgrace to the profession that they make
and they are received into membership. And then perhaps sooner or later you will begin
to observe that something is just not right. They are not growing in grace and in the knowledge
of the Lord. They are not all that attentive to the preaching of the Word and to the attendance
and the gathering of the saints. And you find that in their private life and in their domestic
life there are things that are a direct contradiction to the teaching of God's Word. And you will
find eventually that this kind of declension will become more and more evident and soon
they will no longer be attending the worship services and not even pretending to be identified
with the cause of Christ in the world. Now what has happened? Well what has happened
is that these people have never been converted. They have never been born again. They have
imbibed a certain kind of conviction. They have tasted perhaps to a greater or lesser
degree of the heavenly gift. They have had a kind of enlightenment. Their conscience
has been stirring them. They have sought, they have seen the glory of Christ and they
have perhaps innocently imagined that they had embraced Christ but they have found that
the Christian life cannot be lived no matter how hard they try. They cannot do what Christians
automatically and instinctively do because they have a kind of faith that is a temporary
phase in their life. They have undergone a religious phase, a religious mood but it doesn't
last. And you will find if you examine closely the life of such individuals, you will find
that they have never experienced, never even begun to experience what our Lord Jesus Christ
is emphasizing here as self-denial. They still do things their way. They still pursue their
own ambitions even as members of the church. They are not in the depths of their hearts
submissive to the authority of the Lord Jesus Christ. They are still in the words of Isaiah
the prophet amongst those who have gone astray. We have all sinned. What is sin in the scripture?
It is that we have each one, we are all like sheep. We have gone astray. Each one of us
has gone to his own way and each one of us has his own way. It's all different. No two
sinners live the same way but each sinner does what is pleasing to himself and he does
what is right in his own eyes even when it comes to the things of the Lord. He is relying
upon his own understanding and it doesn't seem good to him at times to attend the prayer
meeting of the church. He sees no need for it. He has no appetite for it. He is not one
who has ever learned and only the Spirit can teach us this. He has never learned to say
no to self and to say yes and amen to the Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ. And so I am
emphasizing this. I am saying this, that when we exercise Christian faith, we are not simply
exercising belief. Christian faith is spoken of in the scriptures as much, much more than
simply believing. There is more to believing than believing. There is doing, there is trusting,
there is loving. In the scripture faith is illustrated as a kind of hearing. It is illustrated
as a kind of knowledge. Christian faith is a kind of knowledge. It is a kind of wisdom.
It is a kind of understanding. It is a kind of seeing. We look to him. We are to look
unto Jesus. We see the things that are unseen. It is not simply a matter of believing the
facts of the gospel. Now I think that is something that is absolutely fundamental that we understand
that. Because the Lord Jesus Christ speaks and he warns his church of the danger of misleading
ourselves as well as misleading the church concerning a profession of faith. For we are
sincere in that profession. But in reality we are living our life the way that we please.
And we are not living our life the way that he desires and indeed commands us to live
our life. And I emphasize that because you remember how in the seventh chapter of the
Gospel of Matthew, towards the end of the Sermon on the Mount, from verse 21 onwards,
the Lord Jesus Christ as he concludes his sermon, he begins to apply the sermon. And
he reminds us that in that day, the day of judgment, the day when we shall all see him
and we shall all hear him and we shall all give an account unto him. On that day he says
many are going to say to me Lord, Lord. Now these people perhaps were immaculate in their
theology. If you were to ask them who is the Lord they would say Jesus is the Lord. And
if you were to say to them who is the Lord they would say Jesus. And the Lord is Jesus
and Jesus is the Lord. And furthermore many of them had done many mighty things in his
names. They performed miracles some of them or so they imagined. And yet his response
to them is depart from me ye cursed, ye evil workers. I never knew you. And furthermore
he is telling them you never knew me. And in all this confession of faith and in all
the mighty things that they were enabled to do in the world, they never once, not for
one moment ever, did they come to the knowledge of the Lord Jesus Christ. He never knew them
and they never knew him. Now the Lord is saying this isn't just going to be the experience
of a few. One here and one there. The odd one out. He says there are going to be many
and there are probably many in every congregation. And there are probably many or some in every
Christian age. It is a real danger that he's pointing out. And he is emphasizing in that
very passage that knowing him and confessing him has to do with doing what he says. Not
being evil workers but being those who do that which is good in his eyes. And we do
it consciously and deliberately because our faith must work by love. Now I say that self-denial
therefore is simply another aspect of believing in the Lord Jesus Christ. It's not simply
an intellectual thing, this Christian faith. And I feel that we in the Reformed tradition
and we pride ourselves in our Biblical knowledge and the books that we read and that is all
of the good. But there's a danger you see of intellectualizing the faith. And there's
a tremendous danger I think in urging in many Reformed circles where it's a matter of
doctrine and that's the important thing. Now doctrine is important. It's the foundation
of everything. It's the scaffolding upon which we build our practicalities in the Christian
life and by which we test our works and so on. But doctrine is not everything. We can
know a great deal and yet do nothing in the cause of the Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ.
There must be this element of self-denial. Now I want to explain what I mean now. We're
still dealing with this but it's fundamental and basic to saving Christian faith, self-denial.
What I mean is this. When we embrace the Christian faith, we are embracing of course Christ.
Because Christ is the centre and to have a Christian faith is to have Christ. We receive
Christ by faith. But when we receive Christ by faith there are two things essentially
that we must remember about the Lord Jesus Christ. And these two things are first of
all His glory and His grace. The glory of God and the grace of God. John puts it in
the first chapter of his Gospel. The Word became flesh and dwelt among us and we beheld
His glory. The glory as of the only begotten of the Father, full of grace and full of truth.
The law was given by Moses but grace and truth came by Jesus Christ. Now why am I emphasising?
I'm emphasising it because in that first chapter of John's Gospel the apostle is reminding
us of the true deity of our Lord Jesus Christ. He is the one through whom the walls were
made and without Him there was not anything made that was made. Everything was made by
Him who is God. And this one who made everything He became flesh. So here we have the glory
of God and here we have the grace of God combined in the Passion and the Incarnation of our
Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ. And that means you see that to be a Christian we must believe
in the deity of Christ. Now I know that this is a, time flies away. I'm going to have to
finish soon too. One of the great things in our day is that we must recognise the cults
for what they are. And the cults can embrace a great deal of the truth but you will find
all the cults they either emphasise one heresy or the other. And the Christian church has
always been plagued with two extremes in terms of heresy. Right from the early centuries
right up to this present century it's been the same. You will find that false teaching
either emphasises the humanity of Christ at the expense of His Godhood and His deity or
you will find that they emphasise His deity at the expense of His humanity. Now we are
living in a generation where liberals and the cults alike, they emphasise the humanity
of Christ and they say we have the man Jesus and yes we do have the man Jesus but we also
have the God man. Not half man and not half God, that's pagan. The Christian doctrine
of Christ is that He is completely God and that He is completely man. Two natures, one
person forever as the Creed and the Catechism put it for us. Now what I'm saying is this,
that when we believe in the Lord Jesus Christ as my Lord and my God that leaves no place
in my life to be the God of my own life or to be the Lord of my life. The moment I understand
who Jesus Christ is and the moment that I understand what He has done for me that immediately
dissolves any claim that I may imagine to have, that I may imagine I have to be the
master of my own destiny and I must recognise that my place before Him who is God and who
is gracious and the saviour is not to rule my own life because that is a denial of His
God's right claims upon my life and my life now must be in submission and I do not do
things my way and I do not have my own ambitions at heart and my own priorities and my own
goals in life but they must be His. I must die to me and I can never be a Christian without
that faith in Christ that receives Him as God and as the man Christ Jesus the Saviour
and in receiving Him in the way that He has presented to us in the Gospel I die to self,
I cannot live to self if I embrace the One who is the God-man and the Lord of my life
and that means you see that I must die to my own self-righteousness. The unconverted
man doesn't understand what sin is. He thinks that sin is sins and sins are simply the manifestation
of sin. The Bible speaks of sins in the plural and in the multiplicity but it also speaks
of sin out of which sins flow and the sinner always imagines sin in terms of sins and because
the sinner doesn't do certain things, he doesn't get drunk, he doesn't beat up his wife or
he doesn't swear, he doesn't do all kinds of sins, he doesn't tell lies, he doesn't
commit murder, he imagines that he's not a sinner because he doesn't do sins but I'm
suggesting to you that sin is far more dangerous than sins in the same way that an inner disease
is far more deadly and persistent than the outward perhaps minor symptoms of the disease
and the moment that I see that Christ is the Saviour, I see myself as one who must be saved
by Christ or I'm never going to be saved because there is nothing in me that can commend
me to God. The unconverted man before his conversion to Christ is a man who claims to
have some goodness, some reason why God should deal with him in grace and in mercy. Self-righteousness
is inherent in us, it's endemic, it's part of our nature. We imagine that God is unjust
to condemn us because we've never done our neighbour any harm, that kind of argument,
we all know of it but the moment that we believe in the Lord Jesus Christ we recognise that
we are undone without him and that God is just to condemn us and we deserve to die not
because we've done sins but because of what we are. You see one of the great problems
of our repentance is so often that we repent over sins, the things that we do and we so
very, very seldom repent because of what we are. The sinner who comes to Christ in true
repentance doesn't just repent of outward sins and isolated deeds, he repents because
of what he is. God be merciful to me, the sinner, I am the sinner and that confession
you remember was made by a man who even if no one else was a sinner in the world he knew
that he was the sinner and he was repenting and confessing what he was rather than the
things that he did and that is an aspect where I say self-denial is fundamental to believing
in the Lord Jesus Christ. If he is the Lord who has come into the world to save me from
my sins and from my sin it means I must die to my self-direction. If I'm going to be led
into heaven I must listen to what he says and I must do what he says. It means that
I die to my self-sufficiency. Remember Paul, right into the Corinthians, who is sufficient
for these things and we often leave the text at that but the Apostle Paul doesn't leave
the text. Who is sufficient for these things? We are sufficient for these things, but our
sufficiency is of God. We are sufficient, but our sufficiency is not in ourselves but
in God. We die to self-sufficiency. We die to self-direction, self-merit and self-direction.
It all goes, I go, the old me must die. I am crucified with Christ, said the Apostle.
I died with Christ and the life that I now live in the flesh, I live by the faith in
the Son of God who loved me and who gave himself. I live nevertheless yet not I but Christ who
liveth in me. You know these texts. Now I'm going to have to press on. That's the first
emphasis I want to make. Self-denial, denying me, me, myself is what the Lord Jesus Christ
means and we cannot follow him, we cannot serve him ever, ever until we first of all
die to me. The second thing I want to emphasize is this, that self-denial is also basic to
service. It's a matter really of why we live and what we do in this world. Follow me, he
says. Serve me, serve me in this way. And really it's a matter of our outlook, our mental
horizon and the perception and the priority of what we regard as important and desirable
in life. The sinner regards himself as important and the self-gratification. There are two
ways to live in this world and Peter tells us about them. He says for the Christian we
must no longer live to the lusts of men. We must now live to the will of God and there
are only these two options and every one of us is living in either one or the other of
these two ways of life. I either live according to my lusts and do things my way and fulfill
the lusts of my flesh and of my mind. That's the natural man and I may be a professing
Christian and still be fulfilling the lusts of the flesh and of the mind. I may be preaching
the gospel accurately to you and still be one who is not dying to self and still fulfilling
the lusts of the flesh and of the mind. We are so deceitful the mark of the Christian
is that he lives according to the will of God. That's the mark. If we love him we keep
his commandments and furthermore we desire to do so because to die to self means not
only that we say yes to Christ but it means that we say it gladly. We don't want the praise
of men. We want the praise of God. We don't want to be glorified by men. We want ultimately
to be glorified by God. We don't want to see the world smiling at us. We want to see God's
smile and not his frown on that day when he will judge the world in righteousness.
We desire not our own glory. We desire to do all things to the glory of God. Let your
light so shine that men may see your good works and what's the outcome? What's the ambition
of our light shining? It is that they may glorify your Father which is in heaven. When
the Apostle Paul reminds the Corinthians that they are to do all things to the glory of
God. Eating and drinking the most basic and essential biological functions due to God's
glory. He does so not as a teacher standing aloof and giving commands and no intention
to do those things himself. No. Be ye followers of me as I also am of Christ. He was an example
for us to follow. He mortified his body lest after preaching to others he himself should
be a castaway. He was a man who learned this great secret of self-denial and that's why
I was reading in Philippians chapter 3. Because in that chapter the Apostle tells us of what
it was like for him before he became a Christian. He was a true born Hebrew. Both his mother
and his father were true blooded Jews of the tribe of Benjamin. The most Jewish of
all the tribes perhaps even more than the tribe Judah according to some of the Jewish
commentators themselves. And the Apostle had a place and he had a position in the religious
and ecclesiastical structures of his national religion and he was a living light in that
religion. A young man, the up and coming young man advancing in the Jewish religion as a
young man beyond many who were years older than himself. He tells us that. The up and
coming, the bright young thing. And then he was converted to Christ and it all became
as dung in his eyes. Because he saw reality and the reality for him was this that Jesus
whom he was persecuting was Lord. Who art thou, Lord? Paul, Saul of Tarsus on the road
to Damascus. He knew that what he was seeing and hearing was what is called a theophany.
He knew that this was a divine manifestation. Who are you? I am Jesus whom you are persecuting.
And at that moment, the moment of truth came for the Apostle or Saul of Tarsus and he became
a dead man. And in another sense he became a living man. For the first time in his life
he began to pray and he began to worship God and he began to serve in spirit and in truth.
And he died to self. And he tells us in Philippians chapter three, those things which were gain
to me, those I counted loss for Christ. Yea, and I count all things loss. Whatever this
world has to offer in terms of family connection, privilege in the religious structures, the
place and the honour of being a leader amongst the professed people of God. All of it is
done, he said, because I come now to desire to know Christ and to know the excellency,
the surpassing. The word in the Greek is a word that means the surpassing. It overcomes
and is better than everything. To know Christ is better than to be the master of my own
little life, religious or irreligious. That's the point, you see. And at that moment the
Apostle Paul began to enter into this life of self-denial. Lord, what wilt thou have
me to do? What do you want me to do? His heart is broken. And if you are a converted Christian,
I tell you there has come, I'm not saying that you've had a Damascus road experience,
but I tell you this, you have had a moment of truth. And in that moment of truth you've
felt a pain in your heart and you have longed, as every Christian has longed in the death
pangs, you have longed to own Christ and to love him more and more. And the lack of love
and the lack of faith that we have is a pain to us and a burden to us. And the, oh wretched
man that I am is the cry of every Christian soul. Because we would long to be other than
what we are in our life of sin. Because, you see, we've died to self because we know
that in us there is not only no righteousness before God, but we are ashamed of ourselves.
And there are things in my heart that I would be ashamed to tell you because my heart is
like yours, it's a cesspit of iniquity. And every evil corruption is ready to break out.
And we die once and for all because the moment of truth has come. And we can no longer be
the proud, self-centred individuals wandering around in our own little world of make-believe,
sinful autonomy. That once we live following the course of this one, it is essential that
if we're going to serve the King, we have the mind of a servant. That we have a servile
mentality. And the supreme example of that is our blessed Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ
himself, Philippians chapter 2. I could have read that chapter, in fact I was tempted so
to do at our reading. Let this mind be in you. What mind? The mind of a servant. He
being in the form of God, he thought it not robbery to be equal with God, made himself
of no reputation. You know the passage, Philippians chapter 2 from verse 5. Christ is the supreme
example. Take the mind of Christ because he said, not my will be done, but thy will be
done. In a great agony of affliction. Thy will, not mine. He was dying you see, to self.
And now Lord Jesus Christ came into the world as a slave and as a servant. To do thy will
I take the light. O thou my God at heart, that is supremely said of Christ. The third,
I must press on because there is something else I want to emphasise in this area of self-denial.
Denying me, my little kingdom of me, me and mine. Where my little world revolves about
my interests and my ease and my profit and my honour and my good reputation and my self-aggrandisement
and my life of complacency, my life of sinful contentment. It must all go if I'm going to
follow after Christ. The third thing I want to emphasise this afternoon, and I'll need
to be very brief, is this. Self-denial is not only fundamental to the exercising of
Christian faith. We can't have faith without it. It's not only fundamental to the exercise
of Christian self. We can, we will never serve Christ without it. We might say we are. If
I'm not a Christian, and if I'm preaching to you, I may preach to you my heart out but
I'll tell you this, I'm preaching for a stipend if I'm not a Christian. I'm preaching for
a place. I'm preaching for prestige. I'm not preaching for Christ if I'm not a Christian.
And it's the same with all of us. We may be in the church, leaders, administrators, decision-makers
but it's all for self. Not what can I do for the glory of God but what can I do for the
glory of me and of mine. That's the wickedness of our heart, you see. And that's the glorious
grace of God that so changes us that we see things as we are. We see him as he is. And
we see ourselves as we are. And it makes all the difference for time and for eternity when
the moment of truth comes. The third thing this afternoon is this. Self-denial is fundamental
to the life of sanctification. And by the life of sanctification, I don't mean just
that growth in grace and in the knowledge of the Lord that is part of the Christian
life in this world. I mean the life of sanctification that never ends, that goes on into eternity
because what is glorification? It is sanctification consummated. That is the purpose why in this
world we begin to be made holy because when life is done and when all that we have been
called upon to do as Christians in this world has been done, we are received into glory
and there is no more sin there, there's no more self there. The Lamb has all the glory
in Immanuel's land as was put so long ago. And it's an interesting thing how often in
the scriptures, indeed in every instance as far as I know, when there is a vision of heaven
opened, in every single instance you find worship of the creature towards the Creator.
And in the book of Revelation you have visions there of the redeemed people of God and they're
all not looking to themselves of what they did, they're looking to Him, to what He did.
Every eye is upon Jesus, they worship the Lamb. Worthy is the Lamb who was slain. Who
is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven? Jesus Christ is the greatest in the kingdom
of heaven. That's the answer to that. But I say that this self-denial is essential for
that life of sanctification and there are many ways we could work this out. I just want
to emphasize a couple before I close. Think of the life of a sinner who lives in sin and
I'm speaking to young people here especially because I want to see you seek the Lord in
the days of your youth before the evil day comes. Because I tell you this, if you are
not converted as a young person, if you're never converted, you may if God spares you
live to old age, you might not. But if you do you will have a miserable old age and there
will be an evil day coming in which you will have no pleasure in them. I visit enough in
old folks' homes and some of us do and it's a real tragedy to go into some of these old
folks' homes because these people, these old men and these old women, they were once beautiful
young women. They were once handsome young men and the vigour of their young manhood.
They were once young, they were just like we were once upon a time and now they're old
and the evil day has come and they've neglected the day of salvation and they once set out
in life's journey and they thought that the world was there for the asking and all the
potential that this world could be given, that this world could give to them. They were
willing to embrace it all and without Christ and the broad road that seemed to be so broad
in which you could do as you pleased and sin with impunity, it has narrowed down to death
and all they're doing now is waiting to die. The life that is broad, you see, that seems
so pleasing and so tolerant, it becomes narrower and narrower until your only choice at the
last is to submit to die and take the life of the saint, the holy life that is in Christ,
the narrow way. You enter in at the narrow gate, he says, and the gate is narrow. You
can't believe just anything, you can't do just anything. We are limited in this narrow
way to what Christ teaches and what Christ requires. It's narrow and we begin to walk
the Christian life, we find it's still narrow but we find that in a sense it's broadening
up and it's not so narrow as it once seemed and we find that our life is filled with good
things because we're looking not to our self-interest but our eyes are fixed on something better
than ourselves and the end of the narrow way comes and it broadens up into the vast vistas
of eternal life. You see, the narrow way is in reality the broad way, the good way, not
broad in the sense of sinful but broadening out into the life that is everlasting and
that is life indeed. And the Christian learns that, something of that even in this world
because we're made, you see, to serve God. That's why we exist. God made us with an instinct
and Augustine put it so well so long ago, thou hast made us for thyself and our souls
are restless until they find their rest in thee. You look at a typical selfish sinful
person and I tell you this, they're miserable and as they get older they become more miserable
because they're tied up, you see, and locked into something for which they were never created.
The life of the Christian dying to self and living unto him is the life in which we find
our soul set free and we find that it leads to everlasting life, happiness and the worship
of God. That is what we are meant to do and that is what we are meant to be and that is
why the Lord Jesus Christ says we must die to self and live unto him who died for us
and who rose again. That's the way to save our life, you see. If you would cling to the
life of sin and self, you're going to lose your real life. If you will die to that life
of sin and self, you will find it and you will find that there are blessings manifold
and great and precious promises which will never ever be revoked. Our faith will never
be put to shame. Now I better stop at that point but may God help us all to be those
who understand that in serving him we must cease to serve ourselves and put him first
and all will be well with our soul. May God bless his word.