We have over-emphasized the psychology of the sinner’s condition. We spend much time describing the woe of the sinner, the grief of the sinner, and the great burden he carries. He does have all of these, but we have over-emphasized them until we forget the principal fact—that the sinner is actually a rebel against properly constituted authority!

That is what makes sin, sin. We are rebels. We are sons of disobedience. Sin is the breaking of the law, and we are in rebellion and we are fugitives from the just laws of God while we are sinners.

By way of illustration, sup­pose a man escapes from prison. Certainly he will have grief. He is going to be in pain after bumping logs and stones and fences as he crawls and hides away in the dark. He is going to be hungry and cold and weary. His beard will grow long, and he will be tired and cramped and cold—all of these will happen, but they are incidental to the fact that he is a fugitive from justice and a rebel against law.

So it is with sinners. Certainly they are heartbroken, and they carry a heavy load. The Bible takes full account of these things; but they are incidental to the fact that the reason the sinner is what he is, is because he has rebelled against the laws of God, and he is a fugitive from divine judgment.

It is that which constitutes the nature of sin—not the fact that he carries a heavy load of misery and sadness and guilt. These things constitute only the outcropping of the sinful nature, but the root of sin is rebellion against God. Does not the sinner say: “I belong to myself—I owe allegiance to no one unless I choose to give it!” That is the essence of sin.

But thankfully, salvation reverses that and restores the former relationship so that the first thing the returning sinner does is to confess: “Father, I have sinned against heaven and against you. I am no longer worthy to be called your son; make me like one of your hired men” (Luke 15:18-19).

Thus, in repentance, we reverse that relationship, and we fully submit to the Word of God and the will of God, as obedi­ent children.

We have no basis to believe that we can come casually and sprightly to the Lord Jesus and say, “I have come for some help, Lord Jesus. I understand that you are the Savior, so I am going to be­lieve and be saved, and then I am going to turn away and think about the other matters of lordship and allegiance and obedience at some time in the future.”

I warn you, you will not get help from Him in that way, for the Lord will not save those whom He cannot command!

He will not divide His offices. You cannot believe on a half-Christ. We take Him for what He is—the anointed Savior and Lord who is King of kings and Lord of lords! He would not be who He is if He saved us and called us and chose us without the understanding that He can also guide and control our lives.

Brethren, I believe in the deeper Christian life and experi­ence—oh yes! But I believe we are mistaken when we try to add the deeper life to an imperfect salvation, obtained imperfectly by an imperfect concept of the whole thing.

Under the working of the Spirit of God through such men as Finney and Wesley*, no one would ever dare to rise in a meeting and say “I am a Christian” if he had not surren­dered his whole being to God and taken Jesus Christ as his Lord. It was only then that he could say, “I am saved!”

Today, we let them say they are saved no matter how imper­fect and incomplete the transaction, with the proviso that the deeper Christian life can be tacked on at some time in the future.

Can it be that we really think we do not owe Jesus Christ our obedience? We have owed Him obedience ever since the second we cried out to Him for salvation, and if we do not give Him that obedience, I have reason to wonder if we are really converted!

I see things and I hear of things that Christian people are doing. As I watch them operate within the profession of Christianity, I do raise the question of whether they have indeed been truly converted.

Brethren, I believe it is the result of faulty teaching to begin with. They thought of the Lord as a hospital and Jesus as chief of staff to fix up poor sinners that had gotten into trouble!

“Fix me up, Lord,” they have insisted, “so that I can go on my own way!”

That is bad teaching, Brethren. It is filled with self-deception. Let us look to Jesus our Lord, high, holy, wearing the crowns, Lord of lords and King of all, having a perfect right to com­mand full obedience from all of His saved people!

 

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*Charles Finney and John Wesley were two revivalists who preached during America’s Great Awakenings in the 1700s and 1800s