Blessed Hope Bible-Presbyterian Church
500 Upper Bukit Timah Rd, Singapore 678106
To be living victoriously in holiness is to be alive unto God. By a command to spiritual vigilance and habitual holiness, the Apostle Paul described this as the delightful new life in Christ. This ought to be the Christian’s life lived in appreciation of the beauty of holiness. This is God’s will for you. You are to be dead indeed unto sin. Sin must not have a strangle hold upon your life, but you are overcoming sin as a personal holiness habit.
The Christian life may be symbolized by a dot and a line that stretches to infinity. There was a point in time when he repented of his sins and received Jesus Christ as Lord and Saviour. This is the dot. A one-time event whereby spiritual life began. This life that began has no end point. It is eternal.
The Christian is “dead with Christ” in that Christ died to bear the punishment of sin on his behalf. The Apostle Paul explains that faith appropriates for the Christian spiritual strength not only through the death of Christ but more so through the resurrection life of Christ. Three days after Christ died, He rose from the dead. Christ died no more thereafter. He appeared to His disciples while He was upon earth for 40 days before He was taken bodily to heaven where He sat down on the right hand of the Father to live forevermore. Death has no more dominion over Him. He conquered death.
Matthew 26:1-13 And it came to pass, when Jesus had finished all these sayings, he said unto his disciples, 2 Ye know that after two days is the feast of the passover, and the Son of man is betrayed to be crucified. 3 Then assembled together the chief priests, and the scribes, and the elders of the people, unto the palace of the high priest, who was called Caiaphas, 4 And consulted that they might take Jesus by subtilty, and kill him. 5 But they said, Not on the feast day, lest there be an uproar among the people. 6 Now when Jesus was in Bethany, in the house of Simon the leper, 7 There came unto him a woman having an alabaster box of very precious ointment, and poured it on his head, as he sat at meat.
Praise God, from whom all blessings flow: Praise Him, all creatures here below; Praise Him above, ye heavenly host, praise Father, Son and Holy Ghost. Amen.
The “old man” refers to our previous unregenerate, godless behaviour. With no understanding of God, no fear of God, no true moral standard, we can choose to do what we want. We were sold to sin. Till God intervened in our lives to show us there is a living and true God who is our heavenly Father. God sent His Son to redeem us back to Him.
Steps For Effectual Prayer
James 5:16 “Confess your faults one to another, and pray one for another, that ye may be healed. The effectual fervent prayer of a righteous man availeth much.”
(1) Confession and Reconciliation (v16a)
(2) Prayer Restores (v16b)
(3) Burdens Lifted (v16c)
(4) More Prayer, More Power (v16d)
The late Rev Dr Timothy Tow said, “United Prayer is like burning charcoal, more prayer, more power, less prayer, less power”.
Born again Christians are no longer under the bondage of sin because the old nature is crucified with Christ on the cross at Calvary. They have the power to say “no” to sin. The reason, the Apostle Paul expressed, is that we been united together with Christ in both His death and resurrection. He is helping us to understand the nature of Christian conversion. There is a complete change.
The Christian ought to be vibrant and filled with the vitality of godliness for he is walking in newness of life. And yet, it can be observed, many in the church today lose their first love and are no longer making progress spiritually. The Apostle Paul is writing to address this by helping Christians understand the great work wrought for their salvation through Jesus Christ. It is such a sad plight in the church scene. He would be addressing the heinous entanglement of sin in the believer’s life.
The Apostle Paul reasoned with us that we should not continue in sin, like a dog going back to its own vomit. Our life as a Christian, forward-looking, must not be still plagued with the ravages of sin. Just because we receive the pardon from sin by God’s grace does not mean that we should delight in sin since pardon is forthcoming each time. The Christian life ought to understand the blessing of living in the beauty of holiness. The sinning Christian is a misnomer because he is not making spiritual progress. Borrowing the Malay word “Hentak Kaki” in marching drills meaning “marching on the spot” to help us see the sad plight of the Christian making no spiritual progress, still being entangled with sin.