Sixteen Truths That I Have Learnt - Part 2 — Zac Poonen

Truths Five and Six: Holiness Comes by Looking to Jesus

In our first session, we considered four truths that I've learned through my life. Number one, God loves Jesus' disciples as much as He loved Jesus. And I want to mention a word about John 17, 23, which I quoted then.

I said that that was only for the disciples of Jesus and not for the whole world. John 3, 16 is for the whole world. And I'll tell you why, because John 17, 23 is in the middle of the Lord's prayer for His disciples.

And He said in John 17 and verse 9, I ask on their behalf, I do not ask on behalf of the world. He was saying this prayer is not for the whole world. This prayer is only for my disciples who forsook everything to follow me.

And they have stood by me all these years, they've given up everything to be my disciples. So I know, Father, you will love them, who these 11, as much as you love me. Not all the others in Israel, but in the footsteps of those 11 are many today who have also decided to be wholehearted disciples of Christ at any cost.

So this verse applies for them. It's not for the rest of the world. The second thing he said was God delights in honesty. And the third was God delights in cheerful givers. And the fourth was, we must treat every human being with dignity.

Now we go to number five, holiness comes by looking unto Jesus. It's the Holy Spirit who makes us holy. But he can make us holy only as we look unto Jesus. Sometimes these chapter divisions, which are made by man in the Bible, can prevent us from seeing a glorious truth.

There are many things like that, like Romans 7 .25 with Romans 8 .1, let's read them together. Or the last verse of John 7 with the first verse of John 8. There are many verses like that. And this is one of those places.

Hebrews 11 is the great chapter of people of faith. We thought about Abel yesterday. But God, Hebrews 11 .40, with all these mighty men of faith mentioned in the Old Testament who split the Red Sea, pulled down the walls of Jericho and stopped the sun and all types of things, all those fantastic things.

It says here in verse 40, at the end of it, God has provided something better for us. Have you noticed that? Better than stopping the sun, better than pulling down the walls of Jericho, better than doing all the miracles, raising the dead like Elijah did, better than all of that.

And what is that? Chapter 12, verse 1 and 2. We can run the race, looking at Jesus, enduring the cross, verse 2, despising the shame. You mean enduring the cross is better than raising the dead? You mean enduring the cross is better than pulling down the walls of Jericho and splitting the Red Sea?

Yes, sir, it is. If you have eyes to see it, very few have seen it. Most believers think I'd rather raise the dead than take up the cross every day. I'll tell you, I would rather take up the cross every day than raise the dead any day because that is a better thing.

It says here very clearly, God has provided something better for us. And that is chapter 12, verse 1 and 2, something better than everything mentioned in Hebrews 11. So whenever you read Hebrews 11 and these fantastic things that people did, remember the last verse.

There's something better for you, that is to take up the cross and follow Jesus. And the reason is many Christians haven't understood that. OK, we'll come to that in a moment. So we are to lay aside every encumbrance, verse 1, and the sin which so easily entangles us.

It's more important to give up sin than to do all the miracles mentioned in chapter 11 and run with the race, the race looking unto Jesus, the author and perfecter of our faith. So what we learn from that is that the way to live a holy life is not just by judging ourselves and any amount of self-effort.

The maximum self-effort you make following all the rules that you hear in the church will never make you holy. It comes by looking unto Jesus. We are to live our entire life, it says, running the race, fixing our eyes on Jesus.

That's a great verse, fixing our eyes. That means there are a thousand and one things that will try to distract you from that. You don't look at Jesus. You look at the way somebody treats you or you look at some circumstance in your life that's making life difficult or you look at some shortage of money or opposition or sickness or a hundred and one things to turn our eyes away from Jesus.

That's why we have to fix it. The only way I can be holy is if I fix my eyes on Jesus and look unto him and run the race behind him. In other words, I got to see the footsteps of Jesus. I told you how some religious people whose wrong doctrine I exposed took me to court for 10 years.

I remember the first day I went to court. I had never been to court for 59 years. I never knew what it was. And naturally, it's a new experience and you feel a bit perturbed in your spirit. Now, as soon as I entered the court, God was so good to me.

Jesus said, don't be afraid. Religious people took me to court before they took you. So you're only walking in my footsteps. Didn't you want to walk in my footsteps? I said, yes, Lord. That excited me.

What a word. It liberated me completely. And he said, look for my footsteps here. I said, Lord, what are those? The footsteps of faith and love. Faith in a heavenly father who's in complete control of the circumstance right now.

And they will never allow it to go one second longer than he has planned. And second, love for your accusers and your enemies. Don't ever give up that. I said, Lord, I'm determined to go walk that way.

And the very first day I grabbed the hand of my accuser and said, God bless you. He was shocked. And I kept that attitude throughout. It's wonderful when you look unto Jesus and he says, I went through this before you.

The Bible says Jesus was tempted in all points as we are. Hebrews chapter 4 and verse 15. We don't have a high priest who cannot sympathize with our weakness. But you have a high priest who can sympathize with our weakness.

Why? Because what is our weakness? Our weakness is not physical weakness or financial weakness or intellectual weakness. Our weakness is that we sin so easily. Do you recognize that your greatest weakness is not your blood pressure or your cholesterol level or anything else like that, which you're so worried about.

It is the fact that you sin so easily. That is your greatest weakness. Not your financial hardship or the fact that you lost your job. If we can see this, my greatest weakness in my life is that I sin so easily.

In my thoughts, in my attitudes. And he can sympathize with our weakness. Why? Because he was tempted in every single point exactly as we are. 16 years of my Christian life, I never believed it. I always believed Jesus was God.

He was not like me. He overcame as God till one day God opened my eyes to see one simple truth, which is written here, that he overcame as a man. And since that day, I've always spoken about it and used the illustration of an angel with the wings trying to teach you to swim.

He flies across the swimming pool and says, follow me. And I say, dear angel, I'd love to follow you, but I don't have any wings. Get rid of your wings. Have a body like mine that's pulled down by gravity.

Then you can teach me to swim. So if Jesus lived on earth as God and says, follow me, I'll say to him, Lord, I cannot follow you. You are God. I'm a man. Take a body like me that's tempted, tempted, tempted morning till night, then overcome without sin, then I can follow you.

And the Lord says, that's exactly how I lived. I came with a body like yours. With a will like yours. Not a sinful nature like yours, because he was born of a virgin, born of the Holy Spirit. But tempted like us.

With a will like ours. But he never did his own will. See John chapter 6 and verse 38. I call this the autobiography of Jesus' life. He describes his entire life in one sentence. I came from heaven never to do my own will, but the will of my father.

Doing my own will is sin. See, our definition of sin may be dirty thoughts, telling lies, fighting with people. No, no, no, no, no. That's a very cheap definition of sin. You want to know the proper definition of sin?

Doing what you want to do. I do what I want to do. That's sin. I want to go and live here. Never mind what God tells about it. I want to do that. You say, what's wrong in going and living there? Nothing wrong.

But if that's not God's will for you, it's a sin. Let me give you an example. With the very exhausting pattern of life that Jesus had, morning till night, people coming to see him, going here, going there, early morning, going to prayer.

At the end of one year, don't you think there'd be anything wrong? There'd be anything wrong in his taking a one-week break and taking a trip to Rome just for a little sightseeing? What's wrong in that?

Sightseeing is not a sin. I've done it. You've done it. And just to relax is not a sin. Take a trip to Rome. There was enough money in the bank. And come back. Why didn't he do it? Why would it have been a sin for him to go to Rome?

Because in his father's plan for those three and a half years of his ministry, that was not included. That's all. No other reason. He would not have sinned if he had gone to Rome. He would not have lusted after anybody or taken up with any other sights or money or anything.

But he would have sinned in the sense that that was not in his father's perfect will. Now many of us don't have that understanding of sin. Because we don't look unto Jesus. So holiness comes not by avoiding certain things like glancing with my eyes, getting angry.

We hear about so many things in the church. Don't have a bitterness against anybody. Yeah, all that is good. But the top heading is doing my own will. That is sin. That's what it says in John 6 .38. I never sinned means I never did my own will.

So even a simple thing like going to Rome would have been a sin for him. Why? Because it was not in his father's will. Now very, very few Christians live like that. That's why there's a lot of sin in so many Christians.

That's why their life is so miserable. That's why so many other things enslave them. Because their definition of sin is wrong. We must have a passion in our life to do the will of God and to do that I have to deny my own will.

That is looking unto Jesus. Otherwise you know in Ephesians 4 .24 there's a word Ephesians 4 .24 a little expression called the holiness of the truth. You see the last part of verse 24? We've been made in the likeness of God has been created in righteousness and holiness of the truth.

That is a paraphrase of the New Testament written by a man called J .B. Phillips. And he paraphrases it as beautiful paraphrase. I like to read many, many paraphrases and translations of the Bible to get different, different aspects of that phrase and every other phrase in the New Testament.

Very often when I read the Bible I go to that same verse and many, many translations paraphrase to get the maximum out of one verse. He paraphrases it as the holiness which is no illusion. You know what the word illusion means?

Illusion means something imaginary. The holiness which is not imaginary which is genuine and real the holiness of truth. The holiness that's real not imaginary. You know children live in an imaginary world and sometimes we can imagine things.

And lot of people their holiness is imaginary. It's not genuine. They don't tell lies. They don't write false accounts. They go to church meetings regularly. They don't yell at their wives. And they avoid certain bad things.

They don't lust after women. They don't commit adultery. They pay all their taxes. And they think they're holy. The holiness which is an illusion. Look unto Jesus if you want real holiness. He never did his own will.

So the question is do you have a passion never to do your own will but in every single day of your life to do the will of God. God doesn't speak every moment saying do this, do this, do this. We'd be robots then.

God doesn't want robots. You know I remember in my life in the early days of my life I used to have very clear direction from God. Even sometimes when I travel when I should travel and many many things little little things.

But as I've grown older so many times I see God and I have no answer. Sometimes I pray for days. Lord what shall I do here? No answer. How do you want me to spend this money? No answer. And I got disturbed about it.

It doesn't mean I'm backsliding. I used to hear it so clearly in the younger days. And then the Lord opened my eyes to see one wonderful truth. Simple really. He says God is like a father. And the Lord asked me how do you treat your children when they are two or three years old?

Brush your teeth. Have a shower. Change your clothes. Go to bed. And the same child is 20 years old. What do you tell him? Brush your teeth. Change your clothes. No. You hardly tell him anything. As they grow up you tell them less and less and less and less and less.

If they have learned from you they do what is right. And he says that's how I treat you. You're grown up. I don't have to tell you everything. Boy how that liberated me that I cannot expect God to speak to me so clearly like he spoke to Abraham.

Abraham or Samuel, Samuel. No, no, no. God doesn't say Zach, Zach. I never heard that. Because I've grown up. And he guides me. He says you're grown up. I've changed your mind. And how did it come? By looking unto Jesus.

I see his example. He never did his own will. So from today onwards remember sin is doing your own will. Get that definition very clearly. And there are many, many subheadings to that. Lusting, getting angry, bitterness, grudges.

All types of things. But basically it's doing your own will. So that is the holiness which is no illusion. And Jesus is called in Hebrews 6 and verse 20 our forerunner. Hebrews is a great book. Great book.

And I wish more Christians would study Hebrews than the other books in the New Testament. I have a series in our CFC website called Through the Bible in 70 hours. 66 books in 70 hours. But I spent 4 hours on Hebrews.

It's a bit out of proportion, right? But it's because Hebrews is such an important book. It changed my life. There's no book in the New Testament that tells us so clearly that Jesus was tempted like us.

And he overcame. And this word forerunner. You never see that anywhere else. Hebrews 6 verse 20. Jesus our forerunner. What does that mean? He ran the same race that I have to run in front of me. All I have to do is look for his footsteps.

This marathon race I see the footsteps of Jesus marked on that track. Ah, here it is, here it is, here it is. Tempted like me in every point. Overcame, overcame, overcame, overcame. Like in the military.

They say left, right, left, right, left, right. Tempted, overcame. Tempted, overcame. Tempted, overcame. Exactly like me. Tempted to do his own will. Never did his own will. Tempted to do his own. Never did his own will.

Looking unto Jesus is the secret of the Christian life. The secret of true holiness. And once I understood that, I could believe that God would do for me what it says in 1 Thessalonians in chapter 5 and verse 23.

May the God of peace make you holy completely. Only God can do that. But God can do that as I give up my own will. Your entire spirit, soul and body be without blame. That means no conscious sin. You have to live without conscious sin every moment of our life.

Even though there may be a lot of unconscious sin. Looking unto Jesus in the moment of temptation. Looking unto Jesus. Lord, give me grace to overcome here. That's what it says in Hebrews 4 .15. He was tempted in all points as we are.

Therefore, what? Therefore, let us also come to the throne of grace and get the same grace that he got. To deny his own will. You know that Jesus got grace? Romans 6 .14. Sin shall not rule over you because you are under grace.

How many of you know that Jesus needed grace to overcome sin? Luke chapter 2 verse 40. Looking unto Jesus. Luke chapter 2 verse 40. The child Jesus. This is like when he was a child. He not only increased in wisdom, his body, soul, and spirit.

We saw in 1 Thessalonians 5 .23 Man is spirit, soul, and body. We must preserve spirit, soul, and body in holiness. Here it says all three are here in Luke 2 .40. His body continued to grow and became strong.

His mind, his soul increased in wisdom. And his spirit, the grace of God was upon him. Jesus needed the grace of God upon him and that is why he never sinned. That's from his birth. And at his death. Hebrews chapter 2 and verse 9.

Hebrews 2 verse 9 it says even his death he accomplished on the cross by the grace of God. Not otherwise. It wasn't that he gritted his teeth and said Lord, Father, I'm willing to go anything. No, no, no, no, no, no.

The grace of God helped him to go to that terrible death on the cross. Birth to death. He was under grace. And we can be under that same grace if we humble ourselves because God gives his grace only to the humble.

There was no exception. Jesus also received it all through his life because he perpetually lived in humility. And anyone who walks in the footsteps of Jesus in humility will receive that grace. There's no partiality with God.

You know that word, there's no partiality with God. It's a great verse. I'll tell you how it helped me in Romans chapter 2. That's what encouraged me. Romans chapter 2. A simple phrase. Sometimes you meditate on a phrase and you get light.

Romans 2 .11. What do you get out of this verse? There's no partiality with God. You say, well I know that. But don't just know that. Meditate on it, brother. I meditated on it. And I thought, I've got four sons.

Everything, God is my witness, that I did for my eldest son, I did for the other three. Everything. If I tried to give a certain amount of education for my first one, I gave it to the other three. If I bought things for my first one, I did for the other three with my limited resources.

No partiality. If I punished my eldest son for one thing, I punished the other three. If I did something for one, I did for the other three. No partiality. Then I thought, the Bible says that Jesus is my elder brother.

Romans 8 .29 says that. Jesus is my elder brother. There's no partiality with God. Means whatever he did for his eldest son, Jesus, he will do for me. Boy! You know how that verse helped me? Romans 2 .11.

Perhaps you got nothing from it. I got a lot from it because I didn't go to the next verse. I stopped there. I'll tell you my honest testimony. Sometimes my Bible reading in the morning is one verse. One verse.

And I think about that for 15 minutes, 20 minutes, or whatever length of time. Then I close the Bible and next day I say, what shall I go? And the Lord says, don't go to the next verse. Same verse again.

Same verse again. It's like a red light and I don't move the car. It's a red light today also, next day also red light. That means I can't move from this verse. Have you ever read the Bible like that?

Or do you say, oh, I've got to finish the Bible in one year. Well, do that if you've never read the Bible before. Read it one year. But once you got through that, do that in addition to these small times of meditating.

Psalm 1 says, the man who meditates on God's word, he'll prosper in everything he does. Have you read that verse? Meditate on God's word and you'll prosper in everything in your life. I say, Lord, I want that.

I'm not talking about financial prosperity. I'm talking about spiritual prosperity. I have to meditate on God's word and turn away from sin. So meditate on God's word. He's our forerunner and he's now at the right hand of the Father to help me.

So looking unto Jesus is the secret of the Christian life. Seeing how he overcame, I used to think, Lord, when I'm tempted in my mind, I'd say, Lord, how did you overcome when you were 19 years old and tempted with the same temptation to sexual thoughts and you overcame.

You pleased the Father. I'm going to do the same. Give me the same Holy Spirit. Give me the grace. He'll do that for you. Okay. Number 6. The way of the cross is the way of life. 2nd Timothy chapter 2.

2nd Timothy chapter 2 and verse 11. It is a trustworthy faithful statement. If we die with him, we will live with him. Isn't it a wonderful thing? To live the life of Jesus on earth in this body and there's only one way to that.

Die with him. I'm very thankful for one thing. I was baptized in 1961 January and I started studying the Bible immediately and I was challenged to read the Bible when I witnessed to another person and he challenged me with a question in the Bible to which I did not know the answer.

I was ashamed. I said, Lord that'll never happen again. I'm witnessing to a non-Christian and he questioned me about something in the Bible which I didn't know the answer to. And I said, Lord that'll never happen again.

From today I'm going to study the Bible. It was a non-Christian who stirred me to study the Bible and I decided that day, if there is an answer in this book, in these 66 books, to any question, I want to know it.

And that's been my passion from that day and in about 7 years I really got through the Bible. And since then I've been reading again and again and again and again and even today after 63 years when I read the Bible I get something out of it.

It's amazing. This is like a well that never runs dry. I don't know how many of you are diligent students of the Bible but it's an amazing thing. There are a lot of things you're missing when you don't know it.

If we die with Him, we will certainly live with Him. So the way of the cross is described in another way in 2nd Corinthians in chapter 4. I want you to look at that. 2nd Corinthians chapter 4 and verse 10 and 11.

You know the meaning of 24 -7. Very common expression used nowadays. 24 -7 means 24 hours a day, 7 days a week or what the Bible calls always. So here's something I must do 24 hours a day, 7 days a week.

Always. Verse 10 Carrying about in my body what? The dying of Jesus. Why? So that that pure, holy, loving life of Jesus will be manifested in me. Now isn't that your passion? I hope it is if you're born again.

That the pure, holy, full of love life of Jesus will be manifested through you. Well, here's the way to do it. 24 -7 Carry in your body this dying of Jesus. Now I never understood that when I first became a Christian.

And as I have told you, after I got baptism and I started studying the Bible, I found something missing in my life. I didn't have power. And I heard of people who wanted who spoke about the power of the Holy Spirit.

And somebody said, you've got to go to a Pentecostal church. Because I was in an assembly where they never preached about the baptism of the Holy Spirit. So I went to a Pentecostal church. I was young, I was 22 years old or something, 23 years old.

And there, there was a Pentecostal pastor who was supposed to be a great person who led people into the baptism of the Holy Spirit. I said, okay. I want the baptism of the Holy Spirit. So he said, let's pray.

And he said, keep saying Hallelujah, Hallelujah, Hallelujah, Hallelujah, Hallelujah. I said, please. That's not what the disciples did on the day of Pentecost when they were filled with the Holy Spirit.

Nobody told them to keep saying Hallelujah. He said, you keep saying it and after some time your tongue will trip and you will speak in tongues. I said, thank you. Goodbye. And I never went back to a Pentecostal church again.

God bless them. 95 or 99 of that tongues is fake. Not genuine. 16 years later God gave me the genuine gift of tongues when I did not seek it. And I did not have to keep repeating anything. It came from heaven.

But that time, God had to wait for me to give me that. But at that time when I sought God for the power of the Holy Spirit, he said, I've got to teach you something else before all these tongues and all.

How did Jesus receive the anointing of the Holy Spirit or when did Jesus receive the anointing of the Holy Spirit? When he submitted to John immersing him in baptism. So baptism is symbolic. Here's John the Baptist putting Jesus completely underwater.

If you keep a person underwater, he dies. So it was symbolically putting a person to death. If you don't lift him up, he's dead. It was symbolizing other people putting Jesus to death every day of his life in some way or the other.

And Jesus not resisting, submitting. You have to submit when somebody immerses you in the baptism tank. And John lifting him up from the water was symbolizing the Father raising up from the dead those who submit to the dying of Jesus.

That means when somebody irritates me I say, Lord, I want to die. Go down. And temptation comes lusting. I want to die. A dead man's eyes cannot lust. In every situation and then when Jesus came up, the Spirit came upon him.

That's what came to me. And the Lord said to me in my heart, if you choose this way of death all your life, my spirit will rest upon you all your life. It will flow, the Spirit will flow through you like rivers of living water.

But the day that comes in your life when you don't choose this way of the cross, my spirit will depart. That was such a word for me and I've tried my best. I haven't always been faithful, I must say. In the early days, before I was filled with the Spirit again, 47 years ago I went through a long period of 4 -5 years of backsliding because it was a time when God was crushing me like Moses in the wilderness.

Through difficult circumstances, difficult people and the Lord said, keep your mouth shut and submit to those people who oppress you. And I did that for 4 -5 years. I was very discouraged. God had to break me like He broke Jacob.

And the day came when He empowered me and Jacob became Israel. But this is what He said to me, the day you move out of this way of the cross, of death to self, the day you start resisting when people put you to death, when people want to immerse you as it were, into death.

And you say, no, I'm not going to go down. My power will depart from you. So I've been very careful. Whenever people have insulted me to keep quiet, when people write articles against me, okay, I accept it.

It's all just, somebody's putting me to death, okay, I'll accept it. When people shout at me, okay, I'll die. And what I ask myself is, how will a dead man react to this situation? I know what to do. How will a dead man react?

I sometimes imagine myself lying there, dead, in a coffin. And somebody comes and pokes me or calls me a devil or something. No reaction. I say, Lord, that's what I want to live. Or, even praise. Oh, Brother Zach, you're a great prophet!

No reaction. That's more difficult. I'll tell you. Try it. To be dead when somebody praises you and says, Boy, you did that! You preached like that! No reaction. You work on it, it'll be true in your life.

There'll be no reaction. You don't learn to die in a moment. It takes time to learn how to die. Just like it takes time to learn how to live. Just like it takes time to learn any trade. Any trade. Carpentry.

You'll bang your thumb a few times, but a day will come when you learn it. Learn to die. You've probably never heard that message anywhere else, but I'll tell you, you've preached it for years in CFC.

Learn to die. The way of the cross is the way of life. So Romans, sorry, 2 Corinthians 4, always carrying in a body this dying of Jesus. So that the life of Jesus will be manifested in my body. That's what I want.

And if you have a passion for the life of Jesus to be manifested in your body, here is the answer. In every situation, choose the dying of Jesus. That is the dying to his own will. The dying to my way of reacting to this situation at home, in your place of work, on the streets, when some other driver cuts into your way, when you have right of way.

Oh, those are trying times. Jesus was not tempted in driving a car. He never drove a car, but he was tempted in other circumstances when somebody cut into his way in some other way. He died. And I want to die.

Not only that, verse 11 is something further. We are constantly delivered over to death. God allows us in situations to deliver over. Yeah, this brother is coming now to trouble my son. I hand him over.

Let him kill him. You know, inwardly. So God allows that fellow to come and inwardly kill you and you say, I accept it. Let this guy crucify me. Why? Not only that the life of Jesus will come up in you, but so that the life of Jesus may be manifested in my mortal flesh and as this death works in me, verse 12, it will work in other people to whom I minister God's word.

If any of you are getting life through my message today, it's because the death of Jesus has been working in me. Death works in me, verse 12, and life in you. That's a secret, brothers. I learned it some years ago.

I offer it to you. Choose that way. It always works. It will work in your wife. If you let death work in you, life will work in your wife. You will lead her to a more godly life. Some of you are so worried, my wife is not so spiritual as I am.

Conceited person that you are. Why not choose this way to make your wife spiritual? Those of you who are very eager to make your wife spiritual, here's the way. Let death work in you, life will work in her.

If she responds to it, I'm not guaranteeing it, but at least it will be offered to her. You offer a million dollars to somebody and he says, no thank you, I don't want it. Then leave it. This is more than a million dollars.

The life of Jesus is being offered and they don't take it, we can't do anything. But it will be offered if death works in you. It's a wonderful way. And so in God's love for us, it says in Romans 8 and verse 36, great verse.

Have you ever thought of it in this connection? Romans 8 verse 36 Lord for your sake, we are being put to death the whole day long. Have any of you experienced that? Working under a difficult boss in an office perhaps?

Or working with a difficult wife perhaps? I've never had a difficult wife to work with so I don't know, I can't be an example to you there. But I've worked with some very difficult believers. Just as bad as working with a difficult boss.

Delivered to death 24 hours. That's what it says here. We are put to death the whole day long. Some of you who think that you're having a very tough time, brother, you don't know what I'm going through.

24 hours a day I'm suffering. Oh, this verse is for you, brother. Put to death the whole day long, sheep to be slaughtered, but in all these things, verse 37, we conquer. Not conquer, but overwhelmingly conquer.

More than conquers. Because of him who loved us and who's dying, I accept in my body the way of the cross is the way of life. If I choose it, in other words, very simple, in every situation, to say to yourself, what will a dead man do here?

How will a dead man react here? I used to often ask myself that question. How will a dead man react here? I want to react exactly like that. I've chosen the dying of Jesus and through the years life has come in me and flown out through me, rivers of living water to other people.