Youth Convention at Fairhaven 1964-03 Returning to the Principles — Major Ian Thomas

Life in Christ and the Indwelling Spirit

Wounds of life that abolishes death and kills it dead. That's what happened when you were converted, if you'd been genuinely converted. God acquitted you for Jesus' sake. He recorded your name in the Lamb's Book of Life as one whose sins he would remember no more for his dear sake who died.

And instantly God restored life, and life He switched yours. Christ in the person of His other self came to inhabit your humanity, and your body became the temple of the living God. You were added to that habitation of God through His Spirit which is called on earth His body, the church of which Jesus Christ alone is the head.

And every redeemed sinner, a living, pulsating member in particular. So the first thing you know about a man in Christ is what? He's alive. The first thing you know about a man in Adam is that he's dead.

And the first thing you know about a man who's in Christ is that he's alive. How is he alive? Because God the Holy Spirit has come to indwell his human spirit and re-impart to him the very resurrection life of Jesus Christ Himself.

To what end? The Bible tells us that the righteousness demanded by the law might be fulfilled in us who now walk no longer after the flesh, dominated by the flesh, but walk now after the Spirit, dominated by the Holy Spirit.

In other words, the coming of God the Holy Spirit into the human spirit is to the end that He the Holy Spirit might re-invade your soul and re-capture your mind for Jesus Christ. And re-capture your emotions for Jesus Christ.

And therefore re-capture your will for Jesus Christ. And whoever re-captures your will, re-captures your behavior. And your total humanity once more declares Jesus Christ. And you make Him the invisible.

As once Christ as man made the Father invisible. He that hath seen me hath seen the Father. So as you go around the world it should be possible for you to say, if you've entered into the purpose for which you have been redeemed, He that sees me sees Christ.

And if you want to know the measure in which you've entered into your redemption, it's precisely just the measure in which other people can see Christ. Not your imitation of Christ.

Not your flowery language about Christ.

But in your most unconscious moment, Christ expressed. Because a man in Christ is not only alive. A man in Christ walks after the Spirit. And a man in Christ lives in the power of His endless life. Said Jesus, John 6 and 57, As the living Father hath sent me, and I live by the Father, so he that eateth me shall live by me.

In Adam, dead. Dominated by the flesh. Dying of sin. In Christ, alive. Dominated by the Holy Spirit. To live. By Him. As He once lived by the Father. The Father dwelleth in me. He doeth the work. John 14.

Christ who lives in me. He doeth the work. To me to live is. And that's normal Christianity. That's what it means to be reconciled to God by His death. And saved. I'd like to say for my part how deeply I have appreciated the opportunity of sharing with you in this convention.

And I'm grateful to those whose hard work has made it possible. And I trust that God will continue to bless you in this way in days to come. And I shall certainly cherish very happy memories of the days spent together with you.

I appreciate the hospitality that has been shown to me by so many very kind people. In our midday session, we saw that a man in Adam is born spiritually dead. Physically alive. Soulishly active. That is to say, he can think.

React emotionally and exercise his will. He can behave. Spiritually dead. Not only is a man in Adam spiritually dead, but he is dominated by a principle that was introduced at the time that Adam turned to sin.

A principle that the New Testament calls the flesh. Not a vague influence of evil, but what Paul describes in his epistle to the Ephesians as the spirit that now works in the children of disobedience.

Spiritually dead, dominated by the flesh. And unless that miracle of spiritual regeneration takes place, called rebirth on the grounds of redemption through the shed blood of the Lord Jesus, the man born dead and dominated by the flesh will die in history.

Now, that was the unhappy side of the picture. But we saw, too, that as in this one man, Adam, death came to the world, so by this other man, the Lord Jesus, the Lord from heaven, there came the resurrection from the dead.

So that a man in Christ is alive, raised from the dead. Not he will be raised from the dead one day, but every man in Christ is already raised from the dead. For, you see, life abolishes death. And the moment you came to receive the Lord Jesus Christ as your Redeemer, as a forgiven sinner, there came to dwell within you the greatest presence of the Holy Spirit.

Healed as the blood-bought property of the Lord Jesus. The presence of the Holy Spirit himself crediting you with the very life of Christ, whose presence abolishes death, chases the gloom from your sky, and turns darkness into light.

So that a man in Adam is alive. Not only is he alive, but being indwelt now by the Holy Spirit, by whom he is alive, he grew up after the Spirit, instead of after the flesh. A radical new principle governing his behavior.

His mind now to be enlightened by the Holy Spirit. The very love of God to be shed abroad in his heart by the Holy Spirit. Romans 5 and 5. So that his will now again will be exercised under the gracious influence of a God-taught mind, God-controlled emotion.

So that increasing you there is born through him the image of Christ, of which image Christ himself is the origin, the cause of his own effect. As electricity is the origin of its own immediate life. In Christ the life, in Christ walking after the Spirit, and to live in the power of his indwelling, endless life.

That's a man in Christ. Now, if you will remember, we commenced our discussion in the lunch hour in the second epistle to the Corinthians in chapter 5, and I'd like you to turn back to that passage because we saw that the 17th verse with which we commence was a conclusion drawn from an argument, an argument which we ourselves have been pursuing.

Therefore, if any man be in Christ, he is a new creature. All things are passed away. Behold, all things are become new. So having focused our thoughts upon what happens when a man, by faith, steps out of Adam into Christ, and with that in the background of our minds, would you turn with me now to the same chapter, the 14th verse, for the love of Christ constrains us, because we thus judge that if one died for all, this is the only good reason, then we're all dead.

The one reason why the Lord Jesus, the second man, the Lord from heaven, died for all, is that all were dead, and he died to kill death, dead, and raise dead men from the dead. Delightedly, he died because we're all dead.

And that he died, verse 15, that they which live, which of course isn't everybody, but those who by the obedience of faith and repentance toward God put their trust in the Lord Jesus, raised from the dead, redeemed through his blood and spiritually regenerate by the coming of the Holy Spirit, that he died for all that they which live should not henceforth live unto themselves, but unto him who died for them and rose again.

That is why he died for you, first because you were dead. And if you realize the fact that you were spiritually dead, and therefore needed his atoning death that you might be raised to life, it is to this end that being raised to life by the presence of Christ within you through the Holy Spirit, you might now henceforth not live unto yourself, but live with Christ generally, so that the Christ's rule has been reestablished in the area of your mind, your emotions, and your will, and your total personality is now filled and flooded with God himself.

That's the measure of your worth. That's the measure of your spirituality. Nothing more nor less. That is why, you see, in the 16th verse, Paul goes on to say this. I'll read it from the Authorized Version, though it's a little bit confusing as it is there translated.

Wherefore, henceforth know we no man after the flesh, yea, though we have known Christ after the flesh, yet now henceforth know we him no more. That is to say, after the flesh. Now, what does the Apostle mean when he says that?

Let me read it to you from the Amplified New Testament. I think it will help. Consequently, 16th verse of 2 Corinthians 5, from now on we estimate and regard no one from a purely human point of view in terms of natural standards of value.

We've got a new standard of value. Not how clever a man is, not how rich a man is, not his social status, not even his age. There's only one real standard, says Paul, now as evaluating a man's worth. How far genuinely he lives to and for Jesus Christ, who died for him and who rose again to live in him.

How far his humanity declares the nature of God. How far the regenerative processes of God in his life have been able to restore him to the image of God his maker. He says that is the only valid standard by which a man's worth may now be evaluated.

I might ask you concerning somebody whom I see coming into a church looking somewhat affluent, how much that person is worth. And if you were taken off your guard, and if I were naughty enough, you might say, if he's worth a dollar, he's worth a million.

And I would have to say to you, excuse me, but you have mistaken my question. I didn't ask you how much money he had in the bank. I asked you how much he was worth. Because a man isn't worth what he's got in the bank.

As far as God is concerned, he's worth no more nor less than how far God can be seen in terms of his humanity. So the question that we should pose to our own hearts tonight is very simple. How much am I really worth?

How far does the world see in me the image of Jesus Christ? But if he declared the Father, how far do I declare the Son? Has he lived by the living Father? How do I live by him? To what extent have I been restored genuinely to my true humanity?

To what degree am I really allowing the Lord Jesus in me to be the origin of his own image and the cause of his own effect, so that my life as a Christian now is totally without explanation apart from Jesus Christ?

Is your Christianity explainable apart from Jesus Christ? Don't you see that if your Christianity, the religion that you practice can be explained other than in terms of Jesus Christ who lives within you it's just a cheap, shabby imitation of the religion God washes his hands of?

You were to reckon yourself to be dead in deeding to sin that self that repudiates the basic principles of man's humanity that is independent and self-sufficient that throws out its chest and says, I have what it takes you're to reckon yourself dead in deed now to this principle and you're to reckon yourself alive now unto God solely and exclusively through Jesus Christ that simply means that you recognise that there is only one person whom God actually recognises as being legitimately alive in you who's that?

Jesus Christ because he's the only person capable of living the Christian life. Any attempt on my part to imitate him will be a shabby imitation, nothing more a hell out of him, yes and it'll impress nobody of course, that's why the apostle went on in the same 16th verse he said this no, even though we once did estimate Christ from a human viewpoint and as a man, yet now we have such knowledge of him we've come to such an understanding of his person and his mission and the principles that govern his life as a man we have such knowledge of him that we know him no longer in terms of the flesh.

How did Paul once know Jesus Christ in terms of the flesh? When he was Saul of Tarsus. When he was Saul of Tarsus he made a very reasonable and intelligent and legitimate estimate of the worth of Jesus Christ according to all normal, natural, human standards in evaluating a man's worth.

And of Saul of Tarsus he would have said this to the best of my knowledge and according to all the information that was accepted as legitimate by my own ecclesiastical colleague. Jesus Christ was born illegitimately of a woman who was both a liar and unfaithful to the man to whom she was his father.

That was the best knowledge that Saul of Tarsus had concerning the birth of Jesus Christ. It wasn't true. But that was what was popularly accepted. This is exactly what the Pharisees meant when the Lord Jesus said to them fear of your father the Jesus.

For they had said to him we weren't born of poor material like you. They couldn't. He was a sly, wimpy cat son of God. We're the children of Abraham. But as far as Saul of Tarsus was concerned Jesus Christ was born illegitimately of a woman who repudiated any knowledge of a man.

So she must have been a liar. And the one to whom she was espoused, Joseph repudiated any responsibility for the birth of this boy. So she must have been unfaithful. So according to all reasonable natural standards at work as far as Saul of Tarsus was concerned Jesus Christ totally was worth.

Precisely now, he was just thrown up on the couch. Probably more than that. Educationally, how much was he worth? He had no more education that would allow him to stand as an apprentice at a carpenter's bench and finally take his place as a carpenter.

This is true. No more in terms of scholastic education college training, theological treaties. Nothing. Educationally, he was worth nothing. He didn't have a word to say that could be compared with the weighty upbringings of those who were the leading thinkers of his day and of which Saul of Tarsus himself was one of the most promoted above many of his teachers in the Jewish religion.

Enthusiastically, Jesus Christ was almost unanimously repudiated by all the theological leaders of his day. All the enthusiastical hierarchy with one consent condemned him as a fanatical soap preacher.

He was a rabble rouser, he was a troublemaker and a heretic of the heretic to be destroyed in the old house. Financially, how much was he worth? Thrown in a borrowed stable he lived on other people had no home of his own.

Borrowed everything he used. Borrowed every bit of food he ate. Borrowed the homes he lived in. Borrowed a donkey to ride on. He was even crucified in a borrowed coffin buried in a borrowed tomb and illustrated one of his family with a borrowed coffin.

Socially, educationally, theologically, financially. How much was Jesus Christ worth? By all normal, accepted, reasonable standards of evaluating a man. Don't be angry with Saul of Tarsus. He was behaving completely rationally on the basis of the only standard he knew.

How many churches in San Francisco would have called Jesus Christ to be their pastor. On the basis of that evaluation. On the basis of his educational background his college training his enthusiastical acceptance in the area of modern theological thinking.

How many colleges would have invited him to serve on their packages. How many mission boards would have asked him to serve on their boards. How many mission boards would ever have sent him to the field in 1964 in San Francisco.

Don't be too hasty in your judgment of Saul of Tarsus. Saul says there came a day in my life when weaving out threatens and slaughter on the road to Damascus. Suddenly I was confronted with a bright light brighter than the sun at noonday.

And in that one blinding encounter I was thrown to my face in confusion. For I looked into the face of a man and I saw God. And he said to me Saul, why persecute us down there? I said, who are you? For I'd never seen that man before.

He said, I'm Jesus. And in that day Saul of Tarsus died and rose again to be called with us totally deflated to reckon from then on all those things that he had accumulated and to which he had attached so much worth that made him something now he considered them to be nothing damned reckless reckless.

For in that blinding encounter with Jesus Christ he discovered that a man's worth was no more nor less than the degree in which God can be seen. And when he looked into the face of Jesus Christ he could see a man in whom the Holy Spirit was a man Christ Jesus God's own dear and incarnate Son who was in the beginning with God and was God and never left with God in any time.

But who for your sake and for my sake of his own prevalence though he was in the form of God and thought it not robbery to be equal with God made himself of no reputation in the New English translation he made himself nothing deliberately he made himself all that man is apart from what God is nothing so that for the first time on earth since man fell into sin there might be a man functioning with me.

And so the Lord Jesus could say he that has seen me has seen you. For for thirty-three years the Lord Jesus Christ lived on earth on the basis for which he as God had created you and me. What did it take to be a man?

God then what did it take for Jesus Christ to live on earth as a man? God I can imagine you might quite genuinely and sincerely say do you mean to tell me that Jesus Christ couldn't live his own life on earth as a man without the father of God?

No turn with me to the fifth chapter of John's gospel. John chapter five and verse ninety. Then answered Jesus and said unto them. Verily verily I say unto you the son the incarnate word the one who is in the beginning with God and was God the one by whom all things were made and without whom nothing was made that ever was made.

And who at this moment now nearly two thousand years later restored to enjoy with the father the glory that he had had with the father before ever the world was upholds all things by the word of his power.

This son the eternal son of God the son can do how much? Nothing of himself. Wasn't he God? Yes in total equality with the father and the Holy Ghost and never less than God. But when Jesus Christ came into this world he didn't come to behave as God.

He came to behave as man. He came to be as man. All that he as God had created man to be he was simply giving you a demonstration of what he expects of you. Nothing less in nineteen fifty four verse thirty I can of mine own self do how much?

Nothing as God he could create the universe as man. He could do nothing as I hear I judge and my judgment is just because I seek not mine own will but the will of the father which sent me. And as I reminded you in the earlier session at midday said the Lord Jesus as the living father hath sent me and I live by the father he that eateth me to live by me.

Just how clever are you? Just how gifted are you? Just how talented are you? That you can do so much apart from Jesus Christ when he as God behaving as man to do nothing without his father. Doesn't that reduce us to our own self?

Doesn't that cripple us? That of course is why the Lord Jesus said in John fifteen verse five. I am divine and you are the bride. He that abideth in me and I in him bringeth forth my fruit. For without me how much can you do?

Without me you can do precisely as much as I as man can do without my father. How much is that? Nothing. Everything that you do apart from Jesus Christ so far as God is concerned is nothing. Evaluate it as you will and have it evaluated by your fellow men and by your fellow believers as they will.

It works so far as God is concerned nothing. And it's surprising how busy you can be doing nothing. You can spend a lifetime doing nothing. And congratulate yourself on being so busy or pity yourself.

The chances are that if you are very very very busy doing nothing you'll be advertising yourself and sweating into the vine. So did everything but Jesus Christ did nothing. Does this mean that he was inactive and passive and lethargic and unmoved and unconcerned?

No no. Jesus being man imperfect in totality available to his father. And because in totality available to his father his father in totality is available for all that God is is available to the man who is available to all that God is.

How available was Jesus Christ to the father? Totally. So how available was the father to the son? Totally. And that's why in the activity of the Lord Jesus Christ there was absolutely no margin of difference whatever between what he did as man and what the father did in and through him as God.

There was no margin of difference because he never took one step and he never said one word and he never adopted one single attitude which wasn't a complete unblemished unsullied expression of the activity of the father.

And he says as I live by the father you're going to live by me. John 14 10. Be leadest thou not that I am in the father and the father in me. The words that I speak unto you I speak not of myself but the father that dwelleth in me he doeth the work.

The father that dwelleth in me. This was the secret of the life of the Lord Jesus Christ as man. But I want you constantly to remind yourself that the Lord Jesus again and again emphasized this fact that as the father had sent him he now sends you repudiate that fact at your peril.

As the father sent me I send you and says the Lord Jesus the father that dwelleth in me he does the work. I credit my father with everything I do and I credit my father with everything I say. And I credit my father with everything that I am and he that seeth me seeth the father.

And as I am sent by my father you are going to be sent by me. And if there is anything about what you are and anything about what you do that is not to be credited to what I am in you and do through you then you are repudiated the basis upon which I am in business.

That's why in the 12th chapter of John's gospel in verse 44 you have this surprising statement made by the Lord Jesus. John 12 44 the Lord Jesus cried and said he that believeth on me believeth not on me.

Did you ever think that one through? He that believeth on me believeth not on me. Then if you believing on Jesus don't believe on Jesus who do you believe on? Well he tells you the one of whom he gives complete, unsullied, unblemished expression.

Who's that? Him that sent me. That's why you can't compare Jesus Christ as one teacher with another teacher one philosopher amongst many philosophers you don't compare his opinions with the opinions of anybody else.

He says I am the truth. And I'll tell you why I am the truth. Because I'm wholly, totality in totality available to my father. Everything my father is can be expressed unblemished in terms of my humanity.

So that when you believe on me you do not believe on me. You believe on the one who is completely expressed in terms of me my father verse 45 he that seeth me seeth in the sense. And that's why if any man hear my word, verse 47 and believeth not, I judge him not.

I came not to judge the world, but to save the world. I don't have to judge him for this good reason. Verse 48. He that rejecteth me and receiveth not my word hath won the judgment. The word that I have spoken the saints will judge him in the last day.

It'll still be true then as it is true now I don't have to judge because every word I speak is a word that I speak by commandment of my Father. I have not spoken, verse 49 of myself but the Father which sent me he gave me a commandment what I should say and what I should speak.

And I know that his commandment is life everlasting whatsoever I speak. Therefore even as the Father said unto me so I speak so that every word I speak as a man is a is a word that my Father speaks as God.

And when you believe on my word as a man you believe on my Father's word as God. The Lord Jesus Christ never claimed your faith in him by virtue of who he was. Isn't that strange. He had the rights, he was God but he was behaving as man.

The only authority that he claimed to believe was that he was a pure expression of what the Father was in him working through. And he says if there comes one single moment in my life when you can find any other activity in and through me other than the activity of my Father you do not have the right to believe me.

John 10, verse 37. If I do not the works of my Father if I am not doing the truth if I am not doing what my Father says if my humanity does not authentically declare the nature of my Father and my Father's will and my Father's works.

If I do not the works of my Father be he, he not. You don't have the right to believe. But if I do, though you believe not me believe the works that you may know then believe that the Father is in me and I am in him.

I want you to know this that the only authority that you have to claim the attention of your fellow men, your own children at home to believe the things that you tell them concerning the word of God and Jesus Christ himself the only authority you have is the measure in which Jesus Christ is expressed in terms of your behavior.

Don't expect your children at home to believe your doctrine. If they don't see that doctrine being behaved in terms of your demands I'll last you to your feet and as soon as they can, they'll kick over the praises and never come near your place of worship again.

And you'll be here. That's why there are so many rebellious children of believing parents. Because they've heard from the lips of believing parents so much of what the parents say and seen so little of the speech that the parents give.

Jesus Christ never claimed any authority for what he said other than by virtue of the facts of what could be seen of the Father. And your neighbors, your fellow students your chums at school your family circle will be as convinced of the truth you speak as they are of the truth you live no more.

Nor do they have the right to be convinced anymore. And so the Lord Jesus lived his life in an unrelenting attitude of total dependence upon the Father. And whether it was teaching the Sermon on the Mount or raising Lazarus from the dead or whether it was feeding the five thousand or washing his disciples' feet there was never a moment at any time in the whole life of Jesus Christ for thirty-three years when he was not doing only always those things that seemed completely available to the sight.

And this he said is normal manhood which is the end product of God's redemptive purpose is to be normal Christianity. Christ in you the secret of his life the Father dwelling in me the indwelling Father the secret of your life.

Christ dwelling in you the indwelling Father that as he lived by the Father you are to live by him as the Father expressed himself through the Son. So the Son is to express himself through you. And the only valid estimate of your worth as a Christian is the measure in which Christ is expressed in terms of your demand for you.

Christ's Death and the Impartation of Divine Life

It's for this reason that it's all the more surprising that there came a day if you'll turn to it in John's Gospel chapter twelve when the Lord Jesus spoke of a particular hour in his life which was to be of greater significance than any other.

Because it's hard to conceive of any hour in the life of the Lord Jesus that could be of any particular significance greater than another if for every moment that he lived and for every step that he took and for every word that he spoke he was constantly and unrelentingly a declaration of the nature and will and purpose of his Father God.

How could one hour be of any greater significance than another. And yet in the twenty-third verse of the twelfth chapter of John the Lord Jesus answered he said the hour is come that the Son of Man should be glorified.

It's an hour that is referred to on more than one occasion in the seventh chapter of John's Gospel and the thirtieth verse then they sought to take him but no man laid hands on him because his hour was not yet come.

In the eighth chapter of the twentieth verse these words speak Jesus in the treasure is he taught in the temple and no man laid hands on him for his hour was not yet come in the thirtieth chapter the first verse before the feast of the Passover when Jesus knew that his hour was come in the seventeenth chapter of John in the first verse the Lord Jesus we're told spake these words lifted up his eyes to heaven and said Father, the hour is come glorify thy Son that thy Son also may glorify thee.

So it's quite obvious that there was one specific hour in the matchless life of the Lord Jesus that was to be of a particular significance continuing in the twelfth chapter in the twenty-fourth verse the Lord Jesus said verily, verily, I stand to you except a corn of wheat fall into the ground and die.

It abides it abides. It abides alone. But if it dies it brings forth much sin by the impartation of that life to us. And once the Lord Jesus Christ declares the purpose of his coming into the world Jesus said I am come that you might have life.

And if I, the sinless grain of wheat approved of my Father this is my beloved Son whom I am well pleased. If this my hour is come in which I am to be glorified is an hour in which I must go into the ground and die.

It is simply that you might have the life that I have. So we recognize at once that the coming of Jesus Christ in this world was primarily concerned with the imparting of divine life to redeem sinners.

Not that sinners being forgiven might get out of hell into heaven but that they might become once more partakers of the divine nature. And becoming partakers of that divine nature have once more all that pertains to life and God's likeness the restoration of man to his true image in the likeness of God himself.

And that's what the gospel is all about. I'd never be so unfair to any boy or girl or man or woman to say come to Jesus and have your sins forgiven. Period. I can't think of anything that would be more calculated to mock them for the rest of their days.

You don't come to Jesus to have your sins forgiven. You come to the Lord Jesus to have life. But in order that you might have his life you must have your sins forgiven. And that's why he says behold my hands and my feet.

For it is I myself that will you see see to the hallmarks of my saviourhood. This is the stamp of my mandate that enables me not only to cleanse the temple by cleansing you with my own precious blood but to re-inhabit that temple and fill it again with the glory of God.

I'm going to give you life. That's why you come to Jesus Christ. And if you want to know why there are so many limp Christians on the way crippled it's a lie. It's because folks have invited them to come to Jesus to get come to forgiven for heaven.

One day when the Lord Jesus constantly said come to me for what I am I am the way I am the truth I am the life. The hour has come. Jesus answered them. The time has come for the Son of Man to be glorified and exalted.

I swear you most solemnly I tell you this is amplified deceptive John 12 24. Unless the grain of wheat falls into the earth and dies. Listen to this very carefully it remains it remains just one grain never becomes more.

But lives goes on living by itself alone. It remains and lives. But if it dies it produces many others and yields a rich harvest. Don't you see that if the Lord Jesus Christ had come into this world and lived the life that he lived even had he only been man and never been God he would have had the right to remain and live for it is him that separates man from God.

He was perfect man. Now we know that he was also perfect God. He was never left than God. But even as man had he never been God he would have had the right at the end of those thirty three years to remain and live forever alone.

You and I would never have become partakers of his divine name. There are some that would have you believe and you know the falsity of it. And I know that there's not one who doesn't really deviate it.

There are some who would have you believe that Christianity simply consists in your attempt to imitate and emulate the matchless example of a beautiful man who lived 1900 years ago and who died before his time as a noble idealist in the great philosophy that if only you will browse upon the sermon on the mountain gaze at his example and do your best to emulate that matchless pattern that he set for good living that makes you a Christian.

Now you know enough to repudiate that. But are you quite sure you've repudiated that as an evangelist converted, religious. Are you quite sure. Are you absolutely certain that your quality of life as a Christian is not based upon the false premise that you can copy his example and do what Jesus did without Christ himself in you being the origin of his own the only legitimate cause of his own effect.

Are you absolutely certain that even within the bounds of evangelical Christendom your Christianity isn't the byproduct of your conformity to certain patterns of behavior that have been imposed upon you by the particular Christian society to which you belong.

And that your holiness does not derive from within your holiness derives from without. Are you sure the moment your brand of Christianity however genuinely you pursue it and with whatever sincerity but the moment it comes from a pattern imposed from without you are repudiating the basic principle that Christ is you enunciated that you can only have his life by his death and you can only have his likeness by his life.