Normal Christian experience as intended by God is a life of total consecration to His will, resulting in the life of Christ reproduced in us.
The cross is God’s only answer to our history prior to salvation. The death of our substitute declares our execution (Rom 6:6, Gal 5:24). The old history is forever closed, and we are now a new creation in Christ Jesus, alive unto God (2 Cor 5:17, Col 3:1014).
Upon salvation we were sealed as divine property by the indwelling of the Holy Spirit. We are thus sanctified (set apart for holy use) to Christ. Paul expresses this truth beautifully in Gal 2:20, “1 am crucified with Christ, nevertheless I live; yet not I but Christ liveth in me; and the life which I now live in the flesh, I live by the faith of the Son of God, who loved me and gave Himself for me.”
By the Holy Spirit’s enabling we are to live a continuous, constant and complete experience of our calling in Christ. Paul speaks of it in 1 Thes 5:23 as God’s purpose in saving us. “And the very God of peace sanctify you wholly; and I pray God your whole spirit and soul and body be preserved blameless unto the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ.” God has entrusted to us, each part of our whole being. 1 Thessalonians 4:3 teaches us, “This is the will of God even your sanctification.”
To live the possessing spiritual life is true consecration. This is not an attainment by self effort, nor can it ever become a condition of sinlessness as long as we are in this body of flesh. It is intended by our God to be the normal joyous purpose and experience of our life in Christ. “But sanctify the Lord God (set apart Christ as Lord) in your hearts” (1 Pet 3:15).
Daily it is our honor to minister unto God by the spiritual service of presenting “your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable unto God which is your reasonable service; and be not conformed to this world, but be ye transformed by the renewing of your mind; that ye may prove what is that good and acceptable and perfect will of God” (Rom 12:1-2). This is not a piece meal lending of myself to God for His service. Rather it is He lending His purchased property to us through which Christ may be seen and ministered to others. This is His mind so we may be found free from blame and defilement to His everlasting praise at His coming. “To the end He may establish your hearts unblameable in holiness before God, even our Father, at the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ with all His saints (1 Thes 3:13). One of the greatest blessings of that day will be that we are free from the very presence of sin for we will awake in His likeness.
