Refined or Removed?
We Christians must look sharp that our Christianity does not simply refine our sins without removing them.
The work of Christ as Savior is twofold: to "save his people from their sins" and to reunite them forever with the God from whom sin had alienated them.
God's holy character requires that He refuse to admit sin into His fellowship. Though the redemption which is in Christ Jesus mercy may pardon the returning sinner and place him judicially beyond the reach of the broken law; but not the boundless grace nor the infinite kindness of God can make it morally congruous for a pure being to have communion with an impure one. It is necessary to the moral health of the universe that God divide the light from the darkness and that He say at last to every sinner, "Depart from me, ye that work iniquity."
This certainly is no new thought. Christian theologians have all recognized the necessity for an adequate purgation of the inner springs of moral conduct and the impartation of a renewed nature to the believer before he is ready for the fellowship of God. our hymnists also have seen and wrestled with this great problem - and thanks be to God, have found the answer, too.
Binney felt the weight of this problem and stated it along with the solution in a little known but deeply spiritual hymn:
Eternal Light! eternal Light!
How pure that soul must be
When placed within Thy searching sight,
it shrinks not, but with calm delight
Can live, and look on Thee.
O how shall I, whose native sphere
Is dark, whose mind is dim,
Before the ineffable appear,
And on my naked spirit bear
That uncreated beam?
There is a way for man to rise
To that sublime abode:
An offering and a sacrifice,
A Holy Spirit's energies,
An Advocate with God.
The offering and the sacrifice and the sanctifying energies of the Holy Spirit are indeed sufficient to prepare the soul for communion with God. This the Bible declares and this ten thousand times ten thousand witnesses confirm. The big danger is that we assume that we have been delivered from our sins when we have in reality only exchanged one kind of sin for another. This is the peril that lies in wait for everyone. It need not discourage us nor turn us back, but it should make us watchful.
We must, for instance, be careful that our repentance is not simply a change of location. Whereas we once sinned in the far country among the swineherds, we are now chumming with religious persons, considerably cleaner and much more respectable in appearance, to be sure, but no nearer to true heart purity than we were before.
Again, pride may by religious influence be refined to a quiet self-esteem, skillfully dissembled by a neat use of Bible words that meant everything to those who first used them but which may only serve to disguise a deep self-love which is to God a hateful and intolerable thing. The real trouble is thus not cleared up, but only driven underground.
The gossip and troublemaker sometimes at conversion turns into a "spiritual counselor," but often a closer look will reveal the same restless, inquisitive spirit at work that made her a nuisance before her conversion. The whole thing has been refined and given a religious appearance, but actually nothing radical has happened. She is still running the same stand, only on the other side of the street. There has been a certain refinement of the sin, but definitely not a removal of it. This is Satan's most successful way of getting into the church to cause weakness, backsliding and division.
Many a business transaction which among worldly men we would brand as sharp practice, when carried a Christian after he has prayed over it is hailed as a remarkable answer to prayer and a proof that god is a "partner" in the affair.
These are illustrations only, intended to show how sin may alter its appearance without changing its nature, and are not to be taken to mean that I am opposed to Christian counselors or businessmen who pray over their affairs. The contrary is true. That church is blessed indeed which has in it a few persons with the gift of discernment to whom weak and troubled Christians may come for help in times of crisis. And blessed is the businessman today who has learned to pray his way through red tape and taxes. Without the help of God I do not see how businessmen stay sane in this frightful rat race we call civilization.
The temptation to spare the best of the sheep and the cattle is very strong in all of us. Like Saul before us we are willing enough to slay the scrubby sheep and the old sway-back steers, but Adam and the devil join to try to persuade us to keep the fattest beasts alive. And many of us fall for the old trick. We make pets of the cattle we should have destroyed and their bleatings and bellowings are heard throughout all Christendom.
The will of God is that sin should be removed, not merely refined. Let's walk in His will.
A. W. Tozer
Born After Midnight - Chapter 19
Chicago, IL
1959
