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TEXT: Romans 8:13
SUBJECT: Mortification #12
Tonight brings us to chapter twelve of John Owen's great book, On the Mortification of Sin.
Thus far, Owen has given two general rules. If you want to mortify your sins, he says, you must:
1.Be a believer. The unsaved are never told to reform their ways, but repent of their sins and find forgiveness through faith in Christ.
2.Be sincere. To have success over any sin, you must fight against every sin. For only the man who hates sin as sin hates any sin and sincerely tries to overcome it.
Those are the general rules. Next he comes to the particular directions. These give detail to the general rules. They are:
1.Identify your sins.
2.Consider the guilt of your sins.
3.Load your conscience with their guilt.
4.Beg God for deliverance from your sins.
5.Respect your natural weaknesses.
6.Beware of the situations that stir you to sin.
7.Oppose temptation right away.
Now we come to rule number eight. Here it is:
"Be much in thoughtfulness of the excellency of the majesty of God and your infinite, inconceivable distance from Him".
This is a bit wordy, of course, but the meaning is clear: Humble yourself before the majesty of God. There is no better cure for sin than a sense of the glory of God. The hymn says it well:
"Turn your eyes upon Jesus,
Look full in His wonderful face;
And the things of earth will grow strangely dim,
In the light of His glory and grace".
Owen divides the topic into two parts. The first is this:
1.What you know of God is overpowering in its effect.
To quote the Puritan,
"With God, says Job, is terrible majesty. Hence were the thoughts of men of old that, having seen God, they thought they must die. The Scriptures abound in this, comparing the men of the earth to grasshoppers, to vanity, to the dust in the balance in respect to God. Think much of these things to abase the pride of your heart and to keep you humble...Think greatly on the greatness of God".
God is revealed by His attributes. Some are unique to the LORD. Only He is "infinite, eternal, and unchangeable". The very words are staggering. Everything else is limited and changed by time and space and circumstances. But He is "the same; [His] years do not fail". Even David could not find the words to celebrate His Majesty: "Great is the LORD and greatly to be praised and His greatness is unsearchable".
Other attributes are shared by men. Think of knowledge and strength and lover. We have these--to some degree. But what is our knowledge compared to the All-knowing God? What is our strength compared to the Almighty? What is our love compared to the God who is love?
These thoughts humble us. And mortify our sins. When Isaiah sees the Lord he is undone! "I am a man of unclean lips" he cries. But that's not all it does for him. It also turns the dirty-mouth into a spokesman for the LORD--"Here am I, send me!"
This is Owen's first point: What you know of God is overpowering in its effect. Thus, if you want to mortify your sins Think about God!
"I have set the Lord always before me. Because He is at my right hand, I shall not be moved" (Psalm 16:8).
"As a man thinks in his heart, so is he". The man who thinks about the world all the time becomes...worldly, of course. But what about the man who thinks about God? He becomes godly.
"But we all, with unveiled face, beholding as in a mirror the glory of the Lord, are being transformed into the same image from glory to glory, just as by the Spirit of the Lord" (II Corinthians 3:18).
Owen's second point is even more "pointed".
2.God is far greater than your knowledge of Him.
"Though you know enough to keep low and humble, yet how little a portion it is that you know of Him".
The most learned man knows nothing of God compared to what there is to know of Him. Paul is a genius, but says,
"Oh the depths of the knowledge and wisdom of God! How unsearchable are His judgments and His ways past finding out!"
Wise King Agur confesses the same ignorance,
"Surely I am more stupid than any man, and I do not have the understanding of a man. I neither learned wisdom nor have knowledge of the Holy One" (Proverbs 30:4).
Thus, the biggest thoughts you ever had of God are nothing compared to God Himself. This knowledge must humble you and put your sins to death.
It had that effect on Job.
"I have heard of You by the hearing of the ear, but now my eyes see You. Therefore, I abhor myself and repent in dust and ashes" (Job 42:5-6).
It had that effect on John also. This is important because he was our Lord's dearest friend. He was the disciple who rested on the Savior's bosom. But when he sees the Lord as He is in glory, even John,
"Falls at His feet as a dead man".
It will have the same effect on you. Owen closes on this point,
"Let us then, revive...a due apprehension of this inconceivable greatness of God and that infinite distance wherein we stand from Him. [Let it], fill the soul with a holy and awful fear of Him to keep it in a frame unsuited to a thriving or flourishing of any lust.
"Consider Him with Whom you have to do--even our God is a consuming fire and in your [greatest admiration of Him] remember that your nature is too narrow to bear thoughts suitable to His glory".
That's where Owen stops. But let me add a few practical remarks. How do you get bigger thoughts of God?
1.Open your eyes! "The heavens declare the glory of God and the firmament shows His handiwork" (Psalm 19:1). How mighty the Lord is!
a. Our Galaxy is about 100,000 light years across. A "light year" is the distance light travels in a year. Light travels 186,000 miles per second. The numbers are boggling! Even more so when you remember:
1. The Milky Way is not the only galaxy. There may be millions more!
2.God made them all out of nothing!
b.Within this galaxy think of the variety of things He made--the Sun, a snowflake, an elephant, an ameba, billions of people, not two of whom are the same.
c.Think of the beauty of a sunset; no artist could duplicate it.
2.Enjoy life. "The earth is full of the goodness of the LORD". What kind of God would so freely distribute these pleasures?
a.The laughter of a child.
b.The smell of an apple pie.
c.The softness of a Siamese cat.
d.The taste of cold water on a hot day.
e.Peering into the eyes of the one you love.
3.Read the Bible. It tells "the mighty acts of God". In creation and providence. In judgment and in salvation.
4.Pray for understanding, Psalm 119:18.
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