The Cross of Jesus Christ
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Introduction
Introduction
Watchman Nee distinguishes between the duty of the blood and the cross as an answer to the dual problem of sin: what we do and what we are.
The blood grants us forgiveness for what we have done, while the cross grants us deliverance from who we are.
The difference between the two could be defined and seen as how we receive peace with God and likewise how we receive peace with ourselves.
Peace with God:
10 For if, while we were enemies, we were reconciled to God through the death of his Son, then how much more, having been reconciled, will we be saved by his life.
How is it we find the concern and dilemma of peace with self in this discussion, as it seems that most primitive believers did not struggle with this problem?
The Civil War Within Our Hearts
The Civil War Within Our Hearts
Watchman Nee describes this conflict and dilemma of self peace the civil war within our hearts. It is what he sees Romans 7 to mean, where the flesh and the spirit are seen to be in conflict with each other.
6 Now the mindset of the flesh is death, but the mindset of the Spirit is life and peace.
7 The mindset of the flesh is hostile to God because it does not submit to God’s law. Indeed, it is unable to do so.
Another way to describe the matter is justification verses sanctification. That is, how can we make sure our behavior is matching our status with God.
Unfortunately, most of our conversation has been one-sided, focusing only on justification and never on sanctification.
According to Nee, the justification is for the behavior and the sanctification of the nature. Therefore, we need justification for our behavior, but our nature needs to be crucified.
To live with only the story of justification is to live a sub-normal Christian life. However, to live the full story is to live the Normal Christian Life.
The Old Man
The Old Man
Watchman writes,
The Blood can wash away my sins, but it cannot wash away my ‘old man.’ It needs the Cross to crucify me. The Blood deals with the sins, but the Cross must deal with the sinner.
Many have claimed that their sins have been forgiven, but do not profess that their old man has been crucified. Consequently, there’s a manner of living that does not match our cleansing; our justification. This is the problem of modern-American Christianity.
Therefore, Paul addresses the problem of the sinner in Romans 5, after addressing the problem of the sinner’s sins in the first four chapters of Romans.
Nee makes a great acknowledgment about evangelism. He states that the normal argument used to prove that one is a sinner is generally expressed through Romans 3:23. However, he argues that this is the wrong approach. For, Paul is not arguing that we are sinners because we sin. Rather, that we sin because we are sinners.
Strategically, Nee is arguing an explanation that challenges the structural problem of sin rather than the symptomatic signs of sin. He writes,
We are sinners by constitution rather than by action.
The fact that we are constitutionally sinners demonstrate that we are unable to please God, even before we sin.
19 For just as through one man’s disobedience the many were made sinners, so also through the one man’s obedience the many will be made righteous.
Who’s a sinner? The response is generally, “The one who sins.” Nee continues by saying, “Yes, one who sins is a sinner, but the fact that he sins is merely the evidence that he is already a sinner; it is not the cause.” He continues, “One who sins is a sinner, but it is equally true that one who does not sin, if he is of Adam’s race, is a sinner too, and in need of redemption.”
It is the birth that counts
Consequently, who we are is much worse than what we do.
The key thing to ask here is: What does it look like for a person who does not sin to be a sinner? What does it mean for a person who does not sin to be a sinner?
Now, Mr. Nee has done well to consider the textual structure of the book of Romans. However, it seems, at first glance, that he has missed the elementary ideas of study. When you look at the definition of sinner, we find,
ἁμαρτωλός, όν pert. to behavior or activity that does not measure up to standard moral or cultic expectations (being considered an outsider because of failure to conform to certain standards is a freq. semantic component. Persons engaged in certain occupations, e.g. herding and tanning, that jeopardized cultic purity, would be considered by some as ‘sinners’, a term tantamount to ‘outsider’. Non-Israelites were esp. considered out of bounds [cp. Ac 10:28 and s. b, below]).
Technically, sinners are simply people who sin. However, the key word to pay attention to is, outsider. What Nee and Paul intend to explain is the fact that we are outsiders to God and the community that make up the people of God. Consequently, we must be brought back in. For, it is our old man that prohibits us from fellowship.
We may understand the major difference between the two as being one between being a sinner and sinful.
A sinful person is one that has committed unrighteous acts.
A sinner is one that neglects duty, which may not necessarily require an act.
Therefore, to be a sinner without sins means to be one who is stuck outside. This is where we might understand the idea of dwelling outside of the camp, by which God grabbed us with His blood. Yet, it is through the crucifixion that we find the ability to never go back.
12 Therefore, Jesus also suffered outside the gate, so that he might sanctify the people by his own blood.
13 Let us, then, go to him outside the camp, bearing his disgrace.
14 For we do not have an enduring city here; instead, we seek the one to come.
Man’s Nature and God’s Solution
Man’s Nature and God’s Solution
The problem, therefore, that must be solved through the cross is the problem of being in Adam.
What can take us out of Adam? The blood? No, it is the cross.
2 Absolutely not! How can we who died to sin still live in it?
6 For we know that our old self was crucified with him so that the body ruled by sin might be rendered powerless so that we may no longer be enslaved to sin,
20 I have been crucified with Christ, and I no longer live, but Christ lives in me. The life I now live in the body, I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me.
24 Now those who belong to Christ Jesus have crucified the flesh with its passions and desires.
14 But as for me, I will never boast about anything except the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ. The world has been crucified to me through the cross, and I to the world.
Christ is the last Adam. There’s no other besides Him, and He is sufficient enough.
45 So it is written, The first man Adam became a living being; the last Adam became a life-giving spirit.
46 However, the spiritual is not first, but the natural, then the spiritual.
47 The first man was from the earth, a man of dust; the second man is from heaven.