Let us in conclusion briefly sum up what has been before us. We have seen that there are three great features of our freedom from sin.
1. From its penalty—judicially.
2. From its power—practically.
3. From its presence—absolutely.
1. We have seen that in Christ's death God has severed the believer's connection with all that is of the first man—severed him forever judicially from “sin in the flesh “; and though it still remains within him, it has no part in the new “I.” We have seen, that because we are now alive before God in Him who exhausted sin's condemnation on the cross, there could not possibly remain any condemnation for us; that before God, such a thing no more exists for us, than a second flood existed for Noah, when he came forth from the ark, and stood beside his altar a divinely favored worshipper, with the rainbow in the heavens over his head.
2. We have seen how we are set free from its power. When, through bitterness of inward exercise under law, we have morally reached the point where we are brought to see that there is no remedy for the flesh, and no deliverance from it but in DEATH; when we find that all our earnest struggles to get rid of it are useless, as all the pious efforts to improve it are worthless; when we learn that God is neither expecting any good thing from it, nor asking us to bring a good thing out of it; when we see that while the law demanded what we could never produce, and brought us into bondage, grace brings to us, without a merit on our part, and as the free gift of God, all that Christ is worthy of, then sin's dominion is over; we are no longer under law, but under grace.
The tree of Calvary, where an end was made to the flesh as before God, is the “tree” which makes the bitter waters sweet (Ex. 15:2424And the people murmured against Moses, saying, What shall we drink? (Exodus 15:24)). But we must taste the bitterness of the waters without the tree, before we learn their sweetness by its means. We have seen that Abraham went through that “very grievous” struggle of parting with Ishmael before he learned from God's own lips that Isaac was reckoned as his only begotten son, and that the son of the bondwoman—“born after the flesh”—had no more place in Abraham's house than if he had never existed, although, as a matter of fact, he survived Abraham nearly fifty years.
As to any expectation from the flesh, as to any confidence in it, or any sympathy with it, we have done with it, we are morally free from it. Should it ever act again, it can only be evil. But we shall not get distressed because we find we have not got rid of it, nor be miserably disappointed because we cannot improve it. No; our distress will be that we have grieved the heart of our God and Father by an allowance of that which He gave His blessed Son to deliver us from, by lightly gratifying that which He saw no remedy for save in the cross of Jesus.
Our distress will not be that we have failed to make the flesh better, as though it was part of our new status before God; but that we have failed to keep the sentence of death upon it, failed to keep it under the condemnation which, at the cross, God righteously passed upon it. We are responsible to judge it as those who have no relationship with it, and who are no longer debtors to it.
3. Thus are we set free to anticipate with rest and delight the coming again of Him to whose precious sacrifice and death we owe our all for eternity; to hail with gladness that blessed morning of promise, when we shall be as free from sin's presence as we are now free from its condemnation. Perfect and personal conformity to Christ in glory is our sure and certain hope; and is, for us, the only actual freedom from the last remains of sin that Scripture speaks about.
“All taint of sin shall be removed,
All evil done away;
And we shall dwell with God's beloved
Through God's eternal day.”
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