“For ye are dead” (Col. iii. 3).
Now, this definite, absolute and final putting off of ourselves in an act
of death, is something we cannot do ourselves. It is not self-mortifying,
but it is dying with Christ. There is nothing can do it but the Cross of
Christ and the Spirit of God. The church is full of half dead people who
have been trying, like poor Nero, to slay themselves for years, and have
not had the courage to strike the fatal blow. Oh, if they would just put
themselves at Jesus’ feet, and let Him do it, there would be
accomplishment and rest. On that cross He has provided for our death as
well as our life, and our part is just to let His death be applied to our
nature just as it has been to our old sins, and then leave it with Him,
think no more about it, and count it dead, not recognizing it any longer
as ourselves, but another, refusing to listen or fear it, to be identified
with it, or even try to cleanse it, but counting it utterly in His hands,
and dead to us forever, and for all our new life depending on Him at every
breath, as a babe just born depends upon its mother’s life.