True and False Condemnation

Every human being in the world is dealt with by the Holy Spirit of God. There is a constant work of the Spirit going on in the life of everyone. The unconverted person is being drawn toward God by two general methods: the “carrot” and the “stick”. The old saying goes that you can get a mule to move by a carrot in front of his nose or a stick applied to his rear. Mules are recognized to be very independent creatures, and this is the spiritual characteristic of unconverted people also. God tries the “carrot” technique by demonstrating His power and majesty in the beauty of creation. He tries to draw people to a knowledge of Himself by making them see “goodness” around them in some form or another - the beauty of a sunset, a “good” act by one person toward another, or just by stressing the fact that the person contains a soul conscience toward “good”.
But most often, demonstrating “good” is not enough to draw the unconverted to God. The “stick” approach is necessary. Evil has a built-in “stick”. God does not have to strike us with the stick. When we act as if we are independent from God, we smack ourselves with the stick. There are built-in consequences to “sin”, which is any attempt at independent living. The whole idea of God is to get us to see that doing our own thing does not work. He wants us to see that independent living does not work. (Later, after conversion, we can come to see that there is no such thing as independent living. The unconverted person lives the nature of Satan and the Christian lives the nature of Christ.)
What God is actually doing is applying TRUE condemnation to the unconverted person. The person separated from God must come to see that he is not a “good” person, that he doesn’t have it in him to BE a “good” person, and that there are spiritual as well as physical penalties for sin.
This drawing toward understanding gradually brings the person to a knowledge of Jesus Christ and what He did for the sinner by paying the penalty of death. By accepting Jesus Christ as his Lord and Master, the person is converted - that is, he becomes a “new creature” with Satan’s nature removed and Christ coming in a living union within.
TRUE condemnation has done its work. It has made another child in God’s family. TRUE condemnation is practically always a requirement for conversion and the new birth. Humans are such “mule-heads” that showing us “good” things hardly ever works toward our good. We need that smack with the “stick” of sin over the rump. We need that feeling of guilt over our “badness”. So TRUE condemnation is an important TOOL of God in the plan of salvation.
BUT WHAT BECOMES OF CONDEMNATION IN THE CHRISTIAN? Here we are that “new person” in union with Christ. Satan’s nature is out. Christ is in. But what happens? WE STILL SIN! In fact, things seem to go along pretty much the same as in our unconverted days. Oh sure, in some areas we feel better about ourselves. And we feel we can call on Christ to “help” us when the going gets too tough.
But now, in the Christian, the Holy Spirit has a different job to do in us with the attitude of condemnation. In order to grow spiritually in our awareness of our “in Christ” position, our “one Spirit” with Christ, we must be made to see that any feeling of condemnation after slipping into sin is FALSE CONDEMNATION!
False condemnation is probably the most prevalent cause of unhappiness and ineffectiveness among God’s children. If the thunders of the penalty of the law have ceased to terrify us through the peace of reconciliation with God, the pointing finger of the law at our daily shortcomings is a constant discomfort. For we do “come short of the glory of God”, AND WE DO SO DAILY! What are we to do about it? We are in union with Christ. And He said He will never leave us. But Satan, using all the external allurement and disturbance that this distorted world affords, finds plenty of means of pulling at us. We are “drawn away of our own desires and enticed”, and often the enticement leads on to consent, and we have sinned (James 1:14,15). Not the blatant sins of our past life, not certainly persistent sinning, for those who do that are not born of God (I John 3:9). But wrong attitudes of soul mind, the quick word, selfishness, impatience, sins of the eyes, slowness toward helping others, the finer points of failure in holiness, which we had never even noticed in our insensitive days; these we fall into and then recognize our fall.
And the moment we spot our weakness, if we don’t get clear at once, we begin to linger in false condemnation - we begin to feel independent again. But false condemnation is an illusion. A Christian in union with Christ will never be condemned again. Christ suffered the penalty of our TRUE condemnation and that is it! Condemnation for sin is over!
Then how do we get out of this guilt feeling, and get out quickly? First, there is the big lie of the Accuser of the brethren. Satan will cast doubts on our crucified position in Christ, and try to tell us that our “old man” is still very much alive in us. That is a falsehood. But many accept it, and drag their feet through life on the false assumption that they have a divided self, a divided nature. Their conception of Christian living is a continuous struggle, a losing battle between their old nature and their new. But there are not two co-equal natures battling in the believer one against the other. We have only one nature at a time; we cannot have more. We were by nature the children of darkness, we are now partakers of the divine nature. No halfway measures about that! The old nature is the old man who died by crucifixion with Christ. The new nature is the new man which is we risen with Christ and Christ living in us.
When God looks at the Christian, He sees Christ! A Christian is a Christ-person, a child in God’s family. And as any good parent knows, we don’t disown (condemn) our child when he slips up and falls. BUT A GOOD PARENT DOES CORRECT! And, for the Christian, CORRECTION takes the place of CONDEMNATION.
The Holy Spirit is the Teacher within the Christian to always keep us mindful of who we are within our spirit - Jesus Christ. We are to live and walk in the Spirit, led by and trusting in Christ (Galatians 5). When we stay in this awareness, we are not then walking in the flesh (independent self), which we have crucified. Because we are not walking in the flesh, the law has no claim on us, for it only presents its demands to independent self. While we abide in Christ, we are dead in Him to law, and therefore dead to sin which is by the law.
But if we do not walk in the Spirit, that is, staying in awareness and trust in Christ within, then we return again under law by independent thinking. And therefore, we return under the external influence of sin, of Mr. Sin, Satan - but not under his CONTROL and therefore not under CONDEMNATION! This is not a question of an old and new nature, which was settled at the new birth. This external and internal matter is a question of the daily walk, and the possibility of slipping back any time for an external visit to sin.
So we have to learn not to accept the big lie of our return to an old “no good” condition, just because we drifted out to an external influence on occasion. We are not to live in the bondage of a false, but very commonly held conception of being two people at once, with a civil war within, a good and bad nature, and who will win? No. Let us confess with the same assured voice as Paul that “the law of the Spirit of Life in Christ Jesus has set me free from the law of sin and death”.
And moreover we must not stay, even temporarily, under false condemnation, when the world, the flesh or the devil has influenced us. It is the easiest thing to do, and our distressed feelings are really self-pity and pride. It is not so much that we have grieved GOD that disturbs us, as that WE, OURSELVES, have failed. The acceptance of false condemnation is really a form of self-righteousness. God has told us that when we sin, to get up quickly and recognize and confess the sin and He is quick to forgive and forget. To remain in false condemnation, therefore, is really disobedience and hurt self.
Every sin of a Christian involves a correction or a re-direction back to Christ. Sin is “missing the mark” and the “mark” is TRUSTING DEPENDENCE ON CHRIST.
Every fall of a child learning to walk hurts a little bit. But the parent urges the child up again in caring love. And the child learns to avoid the hurts by getting better at walking. The falls become fewer and farther apart. And as we grow and learn to walk perfectly, and then even to run with agility, even an adult will occasionally stumble and fall. In fact, we are never immune from falling. That’s life! And that’s also the Spirit Life!
We can learn many lessons from simple believers who keep short accounts with God. They are tripped up, they humbly recognize it, they get back up and go on their way rejoicing. And they often use their testimony to such daily simple experiences to be a blessing to others.

OUR HEAVENLY FATHER KEEPS SHORT ACCOUNTS OF
THE ACTIONS OF HIS CHILDREN.
HE FORGIVES QUICKLY -
AND FORGETS QUICKLY!

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