His divine power has
given us everything we need for life and godliness through our knowledge of him
who called us by his own glory and goodness. 2 Peter 1:3
The supreme purpose of the Christian
religion is to make men like God in order that they may act like God. In Christ
the verbs “to be” and “to do” follow each other in that order.
True religion leads to moral action. The
only true Christian is the practicing Christian. Such a one is in very reality
an incarnation of Christ as Christ is the incarnation of God; not in the same
degree and fullness of perfection, for there is nothing in the moral universe equal
to that awful mystery of godliness which joined God and man in eternal union in
the person of the Man Christ Jesus; but as the fullness of the Godhead was and
is in Christ, so Christ is in the nature of the one who believes in Him in the
manner prescribed in the Scriptures.
Just as in eternity God acted like Himself
and when incarnated in human flesh still continued in all His conduct to be
true to His holiness, so does He when He enters the nature of a believing man.
This is the method by which He makes the redeemed man holy.
The faith of Christ was never intended to
be an end in itself nor to serve instead of something else. In the minds of
some teachers faith stands in lieu of moral conduct and every inquirer after
God must take his choice between the two. We are presented with the well-known
either/or: either we have faith or we have works, and faith saves while works
damn us. This error has lowered the moral standards of the church!
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