You were taught, with regard to your former way of life, to put off your old self, which is being corrupted by its deceitful desires; to be made new in the attitude of your minds; and to put on the new self, created to be like God in true righteousness and holiness. (Eph 4:22-24, my emphasis)
It's all very well to say "put off" the old self and "put on" the new. How do you do it in practice? Last week I shared an excerpt from Martyn Lloyd
Jones's Exposition of Ephesians where he talks about the "principle" of putting off the old self. This week, I'd like to share his "practical application", where he tells us
how to put off the old self.
If you're observant, you'll notice that these"how to's" are very similar to Tim Chester's in
You Can Change. Martyn Lloyd Jones's first three points are really about
faith:
remembering who we are in Jesus. His fourth and last are about
repentance: turning from sin. His fifth point is about
avoiding temptation, one of Chester's strategies for supporting faith and repentance that we'll cover later this term.
The first essential is, that we have to remind ourselves of who we are and what we are. ...
The whole art of Christian living is to know how to talk to yourself. ... A Christian is a preacher, he preaches to himself. You start your day by telling yourself, Now I am the new man, I am no longer the old man; my old man has been crucified with Christ ... It is not surprising that we fail so much. We do not start the day as we should. We groan, Here are these thoughts again, and here is the problem, another eighteen hours or so before me, what can I do? And before we realise it, we are already defeated. Let us therefore remind ourselves who we are ...
The second essential follows obviously ... We are to remind ourselves again of the nature and the character of the old life. [Eph 4:17-19, 22] ...
I suppose I have to say this more frequently than anything else in my pastoral work. People come about particular problems; they tell me that they have been praying to be delivered ... I say to them, Have you ever really looked this thing in the face? You are frightened of it, you are running away from it, you are cowering ... But now, wait a moment. Examine this thing, put it up in front of you, analyse it and dissect it, see it for what it is. That is half the battle. And then ... you will see that the whole thing must be got rid of. Look at it and face it, instead of running away from it. ...
And then there is a third point. Impress upon yourself the utter inconsistency of claiming to be a Christian but continuing to live in the old way.
So obvious, is it not? And yet how we all fail to do it! You have to ... say to yourself: ... I am being utterly inconsistent ... As a Christian ... I am saying that I am a partaker of the divine nature, that Christ died to rescue me from this present evil world, that I have been translated from the kingdom of darkness into the kingdom of God's dear Son. ... Is my conduct and my behaviour to be that of the old realm when I claim to belong to this new realm? [Phil 1:27] ... There are certain things that are incompatible with this new life. Put them off! Get rid of them!
But we must go on to the next step of obedience to the gospel. ... Have nothing at all to do with the works of darkness. [Eph 5:11]
Be drastic. Have no dealings at all with them. ... Watch the beginning. Have no parleying, have no discussion, have nothing at all to do with sin ... The moment you even listen to the devil you have practically gone under. If you have a discussion with him, ... you are already beaten, he will defeat you every time; he is subtle, he is clever ... If you begin to have any parleyings with sin, you are done for. ... If you are in doubt about a thing, say No! Err on that side rather than on the other. Things that are even doubtful should not be touched. [Rom 14:23]
Next we come to another positive injunction which I want to emphasise. ... Do not be fool enough to lead yourself into temptation. [Rom 13:14]
There are certain places that are bad for you - Stay out of them! ... You know beforehand that if you go in, the flesh will be stimulated. ... Therefore, never go into such a place. And not only places, but also people. ... You do not pray about this, you do not argue, you do not need special guidance about this. If experience teaches you that such a person invariably tends to have a bad influence upon you, avoid such a person. ... The same holds good with respect to reading ... So be discriminating and careful as you read ... Avoid that which tends to harm you and to drag you down. ... If there is something that is enticing, do not look at it! ... Make a covenant with your eyes, look straight on [Job 31:1, 7, Prov 4:25], do not let your eyes wander, do not let them lust after things, do not let them turn from the straight path ... : you do not merely pray about it; you must just not look! ...
And that brings me to the last principle - I have tried to put the principles in ascending order - ... mortify the flesh [Rom 8:13, Col 3:5] ...
Mortify means to deaden, it means deliberately to attack, it means to starve ... 'I keep under my body, and bring it into subjection'! [1 Cor 9:25, 27]. ... I am like a boxer, I am not beating the air, I am pummelling myself, I am hitting myself black and blue, I am giving myself black eyes; that this flesh may not get me down. I keep my body under, and bring it into subjection. ... So we not only do not make provision for the flesh, we must mortify the flesh, keep it under, keep it down, realising that unless we do so, it will get us down temporarily and we shall be living a contradictory life. ...
Put off the old man! And do it in detail. The Apostle goes on to details - lying, stealing, corrupt communications. He takes them up one by one, and he says you have to apply the principles with regard to every single item. And thus you will put off the old man that is corrupt and dying and decaying, ... that we may no longer disgrace the fair and glorious name of our blessed Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ.
from Martyn Lloyd Jones's comments on Ephesians 4:22-24 in his
Exposition of Ephesians; longer emphases mine
images are from Hope., tilaneseven, adedip, ashley.adcox, Phil Dragash, Geekgirly, and Alva+Chien at flickr
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