Lesson 2
THE NEW SELF
Man is a spirit being. He possesses a physical body in which he dwells. He has a soul composed of his reasoning faculties. His mind, will and emotions. His body enables him to contact physical things. His reasoning faculties contact mental things. His spirit contacts spiritual things.
Before he receives Eternal life his spirit is dominated by Spiritual Death. This makes it impossible for him to understand the Bible, which is Revelation Truth.
1 Corinthians 2:14 "Now the natural man receiveth not the things of the spirit of God for they are foolishness unto him; and he cannot know them because they are spiritually understood."
The part of man that is recreated is his spirit.
Ezekiel 11:19 is a remarkable prophecy. "And I will give them one heart, and I will put a new spirit within you: and I will take the stony heart out of their flesh and give them a heart of flesh."
Here is a unique suggestion. He is speaking of the New Creation.
He will recreate their spirit, or heart, as the term is synonymously used.
He says, "I will give them one heart." This suggests that a new kind of love is coming which will make them one as a body of people.
Jesus said, "That they may be one even as we are one."
In John 13:35-36 we read, "By this shall all men know that you are my disciples, if you have love one to another."
In the 36th chapter of Ezekiel, the 26th verse, we read, "A new heart also will. I give you and a new spirit will I put within you."
Here is the prophecy of an absolutely New Creation.
He is going to take the stony heart of selfishness out of them, and give them His own heart of love.
In the 27th verse He says, "I will put my Spirit within you and cause you to walk in my statutes."
There will not only be a New Creation, but His Indwelling is promised.
We can hear Jesus saying, "He is with you, but He shall be in you."
1 Peter 3:4 "But let it be the hidden man of the heart."
Here we are given a title for the recreated human spirit. He is called the "hidden man of the heart." He is the New Creation man. He is "the man."
The physical body is not the man, it is the temporary dwelling place for the man.
The reasoning faculties are not the man, they are his servants. I repeat, the reasoning faculties are your servants as well as your five senses.
The body is the home of the five senses, or the five servants of the man. All of the knowledge that the reasoning faculties ever get comes through the five senses, or the five servants of the brain.
The brain would be dormant, inactive, if the five senses did not function.
It would be good to note here that all of the knowledge that is taught in our colleges, universities and technical schools has come to man through these five channels.
The only way that man can obtain knowledge, or an education, is through these five servants, or members of the physical body.
Romans 7:22 "For I delight in the law of God after the inward man." Here this hidden man is called the "inward man." in either case, the "hidden man" is "the man."
The personality of the inner man is sometimes affected by the outer man.
2 Corinthians 4:16 "Wherefore we faint not; but though our outward man is decaying, yet our inward man is renewed day by day."
Ephesians 3:16 "That he would grant you, according to the riches of his glory, that you may be strengthened with his ability in the inward man." (Literal)
The outward, or the visible man, is the one that you salute on the street.
The inward man is the one who gives this outer man either his attractiveness or his repulsiveness.
It is a very remarkable fact that God deals with the "inward man" instead of the outer man.
Spiritual things are unveiled to this "hidden man of the heart."
The Holy Spirit makes His home in the "hidden man."
Sin consciousness comes from this "inward man."
It is deeply important that you understand this fact: it is the recreated spirit that convicts of sin in the believer, and our conscience is His voice speaking to our reason.
We stated before that the "hidden man" is the part of us that is recreated, receives Eternal Life, and becomes a New Creation.
One Bible translator of 2 Corinthians 5:17 translates it like this, "Wherefore if any man is in Christ there is a new self brought into being, but old things have passed away, behold all things have become new."
The reconciliation it speaks of in the next verse is between this "hidden man of the heart" and the Father-God.
He never speaks of reconciliation between the mind, or the reasoning faculties, and God; it is always a reconciliation of the heart.
When I first saw this truth unfolded, it began to have an effect upon my attitude toward some of the teachings that I had accepted in my early days.
Let us think of man as being in God's class. He is a spirit. He is an eternal spirit. He is capable of receiving the nature of God. He is capable of loving God. He is capable of becoming a child of God. He never becomes a god; he is like God.
You understand he was created in the image and the likeness of God, that is, spiritual likeness.
He lost that image in the fall, but it is restored in the New Creation.
There is a very remarkable term used in the Pauline Revelation many times. For instance, in the first chapter of Ephesians it occurs (in one form or another) eleven or twelve times.
Take this as an illustration, Ephesians 1:7 "in whom we have our Redemption."
Notice the first two words, "In whom," "in Christ," or "in Him."
For a long time that bothered me. I wondered what it meant.
I came upon something in John 15:5 that helped me. "I am the vine, and you are the branches."
The branch is a part of the vine. The vine is a part of the branch. The two are one.
In Ephesians 1:6 he says, "We are “in” the beloved."
In Ephesians 2:6 it states, "We are seated ‘together’."
We are seated with this Beloved One at the Right Hand of the Father.
Ephesians 2:6-7 "And raised us up with him, and made us to sit with him in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus: that in the ages to come he might show the exceeding riches of his grace in kindness toward us in Christ Jesus."
In Ephesians 2:10 it tells us that “we are his workmanship created in Christ Jesus."
You see, this occurred before the Resurrection of the Master.
When Christ was recreated the Father said, "This day have I begotten you."
In the mind of Justice the entire Body of Christ was recreated.
This becomes a reality in us the moment we accept Christ as our Savior and confess Him as our Lord. We then receive Eternal Life, the Nature of the Father. This makes us New Creations.
Now come back to the scripture I quoted, "Wherefore if any man is in Christ there is a new creation, a new self. The old things of the old self have passed away, behold, they have become new, and all these things are of God: who has reconciled us unto himself through Christ."
Romans 6: 4-8 "We were buried therefore with him through baptism into death: that like as Christ was raised from the dead through the glory of the Father, so we also might walk in the newness of life."
Notice the next verse. "For if we have become united with him in the likeness of his death, we shall be also in the likeness of his resurrection: knowing this, that our old man was crucified with him, that the body of sin might be done away, that so we should no longer be in bondage to sin." Note the tense, "was" not "is."
"For he that has died is justified from sin. But if we died with Christ, we believe that we shall also live with him."
Way's translation throws much light on this. "Well then, if that baptism made us share His death, it must have made us share His burial too. It must follow that, as Messiah was raised from among the dead by means of the descent of His Father’s glory, so we too, who arose with Him, are to be employed wholly in the activities of the New Life.
"For if, by having died like Him, we have entered into living union with Him, most certainly we shall not be less so in consequence of having risen with Him. This we recognize, that our former self was nailed to His cross with Him, so that that body which was the instrument of sin might be made impotent for evil, so that we could not any longer be slaves of sin."
Notice carefully that the part of us that was recreated, made new, was "the hidden man of the heart." He is called "the old man."
This old man was crucified with Christ. It was neither our physical body nor our reasoning faculties, but our spirit. That is the part of us that was Spiritually Dead and had to be recreated.
Colossians 3:9-10 "Seeing that you have put off the old man with his doings, and put on the new man, that is being renewed unto knowledge after the image of him that created him."
Notice that the "old man" was put off, crucified with Christ.
When Christ arose from the dead a "new man" arose with Him. That new self is the human spirit.
Now the physical body, which is the home of the five senses, must be brought into conformity with Christ, who is the Head of the Body.
This brings us to Romans 12:1-2, "I beseech you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, to present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable to God, which is your spiritual service."
"And be not fashioned according to this age: but be you transformed (or transfigured) by the renewing of your mind, that you may prove what is the good and acceptable and perfect will of God."
In other words, we have to change the way we think to the way God thinks.
This body is the home, or dwelling place, of the spirit. This recreated human spirit wishes to communicate its new found joy to those about it.
Hidden away as it is in the human body, it has no way of communication but through the five senses.
Therefore, the first thing that must be done after one is recreated is to bring these five senses into subjection to the recreated human spirit, and the Word. When this is done the mind will be renewed.
Although you are Born Again you still possess the same mind and body that had been under the dominion of the Adversary. This is the reason that it is so important to renew the mind and bring it into harmony with the recreated spirit.
You must bring it into subjection to this new self that has come into being.
The trouble with the majority of believers is that their minds have never been renewed.
The mind will never be renewed until they begin to practice love. They must live this love life that Jesus introduced to the world.
THE NEW KIND OF SELFISHNESS
"If any man be in Christ there is a New Creation." This New Creation is born of God, and God is love; so the New Creation is a Love Creation.
In our Redemption, Love went the limit. The cross and the three days of suffering was love's limit.
Now we are born of that Love; so we have become Love Creations.
We are partakers of Love's nature. We have the attributes of Love. God reproduces Himself in the New Creation. He makes a superman of Love that "seeks not his own." This New Creation is not provoked by persecution or by slander, or by anything that the people ruled by selfishness can do.
You see, the New Birth made a New Self, a New Spirit, a New Man; and it gives to man a new kind of selfishness. It is the selfishness manifested in Paul and the other members of that early organization called the Church. It plans to give more than it gets, and it is perfectly selfish in this struggle to give more than another can give.
It denies itself to give more. It is really Christ let loose in us.
You can hear the cry, "Master, You died for me. I live now for those for whom you died. You became a slave of love for me. I will become a love slave for them."
In 2 Corinthians 5:13 we read, "For whether we are beside ourselves, it is unto God; or whether we are of sober mind, it is unto you. For the love of Christ constraineth us; because we thus judge, that one died for all, therefore all died; and he died for all, that they that live should no longer live unto themselves."
This Selfishness, as I love to call it, is the kind of love that sought the cross for me.
You remember that dear old saint, Polycarp, a convert of John the Beloved. When he was eighty-two, he started on that long trip to Rome, to confess before the Roman authorities that he was a love slave of Jesus Christ. They pled with him in every town through which he went on his way, that a stake and torches awaited him. His heart was set on giving his testimony in Rome. When he arrived, he was arrested; they tried him, but he refused to recant. They tied him to the stake and heaped the torches of fire around Him.
The authorities pled with Him to blaspheme the Name. Tenderly he looked at them and said, "I have served this Master nearly eighty years. I love Him. He is my Lord." And then, with a firm voice he said, "Light your fire"; and in the midst of the flame he cried, "Father, forgive them, they know not what they do."
You could hear Him say, "He loved me. He gave Himself up for me. If He gave Himself for me, it is no more than right that I should give myself for others."
It was love that led Him. It is Love that leads the way of unselfishness.
Let us notice a basic fact: there are two great forces in the world, this new kind of Love (agape) that Jesus brought, which springs out of the heart of the Father, and Selfishness, which is the nature of Satan.
Satan is spiritually dead. Spiritual death has given birth to Selfishness. Selfishness has dominated the human race.
Man is spiritually dead until he receives the nature of God.
Then, the combat in the world is between Eternal Life and Spiritual Death, or between Agapa and Selfishness.
The outstanding characteristic of natural man is Selfishness. It has given to us every one of the major sins that are destroying the human race.
Selfishness is the parent of the liquor traffic, gambling, and every other sin.
The husband who comes home half drunk doesn't love his family as much as he loves himself. The mother who has taken on the unhappy habits of modern society, and dares display these habits in the presence of her growing children, loves herself and her appetites more than she loves her children.
The natural man cannot love his children as much as he loves himself. He cannot love his wife as much as he loves himself.
The natural human heart is a partaker of the Satanic nature, Selfishness; and when that Selfishness gains the ascendancy it makes the man a despot in his home, filling it with the spirit of tyranny.
I saw a couple who had lived very unhappily and had thought much about separating, but there were little children. The father had a godly background, and so had the mother, but neither of them had ever received Eternal Life.
After the children came along, the wife began to feel the irritations of bondage and said, "These children just rob me of my liberty." The husband began to feel the same limitations. Selfishness began to grow quickly. The home was not a home. It was just a place where they quarreled and made up, found fault, and cursed the children.
Then one day my little book, "The New Kind of Love," fell into the hands of the husband. He brought it home and started to read it. He became so engrossed in it that his wife wanted to know what he was reading.
You see, Selfishness is always jealous. The keener and richer your Selfishness is, the more sensitive you become.
She became very curious as to what that little book was.
Finally she said, "What is that you are reading?"
He said, "It is the most wonderful book I have ever read."
He laid it down on the table, and she began to read it. She hadn't read half of it before she made her decision. She had seen things.
When he came into the house she said, "How far did you read in that book?"
"Nearly all of it. One of the men at the office gave it to me." He responded. "What do you think of it?"
"I only wish we had gotten hold of it when we were first married and life would have been different," she said.
He picked up one of his children and held it in his arms. "Wife," he said, "would you like to go with me on this thing? I would like to have Eternal Life. I am sick of my selfishness."
She looked into his face, and reached out her hand and said, "My dear, I will go the whole way with you."
The two older children were not home when, it happened, and the father and mother did not tell them about it.
Three or four days later the oldest girl said, "Mother, what has happened to you and Dad? You haven't quarreled since last week." Then the mother told the story to her, and the girl, in her mother's arms whispered, "Mother, I want it too."
And so, Love came to live in that house.
After a bit every member of the household sought to give the other more than he received. Love's rivalry began to develop. The husband and wife sought to out-do each other in love.
You see, when two New Creation people, Love filled, begin to practice Agapa, the very atmosphere of heaven is in that home.
Love's slogan is, "I am not seeking my own, but your happiness."
Wouldn't it be wonderful if we could have classes that would take up the study of Agapa. There has never been a chair of "Love" in any of our Colleges or Universities, and yet it is the most important thing in life.
You cannot adjust the labor and capital situation by law or by force. It can only be settled with Agapa.
Oh, if there should arise in the labor world a great leader who could evangelize the labor world and prove to them that Selfishness has never yet built anything that it did not destroy!
Sense Knowledge has built cities, but it always destroys them.
Few of us have recognized that there are two kinds of ambitions: one was born out of the desire to conquer and to reign, and to have and to hold, no matter what effect it had upon those who stand in the way; the other is the ambition to give, and to build, and to make happy; to educate and to train and to make beautiful glad homes. One is the Jesus kind, and the other is inspired by Satan.
You know, one of the sweetest things that Paul ever said was, "He counted me worthy to represent Love, even to represent God, to represent the new kind of love." Saul the hater, became Paul, the lover.
I wish that there could be little societies of men and women who would come together to study how to develop this new kind of love, so that they would have the new kind of selfishness.
I know a man and woman who lived very unhappily for nearly thirty years. They could not separate. They talked about it. They planned on it. They had even gone to their lawyer to talk it over; but when the time came, they could not seem to do it. They received a copy of my book, "The New Kind of Love," and then they came to my services and I happened to be speaking on this new kind of selfishness.
He came to see me a little while after that and said, "Do you know that my wife and I have found the thing we have been hunting for, for thirty years? We are playing the game now. Each one of us is trying to get the advantage of the other in love. Four or five of our neighbors have started to practice love also. One of them came the other night and said to me, 'You know, I can't practice this love. I don't have it in my heart,' and then my wife pointed her to the Lamb of God; and now she has that new kind of love too."
Wouldn't it be wonderful if every one who reads this lesson would become an evangel of this new kind of Love, this new kind of Selfishness?
We have seen the sons of Selfishness become the sons of Love.
We have seen the old Selfishness meet this new kind of Selfishness and be defeated.
The great combat today is between Selfishness and Love. Satan is the symbol of Selfishness; Jesus is the symbol of Love.
Questions
1. 1 Peter 3:4 and Romans 7:22 do not identify man as physical or mental. In what two ways do these scriptures identify mankind?
2. Sin consciousness comes from this "inward man." Why is it deeply important that you understand this fact?
3. What is the connection between Ephesians 1:7 and John 15:5?
4. In Ephesians 2:10 it tells us that “we are his workmanship created in Christ Jesus", this occurred before the Resurrection of the Master. How?
5. The "old man" was put off, crucified with Christ. What happened When Christ arose from the dead?
6. What is the first thing that must be done after you are born-again?
7. What is this “New Kind of Selfishness”?
8. What is the outstanding characteristic of natural man?
9. Few of us have recognized that there are two kinds of ambitions: One is the Jesus kind, and the other is inspired by Satan. Describe each of them.
10. What is the great combat today?
THE NEW SELF
Man is a spirit being. He possesses a physical body in which he dwells. He has a soul composed of his reasoning faculties. His mind, will and emotions. His body enables him to contact physical things. His reasoning faculties contact mental things. His spirit contacts spiritual things.
Before he receives Eternal life his spirit is dominated by Spiritual Death. This makes it impossible for him to understand the Bible, which is Revelation Truth.
1 Corinthians 2:14 "Now the natural man receiveth not the things of the spirit of God for they are foolishness unto him; and he cannot know them because they are spiritually understood."
The part of man that is recreated is his spirit.
Ezekiel 11:19 is a remarkable prophecy. "And I will give them one heart, and I will put a new spirit within you: and I will take the stony heart out of their flesh and give them a heart of flesh."
Here is a unique suggestion. He is speaking of the New Creation.
He will recreate their spirit, or heart, as the term is synonymously used.
He says, "I will give them one heart." This suggests that a new kind of love is coming which will make them one as a body of people.
Jesus said, "That they may be one even as we are one."
In John 13:35-36 we read, "By this shall all men know that you are my disciples, if you have love one to another."
In the 36th chapter of Ezekiel, the 26th verse, we read, "A new heart also will. I give you and a new spirit will I put within you."
Here is the prophecy of an absolutely New Creation.
He is going to take the stony heart of selfishness out of them, and give them His own heart of love.
In the 27th verse He says, "I will put my Spirit within you and cause you to walk in my statutes."
There will not only be a New Creation, but His Indwelling is promised.
We can hear Jesus saying, "He is with you, but He shall be in you."
1 Peter 3:4 "But let it be the hidden man of the heart."
Here we are given a title for the recreated human spirit. He is called the "hidden man of the heart." He is the New Creation man. He is "the man."
The physical body is not the man, it is the temporary dwelling place for the man.
The reasoning faculties are not the man, they are his servants. I repeat, the reasoning faculties are your servants as well as your five senses.
The body is the home of the five senses, or the five servants of the man. All of the knowledge that the reasoning faculties ever get comes through the five senses, or the five servants of the brain.
The brain would be dormant, inactive, if the five senses did not function.
It would be good to note here that all of the knowledge that is taught in our colleges, universities and technical schools has come to man through these five channels.
The only way that man can obtain knowledge, or an education, is through these five servants, or members of the physical body.
Romans 7:22 "For I delight in the law of God after the inward man." Here this hidden man is called the "inward man." in either case, the "hidden man" is "the man."
The personality of the inner man is sometimes affected by the outer man.
2 Corinthians 4:16 "Wherefore we faint not; but though our outward man is decaying, yet our inward man is renewed day by day."
Ephesians 3:16 "That he would grant you, according to the riches of his glory, that you may be strengthened with his ability in the inward man." (Literal)
The outward, or the visible man, is the one that you salute on the street.
The inward man is the one who gives this outer man either his attractiveness or his repulsiveness.
It is a very remarkable fact that God deals with the "inward man" instead of the outer man.
Spiritual things are unveiled to this "hidden man of the heart."
The Holy Spirit makes His home in the "hidden man."
Sin consciousness comes from this "inward man."
It is deeply important that you understand this fact: it is the recreated spirit that convicts of sin in the believer, and our conscience is His voice speaking to our reason.
We stated before that the "hidden man" is the part of us that is recreated, receives Eternal Life, and becomes a New Creation.
One Bible translator of 2 Corinthians 5:17 translates it like this, "Wherefore if any man is in Christ there is a new self brought into being, but old things have passed away, behold all things have become new."
The reconciliation it speaks of in the next verse is between this "hidden man of the heart" and the Father-God.
He never speaks of reconciliation between the mind, or the reasoning faculties, and God; it is always a reconciliation of the heart.
When I first saw this truth unfolded, it began to have an effect upon my attitude toward some of the teachings that I had accepted in my early days.
Let us think of man as being in God's class. He is a spirit. He is an eternal spirit. He is capable of receiving the nature of God. He is capable of loving God. He is capable of becoming a child of God. He never becomes a god; he is like God.
You understand he was created in the image and the likeness of God, that is, spiritual likeness.
He lost that image in the fall, but it is restored in the New Creation.
There is a very remarkable term used in the Pauline Revelation many times. For instance, in the first chapter of Ephesians it occurs (in one form or another) eleven or twelve times.
Take this as an illustration, Ephesians 1:7 "in whom we have our Redemption."
Notice the first two words, "In whom," "in Christ," or "in Him."
For a long time that bothered me. I wondered what it meant.
I came upon something in John 15:5 that helped me. "I am the vine, and you are the branches."
The branch is a part of the vine. The vine is a part of the branch. The two are one.
In Ephesians 1:6 he says, "We are “in” the beloved."
In Ephesians 2:6 it states, "We are seated ‘together’."
We are seated with this Beloved One at the Right Hand of the Father.
Ephesians 2:6-7 "And raised us up with him, and made us to sit with him in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus: that in the ages to come he might show the exceeding riches of his grace in kindness toward us in Christ Jesus."
In Ephesians 2:10 it tells us that “we are his workmanship created in Christ Jesus."
You see, this occurred before the Resurrection of the Master.
When Christ was recreated the Father said, "This day have I begotten you."
In the mind of Justice the entire Body of Christ was recreated.
This becomes a reality in us the moment we accept Christ as our Savior and confess Him as our Lord. We then receive Eternal Life, the Nature of the Father. This makes us New Creations.
Now come back to the scripture I quoted, "Wherefore if any man is in Christ there is a new creation, a new self. The old things of the old self have passed away, behold, they have become new, and all these things are of God: who has reconciled us unto himself through Christ."
Romans 6: 4-8 "We were buried therefore with him through baptism into death: that like as Christ was raised from the dead through the glory of the Father, so we also might walk in the newness of life."
Notice the next verse. "For if we have become united with him in the likeness of his death, we shall be also in the likeness of his resurrection: knowing this, that our old man was crucified with him, that the body of sin might be done away, that so we should no longer be in bondage to sin." Note the tense, "was" not "is."
"For he that has died is justified from sin. But if we died with Christ, we believe that we shall also live with him."
Way's translation throws much light on this. "Well then, if that baptism made us share His death, it must have made us share His burial too. It must follow that, as Messiah was raised from among the dead by means of the descent of His Father’s glory, so we too, who arose with Him, are to be employed wholly in the activities of the New Life.
"For if, by having died like Him, we have entered into living union with Him, most certainly we shall not be less so in consequence of having risen with Him. This we recognize, that our former self was nailed to His cross with Him, so that that body which was the instrument of sin might be made impotent for evil, so that we could not any longer be slaves of sin."
Notice carefully that the part of us that was recreated, made new, was "the hidden man of the heart." He is called "the old man."
This old man was crucified with Christ. It was neither our physical body nor our reasoning faculties, but our spirit. That is the part of us that was Spiritually Dead and had to be recreated.
Colossians 3:9-10 "Seeing that you have put off the old man with his doings, and put on the new man, that is being renewed unto knowledge after the image of him that created him."
Notice that the "old man" was put off, crucified with Christ.
When Christ arose from the dead a "new man" arose with Him. That new self is the human spirit.
Now the physical body, which is the home of the five senses, must be brought into conformity with Christ, who is the Head of the Body.
This brings us to Romans 12:1-2, "I beseech you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, to present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable to God, which is your spiritual service."
"And be not fashioned according to this age: but be you transformed (or transfigured) by the renewing of your mind, that you may prove what is the good and acceptable and perfect will of God."
In other words, we have to change the way we think to the way God thinks.
This body is the home, or dwelling place, of the spirit. This recreated human spirit wishes to communicate its new found joy to those about it.
Hidden away as it is in the human body, it has no way of communication but through the five senses.
Therefore, the first thing that must be done after one is recreated is to bring these five senses into subjection to the recreated human spirit, and the Word. When this is done the mind will be renewed.
Although you are Born Again you still possess the same mind and body that had been under the dominion of the Adversary. This is the reason that it is so important to renew the mind and bring it into harmony with the recreated spirit.
You must bring it into subjection to this new self that has come into being.
The trouble with the majority of believers is that their minds have never been renewed.
The mind will never be renewed until they begin to practice love. They must live this love life that Jesus introduced to the world.
THE NEW KIND OF SELFISHNESS
"If any man be in Christ there is a New Creation." This New Creation is born of God, and God is love; so the New Creation is a Love Creation.
In our Redemption, Love went the limit. The cross and the three days of suffering was love's limit.
Now we are born of that Love; so we have become Love Creations.
We are partakers of Love's nature. We have the attributes of Love. God reproduces Himself in the New Creation. He makes a superman of Love that "seeks not his own." This New Creation is not provoked by persecution or by slander, or by anything that the people ruled by selfishness can do.
You see, the New Birth made a New Self, a New Spirit, a New Man; and it gives to man a new kind of selfishness. It is the selfishness manifested in Paul and the other members of that early organization called the Church. It plans to give more than it gets, and it is perfectly selfish in this struggle to give more than another can give.
It denies itself to give more. It is really Christ let loose in us.
You can hear the cry, "Master, You died for me. I live now for those for whom you died. You became a slave of love for me. I will become a love slave for them."
In 2 Corinthians 5:13 we read, "For whether we are beside ourselves, it is unto God; or whether we are of sober mind, it is unto you. For the love of Christ constraineth us; because we thus judge, that one died for all, therefore all died; and he died for all, that they that live should no longer live unto themselves."
This Selfishness, as I love to call it, is the kind of love that sought the cross for me.
You remember that dear old saint, Polycarp, a convert of John the Beloved. When he was eighty-two, he started on that long trip to Rome, to confess before the Roman authorities that he was a love slave of Jesus Christ. They pled with him in every town through which he went on his way, that a stake and torches awaited him. His heart was set on giving his testimony in Rome. When he arrived, he was arrested; they tried him, but he refused to recant. They tied him to the stake and heaped the torches of fire around Him.
The authorities pled with Him to blaspheme the Name. Tenderly he looked at them and said, "I have served this Master nearly eighty years. I love Him. He is my Lord." And then, with a firm voice he said, "Light your fire"; and in the midst of the flame he cried, "Father, forgive them, they know not what they do."
You could hear Him say, "He loved me. He gave Himself up for me. If He gave Himself for me, it is no more than right that I should give myself for others."
It was love that led Him. It is Love that leads the way of unselfishness.
Let us notice a basic fact: there are two great forces in the world, this new kind of Love (agape) that Jesus brought, which springs out of the heart of the Father, and Selfishness, which is the nature of Satan.
Satan is spiritually dead. Spiritual death has given birth to Selfishness. Selfishness has dominated the human race.
Man is spiritually dead until he receives the nature of God.
Then, the combat in the world is between Eternal Life and Spiritual Death, or between Agapa and Selfishness.
The outstanding characteristic of natural man is Selfishness. It has given to us every one of the major sins that are destroying the human race.
Selfishness is the parent of the liquor traffic, gambling, and every other sin.
The husband who comes home half drunk doesn't love his family as much as he loves himself. The mother who has taken on the unhappy habits of modern society, and dares display these habits in the presence of her growing children, loves herself and her appetites more than she loves her children.
The natural man cannot love his children as much as he loves himself. He cannot love his wife as much as he loves himself.
The natural human heart is a partaker of the Satanic nature, Selfishness; and when that Selfishness gains the ascendancy it makes the man a despot in his home, filling it with the spirit of tyranny.
I saw a couple who had lived very unhappily and had thought much about separating, but there were little children. The father had a godly background, and so had the mother, but neither of them had ever received Eternal Life.
After the children came along, the wife began to feel the irritations of bondage and said, "These children just rob me of my liberty." The husband began to feel the same limitations. Selfishness began to grow quickly. The home was not a home. It was just a place where they quarreled and made up, found fault, and cursed the children.
Then one day my little book, "The New Kind of Love," fell into the hands of the husband. He brought it home and started to read it. He became so engrossed in it that his wife wanted to know what he was reading.
You see, Selfishness is always jealous. The keener and richer your Selfishness is, the more sensitive you become.
She became very curious as to what that little book was.
Finally she said, "What is that you are reading?"
He said, "It is the most wonderful book I have ever read."
He laid it down on the table, and she began to read it. She hadn't read half of it before she made her decision. She had seen things.
When he came into the house she said, "How far did you read in that book?"
"Nearly all of it. One of the men at the office gave it to me." He responded. "What do you think of it?"
"I only wish we had gotten hold of it when we were first married and life would have been different," she said.
He picked up one of his children and held it in his arms. "Wife," he said, "would you like to go with me on this thing? I would like to have Eternal Life. I am sick of my selfishness."
She looked into his face, and reached out her hand and said, "My dear, I will go the whole way with you."
The two older children were not home when, it happened, and the father and mother did not tell them about it.
Three or four days later the oldest girl said, "Mother, what has happened to you and Dad? You haven't quarreled since last week." Then the mother told the story to her, and the girl, in her mother's arms whispered, "Mother, I want it too."
And so, Love came to live in that house.
After a bit every member of the household sought to give the other more than he received. Love's rivalry began to develop. The husband and wife sought to out-do each other in love.
You see, when two New Creation people, Love filled, begin to practice Agapa, the very atmosphere of heaven is in that home.
Love's slogan is, "I am not seeking my own, but your happiness."
Wouldn't it be wonderful if we could have classes that would take up the study of Agapa. There has never been a chair of "Love" in any of our Colleges or Universities, and yet it is the most important thing in life.
You cannot adjust the labor and capital situation by law or by force. It can only be settled with Agapa.
Oh, if there should arise in the labor world a great leader who could evangelize the labor world and prove to them that Selfishness has never yet built anything that it did not destroy!
Sense Knowledge has built cities, but it always destroys them.
Few of us have recognized that there are two kinds of ambitions: one was born out of the desire to conquer and to reign, and to have and to hold, no matter what effect it had upon those who stand in the way; the other is the ambition to give, and to build, and to make happy; to educate and to train and to make beautiful glad homes. One is the Jesus kind, and the other is inspired by Satan.
You know, one of the sweetest things that Paul ever said was, "He counted me worthy to represent Love, even to represent God, to represent the new kind of love." Saul the hater, became Paul, the lover.
I wish that there could be little societies of men and women who would come together to study how to develop this new kind of love, so that they would have the new kind of selfishness.
I know a man and woman who lived very unhappily for nearly thirty years. They could not separate. They talked about it. They planned on it. They had even gone to their lawyer to talk it over; but when the time came, they could not seem to do it. They received a copy of my book, "The New Kind of Love," and then they came to my services and I happened to be speaking on this new kind of selfishness.
He came to see me a little while after that and said, "Do you know that my wife and I have found the thing we have been hunting for, for thirty years? We are playing the game now. Each one of us is trying to get the advantage of the other in love. Four or five of our neighbors have started to practice love also. One of them came the other night and said to me, 'You know, I can't practice this love. I don't have it in my heart,' and then my wife pointed her to the Lamb of God; and now she has that new kind of love too."
Wouldn't it be wonderful if every one who reads this lesson would become an evangel of this new kind of Love, this new kind of Selfishness?
We have seen the sons of Selfishness become the sons of Love.
We have seen the old Selfishness meet this new kind of Selfishness and be defeated.
The great combat today is between Selfishness and Love. Satan is the symbol of Selfishness; Jesus is the symbol of Love.
Questions
1. 1 Peter 3:4 and Romans 7:22 do not identify man as physical or mental. In what two ways do these scriptures identify mankind?
2. Sin consciousness comes from this "inward man." Why is it deeply important that you understand this fact?
3. What is the connection between Ephesians 1:7 and John 15:5?
4. In Ephesians 2:10 it tells us that “we are his workmanship created in Christ Jesus", this occurred before the Resurrection of the Master. How?
5. The "old man" was put off, crucified with Christ. What happened When Christ arose from the dead?
6. What is the first thing that must be done after you are born-again?
7. What is this “New Kind of Selfishness”?
8. What is the outstanding characteristic of natural man?
9. Few of us have recognized that there are two kinds of ambitions: One is the Jesus kind, and the other is inspired by Satan. Describe each of them.
10. What is the great combat today?