Friday: Consecrated by the Holy Spirit
WEEK 14
FRIDAY
CONSECRATED BY THE HOLY SPIRIT
John 17:16-19
We are studying the cleansing of the subconscious when the Holy Spirit moves in. The driving urges—self, sex, the herd—are mastered not by compulsion but by impulsion. A higher loyalty to Jesus as Lord breaks the tyranny of the lower loyalty. This gives us impulses toward the higher loyalty that swallow up the lower loyalties. But they swallow them up in order to assimilate them to higher purposes. The self becomes integrated when it is integrated into something higher than itself; it is cleansed when it is consecrated.
This consecration is made by the Spirit with our consent. We are “consecrated by the holy Spirit” (Rom 15:16 MNT). Jesus also was consecrated by the Spirit: “[Christ] offered himself to God through the eternal Spirit” (Heb 9:14). We often speak of consecrating ourselves to God. And when we do, we find we don’t keep consecrated. We do the consecrating and have to stand before the altar, watchfully trying to keep self on the altar. We have to have periodic and continual “consecration meetings” to try to put the recalcitrant self back on the altar. It is a frustrating business. When we once and for all turn self over to the Holy Spirit by consent, then the Spirit, dwelling within, keeps the self and its powers consecrated. That relaxes the inner life. We don’t nervously have to keep self on the altar. The Holy Spirit keeps it there by attaching its loyalties and love to Jesus; then out of loyalty and love to Jesus we will go anywhere, do anything, be anything. There is no altar where a helpless, bleeding sacrifice lays. There is nothing but love and glory and thanksgiving for the privilege of giving ourselves. We feel no sacrifice. Sacrifice? What sacrifice have I ever made? I laid at God’s feet a self of which I was ashamed, couldn’t control, and couldn’t live with; to my glad astonishment the Spirit took that self, remade it, consecrated it to kingdom purposes, gave it back to me. Now it is a self I can live with gladly and joyously and comfortably. I’ve been hugging that self ever since that I had sense enough to give it up to God—the most sensible thing I ever did. For the moment I did, it became life in Christ.
O Gracious Spirit, how grateful I am for this inner relaxed confidence that you are keeping the self in your gracious keeping by keeping it in love with Jesus. Amen.
AFFIRMATION FOR THE DAY: I shall not struggle to keep self on the altar; I shall consent for the Spirit to keep it there.