The Person Who Has Given Me The Most Trouble Ever – by Desmond Ford

Nov 29, 2015 2457

Looking in a mirrorI will experience temptation from without and from within until Jesus comes in the clouds of glory or raises me from the tomb. It is at the second coming, if we are alive, and at the resurrection if we are dead, that glorification takes place.

Glorification is the removal of the sinful nature; until then we are stuck with it. It remains in the believer but it should not reign. “Sin shall not have dominion over you because you are not under Law but under grace.”

Luther came to learn, contrary to his upbringing, that the way of salvation was not by rules and regulations, laws and commandments. The divine sacred holy law was not given to sinners, it was given to perfect beings at the creation; they could keep it. You and I are not like that.

We are not perfect. We don’t think clearly. Our emotions are all messed up because of things that have happened to us in childhood and heredity and our own bad choices. We are all walking civil wars.

And so, sanctification is a life-long process, but it is our privilege, looking to Jesus, to be more than conquerors in him that loved us despite the fact that we are penitent and acknowledge our sinfulness.

So when Luther used the expression, “At the same time righteous and yet a sinner,” he got it from Romans. But glorification is when that sinful nature is taken from me, and so I will no longer be tempted from within.

Moody said he had more trouble with himself than any other man he ever met. That is my story. I have more trouble with Des Ford than anybody I have ever met. I am not ashamed to say it because that is your trouble too. And the worst of it is that we fool and deceive ourselves.

It is terrible to be deceived by other people but it is much more serious when you deceive yourself. Ananias and Sapphira thought they were deceiving God, but they had first deceived themselves.

Christ said, “Blessed are the poor in spirit.” From the soul that feels its nothingness, nothing is withheld.

There was never a harsh syllable from our Savior to anyone with a sense of need. But how he stripped the self-righteous! (Matthew 23). It was the only way to wake them up.

– Des Ford. Rom 8:27–32. Adapted from, “The News That Shook The World – Part 3.

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