A New and Living Way

In the last message, I introduced the subject of The Way by bringing us back to the fall of man, and trying to show the need that we all have for coming OUT of a very specific condition. It is only as we understand what we are called out of, that we are able to understand something of the way that God has made for us to do so. We all need to come out of something. That’s what salvation is. And we all need to find and walk in the only WAY that has been provided for this end. And I will say again, that the reason I feel pressed to talk about these things has nothing to do with doctrinal debates or spiritual mysteries. For me this is the most practical thing in the world. There is nothing more practical than this subject, because it is only by walking in this way that we experience any true spiritual growth, or heart change.  

From my perspective, it has always seemed that most people don’t really change. Everybody talks about change, wants to change, and especially Christians believe that we should change, and that there is a God who has power to change us. But nevertheless, I’ve been alive long enough now to see that, for the most part, people generally follow a single trajectory for the entire course of their lives, and deviate very little from it. Of course outward things change, time is always giving, taking, and changing the things around us, but it is extremely rare to see a real change of heart, a genuine change for the better, in terms of what we are, who we are, how we think, and feel, and live. 

And the principle reason for this, I believe, is quite simply because nature doesn’t change. I mean, nature has inflexible boundaries. A horse, for example, has a nature, and no matter what you do to a horse, no matter what you teach it, how you care for it, how you feed it, it will never once act like a cat. There are young horses, there are old horses, there are healthy horses, sick horses, ugly horses, strong horses, but there are no cat-horses. And in the exact same way, and for the exact same reason, the heart or life of man does not, and cannot change. As long as man continues to live the life of nature, I mean, so long as he lives in and from and for the nature of Adam (his fallen father), it doesn’t matter what you do to him, what you teach him, or what you feed him, he will only steadily progress (as all natural men have done) along the trajectory of natural life, doing, thinking, wanting, and feeling purely human things. 

Not every human life manifests the same degree of disorder, or sin, or enmity with their Creator, but every human life does continue to be entirely human. Man can change his actions, but he cannot change his motivations. I mean, he can stop overeating and start going to the gym, but self-love is behind both of these choices. A cat must be a cat, a horse must be a horse, and a man must and will only be a man, unless there is a birth and growth of another NATURE within him. And this is the reason why so few change. It is because they cannot change, unless another life, with another nature, finds space and freedom in them to make them something entirely different than what they are.

Now, it is essential that we understand that this is precisely what Christianity is. It is a way to become something different than what we are. FIRST and foremost, it is a gift of a new life, a new nature or Spirit, that is sown into the heart of man by the love of God. As we mentioned last time, it is  first something from above that comes into our condition. And THEN it is a way of living in, abiding in, walking, and growing in that new life, Spirit, or nature that permits its increase and reign. Both of these are essential, and I think you could say that both of them are Christ. Christ is the gift. He IS the life, the nature or Spirit that He gives to us. And Christ is also the way in which we must learn to walk. Christ said, “I am the life,” and He said, “I am the way.”

I want to spend a good deal of time talking about Christ as our way, and how it is that we walk in Him. But let’s start by making sure that we understand something of this gift of grace. If it weren’t for a gift or seed of life that was first given to fallen man by the mercy of God, there would be absolutely no ground or reason to hope for change. There would be no Christianity, no expectation, no faith, because man could never cease being what he is by nature. Do you see what I mean? Men could talk about righteousness, but they couldn’t cease from being unrighteous. Men could talk about virtues, such as humility, selflessness, and love, but if they had nothing in them besides the life of the natural man, they could never produce or experience these things. These things are not found in man in his fallen condition. They are found in another nature, another life or Spirit. And so long as man lives the life of nature, he will go on as he always has, living and desiring and acting according to the insurmountable boundaries of his fallen condition. 

Therefore, the only reason that man has any chance of ever becoming something besides what he finds in himself, is because a measure of Christ’s life and light, His grace and Spirit, His living Word, has been sown into the heart by the Spirit that God has given to us. This gift is the beginning of everything. Every bit of hope that we possess for transformation and freedom from sin, every expectation for growth in truth, righteousness, and goodness, is due to the fact that God has given us a gift, even when we hated Him. God loved us first. He gave us His Son—first as a sacrifice, then as an indwelling Savior, and then as a living way. This is our only hope, and as Paul says, “this hope does not disappoint, because the love of God has been poured out in our hearts by the Holy Spirit who was given to us” (Rom 5:5). 

As I said last time, man cannot produce goodness of himself, any more than a diamond can produce beauty and color without the sun. Man can receive, experience, enjoy, and manifest goodness when goodness is given to him by the only author and source of it. But man, apart from God, does not possess goodness or produce his own goodness. There are multitudes of Scriptures that declare this plainly. There are Scriptures that tell us that man, in his natural condition, fallen and dead to the life of God, “is darkness,” (Eph. 5:8) is “desperately wicked” (Jer. 17:9), that they are “by nature children of wrath” (Eph 2:3) There are other verses that declare in the clearest terms that apart from Christ, we can do nothing (John 15:5). I don’t think I need to prove this now with more Scriptures. But it is easy to be familiar with these Scriptures, and yet not have come to understand that the only possibility that any of us have of becoming good, honest, pure, clean, righteous, humble, wise, etc. or possessing any true virtue or fruit of the Spirit, is because there is a SEED of these things, a seed of that nature sown into our hearts. Christianity is not learning how to do these things, or to be these things in the strength or ability of the flesh or natural man. Christianity is first receiving these things in the form of a SEED from above. And this seed is Christ in you, the hope of glory. It is the mustard seed, the talent, and heavenly leaven, the precious pearl, the treasure hidden in a field. “To each one of us grace was given according to the measure of Christ's gift” (Eph 4:7). “The manifestation of the Spirit is given to every man with which to profit” (1 Cor 12:7). Everything of life and godliness arises from this seed of the divine nature of which we have been made partakers (2 Pet. 1:3-4). 

If you will allow me to use the expression, this is “half” of Christianity. The first “half” is receiving a heavenly Seed, a living Word, a gift of Life that comes down and comes into man from above. But the second “half,” is the living or walking in a particular WAY that causes you to experience, and grow in that gift of God. This too is essential. The way is not the life, but it is how you will experience the life. The way is not the truth, but it is the only way that you will know the truth and be set free. 

We read in John 8:31: “Then Jesus said to those Jews who believed Him, ‘If you abide in My word, you are My disciples indeed. And you shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free.’” 

There is a way in which we must walk. This is what I want to focus on in these teachings. There is a way that is Christ, and we must learn to walk in Him, and to stay in Him. Because it is only by living and walking in this way that we will experience death to spread over the contrary nature in us. And likewise, it is only by staying in this way that the new and living Seed will rise up into dominion and predominance in us. This way is so important! If we depart from the way, neither of these things will happen. The death of the old man and the increase of the new is not instantaneous and automatic. No. Just because you received the Seed does not mean that you are benefiting from it. Remember in the parable of the talents, the man who received one talent had it taken away from when he did not allow it to increase. Or in the parable of the sower, the SAME seed fell onto every kind of ground. In some grounds there was no growth at all, and in others, the beginning of growth was overcome by cares of this world, the deceitfulness of riches, and the lusts of other things. How did this happen? If the Sower was good, and the Seed was good, and the sun and the rain were apparently the same for all of the types of soil, what was the problem? The problem, in a few words, was that most hearts departed from the way. 

How many times, throughout the Old Testament, did God warn and correct His people for departing from the way that He had commanded them to walk in. In Exodus 32:7-8, when Moses was on the mountain with the Lord, we find these words:

And the LORD said to Moses, “Go, get down! For your people whom you brought out of the land of Egypt have corrupted themselves. They have turned aside quickly out of the way which I commanded them.”

In other Scriptures, God sternly warns Israel to remain in the way, so that they will experience His power driving out their enemies, and establishing their kingdom. 

“Behold, I send an Angel before you to keep you in the way and to bring you into the place which I have prepared. Beware of Him and obey His voice; do not provoke Him, for He will not pardon your transgressions; for My name is in Him. But if you indeed obey His voice and do all that I speak, then I will be an enemy to your enemies and an adversary to your adversaries. For My Angel will go before you and bring you in to the Amorites and the Hittites and the Perizzites and the Canaanites and the Hivites and the Jebusites; and I will cut them off.” (Exo. 23:20-23)

But over and over in Scripture, throughout the law, the Psalms, the prophets and the New Testament, in a variety of pictures, declarations and lamentations on the part of God and His people, we see that the vast majority of those in whom God begins to manifest His purpose and power, will NOT keep in His way, and so do not experience the good that He intended. God prepares all, gives all, and does all that He can do, often making statements like, “Oh, that they had such a heart in them that they would fear Me and always keep all My commandments, that it might be well with them and with their children forever!” (Deut. 5:29). God is present, and powerful, and always willing, but because man will not walk before Him in the way that He has provided, the gift He has given bears little or no fruit. And thus, instead of growing in the life, and blessing, and righteousness of His Spirit, their lives become fertile ground for a contrary seed. Consider the following Scriptures:

Yet I had planted you a noble vine, a seed of highest quality. How then have you turned before Me into the degenerate plant of an alien vine? (Jer. 2:21)

Now let me sing to my Well-beloved A song of my Beloved regarding His vineyard: My Well-beloved has a vineyard On a very fruitful hill. He dug it up and cleared out its stones, And planted it with the choicest vine. He built a tower in its midst, And also made a winepress in it; So He expected it to bring forth good grapes, But it brought forth wild grapes. “And now, O inhabitants of Jerusalem and men of Judah, Judge, please, between Me and My vineyard. What more could have been done to My vineyard That I have not done in it? Why then, when I expected it to bring forth good grapes, Did it bring forth wild grapes? (Isa. 5:1-4)

Here I think we can see clearly that there is not only a gift, there is also a WAY to experience the gift. In the first quotation, Jeremiah tells us that God planted “a noble vine, a seed of highest quality.” In the second, Isaiah says He planted “the choicest vine.” Here is a perfect gift! A gift that man cannot add to or improve in any way. Why then did neither of these plants bring forth what God was both expecting and desiring? I say again, there is a gift of God, and then there is a way to abide in that gift, a living way to submit to its power and experience its growth. 

As Christians we must consider these things. There is much talk about what God has done, and what God has given, and much of what is said on this subject is true and right. God has given us life and light in his Son. Yes! But there is a WAY that God has provided for us to walk with His Son. Christianity is not only a gift of life, it is also a way to receive that life, to walk with it, abide in it, stay with it, and experience its power. There is a seed of new life, but there is also a new living way, created by God, opened by Jesus Christ, taught by the Spirit, whereby man can be changed by the life of the Seed, and so become something other than what he is. 

This is what I was saying before. Christianity, real Christianity, is a way to change from one nature to another. It is not just a way by which man can be forgiven for what he has done, or what he has become. It is not merely a collection of revealed truths and doctrines that must be believed and put into practice. Christianity is a new life that is experienced by walking in a new and living way. It is a living relationship with a living Spirit. And when Christians walk in this living way, learn to abide in it and stay in it, they experience the death of one nature, and the growth of another. 

Your heart will not change by learning correct beliefs, or by striving to act contrary to yourself. Effort is not the issue. Education will not change your nature. But everything will change if you learn to walk and live and abide in the new and living way that God has cast up for the redeemed to walk upon. Speaking prophetically through Isaiah about the work of Jesus Christ, and the way He cast up for us, Isaiah says:

“Go through, go through the gates! prepare the way for the people; build up, build up the highway! Take out the stones, lift up a banner for the peoples!” (Isa. 62:10) 

And in chapter 35:8-10 it says:

A highway shall be there, and a road, and it shall be called the Highway of Holiness. The unclean shall not pass over it, but it shall be for others. Whoever walks the road, although a fool, shall not go astray. No lion shall be there, Nor shall any ravenous beast go up on it; It shall not be found there. But the redeemed shall walk there, and the ransomed of the LORD shall return, and come to Zion with singing, with everlasting joy on their heads. They shall obtain joy and gladness, and sorrow and sighing shall flee away.

What is this way? Well, perhaps the most simple way to answer this question is to say what we have said already: the way is Christ. Christ said, “I am the way, the truth, and the life, no one comes to the Father but by me.” Ok, but in what sense is Christ a way? How can a divine Person be a way? What does this mean practically? It always feels very important to me to ask these kinds of questions, because when we don’t bring these sorts of questions to the Lord, we get stuck in assumptions and imaginations and empty concepts. We assume we know things just because we have heard the sound of them so many times, or because we give our assent that they are true and should be believed. But there is an infinite gulf between familiarity with true words, and the experience of truth that is behind those words. It is incredibly easy to say “Christ is the way”! But the way that is Christ is difficult and narrow, and in Jesus’ own words, “few are they who find it.” 

In the coming messages, I plan to refer to some instructive pictures from the Old Testament that I think illustrate the way in a very helpful manner. But in this message, I will say a few things by way of introduction. For starters, I’d like to suggest, that when you consider Christ as a way, instead of simply imagining a doorway, or an archway that you can pass through with one step, you rather think of Him as a long tunnel or hallway, with innumerable doors on either side. And the reason that I prefer this image, is because your experience of Christ as the way will not be like taking one step through a doorway, or like immediately passing from one room into another. It’s true that Christ can also be called a door, and, in fact, He called himself the door of His sheep. Christ is many things. But though the doorway image works perfectly for what Christ was communicating in the parable of the Good Shepherd, I don’t believe it is the most accurate or helpful sense in which we should think of Christ as our way. When considering Christ as “the way,” I would say that He is more like a long hallway in which we continually move along and travel. He is like a long and narrow passageway that is walked every day, and that has a continual heart-changing, mind-renewing, soul-purifying effect upon all who remain in it and continue advancing, and who carefully avoid the various doors on the right hand and on the left. 

Now, what it means to do this—to keep in the way, and to move forward—is an extremely important subject. Everything depends upon it. And the truth is that there is really only one way to walk in it, and  stay in it, and yet there are many ways to leave it. You don’t remain in this hallway simply by holding onto beliefs and doctrines and memories of past spiritual experiences. No, beliefs and memories are not strong enough to keep you in the new and living way. And anyone who expects to continue in the way merely by having correct beliefs, and attending a meeting once or twice a week, will most certainly take one of the very first exit doors on the right or the left. The Israelites all passed through the blood covered door to begin their journey, and every one of them believed in the Lord, and had powerful experiences and testimonies of the Lord’s power and goodness. And yet the Lord testified of nearly the entire first generation, that they “always went astray in their hearts and did not know His ways,” (Heb 3:10) and so swore that they would not enter into His rest. As we have already read from Exodus 32, these continued to “turn aside quickly out of the way which He commanded them.”

So, although it is correct to say that Christ made the way, and that Christ is the way, OUR JOB is to keep in that way. And if I were asked to describe what it means for a Christian to walk in the way that Christ has opened, I would summarize it by saying that it involves TWO primary things. I’ll mention these now, and explain them more later. On the one hand, it involves a continual denial of the will or desire of the flesh. This is absolutely essential. This is like saying, if you want to walk east, you have to deny your will to walk west. Why so? Because it is impossible to walk east while you are still traveling west. In a very similar way, if you are willfully obeying the desires and motions of the fleshly nature, or fallen first birth, then your heart is willingly looking and heading in the wrong direction. You are feeding the nature that Christ is seeking to crucify; and you are ignoring and resisting the nature that Christ is seeking to form in you. It is that simple. Self-denial is not optional. And this is not because God is strict, or because He wants you to suffer. This is very simply because self is the very thing that God is trying to save you from. You cannot follow it and at the same time become free from it.

[And please, let nobody say that this has anything to do with a religion of works. This is denying your works. This is resisting and denying everything that comes from you, so that Christ can be and do all in you. I’ll say more about this later.]

This is on the one hand. On the other hand, keeping in the way involves a continual and voluntary submission of the heart to the light and life of Christ. God does not expect you to naturally know the way, or even to find the way. Nor does He expect you to find in yourself the strength or wisdom to walk in it. But what you can do, and what you must do, is continually and willingly surrender your heart to every manifestation of His light. This is how the way unfolds before you. This is how Christ becomes a light unto our path. And these two fundamental things are like your two feet (so to speak), that will keep you walking in the way. 

Jesus declared these two things in the strongest of words. His words concerning what it means to be a disciple or follower of Him in the way of regeneration could not be more clear. They cannot be misunderstood; they can only be ignored. “If anyone desires to come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross daily, and follow Me.” Following Christ in the way, or walking in the way that is Christ, means a continual turning the back to the lying desires of the natural man, and a continual submission of the will to Christ’s light, life, Spirit, or grace (which are all various descriptions of the same Person and power). This is how we begin our journey, and this is the only way to continue it.