Ego Kaputt

8/14/2019 Ego Kaputt

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THE DEATH OF

OUR OLD SELF

Slawomir Gromadzki - [email protected]

To be able to understand properly the truth about our Saviour,

first we have to deal with the sin problem.

You see, whenever we talk about sin we usually think about our

performance, our bad deeds. But we always have to remember

that sin is also a force or a law which dwells in us.

It is invented by Lucifer principle of self love we are born with.

I am sure you have noticed that although we don’t train our

children to be selfish, though we teach them to be unselfish,

they are often selfish, because they are born like this. And it is

so because Adam and Eve allowed Satan to infect them with thevirus of self love.

Therefore, please remember that when Bible says about this sin,the sin of self love, it is always singular, or Bible calls it a

“law”.

Let me give you two examples:

John 1:29:

“Behold the lamb of God who takes away the sin of theworld.”

Because the word “sin” here is singular we can assume it is used

with reference to the law of sin that dwells in us.

Romans 7: 20, 23:

20. Now if I do what I will not to do, it is no longer I who doit, but sin that dwells in me.

23. But I see another law in my members, warring against the

law of my mind, and bringing me into captivity to the law of

sin which is in my members.

Do you know why Paul used the word “law” here describing the

sin which dwells in us?

Let me explain it for you in a very practical way.

Would you be so kind please to stretch your both hands

forward like this and keep them stretched until I finish thesermon?

Would you be able to keep your hands stretched like this for a

long time?

It is so because there is a law - the law of gravity that is much

stronger then your muscles, because it never changes and never

gets weak.

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Unfortunately, the strength of your muscles is not constant. Soafter certain time you have to give up.

So, now we know that Paul describing the sin of selfish lovethat is in us uses the word “law”, because he wants us to be

aware that like the law of gravity this law of sin is a constant

force and it never changes.

Well, if this is true, can we overcome the constant law of sin

with only our will power? Is our will power a law? No.

So it means that like our muscles our will power may get weak and eventually often overcome by the law of sin.

What than do we need, to be able to compete successfully with

the law of sin?

We need another constant law. Is there any law available for uswith which we may overcome the law of sin?

Thank God, there is one; it is the Law of the Spirit that existstogether with the law of sin in every converted Christian. You

can read about it at home in Romans 8.

So now we know that we are sinners not only because we have broken the Law of God and committed thousands of sins, but we

are sinners especially because we have the factory of sin which

is in us.

Now, tell me please, what is worse: the factory of sins in us, or

its products - our sins?

Let's say that the president of United States wants to deal withthe drug problem in his country. So he gives orders to destroy all

drugs in United States. But, would he be successful if he doesthat? No. What he would have to do to solve the problem. He

would have to destroy all the factories and all the production of

drugs in USA and abroad especially in Mexico.

If a tree gives bad fruits what is the reason of it? Should we

blame the fruits or the tree? The tree of course.

I know certain man who had an orange tree which gave bad,

very bitter fruits. Therefore, he wanted to cut the tree off and plant another one instead. But his small son got an excellent

idea. He suggested his father to feed the bad tree with big

amounts of sugar. So because the father thought that it wasn’t bad idea, they together put a lot of sugar into the soil. But, do

you think that after that treatment the tree started to producesweet fruits? No! To have good fruits they had to cut the bad

tree off and plant a new one.

So, what is the main cause of our sinfulness? Not our sins,

because they are only the bitter fruits of the bad tree which is sin

in us.

It means that to be able to legally save us, God first had to cut

off this bad tree. And as a matter of fact, God did it. He did it inChrist.

Therefore, let me tell you now, how God condemned and

destroyed our factory of sin in Christ.

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According to the 1 Corinthians 15: 45, Jesus came into thisworld as the “Second Adam”. And because the word “Adam” in

Hebrew language means “Human Kind”, we can say that Christcame as the second Human Kind, as us, as the Representative of

all sinners.

What gave Him the right to represent all of us? He wasqualified to be the representative of all sinners because “He

came in the likeness of sinful flesh.”

Hebrews 2: 16, 17 (The New International Version):

16. For surely it is not angels (or sinless Adam before the fall)he helps, but Abraham’s descendants (sinners).

17. For this reason he had to be made like his brothers (who

inherit flesh) in every way...If the Son of God was “made like His brothers, (or like us), “in

every way”, so He also had to assume the same nature,including the law of sin, because only in this way He could

carry it to the cross.

Unfortunately, there are some Christians and even theologians

who would say: “But, if Christ took our sinful nature includingthe law of sin, He himself would become a sinner like us, and it

would disqualify Him to be our Savior!”

Let me tell you something very important and please try to

remember it:

Did God allow any sinful human being to touch lepers?

No.

Why?

Because we would become unclean?

But, did Christ touch lepers?

Yes!

Mark 1: 40 - 41 (New King James Version):

40. Now a leper came to Him, imploring Him, kneeling down

to Him and saying to Him, "If You are willing, You can makeme clean."

41. Then Jesus, moved with compassion, stretched out Hishand and touched him

, and said to him, "I am willing; be

cleansed."

If we touched a leper we would become unclean, however Jesusnot only didn’t become unclean after He touched the leper butHe even cleansed him?

It was so because He had something we don’t have by nature.

There was certain holy ingredient in Jesus that prevented Himfrom becoming unclean. The Son of God was the participant of

not only our unclean nature but also holy, divine nature!

When the leprosy of sin touches us we become unclean and

sinful, but when Christ was touched by our leprosy of sin He

didn’t become sinful, because He took our sinful nature on His

divine nature and because as a matter of fact the “sin” He took wasn’t His but ours.

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To help you to understand it better, let me use two numbers:zero and seven. Zero will represent here our carnal nature and

number seven will stand for holy divine nature.

We come into this world as darkness, as a zero, deprived of

God’s Agape love and Holy Spirit.

But did Christ come as darkness? No! We don’t have to guess because the Bible says He came as “light”. However, He didn’t

come as light only, but as light in the darkness.

He came as the combination of the light of unselfish God’s

agape love and the darkness of human self love.

But, did the darkness of the law of sin overcome the light of the

divine love in Christ?

No, because in John 1:5 (TNIV) we read that:

„The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not

overcome it.”

We all are bourn into this world only as zero, but Jesusappeared in our world as seven in zero!

Did zero manage to destroy Christ’s holiness and make Himworthless sinner like us? No! Why not? The answer is very

simple. Zero couldn’t harm Jesus because He had seven as well.

And zero plus seven equals how much? Equals, not 1, not 3 or 6, but seven!

So the combination of sinful human nature with divine naturecouldn’t rob the Son of God of His holiness even in the least

extent.

But, please remember that although it is true that as we read in

the Book of Colossians 2: 9, “in Jesus dwelled all the fullness

of the Godhead”, He never used His divine power to overcomethe law of sin. He was fighting with the terrible matrix of sin

only as a Human Being. And in the battle He used only the same power which is available to us through prayer.

When I read about AIDS I noticed that there are some people

who got infected with the HIV virus, but somehow they don’tget sick with AIDS. It is so, because through the very healthylifestyle and some natural remedies their immune system, and

especially T-cells, are so strong that the HIV virus, which isvery clever and crafty, is afraid to take a risk, to try to get into

the T-cell to multiply. So the virus all the time hides itself in the

organism of the infected person waiting until T-cells of theimmune system will get weak. So, although those people are

infected with the HIV virus, but because they don’t get sick withAIDS, they are called the “HIV carriers”.

Therefore, using this very accurate and excellent example, wemay say that the Son of God came into this sick world and was

welling to get infected with the ego virus. However, in spite of

that, unlike all of us He was the only human being who never got sick with selfishness. And for all His life He remained only

the ego virus carrier. And eventually He curried the ego virusto the tree where it was cursed by God and annihilated.

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Jesus never got sick with selfishness because through the

extremely “spiritually healthy” lifestyle He managed to

maintain His “immune system” so strong that the virus couldn’tconceive or multiply.

What was His “immune system”?

It was of course the power of Holy Spirit available also for us

through prayer.

To be honest, if Christ didn’t carry in His human nature the law

of sin, it would be impossible for us to understand why we readin the Bible that He was “made to be sin” for us:

2 Corinthians 5: 21 (New American Standard Bible):“He made Him who knew no sin to be sin on our behalf, sothat we might become the righteousness of God in Him.”

However, some theologians say that this scripture doesn’t meanthat Jesus took our sinful nature with the indwelling law of sin,

but the text only says that Christ became the sin offering.

To prove that they are wrong I will read for you an excellentcomment to the verse we have just read. It is the „Jamieson,

Faussett, Brown Commentary” to 2 Cor. 5: 21.

Please, listen to it very carefully because, as I told you before, itis not “milk”:

“Christ was made to be Sin -- not a sin offering, because

otherwise it would destroy the antithesis (exact opposite) to

the word ‘righteousness,’ used in the same sentence.

Paul didn’t also mean that Christ was made to be a sinful

person, which would be untrue, and would require in theantithesis ‘righteous men,’ not ‘righteousness’ in the same

verse.

Christ was made to be ‘sin’, that is, the representative Sin-

bearer of the aggregate (accumulated) sin of all men past,present, and future.The sin of the world is one

, therefore the singular

, not the

plural, is used."

This is quite difficult but excellent comment, and if you haven’tgrasped everything, please remember at least that according to

those theologians:

“Christ was made to be "sin", singular, that is, the

representative Sin-bearer of the accumulated sin of all men: past, present, and future.”

So, Christ is our representative Sin-bearer, which means that

for all His life He had to struggle with the indwelling in Hishuman nature matrix of sin, (being in danger of losing His

eternal life), and eventually He had to kill this bug. And glory be to God, He did it on the tree.

Here is the next evidence:

Rom 6: 6 (The New International Version):

6. For we know that our old self was crucified with him sothat the body of sin might be done away with, that we should

no longer be slaves to sin.

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Paul wrote “we know”. But do we really know and accept thiswonderful, unbelievable truth that our “self (our ego) was

crucified with Jesus”?

The New King James Version, instead of “old self” says: “our

old man was crucified with Christ.” But in the SDA Bible

Commentary we read that the expression:

“Our old man means our former self in the old corrupt andsinful condition.” (Francis Nichol, The Seventh-day Adventist

Bible Commentary).

Now, let me ask you a question: How could our old self, our

representative law of sin or the principle of self love which is inus the source of our sins, how could it be crucified with or in

Christ if He assumed only holy nature of Adam before the fall,the nature free from the law of sin and self?

There are many Christian theologians who believe that it was

exactly what Paul meant here.

Let me read for you a very interesting quotation written by

famous Chinese preacher and martyr by the name Watchman

Nee, who was kept in prison by communists because of his faithin Jesus, for 20 years, and finally in 1972 he was killed.

In the book “DYING WITH THE LORD” he wrote:

"Christ died in my stead, but He bore me with Him to the

Cross, so that when He died I died. Let me tell you, You havedied! You are done with! You are ruled out!

The self you loathe was on the Cross in Christ. And ‘he that

is dead is freed from sin’ (Romans 6: 7). This is the Gospel for

Christians.”

“The self you loathe was on the Cross in Christ!”

At the end of the World War Two, very popular all over the

world was expression “Hitler kaputt”.

And likewise today we can say “ego kaputt”!

My ego and your ego kaputt! It kaputt in our wonderfulSaviour, the greatest Hero in whole Universe!

So, if we know that “our old man died in Christ” than what

should be done next with this dead “old man”?

If in this world someone dies what do people do with the dead

body of the person?

They burry it.

Do you know that today we are going to participate in the

funeral service? Who is going to be buried this afternoon?

Kamila is going to be buried.

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Why?

Because she died, because her “old woman” died in Jesus two

thousand years ago!

However, the sad truth is, that unfortunately, millions of

Christians all over the world, including me (20 years ago), were buried alive. They were baptised without any knowledge and

acceptance of their death in Christ.

But, Kamila is lucky and thank God, she won’t be buried alive because I know she is acquainted with the truth about our death

in Christ and she enjoys it.

And here is the proof that baptism is the burial of “our old man”

that already died in Christ:

Romans 6: 3-4 (New King James Version):

3. Do you not know that as many of us as were baptized intoChrist Jesus were baptized into His death?

4. Therefore we were buried with Him through baptisminto death, that just as Christ was raised from the dead by the

glory of the Father, even so we also should walk in newness of

life.

SDA Bible Commentary, comment to 2Cor. 5. 14:

“In taking Adam’s place Christ became the head of the humanrace, and died on the cross as its representative. Thus, in a

sense, when He died the entire race died with Him. As He

represented all men, so His death stood for the death of all. In

Him all men died. This does not, however, mean universalsalvation, for each individual sinner must accept theatonement provided by the Saviour in order to make it

effective.” (Francis Nichol, The Seventh-day Adventist BibleCommentary)

Today, many scholars are recognizing this truth. Here is whattwo leading protestant theologians say on the subject.

First of them is Anders Nygren who in his excellent

Commentary on Romans wrote:

“It was to be right in sin’s own realm that the Son was to bringsin to judgment, overcome it, and take away its power. It is

therefore important that with Christ it is actually a matter of

‘sinful flesh.’ Christ’s carnal nature was no unreality, butsimple, tangible fact. He was under that same power of destruction. Out of ‘the flesh’ arose for Him the same

temptations as for us. But in all this He was master of sin.”

(Anders Nygren, Commentary on Romans, pp. 314 – 315.)

Thomas F. Torrence:

“The most fundamental truth which we have to learn in the

Christian church, or rather relearn since we have suppressed

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it, is that the Incarnation is to be understood as the coming of

God to take upon Himself our fallen human nature, our actual human existence laden with sin and guilt, our humanity

diseased in mind and soul.

This is a doctrine found everywhere in the early church in the

first five centuries, expressed again and again in terms thatwhat God has not taken up in Christ is not saved....

Thus, the Incarnation had to be understood as the sending of the Son of God in the concrete form of our own sinful nature

and as a sacrifice for sin in which He judged sin within that

very nature in order to redeem man from his carnal, hostile

mind.” (Thomas F. Torrence, The Meditation of Christ, pp.

48 – 49.)

The most difficult battle we have to fight as Christians takes

place in us. It is the battle against our ego, against the principleof self love or the law of sin.

And, if Jesus didn’t carry this cross, if He didn’t fight the same battle, if He didn’t overcome the law of sin in the flesh, than his

own words written in Matthew 16: 24 would be a joke or a

fantasy.

Matthew 16: 24 (New International Version):

“Then Jesus said to his disciples, If anyone would come after

me, he must deny himself and take up his cross and follow

me.”

Let’s say that holy Adam with his sinless nature, which he had before the fall, the nature free from the law of selfishness,

comes to me and he says to me with solemn words:

“Slawek, follow my example and deny yourself (your ego) andtake up your cross (overcome your ego every day) and follow

me!”

Do you know what I would tel him:

“You gara be kidding man! You don’t know anything about

denying self because you simply don’t have one. So, how can Ifollow your example?”

But Jesus was not like Adam before the fall because Bible says

that “He was made like his brethren in every way.”

But, how was Jesus made like us in every way?

How did He become our Brother?

A little bit over two thousand years ago in the centre of the

universe, when the appointed time came, Holy Spirit took theSon of God and suddenly in a split of a second He transformed

Him into a tiny invisible single cell.

Then He curried the precious divine cell through the space to the

small sick planet earth and put the priceless cell of the Son of God into the womb of sinful human being.

And then Holy Spirit took the dark sinful human cell of Mary

and united it with the divine cell of light He brought from thethrone of God.

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kg). A fall with the heavy crossbar on His back may have led

His heart to rupture later on the cross."

Lord Jesus was carrying to Golgotha the crossbar of the cross,

because it was the symbol of our representative principle of self love, which was carried by Him in His humanity and had to be

cursed by God and destroyed forever.

In the Old Testament we read that when Israelites sinned they

were bitten by snakes and because the venom got into their bodies they began dying.

But then, Moses, instructed by God, made a snake on the tree

and shouted to the dying people: “Look to the snake on the tree

and you will be saved! If you don’t look to the snake you willhave to die!”

Numbers 21: 8 (New King James Version):

“Then the LORD said to Moses, ‘Make a fiery serpent, and setit on a pole; and it shall be that everyone who is bitten, when

he looks at it, shall live.”

Who was represented here by this snake on the tree?

Jesus, of course.

But, I am sure you agree that it was extremely strange symbol

of the Son of God?

Why it was so strange?

Because snake in the Bible is also the symbol of who Lucifer!

Now, we have to answer the next very important question: Whyour Saviour was represented here by the symbol of Lucifer?

If you were listening carefully what was already said here till

now you should know the answer:

Jesus was symbolised by the snake because we read in the Bible

that He “became sin for us”. He was represented by the snake because in His human nature He carried to the tree the

conceived by the old snake, Lucifer, the venom of sin.

And like Israel, we also were bitten by the snake and poisoned by the venom of sin. Therefore, we are dying because of this.

But the fantastic truth is that there is a wonderful antidote to the

old snake’s poison. And the antidote is just looking to Jesus

who is the venom Carrier hanging on the tree. If you look you

are saved, if you don’t want to look to such a picture of Saviour you will have to die.

Unfortunately, there are still many Christian theologians todaywho present to us Jesus who can’t be symbolised by snake. And

they say, “Look to our picture of Jesus and you will be saved!”But, to be honest, you may look at their Jesus but you will

never be healed, because their Jesus can’t be represented by the

snake on the tree. And God says to us that only if we look atJesus represented by snake we can be healed.”

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The truth about the death of our old self in Christ is veryimportant, because:

1. If we accept this historic truth that our self died in Christthan you know that you are already punished and saved

in Christ (and you stay saved as long as you truly believein Jesus). Because of this there is no room for the heresy

of salvation by works in your life. So, you only say:

“Thank you Lord! Nothing in my hands I bring,

simply to the cross I cling.”

2. If we accept the historic fact of the death of our old self

in Christ than there is no room for the cheap grace in our life as well. Now, you can’t say: “Jesus did it all instead

of me so I can do whatever I wish.” No, but now,

because you identified yourself with the death of Christ,you have to identyfy also with His holy life. And

because you were in Christ, now Christ is in you, not totolerate the law of sin in you but to repeat the victory

over it.

Jack Sequeira, “Beyond Belief ”:

“Many Christians today have accepted what the great German

martyr, Dietrich Bonhoeffer, described as ‘cheap grace.’ They believe that, because Christ did it all instead of us, without

identifying Himself with us, so now we Christians have theliberty to live as our sinful nature likes.

But we have to remember that although our sinful acts may be

forgiven and blotted out through the blood of Christ, butsinfulness cannot be forgiven, it must die. God, for example, is

able to forgive us our selfish acts; but He cannot forgive

selfishness, it must be crucified, and this is why God included

you and me in the cross of Christ. And just as we cannotobtain forgiveness from our sins unless we see Christ bearingall our sins on the cross, so likewise we cannot know

deliverance from the power of sin unless we see Christ bearingus on the cross.

What, then, is the conclusion of the matter? When we combinethe blood of Christ, (His death for our sins) with the cross of

Christ (the death of our law of sin in Him), we have indeeddiscovered the wonderful power of the cross, full and

complete, and we can rejoice with Paul and say, ‘God forbid

that I should glory, save in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ.”

Amen.

Slawomir Gromadzki - [email protected]

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