As followers of Christ, we are to take God at his Word and accept as true what he says we are. This means our “old man” represents a man who still seeks to please God in the flesh. Such a man hates sin, he doesn’t want to offend God, and yet his conscience continually brings him under guilt. So he pledges to overcome his sin problem: “I’m going to change! I’ll start today to fight my besetting sin, no matter what the cost. I want God to see how hard I am trying.”
Such a man brings to the Lord much sweat and many tears. He prays and fasts to prove to God that he has a good heart. He’s able to resist sin for days at a time, and so he tells himself, “If I can go for two days, then why not four, why not a week?” By the end of the month he feels good about himself, convinced he’s working himself free. But then his old sin surfaces, and down he goes, deep into despair. And that starts the cycle all over again. Such a man is on a treadmill that will never end, one he can’t get off.
May it never be! His man-in-flesh was crucified along with Christ, killed in the eyes of God. Indeed, Paul tells us that the old man was pronounced dead at the cross. Jesus took that old man into the grave with him, where he was left for dead and forgotten. Just as the prodigal’s father ignored the “old man” in his son, the Lord says of our old man, “I won’t recognize or deal with such a one. There is only one man I recognize now, one with whom I’ll deal. That is my Son, Jesus, and all who are in him by faith.”
The new man is the one who has given up all hope of pleasing God by any effort of the flesh. He has died to the old ways of the flesh. And by faith he has come to know there is only one way to please God, one way to delight him: Christ must become all. He knows that there is but One whom the Father recognizes: Christ and all who are in him.
This new man lives by faith alone: “The just shall live by faith.” He believes God’s Word so completely he leans on nothing else. He has found his source of everything in Christ, who is all sufficient. And he believes what God says of him: “Your old man is dead, and your life is hid with Christ in God.” He may not feel it, or comprehend it fully, but he won’t argue with his loving Father’s Word. He accepts it on faith, believing the Lord is faithful to his Word.
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David Wilkerson (1931 – 2011)
Founder of Times Square Church in New York City with over 100 different languages spoken in the congregation. Wilkerson wrote many powerful books such as: The Vision and Cross and the Switchblade. His ministry was prophetic as God called him to be a watchman to the Church in North America. He gave clear messages on repentance to the Church.Wilkerson also founded Teen Challenge where there are hundreds of centres for Christ-centered drug recovery and addiction recovery. He also organized and spoke at pastors gatherings in many countries where he gave prophetic strong messages to encourage pastors and leaders.
Recommends these books by David Wilkerson:
The Vision and Beyond, Prophecies Fulfilled and Still to Come by David Wilkerson
Knowing God by Name: Names of God That Bring Hope and Healing by David Wilkerson
God's Plan to Protect His People in the Coming Depression by David Wilkerson
David Wilkerson is an American Christian evangelist, most well-known for his book The Cross and the Switchblade. He is also the founder of Times Square Church in New York, an interdenominational church.
Wilkerson is well-known for these early years of his ministry to young drug addicts and gang members in New York City in the 1950s and 1960s. He co-authored a book about his work with the New York drug addicts, The Cross and the Switchblade, which became a best-seller, selling over 50 million copies in over thirty languages since it was published in 1963. The book was included among the 100 most important Christian books of the 20th century.
For over four decades, Wilkerson's ministry has included preaching, teaching and writing. He has authored over 30 books.
David Wilkerson is the founder and president of World Challenge, Inc., a nonprofit organization incorporated on September 22, 1971. Reverend Wilkerson, the author of over thirty inspirational books, is perhaps best known for his early days of ministry to young drug addicts and gang members in Manhattan, the Bronx, and Brooklyn. His story is told in The Cross and the Switchblade, a book he co-authored which became a best-seller. (The story has been read by over 50 million people in some thirty languages and 150 countries since 1963. In 1969, a motion picture of the same title was released.)
For over four decades, Reverend Wilkerson's evangelistic ministry has included preaching, teaching and writing. Throughout that time a distinctive characteristic of his work has been his direct efforts to reach the neediest members of the population with help for both body and soul. Even now, the almost 70 year-old minister often goes out alone or sometimes with an assistant to walk through the streets of New York City, along Broadway and Eighth Avenue or down 42nd Street and nearby "Crack Alley" on 41st Street. His mission is always to seek out the lost, the disoriented, and the addicted , to tell them of the power of the risen Christ to set them free.
David Wilkerson, born in Hammond, Indiana on May 19, 1931, was married in 1953 to Gwen Carosso. The Wilkersons' two sons are ministers, and their two daughters are married to ministers. They have 11 grandchildren. The Wilkersons served small pastorates in Scottsdale and Philipsburg, Pennsylvania, until Reverend Wilkerson saw a photograph in Life magazine of several New York City teenagers charged with murder. Moved with compassion he was drawn to the city in February 1959. It was at that time he began his street ministry to what one writer called "desperate, bewildered, addicted, often violent youth.