Ourselves: I; Me; Mine - Chambers, Oswald
Chapter XV – Ourselves: I; Me; Mine
Ourselves as “Ourselves.” “Self ”
The passages alluded to in this outline are exclusively from the new testament; the student can supply old testament illustrations for his own use.
1. Self (Luke 18:914)
(a) greatness (mark 12:2931; comp. 2 Thessalonians 2:3)
(b) grovelling (Luke 15:19; Luke 5:8)
2. Self-seeking (Romans 15:13)
(a) honor ( john 5:4144; john 8:49)
(b) humility (Matthew 18:4; Philippians 2:14)
3. Self-estimation ( john 13:1317)
(a) superiority (Philippians 2:511)
(b) inferiority (Matthew 5:19)
N. B. Important definitions :
(1) self means the sum total of all a man can call m e and m ine.
(2) selfishness means all that gives me pleasure without considering christ s interests.
(3) sin means independence of god.
My self is my conscious personality. My total self includes the whole succession of my personal experiences, and it therefore includes that special phase of my conscious life in which i think of myself. There are three divisions to guide our treatment of this subject: self; self-seeking; self-estimation.
1. Self
Greatness and grovelling. (Luke 18:914). In the final analysis, both attitudes are wrong; one grovels and the other swells in greatness, both are expressive of abnormal conditions. Our lord never teaches the annihilation of self; he reveals how self can be rightly centered, the true center being perfect love towards god (see 1 Corinthians 13:48). Until self is rightly related there, we either grovel or swell in greatness; both attitudes are untrue and need to be put right. The true center for self is Jesus Christ.
(a) Greatness
The first of all the commandments is . . . Thou shalt love the lord thy god with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind, and with all thy strength. (mark 12:2930)
This commandment is at the heart of all the revelations made by Jesus Christ. He reveals the right centre for self to be god, personal, passionate devotion to him; then i am able to show to my fellow-men the same love that god has shown to me. Until i get there, i take the position of the pharisee or of the publican; i either thank god that i am not an out- and-out sinner and point out certain people who are worse than i am, or else i grovel to the other extreme. Both attitudes are wrong because they are not truly centered. How could the pharisee in our lords parable possibly love his neighbour as himself ? It was impossible, he had not found the true center for himself. His center was self-realisation, and instead of loving the publican he increased his own conceit in every detail of comparison. Immediately i become rightly related to god and have perfect love toward him, i can have the same relationship to my fellow-men that god has to me, and can love my fellow-men as i love myself. When a man gets rightly related to god by the atonement of Jesus Christ, he understands what the apostle Paul meant when he said, we preach not ourselves, i. E. , self-realisationbut Christ Jesus the lord; and ourselves your servants for Jesus sake.
This is the one thing that keeps a man from taking account of evil. If my love is first of all for god, i shall take no account of the base ingratitude of others, because the mainspring of my service to my fellow-men is love to god. The point is very practical and clear. If i love someone and he treats me unkindly and ungenerously, the very fact that i love him makes me feel it all the more, and yet paul says love taketh not account of evil, because self is absorbed and taken up with love for Jesus Christ. If you are going to live for the service of your fellow- men, you will certainly be pierced through with many sorrows, for you will meet with more base ingratitude from your fellow-men than you would from a dog. You will meet with unkindness and two-facedness, and if your motive is love for your fellow-men, you will be exhausted in the battle of life. But if the main- spring of your service is love for god, no ingratitude, no sin, no devil, no angel, can hinder you from serving your fellow-men, no matter how they treat you. You love your neighbour as yourself, not from pity, but from the true centring of yourself in god.
(b) Grovelling
I am no more worthy to be called thy son: make me as one of thy hired servants. (Luke 15:19 RV)
when simon peter saw it, he fell down at Jesus knees, saying, depart from me; for i am a sinful man, o lord. (Luke 5:8)
Everyone goes through this stage when convicted of sin; we always have a wrong estimate of ourselves when we are under conviction of sin. The prodigals estimate of himself went beyond his fathers estimate of him, and when we are convicted of sin by the holy spirit the same thing happens. The balance is upset, the health of the body is upset, the balance is pushed right out by conviction of sin. Sin puts mans self altogether out of center, and he becomes eccentric. When the spirit of god convicts a man, he is wrongly related to everything; he is wrongly related to god, to his own body, to everything round about him, and he is in a state of abject misery. The picture of a man not convicted of sin is exactly the opposite. If you watch the tendencies all around us to-day you will notice this tendency ignore sin, deny its existence; if you make mistakes, forget them: live the healthy-minded, open hearted, sunshiny life; don’t allow yourself to be convicted of sin, realise yourself, and as you do, you will attain perfection. There is no conviction of sin, no repentance, no forgiveness of sin, in that outlook. The holy spirit opens not only my eyes, but my heart and my conscience to the horror of the thing that is wrong within, and immediately he does, i get to the grovelling stage. The psalmist says that conviction of sin makes mans beauty to consume away like a moth (psalm 39:11). Beauty means the perfectly ordered completeness of a mans whole nature. The pharisee does not grovel, there is a certain beauty of order about a conceited man, a conformity with him- self; he is of the nature of a crystal, clear and compact and hard. Immediately the spirit of god convicts him, all that beauty crumbles and he goes to pieces, as it were. Jesus Christ takes the man who has been broken on the wheel by conviction of sin and rendered plastic by the holy spirit, and re-moulds him and makes him a vessel fit for gods glory. Self, then, is not to be annihilated, but to be rightly centered in god. Self-realisation has to be turned into christ-realisation. Our lord never taughtdeeper death to self ; he taught death right out to my right to myself, to self-realisation. He taught that the principal purpose of our creation is to glorify god and to enjoy him forever; that the sum total of my self is to be consciously centered in god.
2. Self-seeking (Romans 15:13)
the reproaches of them that reproached thee fell on me. What reproaches fell on Jesus? Everything that was hurled in slander against god hurt our lord. The slanders that were hurled against him- self made no impression on him; his suffering was on account of his father. On what account do you suffer? Do you suffer because men speak ill of you? Read Hebrews 12:3: for consider him that hath endured such gainsaying of sinners against [himself, kjv ], that ye wax not weary, fainting in your souls (rv ). Perfect love takes no account of the evil done unto it. It was the reproaches that hit and scandalised the true center of his life that jesus christ noticed in pain. What was that true centre? Absolute devotion to god the father and to his will; and as surely as you get christ-centred you will understand what the apostle Paul meant when he talks about filling up that which is lacking of the afflictions of Christ. Jesus Christ could not be touched on the line of self- pity. The practical emphasis here is that our service is not to be that of pity, but of personal, passionate love to god, and a longing to see many more brought to the center where god has brought us.
(a) Honour
Jesus answered, . . . I honour my father, and ye do dishonour me. ( john 8:49; see also john 5:4144)
The central honour in our lords life was his fathers honour; he made himself of no reputation. Every kind of scandal it was possible for men to think of was heaped upon him, and he never attempted to clear himself; but let anyone show an attitude of dishonour towards his father and instantly Jesus Christ was ablaze in zeal; and as he is, so are we in this world. Jesus christ changes the centre of our self-love. Is my honour gods honour? Are they identically the same, as they were in jesus christ? Let these statements analyse us: we are scandalised at immorality, why? Is it because gods honour is at stake? Or is it not rather because our social honour is upset and antagonised? As saints, we should smart and suffer keenly when- ever we see pride and covetousness and self-realisation, because these are the things that go against the hon- our of god. Ye have not the love of god in you, said jesus christ to the pharisees, and he pointed out that it was therefore a moral impossibility for them to believe (see john 5:44). No man with a standard of honour other than jesus christs can believe in him. Jesus christ exalts the standard of honour and puts it alongside gods throne. The real underlying meaning of our lord being moved with indignation in the spirit ( john 11:33 RV mg) was because Martha and her sister had accepted a scandal against his father. As soon as death came on the scene, they accepted an interpretation that went against the goodness and the love of god. The only thing that roused jesus christ was for his fathers honour to be brought into dis-Repute. In the temple, instead of seeing a meek and gentle jesus, we see a terrible being with a whip of small cords in his hand, driving out the money changers. Why could not he have driven them out in a gentler way? Because passionate zeal, an enthusiasm and detestation of everything that dared to call his fathers honour into disrepute, had eaten him up; and exactly the same characteristic is seen in the saints. You cannot rouse them on the line of personal interest, of self-pity or of self-realisation; but when once any- thing is contrary to jesus christs honour, instantly you find your meek and gentle saint becomes a holy terror. The phrase, the wrath of the lamb, is understand- able along this line. The obverse side of love is hate.
(b) Humility
Whosoever therefore shall humble himself as this little child, the same is greatest in the kingdom of heaven. (Matthew 18:4; see also Philippians 2:14)
These two passages are a wonderful revelation; they show that the true disposition of a saint in this order of things is humility. When the disciples were dis- cussing who should be the greatest, jesus took a little child in his arms and said, unless you become like that, you will never see the kingdom of heaven. He did not put up a little child as an ideal; if he had, he would have destroyed the whole principle of his teaching. If humility were put up as an ideal it would serve only to increase pride. Humility is not an ideal, it is the unconscious result of the life being rightly related to god and centred in him. Our lord is dealing with ambition, and had he put up a little child as a standard, it would simply have altered the manifestation of ambition. What is a little child? We all know what a child is until we are asked, and then we find we do not know. We can mention his extra goodness or his extra badness, but none of this is the child himself. We know implicitly what a child is, and we know implicitly what Jesus christ means, but as soon as we try to put it into words it escapes. A child works from an unconscious principle within, and if we are born again and are obeying the holy spirit, we shall unconsciously manifest humility all along the line. We shall easily be the servant of all men, not because it is our ideal, but because we cannot help it. Our eye is not consciously on our service, but on our saviour. There is nothing more awful than conscious humility, it is the most satanic type of pride. To consciously serve is to be worse than the pharisee who is eaten up with conceit. Jesus christ presented humility as a description of what we shall be unconsciously when we have become rightly related to god and are rightly centred in jesus christ. Our humility amongst men can only be understood by those who are christ-centred in the same way. This is portrayed over and over again in the new testament. Peter says, they think it strange that ye run not with them to the same excess of riot (1 peter 4:4), and our lord says, leap for joy when they shall separate you from their company, . . . For the son of mans sake (Luke 6:2223). The centre of the life is altered, and the worldling is hopelessly at sea13 in trying to find out the centre from which the christian works. The analysis of a christian from a worldly standpoint results at first not in attraction, but in ridicule. The apostle Paul said that what he preached was foolishness, unutterable stupidity to the Greeks, to those who seek after wisdom; and that is the attitude towards the saints in this dispensation. A saint arouses interest for a little while, when things go ill he arouses deep interest; but when things go well, the interest gradually changes into ridicule, and then into his being absolutely ignored, because he is cen- tred in someone the world does not see, viz. , in god. As long as a christian complies with the standards of this world, the world recognises him; but when he works from the real standard, which is god, the world cannot understand him, and consequently it either ignores or ridicules him. Jesus christ and the spirit of god in the epistles point out this antagonism between the spirit of the world and the spirit of god, it is a deeply rooted antagonism, and as chris- tians we have to realise that if we obey the spirit of god, we are going to be detested and ridiculed and ignored by those whose centre is self-realisation.
Our attitude in this dispensation manifests itself in a humility that cannot sting us into action on our own account. That is the thing that maddens the prince of this world. When the prince of this world and his min- ions scandalise jesus christ and misrepresent him, the weakest saint becomes a giant, he is ready to go to martyrdom any time and anywhere all the world over for the lord jesus christ. We hear it said that the spirit of martyrdom has died out; the spirit of martyrdom is here. If scandal should arise against jesus christ, there would be many to-day who would stand true to the honour of the lord jesus christ where in the past there would have been but one.
What is self-seeking? I must have self-seeking, and if my self is truly centred, my seeking is gods honour. Gods honour is at stake in my eyes, in my hands and feet; his honour is at stake wherever i take my body. My body is the temple of the holy ghost, therefore i have to see that it is the obedient slave of the disposition jesus christ has put in to stand for him. The centre of my self should be god and love for him. This question often arisesi believe i ought to love god, but how am i to do it? How am i to have this tremendous love towards god? I agree that i ought to love him, but how can i? Romans 5:5 is the solution: the love of god hath been shed abroad in our hearts through the holy ghost which was given unto us (rv). Have you received the holy spirit? If not, luke 11:13 will help you: if ye then, being evil, know how to give good gifts unto your children: how much more shall your heavenly father give the holy spirit to them that ask him? Also john 17:26: that the love wherewith thou lovedst me may be in them, and i in them (RV). Ask god to answer the prayer of jesus christ.
There is no excuse for any of us not hav- ing the problem answered in our own life. Our natural heart does not love god; the holy ghost is the only lover of god, and immediately he comes in, he will make our hearts the centre of love for god, the centre of personal, passionate, overwhelming devotion to jesus christ. (god and jesus christ are synonymous terms in practical experience. ) when the holy spirit comes in and sin and self-interest are in the road, he will instantly detect them and clear them out as soon as we give our consent, until we become incandescent with the very love of god. Keep yourselves in the love of god ( jude 21). That does not mean keep on trying to love god, it means something infinitely profounder, viz. , keep the windows of your soul open to the fact that god loves you; then his love will continually flow through you to others. There are two terms used in modern psychology which are of importance in this connectionprojec- tive and ejective. Projective means that i see in other people the qualities i want but am without. Ejective means that i attribute my qualities or my defects to other people. The ejective method is seen in the mat- ter of judging; when somebody has trespassed against me, i instantly impute to him every mean14 motive of which i would have been guilty had i been in his circumstances. Wherefore thou art without excuse, o man, whosoever thou art that judgest: for wherein thou judgest another, thou condemnest thyself (romans 2:1 rv). In Matthew 6:15 jesus christ puts the forgiveness of our trespasses on the ground that we forgive those who trespass against us. If we take the ejective method, we do not forgive them, we sim- ply attribute to others what we should be capable of in the way of meanness in similar circumstances. The statement that we only see what we bring with us the power of seeing, is perfectly correct. If i see meanness and wrong and evil in others, let me take the self- judgement at once that is what i would be guilty of if i were in their circumstances. The searching light of the scriptures comes over and over again on this line, and we come to find that there is no room in a christian for cynicism.
3. Self-estimation ( john 13:1317)
this is a reiteration of the same point, viz. , that self must be centred in god. Is my self christ-centred or self-centred? When i am in difficult circumstances. Does the disposition in me make me say, why should this happen to me? That disposition was never in the lord jesus christ. Whenever his consciousness was revealed, it was his fathers honour that occu- pied him, not his own honour. My self is a human edition for god to be glorified in. Let this mind be in you, which was also in christ jesus (philippi- ans 2:5). Could anything be more practical, or more profound than that command? The mind of christ showed itself in his actions and in his speech, and our mind is shown in our speech and in our actions. What was it that satan antagonised in jesus christ? God-realisation. Satan wanted to alter that centre: do gods work in your own way; you are his son, then work from that centre. At the heart of each of our lords answers to satans temptations is thisi came . . . Not to do mine own will, but the will of him that sent me. Jesus christ was tempted, and so shall we be tempted when we are rightly related to god. I have somewhat against thee, because thou hast left thy first love (revelation 2:4). All the rest becomes of no account. To get eccentric, off the centre, is exactly what satan wants. He does not tempt to immorality; the one thing he makes his business is to dethrone gods rule in the heart. The superiority of jesus christs self was that he was god-centred. He that gathereth not with me scattereth, said our lord; and all morality, all goodness, all religion, and all spirituality that is not christ-centred is drawing away from jesus christ all the time. All the teaching of jesus weaves round the question of self. It is not oh, to be nothing, nothing! But oh, to be something, something! Aggressively and powerfully something, uncrushably something, something that stands next to gods throne, on the rock; to be those in whom god can walk and talk and move and do what he likes with, because self is per- sonally, passionately in love with god, not absorbed into god; but centred in god. Selfishness means that which gives me pleasure without considering jesus christs interests. Talk about selfishness on its bad side, and you will have everyones sympathy; but talk about selfishness from jesus christs standpoint and you will arouse the interest of very few And the antipathy of a great many. Sympathy for my fellow-men is quite likely to rouse antagonism to god. Unless my relationship to god is right, my sympathy for men will lead me astray and them also; but when once i am right with god, i can love my neighbour as god has loved me. How has god loved me? God has loved me to the end of all my sinfulness, the end of all my self-will, all my selfishness, all my stiff-neckedness, all my pride, all my self-interest; now he sayslove one another, as i have loved you. I am to show to my fellow-men the same love that god showed to me. That is Christianity in practical working order.