"The best that I can hope is that this has just opened a window, and that as you look through it you are seeing one thing - how superior is Jesus Christ to all else!"
- T. Austin-Sparks
February 19
Make every effort to keep the unity of the Spirit through the bond of peace. (Ephesians 4:3 NIV)
The new creation is a company, it is a Body indwelt by the Holy Spirit, actuated by the Holy Spirit, actually made one by the Holy Spirit. “In one Spirit were we all baptized into one body” (1 Cor. 12:13). The oneness is the oneness of the Holy Spirit. “Giving diligence to keep the unity of the Spirit” (Eph. 4:3), not to make it but to keep it. A new creation.
Well now, of course that is just the key that opens the door to everything when you see what new creation Life means. And with that you introduce the whole matter of the proper order, the proper regulated order of heavenly Life. Heavenly Life is according to heavenly law. It is not lawless. Each member of this body is not a law unto himself or herself. We are bound by this integrating, regulating law, that we are not allowed to be independent. Here the Holy Spirit forbids it. We are not allowed to take the law into our own hands. We are not allowed to act as individuals; the Holy Spirit will not allow it. There is a regulating order with this Life. This Life expresses itself according to its own laws, as life does in every part of the organic creation. It follows its own lines. That part of the creation follows the laws of the life which it possesses, and this is the Life of the Spirit, and you have not to organize or systematize this. Immediately you begin to do it, you bring death in. It is as fatal to try and make a New Testament church after the New Testament pattern as it is to have no pattern at all! It can be deathly to do that. The thing happens if the Life has its way. We have learned this, yet, much as we know about the truth, we are still so much governed by our own natural life, even in our spiritual activities. There is disorder and running before the Spirit. However, we are all in the school, and we are just stating the laws, the principles and the truth that here you have no need to go and organize something on a New Testament basis. It will come about if the Holy Spirit is really having His way in terms of Life.
Daily Open Windows messages have been selected from the works of T. Austin-Sparks. In some cases they appear in abridged form. The introductory verse and its associated Bible version have been selected by the website editor and did not always appear within the original message. In keeping with T. Austin-Sparks' wishes that what was freely received should be freely given and not sold for profit, and that his messages be reproduced word for word, we ask if you choose to share these messages with others, to please respect his wishes and offer them freely - free of any changes, free of any charge (except necessary distribution costs) and with this statement included.