THE NATURE OF CHRISTIAN LIFE
It will assist the understanding of this article if the reader has in mind that the assembly is the spiritual home of christian life, being Kingdom-of-God in character, heavenly conditions on earth in which the rules of the Kingdom are known and observed, a different dimension and with different values to that of the secular world (1 Cor.3:16, 1 Tim.3:15).
Christian life, begotten by the Holy Spirit through the gospel, defines a believer in Christ – a christian. Described in Scripture as “born-again” life, “eternal life” and “everlasting life” (John.3.) it is by definition a new spiritual form of life that characterises christian conversion, an entirely spiritual event and outcome. Neither human nature nor anything connected with it is involved.
Thus a christian is a person who is born anew spiritually so that the term has no connection to natural/secular life. This conversion experience is the product of faith, itself a spiritual faculty produced by the Holy Spirit acting through the Word of God (Rom.10:17). It follows that, as christian life is spiritual in character at its inception, it continues to be so in its development. Consequently, the divine system of Christianity is a religion of the spiritual and “unseen” that the unregenerate world cannot perceive or understand (2 Cor.4:18) which is why it is described as a mystery in 1 Tim.3:9 and Luke 8:10.
The believer is a person who has experienced two births, the natural common to humanity, followed at some later point in life by the spiritual, common to Christianity. This new spiritual life is, by its very nature, intangible and thus invisible to natural faculties, being discerned only by spiritual means (John 3:3). So christian life, being by definition a “mystery” (Col.1:27), is not something that can be identified by fleshly observation; spiritual life has to do with spiritual things, natural life with natural things, the two being mutually exclusive (John 3:6).
Therefore the christian has two natures, human nature relevant to natural or secular life, and the new divine nature relevant to spiritual, christian activity. In secular life the believer walks by sight (1 Thess.4:12) but in christian life by faith (2 Cor.5:7). Some have personified the two natures as a kind of Jekyll and Hyde, a carnal idea that falls well short of Scripture which depicts them as the “old man” and the “new man” (Col..3:9-10). The believer is one personality and two natures. The world is the sphere of the “old man”, Christianity an environment of the “new man”.
To state the obvious, human nature fits humanity for life in the world and this remains the case for the christian who, though now equipped to operate at a spiritual level, nevertheless still has a secular life with family and business, etc. responsibilities. The N.T. epistles are replete with instruction relating to moral and social issues in the christian’s natural life, which are also observed by many unregenerate in the world at large.
The erroneous, Christendom view of these secular instructions is that they are an integral part of the Christian system, being contained in the epistles, which are inspired Scripture.
However, the truth of the matter is that the divine system of Christianity can only be understood by faith and a new nature (1 Cor.2:13-14).
Clearly, therefore, as these social and moral issues can be readily embraced by the unregenerate, then they lie outside the ambit of faith and the “mystery” of Christianity (1 Tim.3:9). It would thus be strange indeed to aver that moral/social teaching in the epistles is the subject of faith! Yet it is universally assumed to be part of the christian faith despite the fact it is practised by unbelievers!
One does not require born-again life to understand and participate in ethical issues. Regrettably, many believers fail to distinguish between the secular and spiritual spheres of operation in the life of a christian.
Thus, two types of life characterise a christian, one natural and visible and the other spiritual and invisible. Natural life is manifest to human faculties, spiritual life to the divine faculty of faith. As stated, human nature has no involvement in the development and exercise of the “new man”, nor is it the purpose or role of the divine nature to improve or reform the “old”. Contrary to long held tradition, we must distinguish between the secular and the sacred, the christian’s (daily) life and christian life
The spiritual mind will have no difficulty recognising that the two life forms are entirely different and separate, as clearly they must be, belonging to two unrelated dimensions. The common practice of mixing them results in a worldly form of Christianity and sanctified flesh seen in Christendom. The apostle Paul wrote, “No-one engaging in warfare entangles himself with the affairs of this life …..” (2 Tim.2:4). Christ did not come to make the world a better place naturally, nor to enable us to do so by a fleshly Christianity. The warfare to which the apostle refers is clearly spiritual which excludes secular life.
Separation is a work that God has done by virtue of creating born-again life, a spiritual life form unrelated to that of natural man. Believers give practical expression to this divine work of separation by observing it in their christian fellowship and service (2 Cor.6:14-18).
Some take the view that separation is applicable to daily life but this fails to recognise that Christians are the spiritual equivalent of the Jewish nation, not the same, so that separation in secular life is not in view (Phil.2:15,1 Cor.5:10). The divine system of Christianity is heavenly and spiritual in character, not earthly and natural; the Lord Jesus said, “My kingdom is not of this world” (John 18:36), viz. it is a spiritual kingdom and totally apart from the secular world.
As we have shown, christians have a secular life in the world subject to divine guidance in the epistles specific to natural life. But in addition, we have a spiritual, christian life in the Kingdom-of-God, heavenly environment of the assembly, which is separate from the world system and all its influences. Of course, we enjoy the legitimate things the world offers at the level of natural life (art, music, etc.) but they have no place in our spiritual affections and the divine sphere of the Kingdom of God.
Failure to distinguish between the divine sphere and the world often leads to the absurdity of applying spiritual truth to natural things, which is the satanic hallmark of Christendom. Sadly, many otherwise spiritually grounded christians have fallen for this unfounded tactic of the adversary.
A feature of natural life is the emergence of gifts or talents – musical, practical, sporting, etc. and the same is true of the developing christian life, only in this case they are, of course, spiritual in nature (1 Cor. 12) and therefore not apparent to natural man. Consequently, the believer manifests both, appropriate to secular life and christian activity.
The christian also exhibits fruit of the Spirit (Gal.5.22) to God and to fellow believers; these spiritual graces have natural counterparts at a worldly level, as for example in the case of love, natural love being quite different to divine love (John 5:42).
Good works are a feature of secular life but there are also spiritual good works (Eph.2.10) such as prayer and preaching that fall within the province of christian life; unlike the unregenerate, the believer can engage in both.
To summarise, christian life is a divinely-begotten, spiritual identity (the “new man”) conferred at conversion that is invisible to natural faculties, connecting the believer to the Godhead, to fellow christians and to divine revelation. By its very spiritual nature this new life operates at a different level to that of secular life.
To contend, as Christendom and traditionalists do, that Christianity is an ethic involving the issues of everyday life, is to both contradict and repudiate the intrinsic spiritual character of the new birth and the apostle Paul who said, “We look not at the things that are seen” (2 Cor.4:18). How easy it is to become so hidebound by tradition that we fail to notice the implications of this profound and fundamental truth.