Death to 'self'

I take this opportunity on this site and greet you all in the name of our Lord Christ Jesus to share something that i think is a crucial matter among us Christians, and is not realised by us- 'Death to self'.

God has been revealing to me and my fellow brothers in Christ i fellowship with that we can never advance spritually if our self is not crucified and left to hang on the cross, so as to allow the move of the Holy Spirit in us. What God has made me to realise through Watchman Nee's book "The Word of the Cross" is that many christians think that once they have achieved Death to sin, they fall into a comfort zone, yet the self still remains and dominates the christians life, and one believes he is close to God and pleasing Him yet his/hers 'self is a hinderance for the Holy Spirit to work in and through that person. Self is our emotions, love, patience, good character etc(anything which is in us and not God birthed and directed) and most of us christians believe once we are no longer 'slaves to sin' we are pleasing to God, and we leave our natural good character, understanding patient self,and don't allow it to be taken to the cross, yet knowing that Christ said no one is righteous, no good dwells in man.

I pray God wroughts this on us hearts that our self is of no use, that God impacts the cross on our 'self' and leaves it there to hang, so that He can work in us and through us without any hinderances. I pray He conforms us to His image and not us to conform Him to our own image. The cross is a painful experience for all of us but we ave to allow God to do it, if we really want to serve Him, to partake in His glorious nature and become precious stones of God

I thank God for revealing this to me, and i know God is preparing me for this as He has said it to me, not only me but all of His children who seek Him earnestly. I have tried my best to write this article in a way i have understood this issue, i am still growing in Christ and there are many things the Spirit of God has to deal with in me, i thank God for these words.Amen.

"If anyone wants to come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross daily, and
follow Me" (Luke 9:23).

Brother, amen to what you said.
I don't know have you read this article, it has been posted here few times, but I think it is a worth post it once more, I believe it will be encouragement to you:

[i]Drowning in the Sea of Self by C.Brogden[/i]

Watchman Nee relates a story from one of his experiences as a Christian leader in Communist China. A group of young Christian brothers were gathered together to take a swim in one of the many creeks that run throughout the countryside there. Since most were not good swimmers they were careful to remain close to the banks so as not to get in water over their head.

One of the brothers got out a little too far and begin to struggle in the deep water. Realizing his predicament he began to cry out to his neighbors, who by now were out of the water and drying off. "Help! Save me!" he yelled, all the while thrashing his arms and legs in a futile attempt to keep his head above water.

Brother Nee knew that only one man was experienced enough at swimming to provide some assistance, and he turned to him for help. But strangely enough, the would-be rescuer calmly watched the man's plight but made no move to save him, to the great consternation of Brother Nee and the rest of the group. "Why don't you do something?" they all screamed in unison. But the man just stood there apparantly unconcerned.

After a few moments the drowning man could stay afloat no more. His arms and legs grew tired and limp and he began to sink underwater. Now the slow-moving lifeguard dove into the creek, and with a few quick strokes reached the victim and pulled him to safety.

Once all was well, Brother Nee was beside himself. "I have never seen a Christian who loved his own life quite as much as you," he scolded. "How could you stand by and watch your brother drown, ignoring his cries for help and prolonging his suffering?"

But the man calmly explained. "If I were to jump in immediately and try to save a drowning man, he would clutch me in panic and pull me under with him. In order to be saved, he must come to the end of himself, and cease struggling, cease trying to save himself. Only then can he be helped."

The spiritual lesson here is hard to miss. Nee concluded, and we also conclude, that just as a drowning man cannot be saved until he stops struggling, so must all who would be saved by Christ. Until you come to the end of yourself Jesus will not intervene.

You may be thinking, "Oh, I AM at the end of myself!" Yet you continue to make your own plans, your own decisions, your own choices. You think, reason, debate, argue, and seek counsel according to your own devices, your own thought, your own way. How hard it is for you to stop struggling and give yourself completely into the hand of God.

I believe that God would not have us do any great thing, only the next thing. If we will commit our lives to Him, give Him the preeminence in all things, and stop trying to save ourselves, I believe we will have more peace and heart-trust.

To struggle and thrash about like a drowning man is not faith, but desperation. And it will not bring you the help you need.

Psalms 62 expresses this thought exactly: "I stand silently before the Lord, waiting for Him to rescue me. For salvation comes from Him alone. Yes, He alone is my Rock, my rescuer, my defense and fortress. Why then should I be tense with fear when troubles come (vv. 1, 2 Living Bible)?" Good question. Why should we be afraid? Since David realized salvation comes from God alone, he could well afford to stop trying to bail himself out of every situation.

What does it mean to trust like a little child? Think of the Lord Jesus lying in a manger. Totally dependent upon his earthly parents for food, for clothing, for shelter, for protection. He cannot do a thing for Himself.

Fast forward a few years. Now Jesus is a Man. Now He may feed Himself, clothe Himself, find His own shelter, defend Himself. But inwardly, He is still as dependent upon His Father as He ever was. Not the earthly, but the Heavenly. His own Words: "I can do nothing of Myself. It is the Father Who works in Me. I am come to do His will, not Mine."

The sooner we give the reins of our life over to the direction of an all-knowing God, the sooner we will experience the blessed assurance and calm trust that are only to be found in the heart that has come to the end of itself, and has committed itself unreservedly to follow Jesus

Interesting , i have never come across this article, but i should say the messge behind it is very convicting. Thank you so much and may this become a reality for all of us Christians. DEATH TO SELF. May the Spirit lead us all on this site to post such as these to edify us all.Amen

God has been revealing to me and my fellow brothers in Christ i fellowship with that we can never advance spritually if our self is not crucified and left to hang on the cross, so as to allow the move of the Holy Spirit in us. What God has made me to realise through Watchman Nee's book "The Word of the Cross" is that many christians think that once they have achieved Death to sin, they fall into a comfort zone, yet the self still remains and dominates the christians life, and one believes he is close to God and pleasing Him yet his/hers 'self is a hinderance for the Holy Spirit to work in and through that person. Self is our emotions, love, patience, good character etc(anything which is in us and not God birthed and directed) and most of us christians believe once we are no longer 'slaves to sin' we are pleasing to God, and we leave our natural good character, understanding patient self,and don't allow it to be taken to the cross, yet knowing that Christ said no one is righteous, no good dwells in man.

Ernest O'neill preached a great series of messages on the spiritual life and several of the messages deal with this very thing you mention here, O'neill refers to it as the soul life. Here is a link to those messages, check out 'the cross and the soul life" messages in particular.

[url=http://www.howtolivevictorious.com/spiritual-life/index.html]The Spiritual Life Series by Ernest O'neill [/url]

In Christ,

Ron

bro Tash

God has been revealing to me and my fellow brothers in Christ i fellowship with that we can never advance spritually if our self is not crucified and left to hang on the cross, so as to allow the move of the Holy Spirit in us. What God has made me to realise through Watchman Nee's book "The Word of the Cross" is that many christians think that once they have achieved Death to sin, they fall into a comfort zone, yet the self still remains and dominates the christians life, and one believes he is close to God and pleasing Him yet his/hers 'self is a hinderance for the Holy Spirit to work in and through that person. Self is our emotions, love, patience, good character etc(anything which is in us and not God birthed and directed) and most of us christians believe once we are no longer 'slaves to sin' we are pleasing to God, and we leave our natural good character, understanding patient self,and don't allow it to be taken to the cross, yet knowing that Christ said no one is righteous, no good dwells in man.

i praise God for the beauty of fellowship that we are not alone and the Lord reveals things to us that we may share and glorify His name. at the same time in so sharing we are shown that we're not crazy! the Lord has surely been showing me the same thing and sis Diane can testify to the same thing. well we're not crazy, God is working at something here. we [i]need[/i] to empty ourselves of everything which is self, ambition, bright ideas, natural affection, our very love which is natural and which we express. this love is flighty, quickly exposed as shallow in times of adversity. it's fine while we are heathens, but it is not sufficient for the work of God. in fact all that we are is insufficient and must die at the cross that God Himself can be our sufficiency and more importantly the testimony upon completing the work of God is that it was by God's hand, this way no man may glory in His presence.

the church largely teaches self-help/improvement yet Christ and the way thereof is self death. this Faith is not for the faint of heart!

Lord have your way!AMEN.

I agree that death to self is where the real awakening begins. And I also agree that Jesus, because He is love and has given us freewill, will let us voluntarily come to the end of our selves before He comes in. Sure He stands at the door and knocks, however, we must invite Him in.
He seems to teach me the reality that no man can truly serve two masters, and that the doubleminded man is unstable in all his ways. When I compromise my walk (concerning any matter) with God whether I realize it or not, I'm still compromising. Then I begin to become restless, etc, and begin to walk after the flesh.
To me, it's almost like going back and forth between two realms - the spiritual(restful peace) and the flesh(doing things in my own strength). To me their's many sides to the Christian life(as the world sees it), but only in trusting Christ's words by faith and dying to self does a person truly experience Christ abiding within them :-) And to me, when I'm abiding in Him, it's way easier to rejoice in persecutions - I don't even have to try to rejoice in my own strength because He that is within me is greater and it just happens - Love just flows out of me; It's so AWESOME 8-) I think this happens because I choose to lay down my rights as well - I deny myself...I'm finding it possible to really love my enemies as the Lord has commanded us to - They aren't enemies of flesh and blood; They truly are deceived(Lk 23:34a; Jn 16:3) :-o Thankyou for this topic, and the oppurtunity to respond. Only the Spirit of God can guide us into these deep truths...May I become even more of a servant that His will be done, and may my only will be His will. God bless you bros and sis' :-D Richie..PS.I as well have been richly blessed by many of Rev. Ernest O'Neill's sermons

Hi Tash,
This topic is very dear to my heart,thanks for raising it.It all started in the garden with the tree of knowledge and ever since the plague rages on. Why all the self help nonsense?Mankind is utterley helpless and totally corrupt.He became his own god, and believed the lie that he would not die.
What happened to the "I Will" as found in the wine of the new covenant? What happened to the "for His name's sake" from God and "for his name's sake"from man?
It has been said that repentance is the sweetest emotion ,if this is not the death of self what is? Death is dead, long live death.
Thank God his calling is without repentance.

Greetings to you my fellow brothers and sisters in Christ, i am happy to hear you guys opinions on 'Death to Self.' My inner man wants to wake up in the morning and sing praises, meditate on some, verses and pray to the Lord. I do this for some morning waking up at 5am, then some days my self refuses to get up yet my inner man really wants. I find my self listening to my flesh and say let me just sleep for a few more minute, and then when i wake up its already time for me to go to work. I consulted the Lord and told Him His opinions on early rising, and He said "if you love God you will wake up early in the morning" and He went on to say that it depends on your love for Him and gave me an example of how a man loves a woman and wuld go out of His way to do certain things for her. I should say the Lord always gives examples that relate to me and make it easy to understand some things. He is amazing and i think back of the times i belonged to the world and did not know that God is there and has much He wants to share with us. I thank the Lord for all He has shone His light on. May His mercy and love be upon all who call upon Him and seek Him.

Thanks Ron. i am listening right now, and i am learning much. Becoming a member to this site is revealing much to me. so that when the Holy Spirit begins working in me and impacting this on my life , i will just humble myself before the Lord. God Bless.

Here's what John Wesley stated in Sermon 48 entitled "Self Denial." It's a great sermon. It goes along with this death to self.

Here's a paragraph defining self-denial from this sermon.

But what is self-denial? Wherein are we to deny ourselves? And whence does the necessity of this arise? I answer, [b]The will of God is the supreme, unalterable rule for every intelligent creature; equally binding every angel in heaven, and every man upon earth.[/b] Nor can it be otherwise: This is the natural, necessary result of the relation between creatures and their Creator. But if the will of God be our one rule of action in every thing, great and small, it follows, by undeniable consequence, that we are not to do our own will in anything. Here, therefore, we see at once the nature, with the ground and reason, of self-denial. [b]We see the nature of self-denial: It is the denying or refusing to follow our own will, from a conviction that the will of God is the only rule of action to us. And we see the reason thereof, because we are creatures; because "it is he that hath made us, and not we ourselves."[/b]

Watchman Nee's works for the most part, seem quite brilliant, but I'm having reservation towards those who completely devote themselves into following Nee's doctrine rather than the written WORD. The over emphasis of self denial has somewhat brought forth a sort of hyper-spiritualism, or rather mysticism.

I recently met a fairly new believer, who devotes much time in studying Watchman Nee's books, he doesn't seem interested in the bible and has replaced it with Watchman Nee's doctrine. As a result, he has trouble agreeing with the many other Christians because he thinks that Christians must have no self !! To the point where he thinks that even a manifestation of emotional love for Christ, is falsehood and sinful.

Paul teaches the two-natured man in believers. No doubt, after conversion, we are to mortify sins, to deny fleshly lusts, but to think for one to completely demolish the reality of self on earth, that's unrealistic, if not impossible.

We are commanded to love God and to love one another, and to love, it involves self, that self in CHRIST, and our love is borrowed from God's love, but still self has to be involved.

hm, this Christian I met confuses me greatly...

When someone is obsessed in trying to deny self in the flesh, isn't he already entangling with self?

I know it's necessary for us to deny the old and sinful self...

Any thoughts out there? I would love to hear from someone who's familiar with Nee's works.

Okay Ormly my friend,

I won't rely on Wesley but for the sake of brevity I copied a pertinent part of his sermon entitled "self-denial." Most of his sermons were brief (20 minutes or so) but substantive and not complicated.

I'll try to articulate what I'm hearing in the Spirit and seeing in the word of God.

Luke 9:23 And he said to them all, If any man will come after me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross daily, and follow me. The word "deny" here means to deny utterly or to the utmost. Given your kinship with Brother Oswald, I'm sure this is quite clear.

I like the way that Thayer defined the word deny as "to affirm that one has no acquaintance or connection with someone." In other words, it's the complete laying down of my life. There's no longer a connection to any rights. I've laid down everything at the cross.

It's a real denial of self (i.e. an unequivocal denial of self). I believe it's much more than an emotional experience but there comes a point once everything is given over where there is no distinction between "my" life and Christ's life, because I fully belong to Him. This is what I'm pressing into the Lord for in my own life.

So what I've experienced is that the Holy Spirit will question me about something during a period of prayer. Here's an example of one area the Lord has been dealing with me on, is the area of "time" and I heard "Can I have your time?"

I said yes Lord, rather foolishly and the Lord immediately began to test me on this by waking me up at all times of the night to pray. The Holy Spirit has been faithful to wake me up to pray, unless I'm in some type of rebellion.

Whenever I failed to get up, the first question I heard during prayer was "Is it my time or your time?" God's memory is perfect.

God can only use an emptied vessel and I can testify that this "emptying out" is a painful process. It's painful only in the sense that there is resistance in my heart and my insistence on having "my time" my whatever the Lord has laid His hand upon.

It's readily apparent to me that the biggest obstacle we must get past is ourselves. Although the devil is a liar and a thief, he cannot compel us to do anything against our will.

I pray this rambling makes some sense. The real concern I have in the body of Christ is that the idea of self-denial has become to many the self-denial. Know that once something is laid upon the altar, God has the right to consume it even if it's my beloved "Isaac."

As to Watchman Nee, I've heard some good comments about him but haven't read much on him. I think the focus should be on the Bible and in prayer but I find it fascinating how the Lord has dealt with others and that's one of the reasons I enjoy reading about others.

I hear you my brother, and its all good but you missed what I said in brevity by using the word "emotions".

Does the Lord God test his children in these small things as in the case of the little old lady you described. Yes, absolutely and thank God He does. He continues to do it until we're crying out for Him to finish the work.

Here's a wonderful old hymn I read this morning written by a man named Theodore Monod and it's entitled "The Altered Motto." As you can see, it's a progressive walk and the cry of my heart is "None of self and all of Thee." Isn't it amazing that God can take a proud heart and change that heart of stone into a soft heart that is willing and earnestly seeking all of Jesus? What an awesome God we serve!

Blessings to you brother. I pray this hymn blesses your heart today.

Oh, the bitter shame and sorrow,
That a time could ever be
When I let the Saviour's pity
Plead in vain, and [i]proudly[/i] answered,
[b]"All of self, and none of thee!"[/b]

Yet He found me; I beheld Him
Bleeding on the accursed tree;
Heard Him pray, "Forgive them, Father!"
[b]"Some of self and some of Thee."[/b]

Day by day His tender mercy,
Healing, helping, full and free
Sweet and strong, and ah! so patient,
[i]Brought me lower, while I whispered[/i],
[b]"Less of self, and more of Thee."[/b]

Higher than the highest heavens,
Deeper than the deepest sea,
[u][b]Lord, Thy love at last hath conquered;[/u][/b]
[i]Grant me now my soul's desire[/i],
[b]"None of self and all of Thee."[/b]

I just thought that I'd comment, since God has been showing me a bunch of stuff on this topic lately. It has been so wonderful going through the hurt and pain that accompanies the death of self.

The way I hae see it, the very gateway to knowing the Father deeper is found in dying to yourself. There is no way to follow him at all without first letting go of all of wants, dreams, and ambitions. It's like we are all born with this insticnt that tells us that we "need" to matter in this world, when Jesus is telling us that we don't need to matter at all. I am convinced that no one can even know Jesus unless he first lets go of self, after all isn't that part of repentance?

Just my 0.02
-Sean

It has been so wonderful going through the hurt and pain that accompanies the death of self.

There is no way to follow him at all without first letting go of all of wants, dreams, and ambitions.

When we begin to follow Jesus, the scales begin to be lifted from our eyes and we see the inner rebellion, which consists primarily of our ways (or habits). This is ultimately what has to be laid down. The actions seem to come first and the ways, which are the reasons behind the actions. Hope that makes some sense.

I describe it as painful and glorious all at the same time and people look at me somewhat strangely but that's what I'm finding out along this journey. When I earnestly began seeking Jesus some five years ago, the New Age self-help books simply became the Christian self-help books and the messages were quite similar and a couple of passages were twisted to support the author's contentions.

I'm so glad this life is not about the self and that we don't have to be on this treadmill of self-help. It's all so legalistic and there's no joy. But dying to self and surrendering to Jesus, there is great joy amidst the crushing. Praise God is not about anybody other than Jesus because if it was, we surely would be building a monument to them (or ourselves) in much the same way that Saul did.

Blessings to you brother.

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