Some one might wonder if we are never permitted in this truly consecrated condition, to set our affections upon anything in this world, or, if we can possess anything as our own, if all must be yielded up and laid upon the altar. If our affections and every object of the same are yielded to Jesus, then we certainly cannot have them placed upon anything else. This is one of the grand provisions of his grace. Jesus now gets between us and every object of our affections. He not only has our affections, but he has the objects of our affections. In the consciousness of this loss to us we also become conscious of the loss of our old, depraved nature, and the gain of a glorious, heavenly purity which we before did not possess. But above all things, we become conscious of the fact that Jesus has become enthroned within our hearts, and now has full control of our entire being. In him we possess all things. He gives us back, with himself, everything that is good for us: father, mother, brother, sister, and every God-given blessing that we had yielded up to him. But they do not seem to us now like they did before. There is something between us and them. What is it? It is Jesus! This makes every blessing so much more precious to us now. A sacredness exists between us and our loved ones which we never realized before. They now get our love only as they get it through Jesus, for he is between us and them. Praise God for this precious experience! We gave everything, our all, for him. He purified our hearts and now gives everything, his all, to us. Without the subtraction of our all, first, we cannot obtain the addition, his all. Thus, after all, we lose nothing but the depravity of our nature, which loss, of course, involves the loss of all things for the time being, but means the gain of all things in the fullness of Christ. The apostle Paul expresses this crucifixion in his testimony in Gal. 2:20 "I am crucified with Christ: nevertheless I live; yet not I, but Christ liveth in me: and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by the faith of the Son of God, who loved me, and gave himself for me." There was something of the apostle that was crucified. It was the same as he speaks of in Rom. 6:6, "our old man." That depraved, carnal self, the proud, haughty Pharisee, the great Saul of Tarsus who considered himself of such importance among men. This was the =I= that was crucified; but there was an =I= who still lived. This was the humble, sanctified Paul, the servant of Jesus Christ, who now considered himself less than the least of all saints, and not worthy to be called an apostle. What a contrast between the two =I='s. The one, the big =I=; the other, the little =I=. They are exactly of opposite natures. The one was Paul's "old man," the other his humble individual self. Jesus and the big I cannot rule together in the same heart.