Systematic Theology (Volume 3 of 3)Strong, Augustus Hopkins
Religion
Systematic Theology (Volume 3 of 3)
Strong, Augustus Hopkins
Baptists -- Doctrines; Theology, Doctrinal
“We need Christ _in_ us as well as Christ _for_ us. How shall I,
how shall society, find healing and purification within? Let me
answer by reminding you of what they did at Chicago. In all the
world there was no river more stagnant and fetid than was Chicago
River. Its sluggish stream received the sweepings of the
watercraft and the offal of the city, and there was no current to
carry the detritus away. There it settled, and bred miasma and
fever. At last it was suggested that, by cutting through the low
ridge between the city and the Desplaines River, the current could
be set running in the opposite direction, and drainage could be
secured into the Illinois River and the great Mississippi. At a
cost of fifteen millions of dollars the cut was made, and now all
the water of Lake Michigan can be relied upon to cleanse that
turbid stream. What Chicago River could never do for itself, the
great lake now does for it. So no human soul can purge itself of
its sin; and what the individual cannot do, humanity at large is
powerless to accomplish. Sin has dominion over us, and we are foul
to the very depths of our being, until with the help of God we
break through the barrier of our self‐will, and let the floods of
Christ’s purifying life flow into us. Then, in an hour, more is
done to renew, than all our efforts for years had effected. Thus
humanity is saved, individual by individual, not by philosophy, or
philanthropy, or self‐development, or self‐reformation, but simply
by joining itself to Jesus Christ, and by being filled in Him with
all the fulness of God.”
(_c_) Union with Christ gives to the believer the legal standing and
rights of Christ. As Christ’s union with the race involves atonement, so
the believer’s union with Christ involves _Justification_. The believer is
entitled to take for his own all that Christ is, and all that Christ has
done; and this because he has within him that new life of humanity which
suffered in Christ’s death and rose from the grave in Christ’s
resurrection,—in other words, because he is virtually one person with the
Redeemer. In Christ the believer is prophet, priest, and king.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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