Oswald Chambers: Pious Fraud or Bond Slave of Jesus?

A BOND-SLAVE OF JESUS

I am crucified with Christ; nevertheless
I live; yet not I, but Christ liveth in me.

These words mean the breaking of my
independence with my own band and surrendering
to the supremacy of the Lord Jesus. No one can
do this for me, I must do it myself. God may
bring me up to the point three hundred and
sixty-five times a year, but He cannot put me
through it. It means breaking the husk of my
individual in dependence of God, and the emancipating
of my personality into oneness with Himself, not
for my own ideas, but for absolute loyalty to Jesus.

There is no possibility of dispute when once I am
there. Very few of us know anything about loyalty
to Christ - "For My sake." It is that which
makes the iron saint.

Has that break come? All the rest is pious fraud.
The one point to decide is - Will I give up, will I
surrender to Jesus Christ, and make no conditions
hatever as to how the break comes? I must be
broken from my self-realization, and immediately
that point is reached, the reality of the supernatural
identification takes place at once, and the witness
of the Spirit of God is unmistakable - "I have been
crucified with Christ."

The passion of Christianity is that I deliberately
sign away my own rights and become a bond-slave of
Jesus Christ. Until I do that, I do
not begin to be a saint.

One student a year who hears God's call would be
sufficient for God to have called this College into
existence. This College as an organization is not
worth anything, it is not academic; it is for
nothing else but for God to help Himself to lives.
Is He going to help Himself to us, or are we taken up
with our conception of what we are going to be?

Oswald Chambers