The Daily Renewal — The Pattern

Do not lie to one another, seeing that you have put off the old self with its practices, and have put on the new self, which is being renewed in knowledge after the image of its creator.” — Colossians 3: 9-10.

“ Assuming that you have heard about him and were taught in him, as the truth is in Jesus, and to be renewed in the spirit of your minds, and to put on the new self, created after the likeness of God in true righteousness and holiness.” Ephesians 4: 21, 23, 24.

In every pursuit, it is of consequence to have the goal clearly defined. It is not enough that there is movement and progress, we want to know whether the movement is in the right direction, straight for the mark; and especially when we are acting in partnership with another, on whom we are dependent, do we need to know that our aim and his are in perfect accord. If our daily renewal is to attain its object we need to know clearly and hold firmly to what its purpose is.

"You have put on the new man, which is being renewed unto knowledge." The Divine Life, the work of the Holy Spirit within us, is no blind force, as in nature. We are to be workers together with God; our cooperation is to be intelligent and voluntary, "The new man is being renewed day by day unto knowledge." There is a knowledge that the natural understanding can draw from the Word, but which is without life and the power, the real truth and substance, which the spiritual knowledge brings.

It is the renewing of the Holy Ghost that gives the true knowledge, which does not consist in thought and conception, but in an inward tasting, a living reception of the very things themselves of which the words and thoughts are but the images. “Have put on the new self, which is being renewed in knowledge” However diligent our Bible study may be, there is no true knowledge gained any farther than the spiritual renewal is being experienced; "the renewal in the spirit of the mind," in its life and inward being, alone brings true Divine knowledge.

And what is now the pattern that will be revealed to this spiritual knowledge which comes out of the renewal as its true and only aim? The new man is being renewed unto knowledge, after the Image of Him That Created Him Nothing less than the image, the likeness of God. That is the one aim of the Holy Spirit in His daily renewing; that must be the aim of the believer who seeks that renewing.

This was God's purpose in creation, "Let us make man in our image, after our likeness." How little the infinite glory of these words is considered. For nothing less than this, did God breathe His own life into man, that it might reproduce in man on earth a perfect likeness to God in heaven? In Christ, that image of God has been revealed and seen in human form. "We have been predestined and redeemed and called, we are being taught and fitted by the Holy Spirit, to be conformed to the image of the Son, to be imitators of God, and to walk even as Christ walked. How can the daily renewal be carried on, what can the daily Bible study and prayer profit, unless we set our heart on what God has set His on,” The New Man Being Renewed Day by Day After The Image of Him That Created Him.

In the second passage, we have the same thought expressed somewhat differently. Be renewed in the spirit of your mind, and put on the new man, which after God according to the likeness of God, has been created in righteousness and holiness of truth. Righteousness is God's hatred of sin, and maintenance of the right. Holiness is God's ineffable glory, in the perfect harmony of His righteousness and love. His infinite exaltation above the creature. His perfect union with him. Righteousness in man includes all God's will for our duty to Him or our fellowmen: holiness our personal relation to Himself. As the new man has been created, so it has daily to be renewed, after God in righteousness and holiness of truth.'' It is to secure this that the power of the Holy Ghost is working in us. It is to secure this that He waits for us day by day to yield ourselves to Him, in His renewing grace and power.

The daily returning morning hour is the time for securing the daily renewing of the Holy Ghost into the image of God as righteousness and holiness of truth. What need for meditation and prayer to get the heart set upon what God is aiming at, and get a true vision of the wondrous possibility: the inward man renewed day by day into the very likeness of God, changed into the same image as by the Spirit of the Lord. Christian student!

Let nothing less be your aim, or satisfy your aspirations. The image of God, the life of God is in you. His likeness can be seen in you. Separate no longer God and His likeness, let everyone approach Him, let all trust in Him, mean nothing less than finding Him, in His likeness wrought into you by the renewing of the Holy Spirit. Let this be your daily prayer, to be renewed after the image of Him who created you.