Others like not i but christ Features >>
About the Book
"Not I, but Christ" by Watchman Nee reflects on the Christian journey of dying to self and allowing Christ to live through us. Nee emphasizes the importance of surrendering our own desires and ambitions to God, and allowing His will to be done in our lives. Through personal anecdotes and biblical teachings, Nee encourages readers to seek a deeper intimacy with Christ and to let go of their own self-centeredness. Overall, the book serves as a guide for believers to grow closer to God and live a life that reflects the character of Christ.
William Still
I recently read Dying to Live (Christian Focus, 1991), the autobiography of Scottish pastor William Still. I became interested in Still after reading his book The Work of the Pastor earlier this year.
The first half of Dying to Live tells about Stillâs early years into young adulthood and his beginning in pastoral ministry. Still had an unsettled childhood. His parents were separated in his early years, and his father was an alcoholic. He was a sickly child who took refuge in music and became an accomplished pianist. He was part of the Salvation Army as a young man but then entered ministry in the Church of Scotland and served at the Gilcomston Church in his hometown of Aberdeen from 1945-1997.
The second half of the book deals with various aspects of Stillâs pastoral ministry. Still was an evangelical. In his early ministry he worked with Billy Graham, Alan Redpath, and others in evangelistic events. With time, however, he moved away from what he came to call âevangelisticismâ to develop a solid expositional ministry.
Still faced his fair share of hardships during the course of his ministry. When he moved away from pragmatic evangelistic methods, for example, more than two hundred people stopped attending his church almost overnight. In the preface, he references Martin Lutherâs observation that there are three things which make a minister: study, prayer, and afflictions. He observes, âHe who is not prepared to make enemies for Christâs sake by the faithful preaching of the Word will never make lasting friends for Christ, eitherâ (p. 93).
He describes one particularly difficult controversy early in his ministry when he confronted a group of disgruntled elders. At the end of one Sunday service, he read a statement confronting these men, which ended, âThere you sit, with your heads down, guilty men. What would you say if I named you before the whole congregation? You stand condemned before God for your contempt of the Word and of his folk.â He adds, âThe moment I had finished, I walked out of the pulpit. There was no last hymnâno benediction. I went right home. It was the hardest and most shocking thing I ever had to do in Gilcomstonâ (p. 124). That same week seven of his elders resigned and Still was called twice before his Presbytery to answer for the controversy. Yet, he endured.
Still maintains that in light of the unpleasantness one will face in the ministry that the minister of the Word must possess one quality in particular: ââŚI would say that this quality is courage: guts, sheer lion-hearted bravery, clarity of mind and purpose, grit. Weaklings are no use here. They have a place in the economy of God if they are not deliberate weaklings and stunted adults as Paul writes of both to the Romans and to the Corinthians. But weaklings are no use to go out and speak prophetically to men from God and declare with all compassion, as well as with faithfulness, the truth: the divine Word that cuts across all menâs worldly plans for their livesâ (p. 140).
Still was a pioneer in several areas. First, he developed a pattern of preaching and teaching systematically through books of the Bible at a time when this was rarely done. He began a ministry of âconsecutive Bible teachingâ starting with the book of Galatians in 1947, calling this transition from âevangelisticism to systematic exposition ⌠probably the most significant decision in my lifeâ (p. 191).
He was also a pioneer in simplifying and integrating the ministry of the church. After noting how youth in the church were drifting away, even after extensive involvement in the churchâs childrenâs ministry, Still writes, âI conceived the idea of ceasing all Sunday School after beginners and Primary age (seven years) and invited parents to have their children sit with them in the family pew from the age of eightâ (p. 171). He laments âthe disastrous dispersion of congregations by the common practice of segregating the church family into every conceivable category of division of ages, sexes, etc.â (p. 173).
Dying to Live is a helpful and encouraging work about the life and work of the minister and is to be commended to all engaged in the call of gospel ministry. As the title indicates, Stillâs essential thesis is that in order to be effective in ministry the minister must suffer a series of deaths to himself (cf. John 12:24). On this he writes:
The deaths one dies before ministry can be of long durationâit can be hours and days before we minister, before the resurrection experience of anointed preaching. And then there is another death afterwards, sometimes worse than the death before. From the moment that you stand there dead in Christ and dead to everything you are and have and ever shall be and have, every breath you breathe thereafter, every thought you think, every word you say and deed you do, must be done over the top of your own corpse or reaching over it in your preaching to others. Then it can only be Jesus that comes over and no one else. And I believe that every preacher must bear the mark of that death. Your life must be signed by the Cross, not just Christâs cross (and there is really no other) but your cross in his Cross, your particular and unique cross that no one ever diedâthe cross that no one ever could die but you and you alone: your death in Christâs death (p. 136).
you donât have to get married to be happy
You donât have to get married to be happy. In fact, until we realize that we donât have to get married to be happy, weâre really not ready to marry. Disclaimer: I am now happily married. If youâre single, you may be ready to click away, and I can understand why. Too many married people have too much to say about singleness. To be sure, not every married person knows your particular pain and circumstances, but some do. And they may have a perspective on singleness, dating, and marriage that none of your single friends have. I was drunk in love more than once, infatuated in dating, mesmerized by marriage. I started dating in middle school, followed by one long serious relationship after another through high school and college. I thought I would be married by 22, and instead I got married almost a decade later. I said things I wish I could unsay, and crossed boundaries I wish I could go back and rebuild. Iâm not some married guy writing to single you. Iâm writing to single me. I know him better than I know my wife â his weaknesses, his blind spots, his impatience â and I have so much good news for him. And for you. When I say that you donât have to be married to be happy, I say that as someone who devoured romance looking desperately for lasting joy â and who knows what it feels like to end up further from it after each breakup. Does Marriage Mean Happiness? One of the greatest hurdles to getting married is our obsession with getting married. We too easily believe the lie that life will never be as good as it could have been if we never get married. The Bible actually says the opposite of that, even though it has many good things to say about marriage. âTo be truly happy in marriage, it cannot be the ultimate source of our happiness.â The apostle Paul celebrates singleness over  marriage: âI wish that all were as I myself am. . . . To the unmarried and the widows I say that it is good for them to remain single, as I amâ (1 Corinthians 7:7â8). According to him, we donât ever have to be married to be truly and deeply happy. In fact, marriage may actually threaten the only thing that will make us happy (1 Corinthians 7:32â35). Itâs not a command (1 Corinthians 7:6), he says, but counsel from someone who wrote half of the books in the New Testament. Elsewhere, he also celebrates love and marriage as much as anyone in Scripture (Ephesians 5:25â33). But what he wrote about singleness has everything to do with our desires to be married. You donât have to get married to be happy, but to be truly happy in marriage â and in life â marriage cannot be the ultimate source of your significance or happiness. To be truly happy with a husband or wife, you must be happier in Someone else first. You must be most satisfied in Him. Lonely Hunt for Happiness Romantic love is a heart terrorist unless it is anchored in a higher love. Jesus warns the not-yet-married, âWhoever loves father or mother more than me is not worthy of me, and whoever loves son or daughter more than me is not worthy of meâ (Matthew 10:37). Whoever loves future husband or wife more than me is not worthy of me.  Jesus, why would you pit my love for you against my love for my parents, or my spouse, or my children? Because even the best love here pales in comparison to that love, and any love that competes with our love for him jeopardizes our joy. Elisabeth Elliot writes, âThe cross, as it enters the love life, will reveal the heartâs truth. My heart, I knew, would be forever a lonely hunter unless settled âwhere true joys are to be foundââ ( Passion and Purity , 41). âThe happier you are in God before you are married, the happier youâll be with someone else when you get married.â Donât recklessly chase marriage for things you will only fully find in God. Fullness of joy is not found at that altar, and pleasures forevermore are not lying in the marriage bed. No, Scripture sings about a higher love and greater joy, âYou make known to me the path of life; in your presence there is fullness of joy; at your right hand are pleasures forevermoreâ (Psalms 16:11). A Lamp to My Heart Jesus tells a story about ten women waiting for the bridegroom, each carrying a lamp while they wait (Matthew 25:1). Five brought extra oil to keep their lamps lit, while the other five brought lamps, but no oil. Both sets of lamps burned brightly for a while, but as the bridegroom finally arrived â when the women needed the lamps most â five were left in the dark and out of the marriage feast (Matthew 25:10). The lamps illustrate, among other things, the difference between falling in love and staying in love. It doesnât take much at all to start a romantic flame, but it is much harder to sustain it through suffering, disappointment, and conflict. The happiest marriages have storehouses of spiritual oil other marriages have never known. Their love isnât fueled by physical attraction or relational chemistry, but by a mutual affection for and devotion to Christ. The happier you are with God before youâre married, the happier you will be with someone else if and when youâre married. The only people who will make you truly happy in marriage will love Jesus more than you. And the only people whom you will make truly happy in marriage are people you love less than you love Jesus. Thatâs true for every single person. You Need to Fall in Love You donât have to get married to be happy, but you do need to fall in love. When Jesus was asked about the most important command in the Bible, he answered, âYou shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength and with all your mindâ (Luke 10:27). To find the love your soul longs for, you give your heart first to God, not to a husband or wife. The best way to pursue the marriage you want today is to pursue God  with all your heart, mind, soul, and strength. Again, Elliot writes, âWhen obedience to God contradicts what I think will give me pleasure, let me ask myself if I love Him. If I can say yes to that question, canât I say yes to pleasing Him? Canât I say yes even if it means a sacrifice? A little quiet reflection will remind me that yes to God always  leads in the end to joy. We can absolutely bank on thatâ ( Passion and Purity , 90). âThe best way to pursue the marriage you want today is to pursue God with all your heart, mind, soul, and strength.â Ten thousand years from now, your marriage may be just a sweet, but short sticky note in the massive filing cabinet of our happy marriage with Jesus. On our ten-thousandth anniversary with Christ, how will you think about your earthly marriage? How will you think about your current boyfriend or girlfriend (or crush)? After centuries without any confusion or fear or sadness, how will you reflect on your days of heartache and loneliness here? The painful desires and waiting will still have been very real, but now small and insignificant compared with the perfect, seamless love and happiness we will enjoy forever. Donât wait to figure out the source of your happiness until you find a husband or wife. Wait to find a spouse until youâve figured out the true source of happiness. If we knew just how happy Jesus would make us, we would stop looking so desperately for that happiness in a husband or wife. And then we just might be truly happy with that husband or wife one day.
