John Own, Works pp. VI:40-42
“You who were once slaves of sin have become obedient from the
heart.” Romans 6:17
You cannot mortify a specific lust that is troubling you
unless you are seeking to obey the Lord from the heart in all area. If a man finds a particular lust that is
powerful and violent and it takes away his peace and troubles him, and if he
sets himself against it, prays against it, groans under it, and sighs to be
delivered; but in the meantime, perhaps, in other duties and in other ways he
is loose and negligent, he will not be able to gain the victory over that
troubling lust. This is a common
condition among the sons of men in their pilgrimage. If we seek to correct a coarse or filthy
outbreak of sin in the soul, but neglect the basic duties that promote our
spirituality, we labour in vain for it has a bad foundation. We must hate all sin, as sin, and not only
because it troubles us. Love for Christ
because he went to the cross, and hate for sin that sent him there, is a solid
foundation for true spiritual mortification.
To seek mortification only because a sin troubles us proceeds from
self-love. Why do you seek to mortify
this sin?-Because it troubles you and takes away your peace/ Yes, but you have neglected prayer and
reading. Neglect of these is just as
sinful. Christ bled for these also. If you hate sin as sin, you will be watchful
against everything that grieves the Spirit.
Do you think God will help you in such a hypocritical effort? Do you think he will free you from this so
you can commit another sin that grieves him?
‘No’, says God, ‘If I free him from this lust, I will not hear from him
anymore, and he will be content with his failure.’ We must not be concerned only with that which
troubles us, but with all that troubles God.
God’s work is to have full victory, and universal obedience, not just
the sins that trouble our soul. (Emphasis my own).
