Living for Jesus a life that is true

If the young people have the slightest misconception concerning Hymns, #456, they will get into trouble. Anyone who is sixty-five years and over, however, will have a heart filled with so much gratitude that they will think it is sufficient just to have the opportunity to love the Lord, and they will be satisfied simply to serve Him in the church. The older ones do not really want to go out and do something great. Those who have been called by the Lord to serve Him full time for their entire lives have a wonderful testimony. Just as Judges 5:15 and 16 say, they have great resolutions in heart and great searchings of heart. But when we see some with such a lofty desire, there is also some concern because we fear that as "wild oxen" and "wild asses" they will desire to live for Jesus and want to accomplish something great. We fear that they will destroy the church. I say this because of lessons we have learned in the past.

Myself in the chorus of Hymns, #456 refers mainly to the person in our soul, not to our body. Strictly speaking, we cannot give ourselves to the Lord; we must instead put ourselves aside. This is what Paul says in Galatians 2:20: "I am crucified with Christ; and it is no longer I who live, but it is Christ who lives in me." The I, the self, in this hymn does not refer to the body but to the person, which is our natural I, the soul-life.

The chorus of Hymns, #456 says, "O Jesus, Lord and Savior, / I give myself to Thee, / For Thou, in Thy atonement, / Didst give Thyself for me." There is also a problem with the chorus. It is difficult to find a verse in the Bible that says the Lord wants us to give ourselves to Him. On the contrary, the Lord wants us to deny ourselves. Not only does the Lord not want our self; He even tells us that we should not want our self. Why would we give the Lord something that He does not want? Why would we give the Lord something He wants us to give up? Even though this hymn is very poetic, the truth contained in the poetry is not very high.

Hymns, #456 gives us a natural understanding that we should live for Jesus, because stanza 2 says, "Living for Jesus, who died in my place, / Bearing on Calv'ry my sin and disgrace." However, on the cross, the Lord Jesus did not only bear our sins and disgrace; even more, He terminated us. The apostle Paul's word says, "The love of Christ constrains us because we have judged this, that One died for all, therefore all died" (2 Cor. 5:14). We have been terminated; now we are a new creation, and what we offer to Him is the new creation. But this hymn does not have this concept. It says only that the Lord Jesus died on the cross for us, bearing our sin and disgrace. This is entirely objective; it is not subjective. By the end of the hymn, what we offer up is altogether a natural man. Such a consecration is difficult to accomplish because it must be done with clenched teeth.

There are some things that are right in traditional theology, but within those items there is always some hidden error, which is leaven. Let us take Hymns, #456 as an example. All the things spoken of in this hymn are proper, but there is also something hidden. If we sing this hymn repeatedly, everyone will set their will to "live for Christ" and "follow His leading and give Him my all." Have we ever considered what our all is? According to Paul's word in Philippians 3:8, our all is just refuse, and it is not at all precious.

When we sing Hymns, #456, we will certainly set our will to live for the Lord. The second stanza says, "Such love constrains me to answer His call, / Follow His leading and give Him my all." This speaks of a religious life in Christianity. Some people may say that 2 Corinthians 5:14 says, "The love of Christ constrains us." This is true, but the entire verse says, "The love of Christ constrains us because we have judged this, that One died for all, therefore all died." It does not say that One died for all; therefore, all were forgiven and redeemed. Rather, it says that all died. Christ died for us so that we would all die, not so that we would live for Him. Romans 6:5 says, "If we have grown together with Him in the likeness of His death, indeed we will also be in the likeness of His resurrection."

The hymn "Living for Jesus" (Hymns, #456) was written by a famous American brother within the past fifty years. When the brothers in Shanghai translated this hymn in 1949 or 1950, the truth in the translated version was more advanced than the truth in the original. The first stanza of the original hymn says,

Living for Jesus a life that is true,
Striving to please Him in all that I do;
Yielding allegiance, glad-hearted and free,
This is the pathway of blessing for me.
O Jesus, Lord and Savior,
I give myself to Thee,