The wisdom of the fathers
THE OLD HAS GONE, THE NEW HAS COME !

The Maturity of the Church
One trick of the enemy to delay the maturing of the Church consist in blurring the concept of nonconformity with the image of Jesus. If the non-existing likeness with Him in us were sin, we would even in heaven have to deal with the concept of sin, for the Firstborn will be head over shoulders above us for all eternity. The notion of us "being all wretched sinners" has become an ingrained, seemingly self-evident fact to such an extent, that the truth, that the born-again and sincerely surrendered Christian has nothing to do with sin anymore, has difficulty to make headway.
On the cross
When Jesus died on the cross, He was cut off from the world. When a soldier pierced His side with a speer, He did not stir. He was dead. If someone had addressed Him, He could not have answered. He was dead. He could neither contact the world, nor the world could contact Him; all His senses where crucified. The whole personality, that lived in this body had been crucified, and when He died, His body died also. All this applies for us as well - this is the meaning of the words: "I have been crucified with Christ".
How little is our conformity with the crucified Christ understood. Still, we could and should share the same; for only then we can say with Paul: "I have been crucified with Christ". If all Christians had experienced this truth and lived in it, all religious troubles and squabbles, that are so prevalent, would not exist at all.
Oh, let us penetrate into the understanding of the deeper meaning of the secrets of the cross. May the Spirit of God make them a reality for us.
Whoever wants to seize the fruits of the resurrection and ascension of Christ, without keeping an eye on His death and grave, is on a dangerous and wrong path.

The look to Jesus
To look to Jesus, while completely looking away from our own being is not only necessary for our conversion, but for our sanctification as well.
A dear Brother writes: "I was preoccupied with the stirring of the old man and had my eye on him, expecting that these stirrings would be overcome by the grace of the Spirit, as often as they showed themselves. In this way, I did not completely look away from the old Adam. After continued Bible-study, however, the teaching of the Gospel became ever clearer to me, that I had nothing to do with the old Adam anymore, but rather to a much higher degree, only with Christ, the new Adam. It was then that I took a deep look of faith to the cross.

I recognised the complete separation from the whole sinful nature and realised, it mattered now, that by completely looking away from the old Adam, I had to entrust myself totally to the new Adam. Since I did this, I saw myself completely delivered from sin and moment by moment free from sin, because only my new Adam lives in me."
These words are true, because they correspond to the Word of God; added to that, they were tried and tested by numerous saints and found to be true. But there are always souls who, although agreeing to these truth in theory, can not bring themselves to accept them in faith and thank the Saviour in childlike simplicity for the purchased possession of sanctification.
(by Margarethe von Brasch)