Trees without roots

Lofty confessions are like trees without roots if they do not have a correspondingly deep acknowledgment downwards. Acknowledgment forms the roots of life. But when people shut their eyes and believe their self-life has been completely taken away, then there is no opportunity for self-acknowledgment and, of course, no roots. Therefore, we find many who have already been blown over by the winds of temptation. They have ended, not as slaves to the law, but in the flesh, just as it is written about the enemies of the cross of Christ, that their end is corruption. They would rather put a covering over their eyes and dream that all their self-life has gone rather than surrender it to the death of Christ. In these dreams people can become intoxicated in sweet indulgence, as long as they remain asleep. But in this imagined holiness they often go around with a seared conscience, as also one of their ministers told Aksel: “I held this lofty confession to cover my wretched life.” Later he wrote: “I have built outside of Christ.”