he purpose of sharing our Victory in
Christ is to arrange for the believer to understand the ‘identification’
and ‘positional’ truths, and effectively receive them into their lives.
These virtues provide a basis for every believer to comprehend the
excellence of God’s grace and to share the victory with the church. We
pray that your experience will lead to maturity in Christ. My sole desire
is to help equip the body of Christ to experience, mature in, and
understand the message of the Cross in all its implications and share
their experience in the various spheres of influence, so that all may know
Christ as Savior, Lord and Life.
Christian counseling is
Biblical, Christ-centered, and Cross-centered. Discipleship is the
Scriptural method for inspiring Christians. The basis may use Galatians
2:20 as the center to convey the Christian life. We read in 2:20 of the
epistle, ‘I have been crucified with Christ, and I no longer live but
Christ lives in me, and the life I now live, I live by the faith of the
Son of God.’
Most Christians teach Christ died for
their sins but few teach about the death of the carnal nature, our former
self-life. The false identity is dead since we are a new creation in
Christ. Therefore, few Christians find victory in their lives. Although,
God set us free from the penalty of our sins, many Christians do not
experience freedom from the domination of the ‘flesh patterns’ we’ve come
to rely on. Jesus died to set us free from our former life.
The message of the Cross and the
believer's identity ‘in Christ’ is now being emphasized. For those who
know, the Cross holds the key to our Victory. The message successfully
sets believers free from the bondage of the self-life, whenever and
wherever, believers preach the true Gospel being, ‘Jesus Christ and Him
crucified’.
In abundant Christian life the
result comes from an ‘exchanged life’. The death of our former life of
self-reliance to a surrendered life in Christ. The victorious Christians
and forefathers of the faith extracted the truth from the well-known
passage in Isaiah 40:31. 'Those who wait upon the Lord shall renew
(exchange) their strength.'
Most English translations refer to those
who wait on or hope in the Lord being able to ‘renew’ their strength. All
commentaries and study Bibles that deal with this verse note that the
literal translation of the Hebrew word for ‘renew’ is ‘exchange.’ The
victorious believer exchanges their strength for the Lord’s strength. We
wait for God to move in our lives.
The term exchange directly
relates to the discovery of the believer’s new identity ‘in Christ’, and
the completed work of His Cross. The believer is part of a new creation,
one born of God. God’s desire for His children is for Jesus Christ to
express His life in and through us.
The life of Christ being lived through us
gives the Church its greatest victory. It is by far the easiest way to
serve, obey, love, honor, and glorify the Lord without doing it in our
strength. We exchange our human strength for His life. He lives through
us since we are being indwelt by Jesus in the dunamis (dynamic) power of
the Holy Spirit’s presence.
Let‘s look further into our new
relationship in Christ Jesus. God identifies us with Christ and imputes
Jesus righteousness to us. Therefore, the basis for our life and identity
rests upon the events of the death, burial, resurrection, and ascension of
our Lord Jesus. God included us in Christ in these events since He placed
us in Christ - 1 Co 1:30. God reveals these truths to us in His Word
which declares our righteous standing in the sight of God! Therefore,
take God's stance and allow Christ's life to rule your heart and mind. As
His Word gives birth to deeper faith, begin to live according to the life
God provided for you in Christ. God is faithful and He will do it!
Let's take a closer look at Gal
2:20 and see if we can find a deeper understanding on 'how' to live ‘in
Christ’. ‘I have been crucified with Christ; it is no longer I who live,
but Christ lives in me; and the life which I now live in the flesh I live
by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave Himself for me.’
Now let's apply what we know
about the self life and exchange our self-life for Christ's life. I (the
former life, my old Adam) have been crucified with Christ, it is no longer
I (the Old Adam) who live, but Christ lives in me (the new creation), and
the life which I (the new creation) now live in the flesh (body) I (the
new creation) live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me (the new man)
and gave Himself for me (the old Adam).
The old Adamic nature is dead
and we accept this truth by an act of faith. The Holy Spirit motivated us
through supernatural revelation and the objective facts of God's Word to
respond to his drawing. In the same manner, God commands us to set our
minds upon the Spirit and not upon the flesh. Paul instructed us to ‘set
our minds on things above’. God knows that our victory is in trusting Him
to supply all of our needs in Christ Jesus. God’s Word declares that we
have died, that He hid our life in Christ, and that we should no longer
live for ourselves but for the One who gave his life for us.
Through our relationship in
Christ we have escaped death, which is eternal separation from God.. This
happened when God placed us ‘in Christ’. He did away with the old man,
old self, or carnal nature. These terms described the nature of humanity
prior to salvation. Our regeneration by God left the old man crucified.
It was the old nature that must be crucified to allow the new man to shine
forth. Now that the old man is dead, Jesus can shine through us. The
Christian still must deal with temptations of the flesh. This refers to
the flesh patterns from our self-life, the flesh, sinful nature, or
corrupt nature. These terms describe the nature of humanity that attempts
to get it’s needs met other than from God.
The non-Christian’s unregenerate
spirit is dead in sin, the body will die because of sin, and the soul is
separated from a Holy God because of sin. The person who does not know
Jesus Christ is dead to the true knowledge of God. The mind, will, and
emotions are still captive to the Law of sin and death. The person is
captive to fulfilling the Law and is dead in their works since no one will
be justified by the works of the Law. The unbeliever may try to achieve
righteousness by the works of the Law but only those who live by faith in
the atonement by Christ will be justified apart from the Law.
At the time we accept Jesus death as our
death, God sees the surrender as an invitation for Him to live His life
through us. When we come to grips with our depravity and embrace the
Cross, we find God's forgiveness and mercy. The Cross of Christ adequately
dealt with our 'sinful nature' by putting it to death. We occasionally
sin but we are off the hook of the 'carnal nature' permanently. When we
rely on 'self', we can only find a lack of rest; when we accept the Cross
we find peace with God, others, and self.
According to Scripture, God has placed us
into Christ: 1 Cor. 1:30, “But of Him you are in Christ Jesus, who became
for us wisdom from God—and righteousness and sanctification and
redemption—“. God clothed us with the righteousness of Christ and totally
accepts us in His accomplished work of the cross. Jesus overcame the
devil and won the victory for us. "It is finished!" God placed us into
Christ's Spirit, life, body, death, sacrifice, burial, victory,
resurrection, and ascension. Our life is in Christ, now and always.
Subsequently, we are a new creation in
Christ Jesus, 2 Cor. 5:17, “Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new
creation; old things have passed away; behold, all things have become
new.”.
The reason our old man needed
co-crucifixion with Jesus is clear in Galatians 5:17, the Apostle Paul
writes: ‘For the flesh lusts against the Spirit, and the Spirit against
the flesh; and these are contrary to one another, so that you do not do
the things that you wish.’
Living the Christian life simply means
that we live according to our new life in Christ, and not according to our
former identity, the flesh. Paul simply states how we can live the
Christian life in Gal 5:16, ‘I say then: Walk in the Spirit, and you
shall not fulfill the lust of the flesh.’ To live this life, God has
given us a renewed heart and spirit. We have the equipment necessary to
overcome the world. This truth is found in 2 Tim 1:7, ‘For God has not
given us a spirit of fear, but of power and of love and of a sound mind.’
The Victory is being "in Christ". The
Victory is His; Our Victory is in Him! He is our Sabbath and Rest! In
Him, we have a freedom and peace that surpasses all understanding. He is
the vine and we are the branches; apart from him we can not do God's
will. The hope of glory is Christ in us! By faith we can receive the
Abundant Life in the same manner we receive salvation. To receive Christ
as our Life, we need to exchange our former life. We need to allow Jesus
to live His life through us in exchange for our strength.
The Word of God reveals that we
are to let Jesus live through us. Paul, the apostle, wrote that he is
"always carrying about in the body the dying of the Lord Jesus, that the
life of Jesus also may be manifested in our body. For we who live are
always delivered to death for Jesus' sake, that the life of Jesus also may
be manifested in our mortal flesh.". - 2 Cor. 4:10-11
Paul understood the value of
receiving Christ’s life as his own. He willingly laid down his life and
accepted his death in Christ’s that he could live the exchanged life. He
wrote in 2 Cor 12:9-10, “And He said to me, My grace is sufficient for
you, for My strength is made perfect in weakness. Therefore most gladly I
will rather boast in my infirmities, that the power of Christ may rest
upon me.". If we deny our "self" and our natural sinful pride, we can
turn in faith to our Lord Jesus Christ and experience His life through the
Holy Spirit. To gain the victory, we need to die to self daily and allow
the Lord Jesus Christ to live His victory through us.
There are important truths and
principles we need to learn to receive the Exchanged or Abundant Life.
Jesus taught the direct correlation between the fruit and the tree, that
is, the manifestation of behavior and the source. In order to mature, the
young Christians must abide in Christ, to grow in grace, receive their
identity in Christ, continually take up the Cross, and die to self. The
church of Jesus Christ will be found without spot or wrinkle as we are
transformed by the renewing of mind by faith and letting the Lord live
through us.
We do not always draw the correct
conclusion when we look at people as they struggle in the sanctification
process. When we see someone who sins as their practice in life it is
apparent that they need further counsel in the truths of God’s word.
As Christians, we know firsthand the
difference between being lost and going to hell, or being saved and being
heaven bound. When we see a young Christian flounder, we focus on proper
teaching and their need to receive Christ as Lord and Life. We know when
believers accept the Lordship of Christ and Him as their life. The
experience transforms and we see firsthand the difference between being
sold-out to Christ and just being saved. The fruit is revealed. We know
there will be no looking back. And that is all there is to it!
Likewise, upon receiving Christ
as our Life, we must focus on proper teaching to understand the need to
remain in Him. When this occurs, there is a revolution in our minds and
we experience victory and freedom with Christ as our life. We enter into
the Sabbath Rest! Our new-found life in Christ is comparable to life on
the right side of the Jordan, without the struggles of this life, which is
at best being in the wilderness!
What is the question that we
should ask ourselves? Isn't it, “Who is in control of my life?” If we
try to run our lives and find life devastating, then it is time to
consider letting go and letting God have control. If we think we got it
under control we need to surrender it.
Every man, woman, and child can receive
God's personal love and caress. All we have to do is ask Him into our
lives, let go, learn of Him, and give up control. Then we’ll begin to
find out why all the nasty things occurred in our past life. Through the
grace of forgiveness will also find healing of the damaging events from
our past. We will find God brings these changes gradually so we keep His
true peace within and have our joy in Him.
When Jesus is our Life, God
assures us that we have His love and will receive the nurturance,
acceptance, and guidance we all desire, for above all, God is love! When
we accepted Jesus Christ as our Lord and Savior, we become a new
creation. We were born again and received God's gift of the Holy Spirit,
who will lead us into all truth.
Faith towards God has everything to do
with our being able to live the abundant life. We can trust God . We
only need to invite Christ in once, lay our lives down, take up the Cross
daily, die to the former self, and allow Christ to live through us! This
is our call to obedience - to ask, seek, knock and to do God’s will. God
has called us and He will enable us to do all things in Christ. Could we
offer any less than He did and be sincerely grateful?
od separates us from our old identity,
life, and heritage ‘in Adam’ and places us ‘in Christ’. Therefore,
accepting our new identity in Christ enables us to live an abundant,
victorious, and new life by exchanging our strength and life for eternal
life in Christ.
There are two principles
regarding our rebirth, that we need to distinguish: The first is our
identity in Christ, which defines our position with God. We are righteous
in Christ. God virtually has given us Jesus’ righteousness. If we fail
to apply or receive our identity in Christ, our attempts to gain a
righteousness through works could fill us with guilt, shame, and
condemnation. Once we know the truth our attempts at self-justification
are sinful. The second principle concerns our life in Christ. The work
of sanctification encompasses our everyday life and relationships through
the life of Christ dwelling in us.
The work of sanctification takes place in
our lives by allowing Jesus to live His life and the Holy Spirit to work
through us. The Holy Spirit, our paraclete, one who stands by us, will
always be there. He will stand by us through every trial, tribulation,
and stand by us, delivering us from every temptation. He will never leave
us nor forsake us.
The victory of
Christ is our victory. He is the reason the Holy Spirit came to safeguard
our salvation in Christ. Jesus wants us to surrender our strength in
exchange for His strength working in us through the Holy Spirit. The
Spirit will deliver us to God without spot or wrinkle. He will renew our
mind exposing the depravity of the remnants of our former life referred to
as the flesh by the Apostle Paul. We clearly see this in Gal 5:17,
written to early Christians, ‘For the flesh lusts against the Spirit, and
the Spirit against the flesh; and these are contrary to one another, so
that you do not do the things that you wish.’
God wants control of our life - body,
soul, heart, and spirit to do the works He has prepared for us to do in
Christ Jesus. He is our God and wants us to draw our life from Him. He
has given us the truth through the Holy Script, Gal 6:8 states this, ‘For
he who sows to his flesh will of the flesh reap corruption, but he who
sows to the Spirit will of the Spirit reap everlasting life.’
In a spiritual encounter we are 'born
again'; it happened when God placed us in Christ (I Corinthians 1:30).
The unblemished relationship we now enjoy with God by accepting Christ's
atonement is also true for all of our other relationships. All our pain,
anger, and hurt can all be resolved through Christ's death if we allow
Jesus to become our life. Through the revelation of God’s healing grace
we can be reconciled to one another, here and now. This is part of the
ministry of reconciliation we have been given by God.
God sees our life through our relationship
in Christ Jesus. Do not confuse the mistakes we make during the
sanctification process with our new identity. Sin does not affect our
identity. If we confuse behavior with who we are we could fill up quickly
with doubt over our position ‘in Christ’. We are completely forgiven and
God will deal with our sin directly through disciplining us as children.
Our new identity in Christ as God the Father’s children and this will
never change. God gave us Jesus life, the Alpha and Omega, the beginning
and the end, as God's answer to all our questions. It is that simple!
When we identify our new self in the
ascension of Christ, we will begin to understand that our identity on
earth is history. We no longer live, Christ lives in us and the former
life has passed. We no longer have to strive for things of this earth.
Jesus Christ totally reconciles us to God
by His blood. For this reason, Paul told the Colossians, ‘Set your hearts
on things above, where Christ is seated at the right hand of God.’ The
only resolution to the former identity is death. We have the freely
choose to believe. God’s Word says that the old man was crucified
according to Rom 6:6-7: ‘For we know that our old self was crucified with
him so that the body of sin might be done away with, that we should no
longer be slaves to sin-- because anyone who has died has been freed from
sin.’ Once we accept the truth we die to the old fleshy identity as an
act of faith.
To overcome the former life the only thing
we need do is accept Jesus’ life as our own in the same manner we accept
salvation. By an act of faith we live in Christ just as we received
salvation through our confession of faith. We see the work of a
confession of faith in Rom 10:9-10, ‘... if you confess with your mouth
the Lord Jesus and believe in your heart that God has raised Him from the
dead, you will be saved. For with the heart one believes unto
righteousness, and with the mouth confession is made unto salvation.’
Everything we receive is a gift of God so
why should anything else be different. God does not change. He is
gracious and merciful. Just when we needed it God gave us the faith to
believe in God’s Word. God freely gave us the gift of eternal life in
Christ Jesus. The victory of Christ as our life is also a gift received
by faith. Paul wrote to the Ephesians in Eph 2:8-9, ‘For by grace you
have been saved through faith, and that not of yourselves; it is the gift
of God, not of works, lest anyone should boast.’ By grace we receive
everything through God’s gift of faith working in us to do His will.
The problem of living according
to the old nature can only be solved by identifying as a new creation with
Christ’s crucifixion, death, burial, resurrection, and ascension. When we
totally accept our identity ‘in Christ’, God sets us free from the power
of the ‘self-life’ through transformation. The sooner we turn our past
over to being renewed in our mind, the easier life will become as we learn
about being God’s child.
The death of ‘self’ means everything to
living the Victorious Life. We have to come to the end of our
‘self-reliance’ to enjoy the Victory of Christ as He lives His life
through us. The Holy Spirit brings this reality into our life as God
starts to supply every need for acceptance, security, meaning and purpose
in life daily.
The temptation to rely on our former
identity will create an imbalance. If we try to maintain rights we’ll
eventually loose our peace from God. When we run from God it is normally
caused from relating to our former identity in order to get our needs
met. But to gain Christ as our life, we must lose our former identity in
the waters of baptism.
Our independent self-life is rendered dead
over time and self-discipline. Jesus revealed this in Luke 9:23-24,
‘Then He said to them all, ‘If anyone desires to come after Me, let him
deny himself, and take up his cross daily, and follow Me. ‘For whoever
desires to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for My
sake will save it.’
Your spiritual journey to the Cross is to
receive your victory in Christ. God’s Word accomplishes our renewal
through the process of sanctification. We would not know how rich we are
until experiencing what God has done for our relationship with Him.
Your spiritual life is probably a lot like
what Israel experienced in the wilderness if you are a Christian. All
they had to do was Cross the river Jordan to possess the promised land.
It took 40 years to enter in because of disobedience and unbelief.
Your journey to the Cross began with a
process to reveal the condition we now know to be from the flesh patterns
in your life. We were the problem (our flesh) and did not know it. We
all need to come to the end of ourselves and die to our former life before
we can serve God in Spirit and truth. The carnal natures death is what we
need to understand before we know the purpose the Cross serves. Exactly
what we died too!
If you are a Christian, the service to
God, we once performed, was, at least in part, in and of our own strength
and devices. God will no longer accept our self attempts because we now
know the Truth. We know we need to be set free from the power of sin and
surrender to God daily and trust Jesus to live His life through us.
The purpose taking up our Cross
daily is to reveal the remnants of our flesh patterns. The false identity
of the flesh can even attempt to generate the fruit of the Spirit, but it
will only result in a counterfeit. In Gal 5:22, we read, ‘but the fruit
of the spirit is love, joy, peace, longsuffering, kindness, goodness,
faithfulness, gentleness, self-control. Against such there is no law.’
The corrupt tendencies that remain can never produce what is holy and
pure. The motive of the flesh is always self-centered and God calls us to
be other-centered. This is the reason we must be ‘born again’. God’s
solution placed us ‘in Christ’.
Jesus, who holds the highest position in
heaven, is be seated at the right hand of the Father. Since we are ‘in
Christ’, God the Father always hears our prayers. When God co-crucified
us with Christ, He buried us with Christ, raised us with Christ from the
dead, we ascended and were seated ‘in Christ’ at the right hand of God.
When we leave this planet we will reign with Jesus since we are 'in
Christ'.
God did not require us to do any works
except accept the Truth to be saved. God based salvation solely on the
merits of the Cross of the Lord Jesus Christ, so that we could
gratuitously serve Him. God does not need robots; He created us for His
pleasure and to reveal His love reconciling the world unto Himself through
the church.
There are several parallels
between Christ's Cross and ours. Jesus emptied Himself and He wants to
empty us by taking up our own Cross daily. He humbled Himself and that is
God’s will for us. We are to invite the Holy Spirit to lead us and teach
us. Jesus appeared to be a failure and a total fool so He could give us
his wisdom and peace. He gave up all his rights of self-protection and
endured the Cross so we could be real to others without fear. He made
Himself of no reputation to become our reputation when falsely accused.
Hurts and rejection will come but He will help with the healing and His
peace will reign in us. He appeared to be weak so that we can be strong
in Him letting God's love rule our renewed heart and spirit. He gave up
everything so we could share in His own eternal kingdom. He died both
physically in death and spiritually by becoming sin for us when He came
down to save us. He gave up the right to rule His life and then forgave
those who took it from Him.
The evidence of taking up the
Cross by a believer is abundant spiritual life. When a person receives a
renewed heart and spirit, they become teachable. The convert surrenders
their knowledge in exchange for God's truth. God motivates us out of love
to obedience. Believers do God's will because they want to, not because
they have to. The believer who experiences the Cross will have a sense of
total inadequacy in their own strength. They will have a sense of
adequacy in Christ through His strength and a willingness to accept
rejection.
When people learn to trust God in
everything, they will find rest even with external turmoil. Then they
will be able to be transparent and vulnerable. The healed helper will be
willing to share his/her weaknesses and be willing to share failures to
further someone else’s growth. There will be a readiness to affirm and
build up others, by offering genuine humility that places value upon those
who have placed little or no value on themselves.
The born again believer is willing to be
weak and to fail recognizing that the power of Christ’s strength will be
manifest when we are weak. If we are willing to be out of control then
Jesus will take control. As we willing die to self, the motives of our
heart will not need vindication. God will exchange our former desires for
His and we’ll love His will for our life. After we experience the
brokenness of the Cross, again and again, we will become willing
participants to fellowship in Christ's sufferings and take the Kingdom
back by force if needs be. Warning: Christianity, in the truest sense,
is warfare!
he Cross of Christ is our Victory! Through
the Cross, God dealt with all our sin, provided a way to set us free from
our self-life, crucified the old man, and gave us a new identity. Jesus’
sacrifice forgave our sins and gave us a new nature. His blood washed away
our sin, while the Cross continually deals with our character, or who we
are, on a daily basis. The object of this truth is to conform us to God's
will and to transform into the image of Christ. This transformation
produces different behavior from the new nature we have received and through
the renewing of our mind. The Apostle Paul states in Rom 12:1:
‘Therefore, I urge you, brothers, in view of God's mercy, to offer your
bodies as living sacrifices, holy and pleasing to God--this is your
spiritual act of worship. Do not conform any longer to the pattern of this
world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Then you will be
able to test and approve what God's will is--His good, pleasing and perfect
will.’
The road of freedom leads to the
Cross. When we accept Jesus death as our death, God takes this act as an
invitation for Him to live His life through us. Every one of us God
uniquely creates with a personality waiting to blossom as Christ leads us to
maturity and fruitfulness. The Cross of Christ adequately dealt with our
'sinful nature' by putting it to death. Jesus frees us to pursue being the
person who God has made us to be. We still have to deal with the occasional
sin when we fall short of revealing God's love to others, but we are off the
hook of the 'flesh' permanently.
When we come to grips with our depravity and
embrace the Cross, we find God's forgiveness and mercy. When we rely on
'self', we can only find a lack of rest and back in some form of the
performance trap. When we accept the Cross we keep our peace through God’s
manifest presence and loose the need to do in order to gain acceptance.
The victory of the believer is in believing
God and applying the truth found in Scripture. The Word tells us that the
flesh is the problem and Jesus is the solution. The truth is revealed in
Rom 8:3-5, ‘For what the law could not do in that it was weak through the
flesh, God did by sending His own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh, on
account of sin: He condemned sin in the flesh, that the righteous
requirement of the law might be fulfilled in us who do not walk according to
the flesh but according to the Spirit. For those who live according to the
flesh set their minds on the things of the flesh, but those who live
according to the Spirit, the things of the Spirit.’
God desires that we come to the end of our
‘self’ and let Christ become our life. God wants Christ’ life to become our
life! This is revealed in Col 3:3-4, ‘For you died, and your life is
hidden with Christ in God. When Christ who is our life appears, then you
also will appear with Him in glory.’
By identifying with being ‘in
Christ’, God grants a new beginning, a new identity, and a new life. We are
born again ‘in Christ.’ To redeem those called, chosen and elected, God
placed us in Christ Jesus, 1 Cor 1:30, ‘ But of Him (God the Father) you are
in Christ Jesus, who became for us wisdom from God; and righteousness and
sanctification and redemption;’ When God did this, Jesus' life became our
life and His death became our death. In the eyes of God we died with
Christ.
The judgment upon all humanity came from
Adam and fell upon all his children. When God placed our rightful
punishment upon our Savior, Jesus Christ, Jesus took our punishment upon
Himself. When placed in Christ by God we also died with Jesus vicariously,
the carnal nature was done away with whether we live as a new creation or
not.
Through the excellency of Jesus Christ
sacrifice, God's only begotten Son, the propitiation or totally sufficient
sacrifice to obliterate all humanity’s sin, since God was in Christ,
reconciled the world to Himself, I Cor. 15. No greater love did God reveal
than when He willingly gave Himself for His creation in the God/man, Jesus
Christ. God, the Lord Jesus Christ, the unblemished Lamb of God, came from
heaven and died to give us a new life. We now have a new name, environment,
identity, and lease on life.
As saints, you have a new heart, a new
master, new walking papers, and new job description, a new label or title, a
new destination, a new future, a new father and heritage, a new life and
identity. Let these truths sink into your mind and meditate on them for as
long as you like. They reveal the reality of God’s love for you! How do
you feel now?
When we accept God’s judgment for
sin and the atonement of Jesus Christ, we are to receive this new life
offered ‘in Christ’. We either accept the gift of God’s salvation and
eternal life ‘in Christ’, or, we can stand on our own dead works before the
judgment seat of Christ. We have already been found guilty of sin so God
canceled our sin debt through our co-crucifixion on the Cross. Greater love
hath no man than to lay down his life for another.
God crucified the old man with
Christ and no longer lives or has dominion over our lives. Accepting Jesus'
death as our death is seen in, 2 Cor 5:14, ‘For the love of Christ compels
us, because we judge thus: that if One died for all, then all died;’. We
are dead ‘in Christ’ therefore accept that you are dead to your old nature,
to the power of sin, the law, and the world. The following scriptures show
these truths related from God's Word:
We are dead to our old nature and
dead to the power of sin, Rom 6:11. 'Likewise you also, reckon yourselves
to be dead indeed to sin, but alive to God in Christ Jesus our Lord.'
We are dead to the law, Rom 7:4.
'Therefore, my brethren, you also have become dead to the law through the
body of Christ, that you may be married to another; to Him who was raised
from the dead, that we should bear fruit to God.’
We are dead to the world: Gal
6:14. 'But God forbid that I should boast except in the cross of our Lord
Jesus Christ, by whom the world has been crucified to me, and I to the
world.'
If we died with Him we are free:
free from performing for our acceptance and free from missing the mark, as
in a bullseye. If we continue to live according to our Adamic and/or carnal
nature, we will continue to sin but if we reckon ourselves dead, we can walk
in our new nature found ‘in Christ’.
Now you know the truth! We are
free from worry, fear, sin, and death in Christ. We have to accept God's
opinion: that we are dead! No matter how we look at the corpse, how much
Satan lies to us, and how good it looks, it is still dead!
If you are dead, what will knowing
that truth do for you? Remember all the ‘new’ things you became? Would it
do any good to go back to the ‘old’ you? Why would I want to, you might
ask? That’s exactly the point that Paul makes in Romans. The admonition is
to walk in your ‘new’ life and not consider the ‘old’. Is this a refreshing
thought? Jesus totally liberates us from our old nature! No longer are you
to be a slave to Satan or your reliance on old flesh patterns. You are
free! You may now respond with God’s Word freely.
Since God identifies us ‘in Christ’, we are
dead and God hid our real life with Christ. In God's eyes, we were
resurrected with Christ, ascended with Christ, and seated with Christ in
heavenly places. We are with Jesus as far as God's concern for
righteousness goes, and filled with the Holy Spirit, as far as, holiness
goes. We died to our former nature making total victory over the flesh
patters of that false identity possible through reconciliation.
If we are dead there is no reason to concern
ourselves about any need in life. We have no life to improve, no
righteousness of our own, no personal gifts or talents we can call our own.
We are dead and our life hid in Christ by God. The life we now live is by
faith in the Son of God, who died and gave His life for us. In God's eyes
our former ‘self’ no longer exists. God hid our real life with Christ.
Now we have to apply the truth to our
thinking. We are a new creation, created in Christ Jesus and now seated in
heaven with Him, Eph 2:4-7. ‘But God, who is rich in mercy, because of His
great love with which He loved us, even when we were dead in trespasses,
made us alive together with Christ (by grace you have been saved), and
raised us up together, and made us sit together in the heavenly places in
Christ Jesus, that in the ages to come He might show the exceeding riches of
His grace in His kindness toward us in Christ Jesus.’
God has given us a new position and identity
in heaven with Christ, Col 3:1-4. ‘If then you were raised with Christ,
seek those things which are above, where Christ is, sitting at the right
hand of God. Set your mind on things above, not on things on the earth.
For you died, and your life is hidden with Christ in God. When Christ who
is our life appears, then we also will appear with Him in glory.’
We are justified by God through
faith in our Lord Jesus Christ, based upon what God accomplished in Christ.
God imputed to us the very righteousness of Christ. God credits His
righteousness to our account; He is our righteousness. On the day of
judgment, when we stand before God, He shall declare us righteous because He
has given us a righteous identity in Christ Jesus.
When we are willing to lose
control and exchange our life for a new life in Christ, we will not have to
preserve and protect the former identity of ‘self’. Why would anyone want
to keep on doing the things we did, the old flesh patterns? After all, a
flesh pattern is just a behavior that we learned to respond or react with in
the world. And now we are dead to the world.
A lack of the truth, knowledge and
understanding of who Jesus is and the depth of His finished work is the
primary reason Christians fail to live a victorious life. A second failure
from us not accepting responsibility for our actions, behaviors, and words.
The ‘former self’ used its built-in defense mechanisms as a typical response
to justify the human condition. The believer who confesses sin and
identifies it as the manifestations of their former identity has a greater
reason to look unto and rely on Jesus for help.
In Christ, we overcome our flesh patterns
since His Spirit lives in us, 1 John 4:4,13. ‘You are of God, little
children, and have overcome them, because He who is in you is greater than
he who is in the world. By this we know that we abide in Him, and He in us,
because He has given us of His Spirit.’
God granted us this intimate
relationship with Him. Through His Son, the Lord Jesus Christ we overcame
the world. As the life of Christ manifests through our life, His love will
overcome the world for us. And we will be set free from our old flesh
patterns.
Serving God with all our heart, mind, body,
and spirit will certainly create conflicts. Our normal response or old
flesh patterns will be changing. When we are no longer willing to put up
with the characteristics of the flesh, we can overcome them by consciously
letting Jesus live through us. There must be a conscious decision to
surrender control.
The Holy Spirit will lead us to the truth
found in God's Word. The Bible clearly calls us to deny self, look unto
Jesus, and walk in the Way of the Cross. Jesus is our victory! His life
giving Spirit living in us will produce love, peace, and joy in the Holy
Spirit. These fruits will overcome the obstacles to happiness through the
old way we reacted to the world.
There is a rest for those who will
cease from their own works and trust is the atonement. Jesus’ life in us is
the answer to everyone who will trust in God with all their heart, mind,
spirit and body. We find our rest in His finished work of the Cross so we
can finally cease from doing any works to justify ourselves. We need only
learn the Master’s voice and lean upon the everlasting arms full of grace
and truth.
In our time of need we have our personal
responsibility. When temptation is knocking at the door and appealing to
the desires of our fallen nature, we must train ourselves to go to the
throne of grace and ask God for divine intervention. We need to know how
willing God is to come to our rescue if we will humble ourselves to ask,
seek, and knock. God is there with an answer our prayers. Our assurance is
that God will answer us according to His. Our reliance upon the Lord Jesus
Christ honors and glorifies God. Our Lord Jesus who forever makes
intercession for us is always waiting upon our prayer.
Freedom from the effects of the fall and
from the false identity
Freedom from being powerless over sin or
controlled by habitual sin
Freedom to serve God uninhibited, the false
identity opposed spiritual life existing only to serve itself
Freedom to enjoy God’s mercy, grace, and
riches in Christ, the false identity is devoted only to pleasure
Freedom to think clearly as opposed to
double-mindedness, the false identity is the source of confusion
Freedom to embrace a new life and
relationship in Christ, the false identity was crucified with Christ
Freedom to exercise the delegated power and
authority as a child of God we are not powerless
Freedom to say ‘No,' the ‘will’ is set free
from the ‘say yes’ voice of the false identity
Freedom from guilt and shame, set free from
the ‘voice of accusation’
Freedom to address past issues of our false
identity, the ‘old nature’, head on and dealt with on the Cross
Freedom to grow into the image of Christ as
God reveal Christ’s character and fruit of the Spirit through us
Freedom from ‘religion’ that binds us and
left us powerless, we can do all things through Christ
Freedom from doctrines of men to enjoy our
liberty in the Spirit, God’s love motivates us
Freedom to embrace life through the imputed
righteousness of Jesus, we are totally accepted
Freedom to seek a rational faith based on
clear and concise evidence, we receive a spirit of truth
Freedom from living according to our
feelings, set free from an emotional roller coaster ride
Freedom from immediate and long-term
self-discipline, God disciplines us as His beloved children
Freedom comes from knowing Christ will
intercede for us forever through power of the Cross
Freedom from behaviorialism or performance,
we are set free to obey the law of the Spirit of life
Freedom from the endless struggle to ‘Do' in
order to ‘Be,' we are God’s children
Freedom from all power of God’s enemies and
the evil one cannot touch us
Freedom to: be responsible, choose, change,
reason, think clearly, and cast aside any obstacle
Freedom to rest in the finished work of the
Cross and walk after the law of the Spirit of life
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