With / In - Part 3
October 5th 2023,
We’re in Part 3 tonight of a series we’re calling With / In.
We’re looking into the differences & compliments of what it means to be “with Christ” vs. “in Christ”.
And I’ll confess that after last week’s message I felt like I didn’t completely do justice to the ideas we were trying to convey… it was bit confusing. So tonight we’re going to take a bit of an easier approach to the topic & see if we can smooth out some of the rough edges.
Our KEY VERSE is Galatians 2:20 (NASB) let’s read together.
Galatians 2:20 (NASB) - I have been crucified with Christ and I no longer live, but Christ lives in me. The life I now live in the body, I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me.
And the key we’re going to focus on tonight is the idea of “I no longer live, but Christ lives in me.”
If we’re really going to live in a way where we “no longer live but Christ lives in [us]” what does that look like?
If Christ lives in you…
-Are there some things that you feel would be evident in your life?
-What things would you HAVE that you didn’t have before?
-What things would you NOT HAVE / NOT EXPERIENCE that you had/experienced before? -Are there things that Christ would ‘clean up’?
-Are there new habits & mindsets that He would bring?
When we were ‘saved’, we asked Jesus to come be the Savior & Lord of our lives…
“SAVIOR” meaning, because of His blood, He “saves” us from a life of sin…‘saves’ us from an eternity separated from Him… and “LORD” meaning that He has authority & rights over our lives like a King.
But if we’ve done this (asked Jesus to be the Lord & Savior of our lives), there are some expectations that naturally come with this. Some of these expectations are written in the Word and some of them WE ASSUME whether we mean to or not & whether they’re written in scripture or not.
Galatians 5:19-24 :: 19 Now the deeds of the flesh are evident, which are: immorality, impurity, sensuality, 20 idolatry, sorcery, enmities, strife, jealousy, outbursts of anger, disputes, dissensions, factions, 21 envying, drunkenness, carousing, and things like these, of which I forewarn you, just as I have forewarned you, that those who practice such things will not inherit the kingdom of God. 22 But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, 23 gentleness, self-control; against such things there is no law. 24 Now those who belong to Christ Jesus have crucified the flesh with its passions and desires.
So here we have even a list of things that Jesus has cleansed us from… and that we can expect to be cleansed from–and then we often come with expectations like, “when I’m saved I’ll do this less… or I’ll be less… or I wont do that… “I’ll be more patient… I’ll have more self-control… I won’t be as angry… I won’t struggle with alcohol & drunkenness.”
But what happens if we HAVE become a believer, we HAVE been “saved”, we HAVE asked Jesus to come & be the Lord & Savior of our life YET some of these things haven’t yet changed? We still feel envious, anxious or jealous, or we DON’T feel like we embody the Fruit of the Spirit (we learned the song a when we were kids… “love, joy peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness & self-control”) Bottom line: What if we still struggle with some areas or don’t feel like we’re actually succeeding in these areas that the Word says we should?
This is the issue I was trying to explain last week & didn’t feel like I actually explained well. Because I think in many of our lives, we HEAR the Word of God or we HEAR some preacher talk about salvation & we WANT THAT. We even SAY we want Jesus to be Lord but when we actually do make that commitment and become “saved” we don’t always find that we’re
instantly made pure or holy or don’t quite feel like all the ‘yuck’ has been washed off.
It’s like we come in for a shower after working in the yard all day & even after our shower, we still feel like we smell like the grass clippings… or we still have a little bit of BO. “I THOUGHT once I took a shower & even used the soap that I wouldn’t smell like grass clippings…I THOUGHT my pits wouldn’t stink…
And while I know that this is a very basic, probably unbiblical way of looking at sin like BO, I think it IS a good illustration of the way we often FEEL like even after we’re saved, we’re not quite the person we thought we’d be.
But let’s look back at that scripture we just read in Galatians & see what he says in v24: He goes through the list of the deeds of the flesh, then the fruit of the spirit… and the he says, “24 Now those who belong to Christ Jesus have crucified the flesh with its passions and desires.”
What are we supposed to think or do if, even though we’ve prayed for Jesus to be our Lord & Savior, we still feel like we still smell like grass clippings & BO from our old way of life? Is it possible that the “the [old] flesh with its passions and desires” hasn’t been crucified yet? Can that be true??
Tonight I want to talk about HOW scripture tells us we move from “WITH Christ” in His crucifixion…to “IN Christ” in His life. How do we really experience a life where we’re living “IN Christ” 2 Corinthians 5:17 (KJV) - Therefore if any man be in Christ, he is a new creature: old things are passed away; behold, all things are become new. ::
Now in the last couple of weeks we’ve taken apart these two phrases & really dug pretty deep on what the differences are… but now we’re going to learn how to live & act in them.
We talked about the fact that “WITH” means you’re near, alongside…perhaps at the same
time & place having the same experience: Heather mentioned that her commentary says that “WITH” has to do with UNITY, having UNITY/UNION with Christ (we weren’t actually there having the same experience but because of God’s grace & mercy we have been UNIFIED with Christ in His crucifixion, and now we can accept His salvation by applying HIS sacrifice, HIS blood to OUR sin & life.
But to live “IN” Christ something is an entirely different thing altogether. To be IN the Army is vastly different than just being WITH the Army. Heather said that her commentary mentioned that “IN” Christ as having POSITION and/or INSTRUMENTATION.
When we are crucified “WITH Christ” we have the opportunity to be made new IN Christ… new position, new heritage, new identity…
BUT…How do you LIVE like your old self is crucified. Like, we can READ this…and you can HEAR me say it but unless you understand how you can LIVE it, it doesn’t feel like it makes a difference.
Let’s read from Romans 6… we’ve read from this quite a bit during this series already but tonight I want to point out 4 really practical things from this so that we can learn to LIVE IN (remember POSITION – live in the POSITION) that we have because of Christ’s death, burial & resurrection.
(Let someone read via NIV)
Romans 6:1-14 (NIV) - 6 What shall we say, then? Shall we go on sinning so that grace may increase? 2 By no means! We are those who have died to sin; how can we live in it any longer? 3 Or don’t you know that all of us who were baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into his death? 4 We were therefore buried with him through baptism into death in order that, just as Christ was raised from the dead through the glory of the Father, we too may live a new life.
5 For if we have been united with him in a death like his, we will certainly also be united with him in a resurrection like his. 6 For we know that our old self was crucified with him so that the body ruled by sin might be done away with, that we should no longer be slaves to sin— 7 because anyone who has died has been set free from sin.
8 Now if we died with Christ, we believe that we will also live with him. 9 For we know that since Christ was raised from the dead, he cannot die again; death no longer has mastery over him. 10 The death he died, he died to sin once for all; but the life he lives, he lives to God.
11 In the same way, count yourselves dead to sin but alive to God in Christ Jesus. 12 Therefore do not let sin reign in your mortal body so that you obey its evil desires. 13 Do not offer any part of yourself to sin as an instrument of wickedness, but rather offer yourselves to God as those who have been brought from death to life; and offer every part of yourself to him as an instrument of righteousness. 14 For sin shall no longer be your master, because you are not under the law, but under grace.
Ok, here we go, this passage gives us 4 PRACTICAL WAYS to LIVE IN CHRIST:
First practical way we can live in Christ verse 6: “6 For we know that our old self was crucified with him so that the body ruled by sin might be done away with”
We touched briefly on this last week… we can’t LIVE in what we don’t KNOW to be true.
Our illustration last week was of some really sad brothers, Zsolt & Geza from Hungary who lived in poverty for years simply because they didn’t KNOW that they had a heritage of BILLIONS they could be living on through their grandmother. Their mom had left the family, then abandoned her kids… now they’re living in a cave in complete poverty because they didn’t KNOW their wealthy grandmother.
Just like Zsolt & Geza, we often don’t live in the fullness of the promises that Jesus has provided simply be cause we don’t KNOW it… like KNOW, KNOW… not just ‘know’ but REALLY KNOW. this is more than just head knowledge but it’s REVELATION that we need from God. We ARE saved from sin, sin DOES NOT have any dominion over us and we HAVE the gifts of the Spirit because Jesus has provided them for us. We don’t need to PRAY for them, we need to KNOW we HAVE them.
I’m going to give you another illustration about this in just a moment but I want to go ahead with point TWO… but the FIRST point is to KNOW it, allow it to be revealed to us.
Second practical way we can live in Christ: Verse 8: “8 Now if we died with Christ, we believe that we will also live with him. ” Paul, the writer is saying, “Once you KNOW that you’ve died, your old self was crucified, the next thing left to do is to actually BELIEVE it.” What good does it do to KNOW something if you don’t BELIEVE that it’s true?!
We talked a LOT about faith & belief earlier this year… Faith is GOD’s supernatural ability given through the Word… and Belief is OUR action because of that supernatural ability. Romans 10:17 - Now FAITH comes by hearing & hearing by the Word of God. ::
Romans 10:9-10 (NASB) - 9 that if you confess with your mouth Jesus as Lord, and believe in your heart that God raised Him from the dead, you will be saved; 10 for with the heart a person believes, resulting in righteousness, and with the mouth he confesses, resulting in salvation.
One more scripture about KNOWING & BELIEVING, let’s look together :
Isaiah 43:10 (NASB) - 10 “You are My witnesses,” declares the Lord,
“And My servant whom I have chosen,
So that you may know and believe Me
And understand that I am He.
Before Me there was no God formed,
And there will be none after Me.
So back to Romans 6… there’s first a revelation of the truth “6 For we know that our old self was crucified with him so that the body ruled by sin might be done away with” and then there’s our BELIEF that’s added “8 Now if we died with Christ, we believe that we will also live with him.”
What part of your salvation did you participate in? Like, how did YOU help JESUS save you? You didn’t. You HEARD it (so it was revealed to you, now you KNOW it)... then you simply BELIEVED it. That’s it… you didn’t TRY HARD to become more saved than Jesus made you,
you just BELIEVED that His sacrifice was enough to save you from sin & cleanse you ( John
3:16 (NASB) for God so loved the world, that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him shall not perish but have eternal life.)
Why do we think that LIVING in the promise of salvation is any different than RECEIVING the gift of salvation?
then what’s next…
The THIRD practical way we can live in Christ: Verse start at v9 but our third point is v11 so look for it: “9 For we know that since Christ was raised from the dead, he cannot die again; death no longer has mastery over him. 10 The death he died, he died to sin once for all; but the life he lives, he lives to God.
11 In the same way, count yourselves dead to sin but alive to God in Christ Jesus.”
Now, this can seem confusing here in the NIV because counting usually means numbers & math, but let’s consult our “Parallel Bible” …
λογίζομαι logizomai, v. [40] [√ 3306]. to credit, count, reckon; regard, think, consider, realize… “reckon” meaning, come to grips with the fact…
These first three “steps” to living in Christ, there’s actually not a lot of ‘DOING’... there’s just KNOWING, BELIEVING and then COUNTING/RECKONING or COMING TO GRIPS WITH THE FACT.
It’s a little like this… we often get so caught up in TRYING, STRIVING and DOING what it takes to be this super-Christian that we don’t get to the place where we simply REALIZE & COME TO GRIPS with the fact that it’s ALREADY DONE.
ILLUSTRATION: (Trin “I have thumbs”)
I’ve used this illustration before but it’s really important here: When Trin was a baby–just a few months old–she was playing on her little baby-jungle gym with all the colors & dangly toys… and she’s cooing & smiling, grabbing at the toys & having the time of her life. But all of a sudden, somehow she popped her thumb in her mouth & THE WHOLE WORLD STOPPED. She stopped kicking & cooing, the toys stopped swinging… she’s just mesmerized with her thumb. ALL the rest of the fun things she had went away and she’s just STUCK on her thumb. Now, she had ALWAYS had that thumb… she was born with it… it didn’t just appear. But her RECOGNITION of it was suddenly aware like she had never been before.
And what if, when she was a few years older and she wanted to write with a pencil or use crayons, what if she came crying to me and said, “Daddy I want to write, can you give me thumbs? I need thumbs to grab the pencil! Daddy give me thumbs!”
What would I have to tell her? “Baby, you already have thumbs! You were BORN with them.. You have as many thumbs as you’re EVER going to get… just use the ones you have!” It’s SILLY for her to ask for what she already has… she just needs to come to grips
with the fact that she’s already got them & she just needs to learn to use them!
There is this SAME kind of COUNTING, RECKONING, CONSIDERING that we have to do when it comes to recognizing that we’re dead to sin & alive IN Christ. Unfortunately we continually ASK FOR, PRAY FOR, AGONIZE OVER, PETITION God to ‘make me crucified’ with Christ or ‘crucify my flesh’ or ‘give me resurrection life’ when He’s already done it. You ARE already crucified with Christ, you ALREADY have resurrection life. When HE died, YOU died…when HE lived, YOU lived. The fact is, because you were unified WITH Christ in His crucifixion, you now live IN Him giving you the POSITION of the same resurrected life.
These first three ‘steps’ are all that’s needed for you to LIVE IN CHRIST… KNOWING, BELIEVING, & COUNTING…there’s no DOING to be done!
Then the LAST (FOURTH) practical way we can live in Christ: may be the only DOING that needs to be done…Verse 12
“12 Therefore do not let sin reign in your mortal body so that you obey its evil desires. 13 Do not offer any part of yourself to sin as an instrument of wickedness, but rather offer yourselves to God as those who have been brought from death to life; and offer every part of yourself to him as an instrument of righteousness. ”
Remember when Heather read that her commentary said that the word IN that we’ve been reading for IN Christ had to do with position & instrumentation: THIS IS WHAT IT MEANS. Once you KNOW sin has been crucified with Christ… and you BELIEVE that this is a finished work and you can live with Him… then COUNT YOURSELF (or come to grips with the fact) that you are dead to sin… you can OFFER yourself to God as an Instrument!