Christ In Me

My old self has been crucified with Christ. It is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me. So I live in this earthly body by trusting in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me. I do not treat the grace of God as meaningless. For if keeping the law could make us right with God, then there was no need for Christ to die.
Galatians 2:20‭-‬21 NLT

Last night, I wrote about the Spiritual Principal that the story of the Widow’s Mite teaches us about — and how that applies to all things of the heart, not just money.  And today, we are talking about “keeping the law” versus “Christ lives in me”.

This concept of genuine faith and genuine worship of God is at the heart of our very being.

A quick related interjection: One of my favorite books of the Old Testament is the book of Amos. It is a prophetic book of warning about God’s judgement not only on the world but on God’s own chosen people. This book might shock many modern day “Buddy Jesus Christians” who would model God in the image of their own “feelings” on what “love” should look like. But even the new Testament teaches us about the concept that God’s word is a valuable plumbline (Matthew 7:24-27) to guide us in an annunciation and fruitful life — living by the power of the Holy Spirit (Galatians 5:17-26) — and that God will judge the church first (1 Peter 4:17). (NOTE: That is a lot to glue together, so I’ve just left the references for those who want to pull out their shovels and dig deeper, rather than quoting them here.)

“Christ in me” is different than:

• Keeping the law as an obligatory heavy burden (condemnation)
• Keeping the law in order to compare ourselves to others (self- righteousness)
• Outwardly keeping the law in order to use it to judge and Lord over others (hypocrisy)
• Trying but failing to keep the law so that we are remorseful and remain engaged in our religious activities to constantly be making amends or seeking contrition from a religious system (shame)
• Presuming upon God’s grace and using the idea of “Buddy Jesus” as an excuse for continued wickedness (willfully sinning)

Something that we should realize is that there is no way for us to manipulate things and use God’s Word for our own selfish purposes. We are not smarter than Him so that we might twist His Word into a loophole that we might use against Him in court at judgement in order to justify ourselves. We are not justified by our own feelings, thoughts, or misunderstanding of His will — we can only be saved by the Blood of the Lamb and justified by grace through faith.

So, I must genuinely ask, “Has my old self been sacrificed? Does Christ truly live in me?” This is the all important question, my friends.

Heavenly Father, I believe in you, and I trust and believe in Jesus Christ who lived a sinless life, died a sinners death on the cross, was dead, buried in a tomb, and rose again to life, and sits on your right hand of authority, to judge between those who are alive in Christ or dead in sin. I believe that by myself, I am spiritually weak and sinful — but by the power of your Holy Spirit you are bearing the fruit of love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness and self- control in my life for the glory of God and for the revealing of the Children of God to be a light of hope in the midst of a dying world. Help us to have your Word written upon our hearts, to live out the spiritual principals that fulfill the law of Christ, and to be the body of Christ serving and loving one another. Amen.