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The Amish Voice 4
person who believes in Christ will never die, never taste or
experience death.
This is what is meant by the world’s being crucified to the
believer. The believer never has to go the way of the world,
that is, the way of sin, corruption, death, and judgment.
Jesus Christ died to deliver the believer from the world, all
its bondages including the bondage of death.
The Spirit of Jesus Christ (the Holy Spirit) lives within the
believer to give him the power to overcome the world in
all its corruptible attractions. Through the Spirit of God,
the believer has the power to conquer the lusts of the
flesh.
b. Second, the cross crucifies men (believers) to the world.
What does this mean? When the believer dies to the world,
he turns away from the attractions and pleasures of the
world; therefore, the believer becomes unattractive to the
world. Worldly men do not like what they see, for the
believer is rejecting the life-style and pleasures of the
world. Consequently, the worldly want nothing to do with
the believer. They want him out of their way. They want
him as non-existent, as a dead person to them. Therefore,
when a person comes to the cross of Christ, the cross
crucifies him to the world and its ways. He is no longer
attractive to the world.
“Knowing this, that our old man is crucified with
him, that the body of sin might be destroyed, that
henceforth we should not serve sin” (Rom.6:6).
“I am crucified with Christ: nevertheless I live; yet
not I, but Christ liveth in me: and the life which I
now live in the flesh I live by the faith of the Son of
God, who loved me, and gave himself for
me” (Ga.2:20).
2. The cross creates a new man. Nothing makes a person
acceptable to God except God’s very own Son, Jesus Christ.
No religion, no law, no ritual—nothing can avail anything
with God except Jesus Christ. Therefore, if any man wishes to
live with God, he has to
believe in Jesus Christ and approach
God in the name of Jesus Christ.
Now a very practical question arises: How does using the
name of Jesus Christ make a person live forever? Does a
person become acceptable to God by just approaching God
and saying, “God, I come to you in the name of Jesus Christ”?
No! And there is one good reason. God knows who is really
sincere and who is not. God cannot be deceived.
Words and
false profession
—just using the words “in the name of Jesus
Christ”—will not save anyone. A person has to be genuinely
sincere. The point is this: when a person is sincere in his
belief, God gives the person a new spirit—a recreated spirit.
God actually places His divine nature, the presence of His own
Spirit, into the person’s life. The person is “born again”
spiritually. He becomes what Scripture calls a
new creature, a
new man.
“Therefore if any man be in Christ, he is a new
creature: old things are passed away; behold, all
things are become new” (2 Co.5:17).
“Beloved, let us love one other: for love is of God;
and every one that loveth is born of God, and
knoweth God” (1 Jn.4:7).
3. The cross brings peace and mercy (v.16). Note who it is that
experiences peace and mercy: those who walk by the
rule of
the cross and of the new creature
. A person who walks after
the cross, seeking to live as a new creature in Christ Jesus will
be given…
the peace of God.
the mercy of God. He will experience both the
forgiveness of sins and the acceptance of God. And
most wonderfully, he will be given the
perfect
assurance
of eternal life and of God’s care.
Note that the church and believers are called “the Israel of
God.” This simply means that the church and believers are the
true Israel of God, the ones in whom God fulfills His
promises.
4. The cross gives purpose to the scars of life. Christ had
suffered for Paul; therefore, Paul was willing to suffer for
Christ. And suffer he did. He bore as much as any man has had
to bear for Christ. The word for marks means the branding
marks that masters put upon their slaves. The marks identified
the slaves as belonging to them.
The point is clear: Paul had subjected his body so much and
suffered so much persecution for Christ that his body bore the
marks of such subjection and suffering. He could say that the
marks upon his body were the branding marks of Christ—the
marks that proved his slavery and service to Christ. Therefore,
let no man deny his call and ministry for the Lord. He had
strong evidence that he was a true minister of the Lord Jesus:
the very marks upon his body. The cross of Jesus Christ drove
Paul to serve Christ, even to the point of suffering beyond
imagination.
APPLICATION:
The believer who suffers reproach, ridicule, mockery, and
other persecutions because of his stand for Christ bears the
marks of Christ in his body. Have you ever asked the
Why
question of God when...
you are made fun of because of your love for Jesus?
you lose a promotion at work because of your faith?