THE BELIEVER’S STRENGTH IS IN HIS ONENESS WITH CHRIST!

 EVERYDAY IN THE WORD!

FRIDAY DECEMBER 30, 2022.

SUBJECT: THE BELIEVER’S STRENGTH IS IN HIS ONENESS WITH CHRIST!

Memory verse: "But If the Spirit of Him who raised Jesus from the dead dwells in you, He who raised Christ from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies through His Spirit who dwells in you." (Romans 8 vs 11.)

READ: Romans 6 vs 4 - 6:

6:4: Therefore we were buried with Him through baptism into death, that just as Christ were raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, even so we also should walk in newness of life.

6:5: For if we have been untied together in the likeness of His death, certainly we also shall be in the likeness of His resurrection, 

6:6: knowing this, that our old man was crucified with Him, that the body of sin might be done away with, that we should no longer be slaves of sin.

INTIMATION:

The Believer’s oneness with Christ is the source of his or her ultimate strength. The believer is recreated in Him, and have a perfect union with Him. That new man has taken the place of the old man. There is a vital, and absolute union between the believer’s spirit and the Spirit of Christ. It is as vital as the branch of the vine is vital in its union with the vine. The believers bear Him, and He bears them.

The believer can enjoy his or her new life in Christ because he or she is united with Him in His death and resurrection. The believer’s evil desires, that is, his bondage to sin, and the love of sin died with Jesus. Now, united by faith with Him in His resurrection, he or she has unbroken fellowship with God and freedom from sin's hold on him or her.

Many don't understand this freedom from sin. The power and penalty of sin died with Christ on the cross, where He nailed it, disarmed all principalities and powers, and made a public spectacle of them, triumphing over them in it (Colossians 2 vs 14 - 15).  The "old man," the sinful nature, died once and for all, so the believer is freed from its power. The "body of sin" is not the human body, but our rebellious sin-loving nature inherited from Adam. 

Though our body willingly cooperates with our sinful nature, we must not regard the body as evil. It is the sin nature in us that is evil. And it is this power of sin at work in the believer’s body that is defeated. He is now conscious of sin, and try to avoid it. And even when they fall into sin, they regret it. 

God does not take the believers out of the world or make them robots; they will still feel like sinning, and sometimes they fall into sin. The difference is that before the recreation, the believers were slaves to their sinful nature, but now they can choose to live for Christ. Their conscience prick them when they desire to sin, or when they sin, and consequently they desire to confess, and incidentally ask for forgiveness.

God has made the believer what he or she is through Christ, and they recognize what they are and give place to the new thing. That way they glorify Him. The believer should demean himself in negative confession. When he does that, he rob Christ of the glory in His finished work in him, and ht give place to the adversary's dominance. The believer must never do it. But rather must get used to being what he is in Christ. 

Though it is hard for many Christians, who are used to magnifying weakness and failure, instead of magnifying their union with Christ, and their utter oneness with Him. They are used to glorifying the devil when confronted with negative circumstances by attributing it to him—the defeated foe. Instead of commanding the circumstance, in the Name of Jesus, to succumb to their inherent authority in their union with Christ, and their dominion over Satan and his cohorts.

Remember Psalm 23 that is transposed thus; "The Lord is my Shepherd (that is Jesus); I shall not want." In personalizing it now the prophesy is turned into reality. I boldly say, "I do not want. He kept me to live in the midst of fullness instead of in the desert place. I am drinking deeply of the water of life, the drink that satisfies. I am walking in the green pastures of His fellowship. I am enjoying the fruitage of His wonderful love life. I am one with Him, His ability is my ability. I am with Him, and thrive in His strength. With Him I can do all things."

The believer should always visualize himself in Christ. It is always a struggle to get away from the old pictures that he had before in his mind, that is, the old sin nature that has dominated his mind prior to his conversion, especially stemming out of the early teachings of sin and the consequences or it. Break away from such thoughts by waging a battle day by day against such thoughts. Now enter into the victory of the battle that is won in Christ. 

Now look at this, "What would you do if sin had never been?" As a believer, your focus should be on this question. Why? Because this is the picture you ought to see. The Father acts toward the believer as though he or she had never sinned. The Father acts as though sin had never been as far as the believer is concerned. When He recreated the believer He forgot all about his or her past. Why? The new creation has no past. It is a "now creation." This is the victory. There are no theories here that cast a dark shadow over the past life, but they are all wiped out. Now he is in the Beloved.

Beloved, now the believers are the sons of God, (First John 3 vs 2). He is the believers’ Father, and He cares absolutely for them. First Corinthians 1 vs 9 states, "God is faithful, by whom you were called into fellowship of His Son Jesus Christ our Lord." Let the believer personalize it: "My Father is faithful to me. He has called me to come and walk with His Son, to live with Him, to carry on the Son's work in His absence. He has called me to fellowship with Him." 

Fellowship means eating together, bearing up under pressure together, drinking from the same cup. He has called me to drink with Jesus, to live with Jesus, to share with Jesus in the saving of lost men and the building up of the Body of Christ through the Word.

Prayer: Abba Father, thank You for what You wrought for me in redemption, and the privilege of sonship through Your gift of salvation. You made me one with Christ. Therefore, give me the grace to live like Him, and for You all the days of my life, in Jesus’ Name I have prayed. Amen.

PRAISE THE LORD!