I like to garden. Nothing to me compares to the taste of fresh fruit and vegetables. I wait patiently all winter and spring for the first sweet bite of a fresh tomato or corn on the cob. I remember the first garden I ever planted. I planted a tomato plant in just the right place expecting it to grow and be a specimen plant. But to my surprise it did not. Almost overnight its leaves curled up and day after day they would turn yellow and fall to the ground. I watered it, fertilized it, and kept the weeds away but in spite of all my help it got worse until finally it withered and died. Later my dad, who had been gardening most of his life, told me the plant was diseased and doomed from the start.
Man, before he is born of God, is like this plant. All of the influences of good have no affect on him. The glories of heaven are not enough to move him to praise, nor all the blessings of God to make him thankful. Like a withered vine that receives no benefit from the sun or the rain his diseased soul is not touched by all the gracious influences of God.
What is needed in the man is a man. It is the man which God created that died in the garden. “For as in Adam all die--- (I Corinthians 15:22, Romans 5: 12, 18, 19, Ephesians 2: 1-3) It is man that died, not an idea, creed, or doctrine. It is man himself that is lacking in this thing of salvation. To be saved necessitates a new man. It demands one disconnected from Adam and that death which is passed on to him. It requires a totally new creation within. The message of Ephesians is what we are in Christ – The message of Colossians is what Christ is in us. The old man must be put off and the new man put on. But how does a ruined sinner put off or put on? Colossians 2: 11-12 says, “In whom also ye are circumcised with the circumcision made without hands, in putting off the body of the sins of the flesh by the circumcision of Christ. Buried with him in baptism, wherein also ye are risen with him through the faith of the operation of God, who hath raised him from the dead.” To be saved is not a reformation but regeneration. “Therefore if any man be in Christ, he is a new creature; old things passed away: Behold all things are become new.” (II Corinthians 5: 17)
In this new creation Christ is all! Everything of our humanity flows into him as the little streams flow into a mighty river and become one with it. For the believer then to live is Christ and to die is gain. The believer, having the mind of Christ, thinks Christ, walks in Christ, understands in Christ, and considers others as he is in Christ. Christ is made of God unto him wisdom, righteousness, sanctification, and redemption. And so in short – Christ is all and in all.
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