What in the world makes us so embarrassed about the gospel? I determine to know nothing among you except Jesus Christ and Him crucified. All right, the text I want to look at tonight is short but rich, and it's one of those verses that I memorized as a fairly new Christian. It's a text that is probably familiar to most of you. Galatians 2 20. Galatians 2.20, 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. There's a lot of amazing truth packed into that simple verse. It's a marvelous summary, really, of Paul's whole theology. Packed into a single sentence, it compresses every facet of salvation into what is really a wonderfully concise statement that focuses deliberately on the personal nature of justification and faith and our perfect union with Christ. I've often said that the heart and soul of Paul's theology and especially his teaching about salvation is summed up in the truth of our spiritual union with Christ. If you want to understand Paul, you have to get that concept. I think I've pointed out from this very pulpit on a couple of occasions that the Apostle Paul's favorite way of referring to Christians is this. He repeatedly says that we are in Christ. spiritually and mystically united with Christ in such a way that in the words of Ephesians 5 verse 30, we are members of his body, of his flesh and of his bones. We are in him in a spiritual union. that unites us with him in such a way that his life counts for our life, his death counts for our death, his resurrection counts for our resurrection, and his resurrection power becomes the energy by which we live. Colossians 3, verse 3 says, For you are dead and your life is hid with Christ in God. And therefore, whenever Paul speaks of believers, He describes them as those who are in Christ. In fact, I was prepared tonight to give you a whole string of verses that use that expression. I'm going to shorten that because I don't want to extend the service unnecessarily tonight. But let me just give you a couple of Romans eight verse one. There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ. Romans twelve five, we being many are one body in Christ and everyone members of another. And in fact, in Romans sixteen, if you really want to see this graphically, don't turn there now, but go and look at Romans sixteen, where Paul's Paul sending greetings to specific saints in Rome. And he repeatedly uses that expression in Christ. He uses it some twelve times, I think, in that one chapter. And over and over again, that is how Paul refers to believers. Second Corinthians 517. If any man be in Christ, he's a new creature. He's describing a union with Christ that makes us share in and benefit from all of Christ's virtues. And again, I could go on and on giving you verses. that use that expression, I won't. But let me just say this in every one of Paul's New Testament epistles, he uses that expression in Christ to describe believers. It's used some 50 or 40 or 50 times in the New Testament, depending on which translation you look at. Peter uses it once in first Peter 514. But normally that is a purely Pauline expression. It's Paul's favorite expression. And it underscores the one truth that really lies at the heart of Paul's soteriology, that faith brings us into vital union with Christ so that we participate in his life and death and resurrection. And that is both a positional and a practical truth. In other words, there is a forensic or legal aspect to it, meaning it involves a divine reckoning. God's verdict is that we are in Christ. We're not literally and actually crucified with Christ, but he died as our substitute, our legal substitute. And in the reckoning of God, Christ's death counts as ours. His death is the atonement for our sins. He's paid the penalty of sin. Prescribed by the law on our behalf, and so there is a legal or forensic reckoning that's involved here. But there is also a practical and experiential side to our union with Christ. His life and His power infuse us and transform us by awakening us from a state of spiritual death. That death that held us in its bondage as unbelievers and Christ's power then continues to operate in us to energize us by giving us godly desires, by giving us a true love for holiness and infusing in us the power both to will and to work for God's good pleasure. Our verse. Galatians 220 encompasses all those truths in language that is almost poetic. Paul employs the language of oxymoron throughout this verse. I throw that word out for you not to impress you. I hope you understand what the what the idea of oxymoron is. It's a figure of speech. that deliberately uses the language of paradox. It sets seemingly contradictory terms against one another. An oxymoron is like it's an expression that appears self-contradictory, just appears that way. It's not really like pretty ugly, you know, or jumbo shrimp. One of the famous was or my favorite Microsoft works. And I love oxymorons because they make you stop and think. Tight slacks. Nothing much. And we love to do that. We love to put words together that really don't go together. Unbiased opinion, you know. Exact estimate. Or self-help group. I could go on, I won't bore you with a list of them, but there are lots of them. Civil War, where do these come from? But the juxtaposition of words and ideas that don't usually go together make the real point stand out for us much more clearly. And some truths in the Christian life are best expressed as oxymorons, paradoxical language, and in our text Paul uses a trio of paradoxes to sum up the reality of our fullness of salvation in Christ. Look at them. He says, I am crucified, yet living. I live, yet not I, but Christ. And the life I live in the flesh is a life lived in faith. Three paradoxes there, and I want to look at those one at a time tonight and try to unpack some of the truth about our salvation that Paul has condensed into this one incredibly rich statement. Notice first, we'll call it if you want to take these down, I'll give you three of them. The paradox of death, the paradox of death. He begins this statement by saying he is crucified, yet living. I am crucified with Christ. Nevertheless, I live, and if you understand Paul's whole theology, this is a very deep paradox indeed, because before he was crucified, Paul was actually dead. He says so in several places, but chiefly Ephesians 2, verse 5, he says to all of us, we were dead in sins, but God has quickened us together with Christ. And he's speaking there of our life before conversion, our life without Christ. He says all of us were dead in trespasses and sins, or as he says in Ephesians four, verse 18, having the understanding darkened and being alienated from the life of God through the ignorance that was in me because of the blindness of my heart. That's what life was like before Christ death. And Paul says he was dead. But now, as one who is crucified with Christ, he is truly alive for the first time. Paul has borrowed this paradox, I think, directly from the teaching of Christ, who said in Matthew 16, verse 25, for whosoever will save his life shall lose it, and whosoever will lose his life for my sake will find it. Now, in what sense was Paul crucified with Christ? You'll often hear people quote this passage as if Paul's speaking of some kind of mystical, deeper life, second level experience that launched him into a higher plane of spiritual life. I've heard speakers use and abuse this passage by applying it to a kind of pietistic self-crucifixion, as if Paul were speaking about some kind of spiritual or even real self-flagellation, you know, where he would put himself on the cross daily by self-denial or something like that. That is not what Paul is talking about here at all, and the context makes it clear. Notice verse 19. For I, through the law, am dead to the law that I might live unto God. And what he's talking about in verse 19 is what he explains. With this first paradox in verse 20, he's talking about being dead to the law, dead in a legal sense. In other words, beyond the reach of the law's threats and condemnation, the law's ultimate penalty was already paid on his behalf by Christ. So Paul is saying the law has no further claim on me. As far as the law is concerned, I'm dead. And that's exactly what he means. In the eyes of the law, he is dead. He is legally dead. He is talking here about the doctrine of justification by faith. He says so explicitly back in verse 16, knowing that a man is not justified by the works of the law, but by the faith of Jesus Christ. Even we, and he's speaking here to Peter, even we Jewish people have believed in Jesus Christ, that we might be justified by faith in Christ and not by the works of the law. For by the works of the law shall no flesh be justified. He's saying that's how we're justified by faith. And now he says he's dead to the law. The law has no further claim on him. And in our verse, verse 20, is simply explaining why he is dead in the eyes of the law. I am crucified with Christ. Now, again, it goes without saying that Paul was not literally and actually placed on a cross alongside Christ. He was not crucified with Christ in any literal or historical sense. So what does he mean by this? How was Paul crucified with Christ? He explains exactly what he means at the end of the verse and also in verse twenty one, the son of God loved me and gave himself for me. And therefore, Paul says, I do not frustrate the grace of God, for if righteousness comes by the law, then Christ is dead in vain. He's saying that the death of Christ on the cross was for him. On his behalf, in other words, Jesus death counted as Paul's death legally. And that's true of every believer. That's one of the major points Paul makes all through his writings in the New Testament. Christ, Paul says, gave himself for me. He died in my place. He stood in for me as my proxy and my substitute before the judgment seat of God, and he took my punishment. And that's what the expression for me means in this context. When you read that, that's what he's saying for me instead of me. See, death is the legal penalty of sin, and Christ actually died the worst, most horrific kind of death punishment. you could ever meet out the law exacted against him the death penalty for sin, a sinner's death. If he died in such a way for me, then he could have only done it in my place as my substitute and representative because Christ himself was not a sinner. And that's exactly what Paul says just a chapter later than this. Look at Galatians 313. Christ has redeemed us from the curse of the law being made a curse for us for his written curse. It is everyone who hangs on a tree. That was the death penalty exacted by the law against Christ. Why? For me, Paul says. And so it's clear that what Paul aims to teach here in Galatians 2.20 is the substitutionary nature of Christ's sacrifice. And you see, legally, if Christ bore the legal penalty of my sin on my behalf, then legally it is as if I was crucified with him. Because in the eyes of the law, that was my sin being atoned for. That was my death by proxy. That was the portion of divine wrath I deserve and so, Paul says, I am crucified with Christ and that is how I am dead to the law through the law. Legally, or in Paul's exact words, through the law, I am as good as dead. And so every truth Paul makes in reference to this passage is rooted and grounded in the doctrine of substitutionary atonement. My participation with Christ, my spiritual union with Christ, my fellowship in his death and resurrection, his role as my representative and proxy, all of it hinges on the truth of substitutionary atonement. Christ died as my substitute. In my place and in my stead, now there have always been people throughout the history of the church people who call themselves Christians and want to identify themselves as Christians, but who despise this doctrine of substitutionary atonement. And as a result, they usually try to redefine what Jesus death was all about. Some have said Jesus died not as our substitute, but as our example. So when he died on the cross, it was only to give us an example of self-sacrifice and meekness. He was showing us what it means to turn the other cheek. And so what saves us under that system is not what Christ did for us, but whatever we do to follow his example. And that is virtually, that's what virtually all theological liberals, all Socinians, deists, all kinds of moralists, that's what they teach. That same view has also cropped up in several places over the past five years or so, especially in the literature associated with the emerging church movement. You see this doctrine of substitutionary atonement attacked more and more, and it's usually promoted by people who think, OK, but substitutionary atonement makes God seem so harsh. If God is so rigid in demanding a punishment for sin that he would even punish his own son for the sins of other people and place his innocent son on the cross in the stead of guilty people, that just makes God seem so harsh. And so they say, let's let's reimagine the atonement. Let's look at it a different way. And we'll say it's an example of Christ's love and it's an example of turning the other cheek. And let's just think of it as an example for us to follow. But that turns out to be a recipe for salvation by works because it denies the objective efficacy of Christ's death for me. It means his death for me didn't really accomplish anything other than giving me an example which I now have to follow. If he is only an example for me, then it's up to me to follow that example if the atonement is going to be efficacious in my case. There have also been people throughout the history of the church who are more or less willing to acknowledge that, OK, Christ's death on the cross was the penalty of sin in a sense, Christ did, in a sense, bear the penalty of sin, but he didn't do it vicariously. He didn't do it as a substitute. He didn't do it actually taking the guilt of my sin on himself. In other words, he didn't really die as anybody's substitute or proxy, but rather they say his death was a sort of display of how much God hates sin. It was a demonstration, a public demonstration of what divine wrath would look like if God really did carry out the penalty against sin. And so the cross, according to them, was more or less a symbolic gesture, not an actual payment for anybody's sins. And again, that destroys the objective efficacy of Christ's death and makes the atonement mainly an example for us to follow. It puts the work of our redemption back on ourselves. And so they destroy the truth that explains our union with Christ, because, you see, if he's not my substitute, then I don't have this union with him that Christ is that Paul is describing in this verse. Now, these things are important for you to understand and defend, because there is an upsurge of people today who argue against the doctrine of substitutionary atonement. And sometimes they can make their arguments and their words seem really good. As I said, a lot of people don't like the doctrine of substitution because they just can't stomach the idea that God always demands vengeance against sin. They'd rather have a kindly sort of pliable God who just overlooks sin and ignores justice altogether and and says, basically, let's just forget about any kind of punishment. Substitutionary atonement is not a doctrine, frankly, that is well suited for the postmodern era in which you and I live. It goes against the sensibilities of contemporary culture. The idea that a loving God would punish the sins of an evil world in the person of his own innocent son is a truth that most people find distasteful. It's an offense. It seems refined and indelicate, it is an offense, just like the Bible says, the cross of Christ is a stumbling stone and a rock of offense. But to those who believe it's the power of God and the wisdom of God, and that's what Paul is celebrating in our verse. The offense of the cross is the very thing we do celebrate. Don't ever be tempted to back away from it or tone down this truth or soften the idea just because worldly wisdom finds it offensive. A hundred years ago, Alexander McLaren. Pointed out, this was a tendency even in those days as well, because it's not just the postmodernists who make these arguments, the modernists made the same arguments. And Alexander McLaren was up against the modernism of his day, which was going exactly the same direction as the postmodernism of our day. And he pointed out that when people lose sight of the substitutionary nature of Christ's atoning work, they soon lose interest in the cross completely. And that's a disaster. He said this quote. Whenever the full-orbed faith in Christ as our substitute has begun to falter and grow pale, people do not know what to do with Christ's death at all, and they stop talking about it to a very large extent. And then he added this. Unless Christ died as a substitute and a sacrifice for sinners, it's really hard to see any meaning in the cross other than a sentimental melodrama. And what McLaren was warning about is exactly what happened among the modernists and theological liberals who were just beginning to flourish in his day. And frankly, that is the same thing that is happening today with seeker sensitive Christianity, postmodern Christianity, open theism, emerging Christianity and all the other varieties of pseudo Christianity that are trying to modify the gospel message. and move in and take over evangelicalism and make the gospel more palatable for people today. Try to do away with the offense of the cross. Listen, if you are ashamed of the offense of the cross, you will ultimately silence the only truth that can save. So it's vital, it's crucial. And Paul's words in this text reveal the superiority of the doctrine of substitutionary atonement. The truth that Christ died as a substitute for sinners means that Christ's atoning work is inherently and objectively efficacious. His work on my behalf has already accomplished everything necessary for my life and salvation. And so there's no work and no ceremony for me to perform in order to add to the process in order to gain any merit of my own. But eternal life is already my present possession, guaranteed by the death and the resurrection of Christ, because he's already died and risen again. And he did all that as my substitute. I, through the law, am dead to the law that I might live unto God. As Paul says here, I'm crucified with Christ. Nevertheless, I live yet. Not I, but Christ live within me. Jesus himself said, Verily, verily, I say unto you, he who heareth my word and believeth on him who sent me half everlasting life, he speaks of everlasting life as a present possession. And that person, he said, shall not come into condemnation, but his past past tense has already passed. from death unto life. Eternal life, again, is my present possession, and the only guarantee of that truth lies in the fact that he has already fulfilled as my substitute everything the law of God ever demanded of me, including the penalty for my sin. My spiritual union with Christ is what seals the reality of that truth. On the personal and practical level, that's what these testimonies tonight were all about. And this is the very truth that makes assurance of salvation possible. Notice, by the way, how this text portrays salvation in our union with Christ as a very personal and individual thing. Have you noticed all the personal pronouns Paul uses the subjective pronoun I? is used five times in this one sentence. That's unusual for Paul to speak of himself that much, but he's not really speaking of himself here. He's applying what Christ did to him. So you have I five times, the objective pronoun me is used three times. That is eight first person pronouns in just one verse, one sentence. Paul's emphasis here is on the personal and individual aspect of salvation. He's not talking about any corporate or collective notion of covenant membership or the community of Christianity or whatever. Now, some of you, especially the seminary students in our midst, will be aware of a deadly theological trend that is popular right now in some academic circles, known as the New Perspective on Paul. This is a wholesale reinterpretation of Paul's theology that departs to some degree from every historic Protestant distinctive on the doctrine of justification by faith attacks really what Paul is talking about in this verse. It's a move instead back to a more sacramental and corporate theology of justification and tends to diminish or even eliminate the notion of personal justification and according to many who who promote this new perspective on Paul. When Paul speaks of justification, they say he's not talking about how an individual can be right before God. He's talking about how Jews and Gentiles corporately relate to God's covenant. And in fact, let me quote one of the advocates of this view, N.T. Wright. He's probably the most influential advocate of the new perspective on Paul. He says this, quote, Justification is not so much about soteriology as about ecclesiology. In other words, it's not so much about the doctrine of salvation as it is about the church. It's a group thing, he says, not an individual thing. It's about how diverse groups of people, Jews and Gentiles in particular, and how they relate to the covenant community. It's not about the individuals standing before God. He insists that through most of his writings. But here, Paul is clearly dealing with a very personal and individual reality. Verse 16, knowing that a man, a private soul, personally, individually, is not justified by the works of the law, but by the faith of Jesus Christ. And then, down in our text, Paul is still in the process of unfolding that same doctrine of justification, and he deliberately makes it as personal as possible by declaring his own case. He's not saying this is true of me only. Paul isn't claiming this is true of him and not you and me as believers, but he's saying this is true of every believer, but I'm going to express it in a personal way just to stress the personal nature of it. I am crucified with Christ, he says. 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. He doesn't say us, although he doesn't exclude that idea. He certainly means all of us who believe. But the justification he is describing here is a personal and individual reality, and he stresses that. And this is the paradox of death. I am crucified with Christ. Nevertheless, I live. Now, here's the sum of everything I've been saying. Paul is describing a personal faith that looks back to the historical event of Christ's death and resurrection and rests in the knowledge that my union with Christ makes me the beneficiary of his death on the cross and a participant in that historical event. I'm dead to the law because Christ died in my place, and as we're about to see, I'm alive unto God because I also participate spiritually in Christ's resurrection. Now, I want you to see that the thread of this same idea runs through everything the Apostle Paul ever wrote, he continually says that we are dead because Christ died as our substitute and and by our union with him. We participate spiritually in his death. That's a common theme throughout the Pauline epistles. Let me just quote a few verses for you. Galatians 6 14. He says, God forbid that I should glory except in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, by whom the world is crucified unto me and I unto the world. Romans six, verse two, we're dead to sin, he says. How are we dead to sin? Verses three and four. Know you not that so many of us, as we're baptized into Christ Jesus, were baptized into his death? Therefore, we are buried with him by baptism into death. Now, that's not speaking about water baptism there. It doesn't have anything to do with baptism by water. There's not a drop of water in Romans six. This is about baptism into Christ, baptism being identification with him. It's about our union with him. Again, baptism was a term that related to the dying of fabrics, where it was immersed in the dye and took on the properties of that dye. We are baptized into Christ in that sense. It's the same thing Paul describes in 1 Corinthians 12, 13, for by one spirit are we all baptized into one body, whether we be Jews or Gentiles, bond or free, we've been made to drink into one spirit. He's describing it as a spiritual baptism. The Holy Spirit, notice, is the baptizer in this case. He baptizes us into Christ, he immerses us into Christ. And this is speaking of the spiritual reality of our union with Christ. And he says, if you are baptized into Christ, in other words, united with him spiritually through the agency of the Holy Spirit, then you are baptized into his death, united with him in his crucifixion. And so that is the sense of what Paul means In our text here, where he says, I am crucified with Christ crucified, but not literally and actually dead. I'm crucified with Christ. Nevertheless, I live. That's the paradox of death, and it flows right into the next paragraph. If you want to write these down, notice the next one, the paradox of resurrection. I live, he says, yet not I, but Christ, I'm crucified yet alive. I'm alive and yet it's not my life. He's building this amazing string of paradoxes that cover the whole range of the Christian experience. The paradox of death was all about justification and the point there is that faith justifies us as it as it looks back to the historical event of Christ's death. The paradox of resurrection is about the very principle of eternal life itself. And here we see that faith regenerates and empowers us as we look to the living Christ for our life and energy. I live, he says, but my life is not my own. Christ is the source of it, and just as his death counts as his death, His resurrection from the dead both seals my justification and gives me life. So I'm alive from the dead because my substitute is alive from the dead and I am united with him by faith. Paul saying the very same thing here that he says in Colossians three three, where he says, for you are dead and your life is hid with Christ in God. In other words, believers are united by faith with Christ in such a way that God sees our sin debt paid in full by Christ's death, and we are therefore brought up from the dead with Christ through his resurrection so that death has no more dominion over us. Our life is hidden safely in his care because it's his life, too, by union. by our participation with him and his participation with us. In fact, that is the very same thing Paul says in Romans six. I keep going back there for a reason. Romans six, verses eight through eleven. He says, Now, if we be dead with Christ, we believe that we shall also live with him, knowing that Christ being raised from the dead dieth no more. Death hath no more dominion over him. For in that he died, he died unto sin once, but in that he liveth, he liveth unto God. And the resurrection of Christ, therefore, guarantees our life, and since death has no more dominion over him and because we are spiritually united with him by faith, our life is hid with Christ in God, and therefore we are secure forever. This is an amazing truth, and Scripture stresses it over and over. I'm not digging something obscure out of this single verse. It's all over Scripture. John 14, verse 19, Jesus said, Because I live, you shall live also. And listen to the next verse, John 14, 19, Because I live, you shall live also. Now, verse 20. At that day, you shall know that I am in my father and you and me and I in you. Christ is united with his father in the father, and we are united with him, he says, you and me and I and you so that our life is literally hid with Christ in God. And by our union with him, we participate in his resurrection life, and it's a great security to us. By the way, there is a practical use for this truth. Paul leaned on it to see him through his worst sufferings. Listen to what he says in 2nd Corinthians 4 verses 8 through 10 and notice this same truth runs as a thread through that passage. 2nd Corinthians 4 starting at verse 8, he says, describing his ministry, we are troubled on every side, yet not distressed. We are perplexed, but not in despair, persecuted, but not forsaken, cast down, but not destroyed. Why? Why do these difficulties not have any impact on Paul? Verse 10, always bearing about in the body the dying of the Lord Jesus, that the life also of Jesus might be made manifest in our body. And in 1 Thessalonians 5.10, Paul says that Christ died for us, that whether we wake or sleep, We should live together with him. Again, that is the bedrock foundation of our security. In other words, our union with Christ makes us participants not only in his death and crucifixion, but also in his resurrection and his life. So we're crucified with Christ, nevertheless, we live or more precisely, Christ lives in us. In fact, notice another significant thing here in Galatians two twenty earlier, I showed you how frequently Paul uses this expression in Christ to signify our union with him here. He turns the expression around and shows the flip side of this same truth here. It's not just we who are in Christ, but also Christ lives in us. And that's how intimate the union is. It's the same thing Jesus said in John 14, 19, which I just read a second ago, where he says, I am in my father and you are in me and I am in you. It works both ways, so inseparable is our union with Christ that we are in him and he is in us. Listen to Paul's prayer for the church at Ephesus Ephesians three verses sixteen and seventeen says he's praying for them that God would grant you according to the riches of his glory to be strengthened with might by his spirit in the inner man that Christ may dwell in your hearts by faith and in Colossians one twenty seven. He speaks again of Christ in you the hope of glory. And as Rick said this morning that hope It's not just a vague longing or a wish, it's a certainty. Christ in you, the guarantee of glory. Christ lives in us and his resurrection life is what energizes and drives our spiritual life and guarantees that for all of eternity. We are participants in his resurrection as well as his death so that Even though in the eyes of the law, we're not only crucified with Christ. We're alive with him as well. We're crucified with Christ, nevertheless, we live. And in practical terms. This truth ought to teach us to depend on the indwelling spirit of Christ to empower us, this truth ought to color how we think about everything that comes against us. It teaches us to look beyond ourselves and to lean on Christ, who is our life. We're not living the Christian life for Christ, he's living it in us, that's the proper perspective, and that is. precisely what Paul says in Romans 6. I keep going back to that passage because you know what? In extended form, Romans 6, well it says precisely the same thing as our text. And if you take it and extend it out, Romans 6 is practically an extended commentary on Galatians 2.20. Paul summarizes his whole theology here in Galatians 220. He spells out the same truth in detail in Romans six. And if you see these two passages together, it'll help you understand them both better. Romans six, remember, is where Paul says we're buried with Christ into death by that spiritual baptism that unites us with him. Verse eight is the one that says now, if we be dead with Christ, we believe we shall also live with him. Verse nine says death can have no dominion over him now that he's conquered death and been raised from the dead. And then Paul says this verse eleven. Likewise, reckon ye also yourselves to be dead indeed unto sin, but alive unto God through Jesus Christ, our Lord. He's saying, put this perspective over your entire vision of your Christian life. That's how you should think of yourself. Do you think of yourself as dead and resurrected? If you are truly united with Christ by faith, you should, because you know what? That's reality. It's a spiritual reality, but it's real. It's more real than anything you can see with your eyes or touch with your hands, because this is how God himself sees you. And that's how you ought to think of yourself, and that's what Paul says here. Reckon yourself to be dead, indeed, unto sin, but alive unto God through Jesus Christ. Reckon yourself. Notice how Paul uses this word reckon. The Greek word is logism and it's the same word that's in other places translated impute, like in Romans four, where we're told that God imputes righteousness apart from works to believers. In other words, he reckons us. Righteous, Romans four, verse eight uses the same word, and it's actually quoting from an Old Testament passage, Psalm 32, to say that God does not impute or reckon sin to believers. In other words, he reckons them guilt free, completely righteous. As a matter of fact, he imputes to them a righteousness that is not their own. And at the same time, he doesn't impute to them their sins, the guilt of their sin. That's how the divine reckoning of justification works, and Paul says that's how we ought to think of ourselves. We should reckon ourselves dead indeed unto sin, truly and really dead to sin and dead to the law. Beyond the reach of the law's condemnation and therefore freed from death and freed from sin's guilt. We're freed from guilt and condemnation by Christ's death, because again, we're united with him. And in legal terms, we are therefore participants in his death. And so we should reckon ourselves well and truly dead to sin. But you know what? It doesn't stop there. We're also alive unto God because we participate in Christ's resurrection as well as his death. And so we're alive, but it's not our life. It's the resurrection power of Christ. Listen to Paul's words from Philippians three verses ten and eleven, another very familiar passage. And here is the true longing of every heart that is united with Christ by faith expressed in the words of the apostle Paul. He says that I may know him and the power of his resurrection and the fellowship of his sufferings being made conformable to his death, if by any means I may attain to the resurrection from the dead. And so, Christ's death and his resurrection are one package. His death frees me from sin. His life empowers me for righteousness. And we lay hold of both of them by faith. And in fact, that is the paradox of the resurrection. I live, yet not I, but Christ lives in me. I live, but it's not my life. And so, we've seen the paradox of death. We're crucified, but we're living. We've seen the power of the resurrection. We're living, but it's actually the life of Christ in us. Now, here's a third paradox. We'll call it the paradox of life. This one is a little more subtle when you read the verse in English, but let me show it to you, the life which I now live in the flesh, I live in faith. That is the literal rendering of the Greek prepositions in the flesh and in faith, and they are identical and parallel expressions in the Greek, and it sets up another paradox. While I'm living in the flesh, I'm actually living in faith. And so faith, not the flesh, is the driving principle in my life. My true life is not contained in this flesh. The life of my flesh, the living, breathing, organic life that is visible to the human eye, that is not my true life. My flesh is simply a mask that conceals the true principle of life that actually energizes me. Spiritual life. I live by faith in the son of God who loved me and gave himself for me. Notice he's speaking of the life which I now live in the flesh as opposed to my life before conversion, which was really a kind of walking death, remember. Spiritual death, dullness to the things of God, that was the old life, but the life which I now live in the flesh, I live by faith. And notice also that the object of our faith is also personal and objective, its faith in the son of God, faith in his person and faith in his work. And I want to show you something. Don't miss this. All three of these paradoxes hinge on faith. The paradox of death teaches us that faith justifies as it looks back to the historical event of Christ's death. The paradox of resurrection teaches that faith regenerates and empowers as it looks to the living Christ for its true energy. And here we learn from the paradox of life that faith sanctifies as it conforms us to Christ. And you know what, it's the same faith in all three cases, the faith that justifies is the same faith that sanctifies not a different faith. Verse 16 says we're justified by faith in Jesus Christ. Verse 20, Paul says the life we're living in this flesh while we wait for glory, we're supposed to live in the energy and the power of our faith in the Son of God. It's the same faith, it's not a different faith, but it's the same faith because it's the same object of faith. It's always faith in Christ. The error of. deeper life theology and all brands of perfectionism, no lordship doctrine, most forms of pietism. They all commit the same error in that they make justification and sanctification hinge on different acts of faith so that they think, OK, you're justified by an initial act of faith, but you have to have a different experience of faith and a different kind of faith in order to gain sanctification. So you're saved by this act of justifying faith where you look to Christ as Savior to free you from the guilt of sin. But then they go on and teach that you need to reach a higher level, a second stage of the Christian life by a completely different act of faith and a completely different kind of faith. A completely separate experience of faith when you finally surrender all or accept Jesus as Lord, not just Savior, or or you finally die to self or you have some kind of existential faith crisis where you finally get to move to the next level of spirituality. If that is your impression of how sanctification works, forget it. That's not how it works. And that's not what scripture teaches. The faith that sanctifies is the same faith that originally looked to Christ as our substitute and our Savior. And if you don't realize that you are going to be hamstrung in the process of your sanctification. Notice here, Paul is talking about real life in this present world, the life which I now live in the flesh, and he says the driving principle of this life is faith in the Son of God who loved me and gave himself for me. That is the same faith that was born at Paul's conversion on the road to Damascus. It's the only faith Paul ever knew. It's the same faith he nurtured and cultivated and sustained throughout his life. It is the faith he was speaking of at the end of his life when he wrote to Timothy and said, I fought a good fight. I've finished my course. I have kept the faith. It's gospel faith, faith in Christ who loved me and gave himself for me. And the object of that faith is the same historic person and historic event that procured our justification in the first place. That is the proper focus of all true faith. He gave himself for me on the cross, which is the greatest manifestation of his love. Greater love hath no man than a man that lay down his life for his friends. So the cross is the focal point of the faith that empowers a godly life. And if you lose sight of the work of Christ for you, you will falter in your attempts to live your life for him. I've said this many times before, but it bears repeating, if you struggle with besetting sins, if your sanctification seems sluggish or stalled, if you are frustrated in your progress towards Christ likeness, There is no greater spiritual tonic than to preach the gospel to yourself. Remind yourself what Christ has done on your behalf as the great high priest who offered himself as an atonement for your sins that will restore the proper focus of your faith and that will energize you spiritually to live in the power of his resurrection. Remind yourself that you are dead to sin, dead indeed to sin through the cross, but alive unto God through the resurrection. And reckon yourself to be dead indeed unto sin and its power, dead to the claims of the law against you, but alive in the resurrected Christ. And remember that faith unites you to him so that his power and his life flow through you. And that will do more than all the counseling sessions in the world to set your spiritual compass straight again. Your sanctification, no less than your justification, is wrought by faith in Christ and not by your own self effort or fleshly energy. That was Paul's focus. That is the message of our text. All the Christian life is a life of faith, because faith is what unites us with Christ. Now, quickly, as we close, what if you're not a true believer in Christ, what relevance does any of this have to you? I mean, can you know with any certainty that he loved you and gave himself for you? The answer is only if you lay hold of him by faith. If anyone has not the spirit of Christ, Scripture says he is none of his. True faith. His personal faith, that's one of the lessons of this passage, you cannot be in spiritual union with Christ because of the faith of your parents. Or because of an act of water baptism or because of any other sacrament or work you might do, you don't unite with Christ by attending church or even by joining a church, only faith, personal faith in Christ can unite us with him. And only the Holy Spirit can awaken a dead heart to faith. But Scripture says faith cometh by hearing and hearing by the word of God. And so the very fact that you have come under the hearing of the word of God is a token of his mercy and goodness to you. And I urge you to respond to it. So if you are here today without being united with Christ by faith, My counsel to you is to receive him by faith as your Savior before you leave here tonight. My prayer for you is that his word and his tender plea will be the instrument by which he draws you to himself. And for those who are in Christ, let this passage be a reminder of your high position. Remember, the same faith that looks to Christ for salvation lays hold of all his work on our behalf. You don't need a new or different kind of faith, you just need to go back to the beginning and recover your first love. He loved me, he lived for me, he died for me and he lives in me, that is the key to everything in a single verse. I've been crucified with Christ. It is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me and the life which I now live in the faith. I live by the faith of the son of God who loved me and gave himself for me. Let's pray. What a powerful reminder this single verse is the gospel and all the spiritual truth we need wrapped up and summarized in a single text, I pray that your spirit would apply it to our hearts tonight. that would be reflected in our lives this week and that Christ would glorify himself in us through that resurrection life that operates in us. We pray in his name. Amen.