Our Association with Christ
Excerpt from: Our Association with Christ
COL 2:20-23; COL 3:1-4 WE have here three aspects of our association with our blessed Lord. We are spoken of as "dead with Christ," as "risen with Christ," and as going to "appear with him in glory" by-and-by.
Now these three aspects of our association with Christ bring before us a blessed thing. It is that God in His infinite grace cannot see us apart from Christ. If He died, we died with Him; if He is risen, we are risen with Him; and, as to His future appearing in glory to reign, we are so bound up together with Him, that, when He appears, we shall appear with Him. God cannot look at our blessed Lord and Savior, but He sees us with Him.
Now I purpose first simply to consider these three aspects of our association with Him, and then to pass on to the responsibilities which these involve.
In the first place we read, "Wherefore, if ye have died with Christ." Now is it too much to say that many of us fail to enter into this aspect, of our association with Christ? Probably every one of us here to-night knows forgiveness of sins? Is it too much to ask if we all do? For, as a fact, sometimes one even meets at the Lord's table those who do not know the forgiveness of their sins. Assuming, however, with this word of warning, that we do know our sins forgiven, let me put a further question: Do we all know what it is to have "died with Christ"?
This is a marvelous thing, and one we do well to consider; for we never can know liberty of soul until we have entered into the fact of our association with Christ in His death. For in that death, not only have I forgiveness of sins, not only is my guilt gone, but myself is gone. Knowing union with Him thus, I can take the place of myself being gone altogether; I can say with the apostle:
"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." [Gal 2:20]
I live, yet not I; self is gone.
Allow me to press this a little before I proceed. Let me say a word as to what we are delivered from by the truth of having died with Christ.
If you turn for a moment to Rom. 6, you will find there the first aspect of what we are delivered from. I do not go into the details to-night, but simply call your attention to the scripture. We read:
"Knowing this, that our old man was crucified with him, that the body of sin might be" — not "destroyed," but — "brought to naught [annulled], that henceforth we should not serve sin. For he that is dead is freed from sin."
It is sin, not sins, remark. So the first thing we are delivered from by the death of Christ is sin.
Many of us, who know ourselves forgiven of God, are often cast down by the knowledge of sin dwelling in us. At first, after our conversion, there was great joy; but soon after, perhaps, the joy faded away, and inbred sin came up in such a way as even to force doubt upon the soul; in such a way indeed as to raise the question "Have I ever been saved at all?" Therefore, I say, if we do not go on beyond the mere knowledge of the forgiveness of sins, we shall never know deliverance from sin.
Now sin has no claim whatever on one who has died with Christ. If a really dead man were lying here before me, I could not by any possibility tempt him to sin. And there is no other way of resisting temptation but by reckoning ourselves to have died with Christ. Otherwise I have no vantage-ground to stand on; whereas, by this means I become impervious to Satan's assaults. As I have said, how can you tempt a dead man? Is it not sadly true, that the experience of many of us has been that of successive defeats? I believe the reason of this is, that we have never known what it is to have died with Christ, and so Satan is able to entangle us with his wiles.
Beloved, let us enter into what God teaches us here as to our standing in Christ; that He counts us as having "died with Christ;" that He has in Christ "condemned sin in the flesh," so that He has in His death condemned me as well as my sins.
On passing on to chapter 7., we find we are, secondly, delivered from the law. I am going over fundamental truth in touching on these subjects, We find the apostle here dealing with the law. If we read verse 6, it will do for our purpose. I read it from the "New Translation":
"But now we are clear from the law, having died in that in which we were held, so that we should serve in newness of spirit, and not in oldness of letter."
I need not make the familiar statement as to this, that the law has no application as a rule of life for such as are in Christ.
I pass on to the third thing from which we are delivered, which we find in Gal. 6, where we read,
"God forbid that I should glory, save in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, by whom the world is crucified unto me, and I unto the world."
The death of Christ delivers us, thirdly, from the world. We have first deliverance from sin; second, deliverance from the law; and now we are dead to the world, and consequently delivered from it. It has been said that every trace of Egypt is a reproach to a Christian. If I am crucified to the world, dead to it, by the cross of Christ, by every act in which I associate myself with it, I declare, or rather I deny, in so far as I thus act, that I have died with Christ.
We need to search ourselves with respect to this in the light of that word of God, which is "quick and powerful, and sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing even to the dividing asunder of soul and spirit, and of the joints and marrow, and is a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart." If we took the place boldly of having died with Christ, we should be delivered from the world. You cannot pass down a street of any town without being appealed to, on every side, by the lust of the eye, the lust of the flesh, and the pride of life. How am I to meet and resist these attractions? By holding myself a dead man. I have an answer to every temptation that can appeal to me, because God in His grace tells me that I have died with Christ.
Thus, and thus only, are we delivered from sin, from the law, and from the world.
Let me now return to the passage that I read from Colossians. Here we get deliverance from man.
"Wherefore if ye be dead with Christ from the rudiments of the world, why, as though living in the world, are ye subject to ordinances, (touch not; taste not; handle not; which all are to perish with the using;) after the commandments and doctrines of men? Which things have indeed a show of wisdom in will worship, and humility, and neglecting of the body; not in any honor to the satisfying of the flesh."
I will paraphrase the last part, as it is really rather different to what is given in our translation; thus: "These things are not of any value; they are only for the satisfying of the flesh."
Now, as we all know, there are before God only two men: Adam and Christ. We are taught in this scripture that we are dissociated from man, from Adam, by being set in Christ. If I do not know this truth, that I am associated with Christ, I shall not be able to escape from man. I have no right to give allegiance to any man as having authority over me, especially when he presses religious claims as here; I owe allegiance to Christ only. Then why, it will be asked, are wives to obey their husbands, servants their masters, children their parents? Because the Lord puts them severally in the place of subjection. I take up every relationship in which the Lord puts me, and obey Him in them. Thus I pass through this scene a free man; I am completely delivered from man with all his religious claims; I owe obedience only to Christ, and those whom He tells me to obey.
Let us take up a few instances in illustration of this truth.
Men come perhaps and say: we are bound together to do a great and good thing for the world, one which will benefit humanity, will you help us? I answer, I am glad that you are going to do a great and good thing, but for myself I cannot take part with you in it unless it has the authority of Christ.
In the same way, if a politician seeks to draw me into co-operation with him, let me take the ground of having died with Christ: for then I dismiss politics, for what has a dead man to do with the government of the world? I dismiss societies and human organisations; indeed I refuse every claim, whatever its sanctity in the eyes of man, for the reason that, through association with the death of Christ, I have passed out of the sphere in which these things have their place and home.
We now pass on to the second aspect of our association with Christ. We may notice that the twentieth verse is linked with the twelfth, that is the first part of it. And the last part of the twelfth verse is linked with the first verse of chapter 3, where we read:
"If ye then be risen with Christ."
Now if we are risen with Christ, we have lost our place in this scene. Colossians is peculiar in this respect. The Epistle to the Romans goes as far as having died with Christ, but no further. But when we come to the Epistle to the Colossians we have not only died with Christ, - but we are also raised with Him; though we are still left in this scene. Passing on to the Epistle to the Ephesians we go a step further, as you know, and find ourselves seated
"in heavenly places in Christ Jesus" [Eph 2:6]
But the consequence of our being "risen with Christ" is that we do not belong to this scene at all; we are to
"seek those things which are above, where Christ sitteth on the right hand of God."
Sometimes the question is asked, What are these things? They are all the things that characterise the place where Christ is sitting at the right hand of God, the whole scene of glory of which He is the centre; and we belong to this place because He is there."
Photo by Bobbie Wallace on Unsplash
