ALL THINGS OUT FROM GOD

All Things are Out From God Part 3 Necessity of the Cross A. The Cross is not merely a THING in which to believe. Neither is the death of Jesus merely an historical event upon which to rest my faith. Of course, without the historical event nothing else would be possible. But our faith is NOT to be in the Cross. It is to be in the One who died on it. Our faith is to be in Christ – the living Christ with whom we are one in spirit. And if it is, then we are planted into His death and into His resurrection. B. We will be crucified with Christ because we are one with the One who was crucified for us. We will be raised with Christ because we are one with He who was raised for us. We will be seated in heavenly places with Christ because He is seated in heavenly places, and we are joined to Him. Thus, the object of our faith is the Person of Jesus Christ – right now, the very Christ who dwells in us. For if we are planted into Christ by faith, abiding in Him, then we will likewise be planted into all He has done and all that is in Him. C. Note the distinction between having received all in Christ, and having experienced Christ. Despite the finished reality found in Christ, and having received all that is in Him, it is nevertheless a fact that when Christ joins us to Himself, we have just begun. This is why, even though in Christ we are complete – that is, have all that God has to give – this is why the purpose of God must be to now unfold the Christ to us, and bring into our experience all that is in Him. D. But, It is one thing to have all things in Christ. It is another to actually come to learn, know, see, and experience all those things that are in Christ. Israel was given all of the land before they ever set foot in it. But they still needed to enter in and take possession of all that God had already given to them. E. Here is where the conflict begins. When we encounter problems in life – problems that demand solutions, resources, and wisdom – how do we respond? God says to abide in Christ. He is, and carries, all that we will need. But unfortunately, we do not easily abide in Christ. Rather, we draw upon ourselves or upon something of this world. And most of us don’t even realize what we are doing. We barely know the difference. F. The only way in which a person in whom Christ dwells is ever going to learn the Truth of abiding in Christ is if the work of the Cross has God’s way with them. And in order for God to have His way with us, we must PICK UP our cross and lose our lives – as Jesus said in Matthew 16:24-25. The admonition to pick up our Cross shows that we have to choose to yield to God. G. But his yielding is not so much a matter of figuring out what to do. It is a matter of saying to God, “LORD, do in my life whatever it takes to bring me into the fullness of Christ. Do whatever it takes through the Cross I will pick up to bring me to where I will realize Christ and abide in Him.” God has to do this – and the first step is death to the old. But we have to pick up the Cross – we have to embrace Him. H. The work of the Cross will bring us to the place where we are absolutely and joyfully convinced that there is NOTHING in us – nothing outside of that circle in our natural makeup – carries LIFE. We will see by experience that no resource found in natural man can enable us to walk with God. Do we know this to the point where we voluntarily desire to see the death of all that we are in Adam, so that we might come into the fullness of Christ? Can we honestly say that we do not want to draw upon ourselves for life, and that we will aren’t even going to try? Well, we probably won’t come to this place without some hard but necessary lessons – but we must come to this place in order to be free in Christ. I. Most people in Christ spend years trying to live the Christian life by drawing from their natural man. We still think that God wants to salvage something from us and bring it into the new creation. We still think that Jesus Christ died to bring out our latent greatness, or to enhance the good things about us, or to fix up our old man and make him fit for God’s use. No. Jesus Christ came to die so that the Adam life could die in Him. If anyone is in Christ Jesus, he is NOT, “an old fixed up creation.” No. He is a new creation, and all of that newness is FROM OUT OF GOD in Christ. J. It is essential that we see that Christ is ALL for the believer – but we will never see that He is all until we at least begin to see that we are NOTHING. This is the TRUTH we must see. And any other basis for living is deception.