Living the Paradox: Life in Christ and the Body

"well we're into the second stage of the journey that we've called The Inside Story we began looking at the inside story of human life and we have progressed to look at the inside story of the Christian Life what do you make of the Christian Life how do you find tying together what the Bible says about it and your own experience of it if you're a Christian you've died to sin but if you're like me you probably find that sin is pretty much alive towards you its presence is obvious I wonder if you've notic the contradictions in your own Christian Life um you love Christ so why is it then that you're drawn to sin uh you trust Christ so why is it then that you struggle with so many fears and so many anxieties I don't know about you but I often find that I am a mystery to myself do you find that about your Christian Life you think now I I don't fully understand exactly what's going on inside of me as a Christian well that's the reason why we're looking at the inside story of the Christian life so that we can get a better handle on what it means to be a Christian and if you're not yet a Christian what it would be like what you could expect if you were to become a Christian even today" [00:03:24]

"Galatians Chapter 2 and verse 20 I want to draw your attention to what I think is one of the greatest statements about the Christian Life in all of the Bible to me it has been one of the most profoundly helpful in all of the New Testament many of you will be familiar with it Galatians chapter 2 and verse 20 we read these words I have been crucified with Christ and I no longer live but Christ lives in me and the life I live in the body I live by faith in the Son of God who loved me and gave himself for me uh Spurgeon says about this verse uh quote your life as a Christian is a very strange one I am crucified nevertheless I live how do you hold these two things together what a contradiction he says the Christian's life is a matchless riddle no worldly person can comprehend it and even the believer himself cannot fully understand it he knows it but solving all its enigmas he feels to be an impossible task" [00:130:44]

"do you notice that Paul describes the Christian Life in two ways first he says the Christian Life is a life that is lived in the body the life that I live in the body and then secondly he describes this life that is lived in the body is a life lived by faith in the Son of God who loved me and gave himself for me so here are two uh touchstones of the Christian Life here are two handles as it were that you can get on the Christian Life the Christian Life is lived in the body and the Christian Life Is by faith in the Son of God these two statements will give you a firm handle on the Christian Life as it is in the Bible and as you will experience it every day of your walk with Christ your Christian Life is lived in the body and what that means is that you will always feel the pool of the flesh as long as you live in this world you will find that there are times when you lack courage there are times when you lose heart you will find times when you lament your own failure you may experience sickness you will experience at some point weakness uh eventually if Christ has not come within the span of your lifetime you will like the vast majority of other believers EXP experience death itself on the way there you may experience depression on the way there you may experience anxxiety doubt feelings of inadequacy uh loneliness all of this flows from the reality that Paul States here that we live the Christian Life in the body in this physiological reality I live this life in the body but that is not the whole story" [00:278:80]

"second handle on the Christian Life your Christian Life is lived by faith in the Son of God as Christ is for you he's saying do Christ is with you his Spirit lives in your body and what that means is that you can look to him and you can count on him in every circumstance of your life what he's saying here then is that it is Christ's presence that makes it possible for you to live this difficult and challenging life in the body because Christ's power makes it possible for you to live this life with all of its struggles and with all of its difficulties and that power is appropriated to you and by you as you exercise Faith so think with me for a moment to give an illustration here about the Metra train making its way in every morning and coming out every evening from Chicago the train runs runs on Twin tracks and if you like to think about it that way thinking about these parallel tracks that we cross so many times the Christian Life runs on the twin tracks of these realities you are in Christ and you are in the body both of these things are true so long as you are living in this world and just as the metr train needs two tracks to get into Chicago so you need a firm grip on these two realities in order order to make sense of the Christian Life get hold of one without the other and you'll always be in confusion you'll be saying why is the Christian Life as it is why am I so far from the realities of the Bible the Christian life then is in Christ and it is in the body and once you grasp that you'll begin to see and make sense of your own experience sin dwells in you by the flesh Christ dwells in you by the spirit as long as you're living this Christian Life you're engaged in some kind of conflict with the world and the Flesh and the devil and the reason that you're able to engage in this particular struggle is that Jesus Christ lives in you being in Christ means that you have new life being in the body means that you have new battles and that's our title today new life and new battles" [00:396:59]

"2 Corinthians chapter 1 and verses 8 and9 is the first of these 2 Corinthians chapter 1 and verse uh 8 and uh n um look at the new battle here uh Paul says we do not want you to be uninformed Brothers about the hardships that we suffered in the province of Asia we were under great pressure and it was far beyond our ability to endure so that we despaired even of Life indeed in our hearts we felt the sentence of death now you see the battle written all over there he says to translate it another way we were utterly unbearably crushed that was part of his experience of the Christian Life but notice at the same time he then says in this verse but this happened that we might rely not rely on ourselves but on God who raises the dead and you see the power of that he's experiencing the new battle and the new life at precisely the same time he is not saying I once was in a terrible battle but of course now I'm in Christ all of that is behind me no he said the new life in Jesus Christ is what made it possible for me to stand and to endure when I felt utterly unbearably crushed and when I felt even the sentence of death coming over my own life new battle New Life" [00:583:72]

"2 Corinthians chapter 4 and two verses here verse 11 and verse 16 notice the battle in verse 11 we who are alive are are always being given over to death for Jesus sake always being given over to death I mean you remember how Paul speaks later in this letter about being Shipwrecked and being flogged and being persecuted I mean this is real experience he had the wounds in his own body to demonstrate it but then he says look at the life here we're always being given over to death for jesus' sake so that his life may be revealed in our mortal body Life of Christ is being evidenced in this Apostle standing up under this and continuing to serve Christ and to go on as a missionary verse 16 he's making the same Point again the twin realities we do not lose heart though outwardly we are wasting away so here's a Christian who physically his body is in Decline but he says at the same time in inwardly we are being renewed day by day there's the reality both of life in the body and the reality of Life In Christ and these two things are happening to the Apostle at the same time" [00:679:44]

"2 Corinthians chap 12 and verses 7-9 you may know these verses well here's a here's the battle verse 7 there was given to me a thorn in the flesh a messenger of Satan to torment me and three times I pleaded with the Lord to take it away oh God please take away this Affliction in my life Satan's tormenting me see there's the conflict there's the battle but notice the new life but Christ said to me my grace verse is sufficient for you my power is made perfect in weakness and Paul says therefore I will boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses so that Christ's power May rest on me so this is the same Apostle who on one occasion captured these things in just two phrases he said who is sufficient for these things I look at my life it all seems overwhelming who is sufficient for these things that I face that's life in the body isn't it you ever felt that I know I have but you see that's one of the twin realities of the Christian life because in the very next line he says but our sufficiency is of God the battle the life in the body by faith in the Son of God who loved me and gave himself for me" [00:838:44]

"the Christian is at peace with God but he is at war with sin see a true Christian um someone has said is known as much by his War as by his peace if you think of the Christian Life only in terms of oh well I have peace with God and so I should experience all this wonderful peace all the time then you've got one handle and you want have a clear grasp of what the Christian life is to be at peace with God also means that you're at war with sin and that is why the Christian is known as much by his Conflict by his struggle as he is by his experience of Peace grasp one without the other you really will never understand or make sense of the Christian Life" [00:970:44]

"the Christian is done with sin but sin is not done with the Christian now that's important when you read a passage like Romans in chapter 6 in verse 2 you know we have died to sin the Bible says or when you read um 1 John in chapter 3 and verse nine and John says you cannot go on sinning if you've been born of God you you no longer sin and yet at the same time um in 1 john8 we're told if a man says that he is without sin he deceives himself and the truth is not in him how are we to put these things together simply this way that to be a Christian means that a decisive break has been made with sin you are not the person you were you are done with sin but sin is not done with you" [00:1074:12]

"the Christian lives in the power of the spirit but he or she also experiences the weakness of the flesh see don't expect that the power of the holy spirit will make you feel on Tuesday evening to take a random point in the week like you are standing on the Victor's Podium taking your bow for your performance in the Christian Life during that day you will not have that experience not the side of of heaven and then you will be on your face and on your knees in adoration before Christ no the power of the holy spirit is what makes it possible for you to persevere in the challenges that you face on Tuesday of this week" [00:1134:64]

"here's another way of putting it just trying to get the the twin tracks of the Christian Life here sin is no longer your master that's wonderfully triumphantly true of you in Jesus Christ but sin will always be your enemy so long as you are living in this body wonderful statement in Romans chapter 6 and verse 14 sin shall no longer be your master but it is always your enemy let me give you a picture this has helped me and maybe it'll help at least a few of us imagine a war is taking place between two armies and picture yourself engaged in the conflict here we are together and uh we're behind some rocks and we're taking heavy enemy fire and eventually our Escape Route is cut off and we're surrounded and we're captured you surrender your weapons and you're carted off together with the others in your unit and eventually you arrive at a place where you're going to be imprisoned it is like a massive cage whole crowd of people are already there Inside the Cage is opened you're roughly thrown in there and uh when you begin to get oriented to where you are you realize that this place is being run by a man who looks absolutely terrifying he shouts out orders and all the people who have been there for some time do exactly what he says and you value your life so you decide you're going to do exactly the same for the next year your whole life is in the cage you eat you sleep you exercise but all the time you are under the power of you the enemy you are in the cage and you have no alternative really but to do what he says to you and there isn't a way out as long as you're in the cage there is absolutely nothing you can do to overcome the enemy then one night as you're sleeping you hear an extraordinary noise and a commotion and suddenly you realize what is happening your captain has come and he's brought all of his forces and he's making an assault on the cage in order to set you free the locks on the cage burst open uh he he he grabs you from where you are and together with the others he he he loads you into a Jeep and off you go and up into the hills and and your captain then hands you a weapon you haven't had one in your hands for a year he says you'll need this you're back in the battle now the next day you're up there in the hills and the man who's been running the cage he comes out and he's looking for you and he has all of his forces with you and here we are the unit and now we're armed and now we're out in the open we're in an entirely different position the man who's run the cage of course is shouting orders he's got this loud hailer and he's saying now you come back in you shouting all kinds of orders of course you don't pay attention to him why you're not in the cage you're free but now you're in a battle and he will hunt you as long as you live and you will always need your weapon and you must always be on your guard and when he is gone others will come after you but you're not in the cage you're free but being free means you're in the fight that's the point sin is no longer your master you're not in the cage that's Romans 6:14 but friend sin will always be your enemy you will always be fighting this will always be your battle and how will it be waged as long as you are in the body it will be waged by faith in the Son of God who loves you and who gave himself for you" [00:1442:64]