Alive in Christ

EPISODE SUMMARY

God isn’t seeing the old you when He looks at you, because He knows that Jesus already dealt with that on the cross. This means that God is no longer dealing with your behavior. Instead, He’s focused on developing your new identity in Jesus.

Jesus invited us into a new relationship with God.

Remember, in Acts 4:13, when the religious leaders were watching Peter and John? They were perplexed. These guys didn’t have an education, but they had been transformed by years of walking and talking with Jesus.

“Now when they saw the boldness of Peter and John, and perceived that they were uneducated and untrained men, they marveled. And they realized that they had been with Jesus.”

At the cross, the mold was broken as to how to have a relationship with God. It was no longer about keeping all the rules and regulations and only getting to be in His presence a few times a year at the temple. Jesus gladly took the initiative to break the mold; walking and talking with His people in a new and living way.

The cross freed us to become like Him.

Jesus came talking about the Kingdom, and we now have a realm that is in direct competition with the world. The Kingdom is concerned with upgrading all of our life experiences so that we live in the relationship that Jesus has with the Father and the Holy Spirit. This is the essence of what it means to have Christ in us, and for us to be in Him.

When God broke the mold of the old you on the cross of Christ, He set you free to become a unique expression of His true nature. It’s true that you’re being recreated in His image, which is God’s original purpose in Genesis 1:26. Our revelation of His nature of freedom expands when we realize what has already been accomplished at the Cross.

The old man is dead and we are now alive in Christ.

When Jesus said, “It is finished,” the mold was irreversibly broken in that moment.

If someone is standing with a huge platter, and they drop it, and it shatters … there’s no putting it back together. The finished work of the cross is becoming absolute in our minds and in our heart.  The old you was shattered. Your true freedom is that you are dead and your life is  hidden with Christ in God (Colossians 3:3).

There is no more “old you” to fix up. Your old man does not exist.  God sees you in the New Man, which is Christ in you.  That is the whole new focus.  

Want to learn more? Tune in to today’s podcast as we learn about the astonishingly good news of the cross.

As always, thanks for listening!

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