Living in the Life of Christ

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The Reading of God’s Word – Colossians 3:12-17

Put on then, as God’s chosen ones, holy and beloved, compassionate hearts, kindness, humility, meekness, and patience, 13 bearing with one another and, if one has a complaint against another, forgiving each other; as the Lord has forgiven you, so you also must forgive.

14 And above all these put on love, which binds everything together in perfect harmony.

15 And let the peace of Christ rule in your hearts, to which indeed you were called in one body. And be thankful.

16 Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly, teaching and admonishing one another in all wisdom, singing psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, with thankfulness in your hearts to God.

17 And whatever you do, in word or deed, do everything in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God the Father through him.

Prayer Warm up

Good morning my name is Eric Mattie I serve as one of the Elders here at LEFC. Pastor The title of today’s message is Living in the Life of Christ

Where we are in Chapter 3...

The apostle Paul is encouraging the Colossian believers that maturing in their spiritual lives does NOT consist of secret mystical revelation or self-punishing disciplines. Rather it is through understanding and living on the basis of the believer’s union with Christ’s death, resurrection and future appearing.

Now remember In Chapter 3 Paul is showing the Colossians how their identification in Christ leads to a new way of life.

For Paul, He is saying that our life is bound up in Christ who has done an inside work on giving us new life. Remember I went through the short list on how people summarize their life based on something external to them. But that is not how Paul see this at all.

So Paul summarizes that our life is now

· A union in Christ Resurrection v 1,2

· A union in Christ’s Death v 3 and

· union in Christ appearing v 4

Last week I went through the front part of chapter 3 explaining both our union in Christ death and our union in Christ’s appearing.

I highlighted not so much what Christ’s death accomplished in satisfying the wrath of God and provide peace and forgiveness and eternal life. Those are all fruit of the Gospel and main components we rejoice as a Body that we are offered that grace.

Rather the aspect I focused on is what Christ death effected in our spiritual reality. It broke the ties that bind us to our old sinful self, the world and the devil.

· We are born again into a nature that has broken ties to sin,

· born again into sin that is canceled

· and born again with new ability to say no to sin.

And from that I challenged all of us to put to death sin in our own lives

So that’s the review and I want to pick it up where I promised I would take this week and that is to look at the very first aspect about our union with Christ resurrection

New realize Paul’s call to put sin to death is done so for a reason. And that reason is that is that we may have life and have it abundantly.

That abundant life is enjoyed by believers union in Christ resurrected life. Let me give the main point of today’s message then we will dive in.

Paul is saying in a nutshell in Chapter 3...

Your Life in Christ is a Union in His Resurrection. Therefore we are to be Living in the Life of Christ

So here we have the main declarative idea And then

And then main point of action

However each needs a little more explaining

Your Life in Christ is a Union in His Resurrection

EXPLANATION AND BIBLICAL BASIS

“If then you have been raised with Christ,…” Colossians 3:1

And again this points right back to chapter 2:12 where the apostle is declaring to them the reality that…

”… you were also raised with him through faith in the powerful working of God, who raised him from the dead.” Col 2:12

Paul talks about the same powerful work of God in Romans:

“We were buried therefore with him by baptism into death, in order that, just as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, we too might walk in newness of life.

For if we have been united with him in a death like his, we shall certainly be united with him in a resurrection like his.” Romans 6:4, 5

· Paul is emphasizing that just as we are united in his death we are united in his resurrection.

In Galatians, Paul explains further that,

I have been crucified with Christ. It is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me. And the life I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me. Galatians 2:20

· That phrase “Christ who lives in me…” was again one of those phrases that escaped my early Christian walk.

· I mean the confusing phrases of having Christ in my heart and The Spirit filling me and now Christ living in me… how does that work? I mean does Jesus walk with a limp to now or am I like a muppet that some else controls me from the back?

THE ESSENCE OF CHRIST BEING OUR LIFE

· Many will say that our life should look like the very verses I preached on last week. That it is a life centered around putting sin to death.

· And I do concur that killing sin is an essential part of taking up our cross, denying our self and follow Jesus. It is a daily lifestyle of repentance.

· I mean I have a website dedicated to that aspect called killsin.com

But while it is an essential part of the Christian’s daily walk, it is not the essence of Christ being our life.

We understand that just as there is a death that has happened, we also know a new creation has come into being.

In fact look at 2 Corinthians 4:16:

“Though our outer self is wasting away, our inner self is being renewed day by day.”

Colossian pinpoints by saying:

“Do not lie to one another, seeing that you have put off the old self with its practices and have put on the new self, which is being renewed in knowledge after the image of its creator. Colossians 3:9, 10

Two things we need to notice here: