St. Paul's Christianity was identification of the Christian with Christ. It was not merely believing a scheme of doctrine, nor following a certain course of devotion, nor accepting an offered grace. It was absolute union with Christ in spiritual experience. Nothing is more characteristic of the apostle than the way in which, in almost every Epistle, he describes the Christian life as going step by step with the life of Christ from the earthly humiliation and death to the heavenly triumph. Here the most essential elements of that experience are pointed out, and the secret of them declared.

I. THE ESSENTIAL CHRISTIAN EXPERIENCE.

1. Crucifixion with Christ. This is no figure of speech, meaning only that, inasmuch as Christ died for us, we may be said to have been crucified representatively in him. The passionate earnestness of St. Paul in describing his own spiritual renewal goes far beyond any such shallow conception. He is plainly describing what he really endured.

(1) This is death. The old life is killed out. The passions, lusts, habits, and associations of the life in sin, self, and worldliness are mortified. Christianity is not simply educational. It is first of all militant - purging, scourging, killing.

(2) This is crucifixion - a painful, violent death; for it is no light matter to destroy the life in sin, so full of pleasant attractions, and so deeply rooted in our inmost nature - and a judicial execution, wrought on us by the vindictive powers of our own treacherous passions when once we turn from them to faith in Christ.

(3) This is a crucifixion with Christ. Our union with Christ necessitates this death of the old life and brings it about. The new wine bursts the old bottles. Conscience and Law fail to destroy the old life, though they reveal its hideous deformity. But when we come to Calvary and reach out to the dying Christ, entering into his experience by faith and vivid sympathy, the old self receives its mortal wounds. Then we can live the former life no longer.

2. Christ living in us. St. Paul feels that he has so given himself up to Christ that the ruling power in him is no longer self but Christ. This is true Christianity.

(1) It is life. We die that we may live. We begin with mortifying the old life, but we do not continue to exist in a barren asceticism. New energies spring up from the grave of the old life.

(2) This life is Christ's. It derives its power from Christ, it is swayed by the will of Christ, it seeks the ends of Christ, it breathes the spirit of Christ, it is lived in personal communion with Christ. Selfish aims and self-devised resources are gone, and in their place the grace of Christ is the inspiration, and the mind and will of Christ are the controlling influences of the new life. This is not a future possibility, but a present attainment. The life is now lived in the flesh.

II. THE SECRET Of THIS EXPERIENCE.

1. It is realized through faith. St. Paul lives "in faith." The power of Christ to destroy the old life and live himself in us depends on our faith in him, and is exercised just in proportion as we yield ourselves to him in trustful reliance and loyal obedience. No fate will make it ours, no mechanical influence will secure it. Intelligently, voluntarily, we must exercise faith in him to be joined to him in crucifixion and new life. Faith is always the greatest bond of union.

2. It is determined by the love and sacrifice of Christ. Here is the motive for our faith. The love of Christ constrains us. The gift of himself for us reveals and confirms his love and brings it home to our hearts. The explanation of the revolution in St. Paul's life, of the death of the persecutor, and the creation of the apostle, is his coming under the influence of these truths. To enjoy the same experience we must

(1) fix our thoughts on the same great, wonderful love and sacrifice of Christ; and

(2) appropriate them personally to ourselves. "He loved me," etc. - W.F.A.

This verse enunciates three striking paradoxes which are realized in the experience of every Christian.

I. THE JUDICIAL PARADOX, or the mystery of the believer's legal standing. The believer, be it remembered, is a dead man to begin with, i.e., before he becomes a believer. In his natural condition he is an unpardoned transgressor, and therefore in the law's eye as good as dead. He is already taken, charged, tried, convicted, sentenced, shut up to the just judgment of wrath, and only waiting the hour of death to meet its execution. But now in Christ, who before the law acted as his representative, and for his sake became obedient unto death, he is executed too. So far as the claims of justice are concerned, he is crucified with Christ, i.e., Christ's crucifixion stands for his, and he personally is free. He has died, and yet he lives!

II. THE SPIRITUAL PARADOX, or the mystery of the believer's inner life. The moment a man becomes a believer, he at the same time becomes the subject of an inward change, by which his old corrupt nature of sin is destroyed, and a new principle of holy life is implanted. Christ lives in him.

III. THE PRACTICAL PARADOX, or the mystery of the believer's outer walk. While living in the body and in the world the believer is not under the dominion of either, but regulates his conduct and conversation by principles superior to both — by faith in the Son of God. Christ's law is his rule of life; Christ's person the object of his love. CONCLUSION:

1. The text examines us about our standing in the eye of the law. Are we crucified with Christ or not?

2. The character of our inner life. Are we spiritual men, or sensuous?

3. Our walk and conversation. Are we walking by faith, or by sight?

(Anon.)

I. THE PERSONALITY OF THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. This verse swarms with I and me. Christianity brings out a man's individuality, not making him selfish, but making him realize his own separate existence, and compelling him to meditate on his own sin, his own salvation, his own personal doom unless saved by grace.

1. In proportion as our piety is definitely in the first person singular, it will be strong and vigorous.

2. In proportion as we fully realize our personal responsibility to God shall we be likely to discharge it. —

II. THE INTER-WEAVING OF OUR OWN PROPER PERSONALITY WITH THAT OF JESUS CHRIST. I think I see two trees before me. They are distinct plants growing side by side, but as I follow them downward, I observe that the roots are so interlaced and intertwisted that no one can trace the separate trees and allot the members of each to its proper whole. Such are Christ and the believer.

1. Dead to the world with Christ.

2. Alive to God in Christ.

3. The link between Christ and the believer — faith.

4. A union of love.

5. A union by sacrifice.

III. THE LIFE WHICH RESULTS FROM THIS BLENDED PERSONALITY.

1. A new life.

2. A very strange life.

3. A true life.

4. A life of self-abnegation.

5. A life of one idea.

6. The life of a man.

7. The life of heaven.

(C. H. Spurgeon.)

Faith is not a piece of confectionery to be put upon drawing-room tables, or a garment to be worn on Sundays; it is a working principle, to be used in the barn and in the field, in the shop and on the exchange; it is a grace for the housewife and the servant; it is for the House of Commons and for the poorest workshop. I would have the believing cobbler mend shoes religiously, and the tailor make garments by faith, and I would have every Christian buy and sell by faith. Whatever your trade may be, faith is to be taken into your daily calling, and that is alone the true living faith which will bear the practical test. You are not to stop at the shop door and take off your coat and say, "Farewell to Christianity till I put up the shutters again." That is hypocrisy; but the genuine life of the Christian is the life which we live in the flesh by faith of the Son of God.

(C. H. Spurgeon.)

Every moment the life of the Christian is to be a life of faith. We make a mistake when we try to walk by feeling or by sight. I dreamed the other night, while musing upon the life of the believer, that I was passing along a road which a Divine call had appointed for me. The ordained pathway which I was called to traverse was amid thick darkness, unmingled with a ray of light. As I stood in the awful gloom, unable to perceive a single inch before me, I heard a voice which said, "Let thy feet go right on. Fear not, but advance in the name of God." So on I went, putting down foot after foot with trembling. After a little while the path through the darkness became easy and smooth, from use and experience; just then I perceived that the path turned: it was of no use my endeavouring to proceed as I had done before; the way was tortuous, and the road was rough and stony; but I remembered what was said, that I was to advance as I could, and so on I went. Then there came another twist, and yet another, and another, and another, and I wondered why, till I understood that if ever the path remained long the same, I should grow accustomed to it, and so should walk by feeling; and I learned that the whole of the way would constantly be such as to compel me to depend upon the guiding voice, and exercise faith in the Unseen One who had called me. On a sudden it appeared to me as though there was nothing beneath my foot when I put it down, yet I thrust it out into the darkness in confident daring, and lo, a firm stop was reached, and another, and another, as I walked down a staircase which descended deep, down, down, down. Onward I passed, not seeing an inch before me, but believing that all was well, although I could hear around me the dash of falling men and women who had walked by the light of their own lanterns, and missed their foothold. I heard the cries and shrieks of men as they fell from this dreadful staircase; but I was commanded to go right on, and I went straight on, resolved to be obedient even if the way should descend into the nethermost hell. By and by the dreadful ladder was ended, and I found a solid rock beneath my feet, and I walked straight on upon a paved causeway, with a balustrade on either hand. I understood this to be the experience which I had gained, which now could guide and help me, and I leaned on this balustrade, and walked on right confidently till, in a moment, my causeway ended and my feet sank in the mire, and as for my other comforts I groped for them, but they were gone, for still I was to know that I must go in dependence upon my unseen Friend, and the road would always be such that no experience could serve me instead of dependence upon God. Forward I plunged through mire and filth and suffocating smoke, and a smell as of death-damp, for it was the way, and I had been commanded to walk therein. Again the pathway changed, though all was midnight still: up went the path, and up, and up, and up, with nothing upon which I could lean; I ascended wearily innumerable stairs, not one of which I could see, although the very thought of their height might make the brain to reel. On a sudden my pathway burst into light, as I woke from my reverie, and when I looked down upon it, I saw it all to be safe, but such a road that, if I had seen it, I never could have trodden it. My journey could only be accomplished in childlike confidence upon the Lord.

(C. H. Spurgeon.)

I. DEATH TO THE LAW IS THE CONDITION OF LIFE UNTO GOD.

1. The part which the law performs in bringing about this death. By its own teaching the law proclaims its impotence, forbids our reliance on it, and prepares the way for Christ who delivers from its bondage.

2. The connection between death to the law and life unto God. Emancipation. Abject slavery exchanged for filial freedom.

II. LIFE UNTO GOD IS A LIFE OF FAITH IN THE SON OF GOD. It introduces the believer to(1) a new power — even the power of a Divine life;(2) a new motive — love. The believer works no longer up to the point of acceptance with God, but from that of sin forgiven and acceptance secured.

(Emilius Bayley, B. D.)

"I am crucified with Christ" — wondrous words! I am so identified with Him that His death is my death. When He was crucified, I was crucified with Him. I am so much one with Him under law and in suffering and death, that when He died to the law I died to the law. Through this union with Him I satisfied the law, yielded to it the obedience which it claimed, suffered its curse, died to it, and am therefore now released from it — from its accusations and its penalty, and from its claims on me to obey it as the means of winning eternal life. By means of law He died; it took Him and wrought its will on Him. As our Representative in whom we were chosen and in whom we suffered, He yielded Himself to the law, which seized Him and nailed Him to the cross. When that law seized Him, it seized at the same time all His in Him, and through the law they suffered and died to it. Thus it is that by the law taking action upon them as sinners they died to the law.

(John Eadie, D. D.)

What principle can tend to cherish tenderness, lowliness, modesty, recollectedness, dignity, quietness in speech and manner, devotion and the winning grace of a pervading charity, so effectually as the abiding consciousness of our Lord dwelling and walking in one's self as a tabernacle of His own gracious election, and in others as in oneself according to the same promise? What can so sustain the soul above natural desires, in a higher sphere of life, in an ever-upward advance towards the glory of the heavenly Court, as the instinctive sense, rooted and grounded in the soul's life, that there is a wedded union between the soul and the Lord who bought it with His own blood, and now Himself within it claims it for His own? What gives so keen a remorse at the hatefulness and horror of sin, as a conviction of its desecrating the organs, the limbs, the faculties which God inhabits and uses as the chosen vessel of His own sanctity? It is not what he himself is that forms the joy of the saint, nor the failing to be what God had willed him to be, that constitutes the remorse of the true penitent; but it is to the one the consciousness that God is in him, and he in God; and to the other the loss of a Presence in Whom alone is peace, and out of Whom is utter darkness. To realize what we are, or what we fail to be, we must appreciate what His abiding in us causes us to be. We can never truly look at ourselves separate from Him. Our power is His power in us. Our efforts are the putting forth of His strength. Our sin is, that after He had come to us, we resisted Him.

(T. T. Carter, M. A.)

Christ liveth in the flesh still, in the body of every believer; not merely Jesus the humbled man, but Jesus the Christ of God; Jesus, who by the resurrection was declared to be the son of God with power, and proclaimed to angels and men as both Lord and Christ! Who liveth in me? Yourself! Nay, I am dead; I am crucified with Christ, nevertheless I live; yet not I — Not thee! Ah, who then? "Christ liveth in me." Yes, the mighty God liveth in thee, believer. Not thyself; not thy poor, weak, helpless self; but Christ by His power, the power of His Spirit liveth in thee. Ah, why then dost thou talk about impossibilities? Why say, "I cannot do this; I cannot do that; I cannot attain to this or to that; I cannot overcome this or that enemy"? Thou speakest foolishly, if thou speakest thus: and if thou now persistest in saying so, thou wilt speak falsely, aye, and blasphemously too: for not thou, but Christ liveth in thee. And who is mighty as He? Is Satan too many for Him who trampled on the power of all His enemies, who triumphed over them openly, and who led captivity captive? Ah, and is the flesh too powerful for Him? Who is the man who says, "I must sin — I must sin; while I continue in the flesh I must continue to sin"? And is sin too great, too powerful for Jesus, for Him who, when in the flesh, a Man of sorrows, encompassed with infirmities, beset by perils, a weak man, overcame it, and remained holy, harmless, undefiled? Did He, when thus weak through the flesh, put sin far away from before His face? And shall He not, now that He sits on the right hand of the Majesty on high, prevail against all your sins? O speak not so lightly of Him and of His power!

(Edward Irving, M. A.)

The Eternal Being gave Himself for the creature which His hands had made. He gave Himself to poverty, to toil, to humiliation, to agony, to the Cross. He gave Himself "for me," for my benefit; but also "for me," in my place. This substitution of Christ for the guilty sinner is the ground of the satisfaction which Christ has made upon the cross for human sin. But on what principle did the Sinless One thus take the place of the guilty? Was it, so to speak, an arbitrary arrangement, for which no other account can be given than the manifested will of the Father? No; the substitution of the suffering Christ for the perishing sinner arose directly out of the terms of the Incarnation. The human nature which our Lord assumed was none other than the very nature of the sinner, only without its sin. The Son of God took on Him human nature, not a human personality. He becomes the Redeemer of our several persons, because He is already the Redeemer of this our common nature, which He has made for ever His own (1 Corinthians 15:20). As human nature was present in Adam, when by his representative sin he ruined his posterity, So was human nature present in Christ our Lord, when by His voluntary offering of His Sinless Self, He "bare our sins in His own body on the tree." Christ is thus the second Head of our race. Our nature is His own. He carried it with Him through life to death. He made it do and bear that which was utterly beyond its native strength. His Eternal Person gave infinite merit to its acts and its sufferings. In Him it died, rose, ascended, and was perfectly well-pleasing to the All-Holy. Thus by no forced or artificial transaction, but in virtue of His existing representative relation to the human family, He gave Himself to be a ransom for all.

(Canon Liddon.)

"He loved me and gave Himself for me." Each sinner, each saint around His cross might have used these words of the apostle. For His blessed mother and St. John; for the Roman judge and for the Roman soldiers; for the chief priest and for the Pharisee; for the vilest and hardest of His executioners, and for the thieves who hung dying beside Him, our Lord gave Himself to death. For all who have been first and greatest, for all who have been least and last in human history, for all whom we have loved or seen, for our separate souls, He gave Himself. True, His creatures indeed are still free to accept and appropriate or to refuse His gift. But no lost soul shall murmur hereafter that the tender loving-kindness of God has not willed to save it. No saint in glory shall pretend that aught in him has been accepted and crowned save the infinite merit, the priceless gifts of his Redeemer. The dying love of Jesus embraces the race, and yet it concentrates itself with direct — as it seems to us — with exclusive intensity upon each separate soul. He dies for all, and yet he dies for each; as if each soul were the solitary object of His incarnation and of His death.

(Canon Liddon.)

A Christian life is the living Christ manifesting Himself. It is the vital power putting forth leaves and fruits — the vine sending out its strength into the branches. It cannot be too deeply impressed upon us that Christianity is a profound connection of the soul with Christ — that it is not the imitation of a splendid model, but the indwelling of a living Person — that the Christ form is only the outward development of the Christ nature, the life manifesting itself after its kind. You all know that the various forms of vegetable creation are sustained and perfected by a secret, silent, but resistless power which we call life. It is this that lifts the oak in the forest am! spreads its mighty branches to the storm; and this that carpets the earth with verdure and decks the fields with teeming flowers. In the great and in the small, in the tree and in the herb, in the pine of the mountain and the grasses of the field, this secret but resistless principle asserts its power. Now, thus is it with us as Christian men; our Christianity is a principle of life; we are not imitations, we are alive; we are not artificial flowers, we are flowers growing in the garden, branches growing in the vine.

(J. W. Boulding.)

Christ is our life. How His life is made to be, at the same time, our own, is a mystery of grace, of which you have seen types in the garden, where just now so many millions of God's thoughts are springing and growing into beautiful expression. You once grafted something on to a fruit tree. The process, though delicate, was most simple. You only had to be careful that there should be clean, clear, close contact between the graft and the tree. The smallest shred or filament of wrapping round the graft would have prevented the life of the tree from flowing into it. The weak, bleeding graft was fastened on to the strong stem just as it was, then in due time it struck, then gradually the tiny slip grew into the flourishing bough, and lately, as you stood looking at that miracle of tender formation and soft bright flush, you almost fancied it was conscious. It seemed to say, "I live; nevertheless not I, but the tree liveth in me; and the life I now live in the foliage, I live by faith in the shaft of the tree. I trust to the tree only; every moment I am clinging to it, and without it I can do nothing."

(Chas. Stanford, D. D.)

My conception of Christ is that He is mine: not mine in any sense which appropriates Him to me alone; but mine as really and truly as though I were the only human being in the universe. My father was absolutely mine, although my next younger brother could say the same thing, and though every brother and sister could say the same thing. I had the whole of him, and each of my brothers and sisters had the whole of him. And I have the whole of my God. The God of all the heaven, and the God of the whole earth, and of time, and of physical law and its sequence, and of all invisible laws and their sequences — He is my God.

(H. W. Beecher.)

We all live in the midst of two worlds — a material world and a spiritual world. The material world is visible to all. We see it, and deal with it, every moment. The spiritual world is visible only to those whose eyes have been supernaturally opened to see it. But the one is as real and as great a fact as the other. They both are close to us. And every. man is a centre round which they both are circulating.

1. The material world is the world of our senses. The spiritual world is the world of our faith. We come into the first at our natural birth; we enter the second at our regeneration. When we have entered it, it is far grander than the other.

2. The material world is beautiful and pleasant, but it has its dark shadows. It is not what it was once made to be. It brings its sorrows, disappointments, and regrets. It is always passing away. And soon, very soon, it will be but as the shadow of a dream! The spiritual world remains unfallen. It is hidden. But all the elements of our immortality are there, and it can never pass away.

3. In the material world are our friendships, ambitions, businesses, professions, earthly work, bodily pleasures. In the spiritual world are the ministrations of angels; the operations of the Holy Ghost, the presence of Christ; the sweet sense of pardon; the peace and love and service of God; an eternity begun; heaven always in sight; thoughts that satisfy; occupations that will never tire; joys that cannot fade. To the man who lives in the spiritual world, the material world is becoming small. He uses it, and enjoys it; but it is not his life. It is his servant, whom he employs; not his master, whom he obeys. And of that great spiritual and eternal world, which is about us everywhere, and in the midst of which, consciously or unconsciously, we are all walking every step, the circumference is glory — the key which opens it is faith — and its centre, from which all radiates and to which all converges, is the Son of God, His person and His work.

(James Vaughan, M. A.)

Life — the higher and truer life of a man — resolves itself into one thing, viz., trust in Jesus. Expand that trust, and you will find it life — life indeed — life for ever. Consider this life. The question was, How can a sinner live at all, and not die? seeing God has said, "The soul that sinneth it shall die;" and every one of us has sinned? Can God falsify His own word?

1. When Jesus died we died. We died in Him. So we have died, and our death is passed. We can live, and God be true.

2. But what makes life? Union with life. Christ is life. We are united to Christ, as a member is united to the head. And as the member lives because the head lives, we live by and in the life of Jesus Christ. That is life.

3. Now life thus possible, and thus made — what is it? Life is to live in every part of our being — body, intellect, heart, soul. Now what can engage the whole man but religion? And what is religion? The indwelling of Christ and the service of God.

4. Then of that life what is the motive power? Love. The love of God. Who can really love God but those who are forgiven, and who therefore can feel, "God is my Father"? And who can say that out of Jesus Christ?

5. And of that life what is the root? The Exemplar, the great Exemplar — the pattern of Christ.

6. What is its aim and focus? To please and glorify Him to whom it owes itself.

7. What is its consummation and rest? The presence, and the image, and the enjoyment, and the perfect service of God throughout eternity.

(James Vaughan, M. A.)

The secret of this life, which alone is life, is faith. And what is faith? Trust. And what is trust? Taking God simply at His word. Now, let us see what God has said concerning this life. God has said — He has repeated it under many forms and by many images — "Believe and live." "Whosoever believeth in Him shall not perish, but have everlasting life." Now you must take that without any deduction, or any qualification, or any condition whatsoever. It is for all sinners — for sinners of every dye — without one single exception! The promise is to every one who will accept it. Accept what? Accept that the Son of God (and no other but the Son of God could do it, for no other would be an equivalent) the Son of God has, by His death, paid all the penalty and cancelled all your debt to God; and so the mandate has gone forth from the throne, "Live!" "Deliver him from going down to the pit; I have found a ransom." That done, your life from that moment — if you have faith enough — may be a life without any fear. Your sins forgiven are sins buried. And buried sins have no resurrection. They shall "never be mentioned." They are "remembered no more."

(James Vaughan, M. A.)

I. THAT SELF-CRUCIFIXION IS THE SOURCE OF LIFE. This is the reason; there is an old life which must utterly perish, that by its death and out of its death the new life may arise.

1. The death of the old life. The life that must be crucified before the Divine life can rise is the self-life in all its forms. Why must man's self-life die? It is the very ground and root of all sin. The assertion of the "I" of the self is the perpetual tendency of the flesh. "I live" is the watch-word of carnalism — there is no sin which is not an assertion of self as the principle of life. Man not always conscious of this, blinded to it. Thus the sensualist may be conscious only of the wild cravings of desire, but by yielding to them he is asserting his passion, his pleasure, to be greater than the law of God. The old self-life must die. Before the Cross, faith and love are self-crucifixion. Faith renounces self and destroys the old life. Love goes out of self to Christ.

2. The awakening of the new life. "Nevertheless I live." This is more than being constrained by any new emotional motive of love; literally Christ was in St. Paul by His Holy Spirit. This is best understood by experience. You know that when you by faith died with Him to the flesh you felt the impulse of a life not yours possessing you, and inbreathing a Divine energy and a heavenly love. Christ living in you will consecrate all.

II. NATURE OF THE LIFE THAT SPRINGS FROM IT.

1. Purity. The inspiration of the indwelling Christ will free from sensual and low temptation; it means perfect devotion to God.

2. Peace. Christ in us calms the troubled spirit; becomes the fulness of emotion.

3. Power. If the self-life is crucified with Christ, and Christ is dwelling in us, we have His power to overcome sin. The Cross-life is power, kingship over self.

(E. L. Hull, B. A.)

Some men have called this doctrine of the real presence of Christ in the soul mystical and untrue. I only know that if it be so, the Bible is mystical and untrue, for the Saviour and His apostles assert it again and again in words which cannot be explained away. They speak little of motives or influences; they speak plainly of man being inspired by the actual contact of God, through the Eternal Spirit. It only seems mystical because we are so prone to fancy that we can explain spiritual processes by outer motives and influences. But what are the motives, what are the influences, which change a man's nature? They are only the words by which we feebly express the great mystery of the real touch of God. All creation seems to me to confirm this spiritual truth. We are driven to believe in the present action of God in the world. We speak of law, but law is only a phrase by which we hide our ignorance. What we call law is the act of God. The seed bursts into life not by dead laws, but the Eternal finger touches it, and it lives. The stars burn, not by dead laws; God's glory smites them, and they light the firmament. The earth moves, not by dead laws; God's arm propels it, and it rolls on its destined path through the untravelled infinity of space. And if the eternal power of the present God thus blooms in the flower, glows in the stars, and is seen in the majestic march of worlds, shall we not much rather believe that the real Spirit of the living Christ is in actual contact with the soul when, crucified with Him, it wakes to a life of immortal beauty? This, then, is the life springing from self-crucifixion — Christ in the soul, forming it into a new creature. Until the old life has perished He cannot live there, for only when the forces of the carnal nature are destroyed can His holy presence dwell within. I cannot describe it, but you may know it.

(E. L. Hull, B. A.)

Peculiar language. One clause seems to contradict another. Yet no real contradiction; but strikingly suitable language to express the mysteries of faith respecting Christ's union with His people, and their consequent participation of the benefits of His sufferings and death.

I. THE BELIEVER'S CRUCIFIXION WITH CHRIST, OR HIS COMMUNION WITH HIM IN HIS DEATH. The meaning is: "The ends of Christ's crucifixion are accomplished in me."

1. Believers are crucified with Christ, in virtue of their legal union to Him as their Head of righteousness. Christ and His people are as one body, one mass; He the Sanctifier, and they the sanctified, are all one.

2. Really and spiritually crucified with Him, through union to Him as their Head of living and quickening influence.

II. THE BELIEVER'S LIFE IN CHRIST, OR COMMUNION WITH HIM IN HIS LIFE.

1. He is invested with a righteousness commensurate to all the demands of the Divine law.

2. With respect to his sanctification also, it may be said that the believer lives — yet not he, but Christ lives in Him.

3. With respect to the life of consolation and glory, it may be said that it is not the believer who lives, but Christ lives in him.

III. THE INFLUENCE OF FAITH IN MAINTAINING THIS LIFE.

1. Faith as the means of our union with Christ, is necessary to our communion with Him, both in His righteousness and His grace.

2. By faith our communion with Christ is carried on, in our receiving of all His benefits.

3. Faith is the means of the spiritual life, as it terminates on the promises, the apprehension of which has so powerful an influence both on our peace and our purity (2 Corinthians 7:1; Psalm 27:13, 14).

4. Faith is the means of the spiritual life, as by bringing eternal things near, it counterbalances the temptations and terrors of the world (1 John 5:5; Hebrews 11:1.).

5. Faith is the means of the spiritual life, as it supplies from its contemplation of the love of Christ fresh motives to obedience and patience (2 Corinthians 5:14).

6. As it refers to the authority of Christ's law, and enables the Christian to perceive the reasonableness even of the most difficult of His precepts, as well as the awful responsibility under which he lies to Christ's judgment (2 Corinthians 5:9-11; Hebrews 11:6).

7. Faith, by making the Christian habitually conversant with spiritual objects and motives of conduct, gives a spiritual character even to the common actions and enjoyments of this natural life.

(M. Willis.)

This extremely bold, startling, and paradoxical assertion of the apostle, is a metaphorical, pictorial statement of a great spiritual truth, about all really Christian life. Every genuine Christian, who is really united to Christ by living faith, has been crucified with Christ; and since he still lives, his life thereafter is the life of Christ in him.

I. THE CONTEXT WILL FURNISH US WITH THE FIRST RAY OF THE LIGHT WE SEEK. St. Paul is combating an error subversive to Christianity itself, viz., ritualism. He declares that if you go back to that — to the old notion that by deeds you can be justified — you are going back again to law, and have left Christ behind,

II. WHAT IS THE UNIVERSAL SPIRITUAL TRUTH REPRESENTED BY THESE IMAGES — "DEAD WITH CHRIST," "CHRIST LIVING IN US"? If you have really gone to God with the prayer and hope of faith, resting on the propitiation of Christ, you have died to sin. It is as if you had been crucified with Christ. It may be that your Christian history contains no moment of mighty conscious change; that your change took place by slow and imperceptible degrees, more like education than conversion. In that case, it would not be likely that you should feel this great truth about yourself as Paul felt it. Your death to sin may have been less like a crucifixion, a sudden, painful, yet blissful, inevitably conscious severance from it, than like a slow, lingering, almost painless process; like a disease whose stages of advance could never be marked by hours or days. But still it is true of you; if you be hoping in God through Jesus Christ our Lord, you have been crucified with Christ to that huge guilt of which law, just and holy law, convicted you; and having thus died to it, you have no more to fear from it. God has severed it and you. And it is now for you to recognize the grand truth, and rejoice in it.

III. THIS CRUCIFIXION HAS RESPECT TO SOMETHING ELSE THAN THE PREVIOUS GUILT OR DEBT TO DIVINE LAW. Sin is not merely an external thing; an ever-accumulating mass of wrong deeds and words, of omissions and neglects. All these are the results of what we are. The seat of sin is in the soul. The working of the evil element has produced evil habits and tendencies. These must be eradicated. The old nature has to be mortified, crucified; and in its place Christ is to reign.

(G. W. Conder.)

Think of a man who is living to himself, without any thought of God, or any earnest endeavour to serve or please Him. Living to gratify only his own tastes, passions, desires, and none else's. Self-interest his law, self-love his inspiration, self-satisfaction his end and aim, self his god. This is the man. Not the caricature of him — his faithful portrait. If he be not living unto God, he must be that; there is no alternative. Look well at him as such. Scan him closely for an instant more, a man whose whole principle, law, motive, aim, end, is self. And now, see him again, emerging, as it were, from Christ's sepulchre with Christ, his hand in his Saviour's, yielding to the loving entreaty of the Lord to come hopefully to God; to confess his sin, and be pardoned. How completely altered his mien! How relaxed that stiff unbending erectness which formerly marked him! How softened down that stern unlovely expression which spoke from his every feature. Surely the proud, harsh, unyielding spirit of self must have been outcast from him, left behind him in the grave of Christ. It is not the same man. God! God's law! ,God's favour! tits anger, His pardon, His help and guidance, that used to be nothing to him, are everything to him now. If he could, he would so grave that law in him as that its force could never depart from him. If he might, he would stay there for ever gazing on God, never to look at anything else, lest he should sin again.

(G. W. Conder.)

Hear the testimony of one who has experienced this. He says to you, "You know my former life. It was I who lived then. It was my ideas, my wishes, my passions, my tastes, which moved me then. But it is not so now. I have seen Christ, I have heard Him, have begun to love Him, and He is to me, in addition to being my glorious and living Friend outside-me, with whom I can converse and to whom I can pray, also a living system of truths, a living revelation of Divine ideas. Truth has laid hold of me by Him; has entered into me; has won my approbation, my choice, aye, my intense desire. Eternity touches me by Him. Law attracts, governs me through Him. God is very near to me in Him. Man is more beautiful and great to me in Him. He is the portrait of what I may be, and desire to be. I see obstacles overcome in Him. Hope fills me from Him. Holiness begins to suffuse me from Him. He is all in all to me. And so my new life is no longer that self-prompted thing it once was. It is, though still my life, because I choose and love it, nevertheless all of it derived, drawn, inspired from Christ. 'I live — nevertheless not I, but Christ liveth in me.'"

(G. W. Conder.)

And now you will see what part faith plays in the matter. Obviously it is the connecting link betwixt that Incarnate Truth and my inner self. Here is a man who once did not see, and therefore could not believe it. And he had no Divine life in him — nothing but what was perishable; all of it, its joys, hopes, attainments — perishable. But, he came at last to see, aye, to believe. The record, the saying, the preaching, was fact in his esteem. And immediately — as the fluid flies along the galvanic wire when it has contact — immediately, by the contact of a living faith, a faith of the heart, the influence, the vitalizing, Divine force of that truth begins to flood his being, and he begins to live a life that shall never rile.

(G. W. Conder.)

I. THE NATURE OF FAITH

1. As described in the Bible.

2. As defined by theological writers.

3. As elucidated by familiar illustrations.

II. THE RELATION OF FAITH TO THE SPIRITUAL LIFE.

1. It is a realizing grace.

2. It is a strengthening grace.

3. It is a receiving grace.

4. It is a uniting grace.

(George Brooks.)

The apostle had said before, that "we are justified by faith alone, and not by the works of the law;" and that a believer was crucified with Christ. Now, says he, this doctrine that I have preached unto you, is no way opposite unto our spiritual life, or unto our holiness; yet, now I live, or "nevertheless I live."

I. EVERY TRUE BELIEVER, EVERY GODLY, GRACIOUS MAN, IS A LIVING MAN, lives a spiritual life, is in the state of life (John 6:40, 47, 48, 54, 55).

1. What is this spiritual life?(1) It is a supernatural perfection (Ephesians 4:18).(2) It rises from our union with Christ by the Spirit.(3) It is that supernatural perfection whereby a man is able to act, and move, and work towards God as his utmost and last end.

2. Whereby may it appear, that every godly, gracious man, is thus a living man, made partaker of this spiritual life, so as to be able to act, and move, and work towards God as his utmost end?(1) Take the life of plants and herbs, or of flowers; and what is the essential property of the vegetative life? It is to grow. So with saints; they grow in grace (Psalm 84:7; Romans 1:27; 2 Corinthians 3:18).(2) What is the essential property of the sensitive life, of the life of beasts and birds? To be sensible of good or evil suitable to it. This is found also in saints (Romans 7:23, 24).(3) What is the essential property of the life of reason? To understand, to know, and to reflect on a man's own actions. This distinguishes a man from a beast. Every godly, gracious man, especially, has this power. So, then, take the argument in the whole, and it lies thus: If a godly, gracious man have all the essential properties of those three lives, in a spiritual way and manner, then certainly he is in the state of life, and doth lead a spiritual life.

3. But how does it appear that others are not in this state of life?(1) He that believeth not is spiritually dead (John 3:36; John 5:40).(a) If we be alive indeed, and made partakers of this spiritual life, why then should we not live at a higher rate than the world do, which have none of this life?(b) If we be alive indeed, and made partakers of this spiritual life, why should our hearts run after the things of the world, so as to feed on them as our meat, to be satisfied with them?(c) If we be alive indeed, why is our communion and fellowship together no more living? A living coal warms.

II. OUR JUSTIFICATION BY FAITH ALONE IS NO ENEMY, BUT A REAL FRIEND TO OUR SPIRITUAL LIFE. How comes this to pass?

1. The more a man forsakes any good thing of his own for Christ, the more Christ is engaged to give a man His good things. There is no losing in losing for Jesus Christ.

2. God never causes any man to pass under any relation, without giving him the ability needed for its duties.

3. The more a man agrees with God and the law, the more fit he is to walk with God and observe the law.

4. Faith establishes a man in the covenant of grace.

(W. Bridges.)

This must be taken in connection with two other texts in this crucifixion Epistle, viz., Galatians 5:24, and Galatians 6:14. The three together exhibit —

I. The ORDER.

II. The CHARACTERISTICS.

III. The PERFECTION of personal religion as fellowship with the Redeemer's death.

I. The sinner, condemned by the law, makes the sacrifice of the great Substitute his own, and is, therefore, legally released from its penalty.

II. The flesh, or the old man remaining in the pardoned believer, is hanged up, and delivered to death in the same mystical fellowship.

III. The saint glorying in Christ crucified as the ground of his acceptance, and the source of his sanctification, is crucified with Rim to the world and all created things that belong not to the new creation. Let us read these words, where they were written, at the foot of the Cross.

(W. B. Pope, D. D.)

I. CHRIST CRUCIFIED.

1. A great mystery.

2. The way to glory.

(1)For Christ.

(2)For us.

3. The ground of our highest glorying.

II. PAUL CRUCIFIED.

1. Sin has a body (Romans 7:24; Colossians 3:5.).

2. Sin and grace cannot co-exist any more than life and death.

3. Kill your runs or they will kill you.

4. And this not only in the matter of notorious crimes, but in the whole carriage of your lives.

5. Thus to be a Christian is a serious thing.

6. Afflict not so much your bodies as your souls.

III. PAUL CRUCIFIED WITH CHRIST.

1. Many are crucified, but not with Christ.

(1)The covetous and ambitious man with the world.

(2)The envious man by his own thoughts: Ahithophel's cross.

(3)The desperate man with his own distrust: Judas's cross.

(4)The superstitious man.

(5)The felon and justly: the cross of the two malefactors.

2. Paul was crucified with Christ.(1) In partnership. Christ s crucifixion is re.acted in us.

(a)In His agony, when we are afflicted with God's displeasure against sin.

(b)In His scourging, when we tame our flesh with holy severity.

(c)In His crowning with thorns, when we bear reproaches for His name.

(d)In His affixion, when all our powers are fastened to his royal commandments.

(e)In His transfixion, when our hearts are branded with Divine love.(2) In person.

(a)As in the first Adam all lived and then died, so in the second Adam all die and are made alive.

(b)Our real union with Christ makes His Cross and Passion ours.

(c)Every believer may comfort himself that having died with Christ he shall not die again.

(Bishop Hall.)

I. Christ dwelling by faith in the heart becomes the principle of a new life.

II. From this life, as an inexhaustible fountain, the believer draws to the supply of his wants and fruitfulness in well doing.

III. What properly distinguishes the believer's life in the flesh and makes it what it is, is its being kept in perpetual fellowship with Christ.

IV. The recognition of the truth that as dying and atoning Jesus becomes a source of new life runs out into appropriating confidence.

(Principal Fairbairn.)

I. DEATH BY SIN.

1. Its guilt makes us liable to condemnation.

2. Its filth, which makes us odious.

3. Its punishment, which is death eternal.

II. THE TREE OF LIFE AFFORDS THE ANTIDOTE TO SIN.

1. The life of justification. The righteousness of Christ, cancelling the obligations of the law, frees us from the first.

2. The life of sanctification, which is Christ in us.

3. The life of joy and cheerfulness, which makes us more than conquerors.

(T. Adams.)

I. Christian enthusiasm is POSSIBLE UNDER GREAT NATURAL DISADVANTAGES.

II. This enthusiasm must BE MAINTAINED BY CONTINUED FAITH IN CHRIST.

III. It is HEIGHTENED BY THE CONSCIOUSNESS OF THE PERSONAL LOVE OF CHRIST.

IV. It is gloriously aroused by THANKFULNESS TO GOD FOR HIS UNSPEAKABLE GIFT.

V. THE CHRISTIAN FEELS FREE to serve Christ enthusiastically BECAUSE CHRIST HAS BORNE THE PENALTY DUE TO SIN.

VI. Christian enthusiasm, so far from CRUSHING INDIVIDUALITY AND INDEPENDENCE, EMPHASIZES THEM.

VII. IT OVERPOWERS UNHEALTHY SELF-CONSCIOUSNESS.

VIII. THE SOURCE OF IT ALL IS THE INDWELLING CHRIST.

(C. Stanford, D. D.)

I. CHRISTIAN EXISTENCE IS A DEATH AND YET A LIFE.

II. THE BELIEVER LIVES AND YET HE DOES NOT LIVE.

III. THE BELIEVER'S LIFE IS A LIFE IN THE FLESH, BUT NOR ACCORDING TO THE LAWS OF THE FLESH.

(T. Hamilton, A. M.)

may be considered with respect to —

I. Its OBJECT, the promises of the new covenant as —

1. Our justification.

2. Sanctification.

3. The supplies of the present life.

4. Everlasting blessedness.

II. Its TRIALS, or the evils that seem to infringe the comfort of the promises.

1. Afflictions.

2. Temptations.

III. Its EFFECTS, as —

1. Holy duties and exercises of grace.

2. The ordinances by which it is fed and increased, as the Word, prayer, and sacraments.

3. The duties of charity, of public and private relations, as honouring God, in our generation and callings.

(T. Hamilton, A. M.)

So called because —

I. He is the REVEALER of it (John 1:17).

II. He is the AUTHOR of it (Hebrews 12:2).

III. He is the OBJECT of it.

(T. Adams.)

I. Its PERSONAL INTEREST.

II. The BURTHEN of it.

III. Its INSPIRING POWER.

(A. J. Muir, M. A.)

The living Person in whom we trust, not the system of precepts which we follow, or of dogmas which we receive, is the centre of the Christian society. The name by which religion in all subsequent times has been known is not an outward "ceremonial" (θρήσκεια) as with the Greeks, nor an outward "restraint" (religio) as among the Romans, nor an outward "law" as among the Jews; it is by that far higher and deeper title which it first received from the mouth of St. Paul, "the faith."

(Dean Stanley.)

A Lent of mortification — "I am crucified with Christ." An Easter of resurrection — "I live, etc."

(Bishop Hall.)

We must have our part with Christ in every part of His Cross. In the transverse, by the ready extension of our hands to all good works of piety, justice, and charity; in the arrectary, or beam, by uninterrupted perseverance in good; in the head, by an elevated hope and looking for of glory; in the foot, by a lively and firm faith, fastening our souls upon the affiance of His free grace and mercy. And thus shall we be crucified with Christ.

(Bishop Hall.)

The phrase carries us back to the historical scene. There Christ was crucified with two thieves. Jesus was crucified with us, that we might be crucified with Him. lie entered into our pain that we might enter into His peace. He shared the shame of the thieves, that Paul might share His glory. This double truth was manifest at the time of Christ's suffering. You remember the penitent thief, as their crosses were lifted side by side, he saw Christ entering into his wretchedness. Before the feeble tortured breath had left the body, he had entered into Christ's glory.

(Phillips Brooks, D. D.)

The other night a friend of mine witnessed a drunken brawl. There was a man there who continued in the brawl, and his wife came out of the crowd and said: "I will go and fetch baby to him; that will bring him out if anything will." Ah! she was a philosopher, though she did not know it. She wanted to get to the deepest part of the man's nature. She did not talk of policemen and prison; she wanted to bring the innocent one before him, as much as to say, "Will you make a thorny couch for this little one to lie upon? Will you forge a dagger with which to pierce this little one's heart?" And in a measure she came in the spirit of the gospel; for the gospel comes to make us hate sin by showing that another suffered and died for it.

(C. Vince.)

This is a striking" point of. union,, between Paul and John; the Pauline form of "He that hath the Son hath life."

(W. B. Pope, D. D.)As the mistletoe, having no root of its own, both grows and lives in the stock of the oak, so the apostle, having no root of his own, did live and grow in Christ. As if he had said, "I live, I keep a noble house, am given to hospitality, but at another's cost, not at mine own. I am beholden to Christ. I have not a farthing of mine own. He carrieth the pack for me, and gives out to me according to my necessities."

(Surinnock.)

The sun might say every morning in the spring, I am come that the earth may have life and have it more abundantly; I am come that the fields may grow, that the gardens and vineyards be more fruitful, that the beauty of the landscape may appear, that the dead may become alive, and the world be filled with joy. And the sun might add, I am the resurrection and the life; I raise the buried flowers and herbs from their graves, and cause them to live. But they perish in the autumn. The Christian shall never perish; never by annihilation, absorption, or eternal misery.

(Thomas Jones.)

Man was made to grow. To stand still in the course of nature is to die. When the force that raised the mountain to its height had ceased, that moment the mountain began to sink again; when the tree stops growing it begins to decay; when the human body has attained its perfection, when the tide of growth has reached its highest mark, it begins to recede. But the life that Christ gives means everlasting progress in knowledge, love, usefulness, and bliss.

(Thomas Jones.)

It was hard for an enthusiast to live in flesh like Paul's. He suffered so much from his eyes that the rough Galatians felt so much for him that they would have been willing to give him their own. He suffered so much from his hands, that when his great heart was full, and he longed to dash off a missionary letter, he was unable to hold a pen. He suffered so much from shattered nerves, that his first appearance among strangers was "in weakness, fear, and much trembling." Who can always be calm and wise and bold, have a commanding presence, and secure a fascinated silence, when he always works in weakness, when pain is ever crashing through the sensibilities, when the smallest frictional touch can sting the life to agony.

(Thomas Jones.)

Plant the tenderest sapling in the ground, and all the elements of nature shall minister to its wants. It shall feed upon the fatness of the earth, its leaves shall be wet with dew, it shall be refreshed with the showers of spring, and the warmth of summer shall cause it to grow. In like manner the man who is rooted in Christ, united to Him by faith and love, shall be energized and made strong for the work which he has to do.

(Thomas Jones.)

All that Christ did and suffered He did for thee as thee; not only as man, but as that particular man, which bears such and such a name; and rather than any of those whom He loves should appear naked before His Father, and so discover the scars and deformities of their sins, Christ would be content to do and suffer as much as He hath done for any one particular man yet. But beyond infinite there is no degree; and His merit was infinite because both an infinite Majesty resided in His person, and because an infinite Majesty accepted His sacrifice for infinite.

(John Donne, D. D.)

When Paul and his companions were shipwrecked at Melita, the apostle set to work like other people to gather fuel for the fire. Even so you and I must take our turn at the wheel. We must not think of keeping ourselves aloof from our fellow-men as though we should be degraded by mingling with them. We are men, and whatever men may lawfully do we may do; wherever they may go we may go. Our religion makes us neither more nor less than human, though it brings us into the family of God.

(C. H. Spurgeon.)

Luther's motto was, Vivit Christus, Christ liveth. How to use life: — Two friends gathered each a rose; the one was continually smelling at it, touching its leaves, and handling it as if he could not hold it too fast; you do not wonder that it was soon withered. The other took his rose, enjoyed its perfume moderately, carried it in his hand for a while, then put it on the table in water, and hours after it was almost as fresh as when it was plucked from the bough. We may dote on our worldly gear until God becomes jealous of it and sends a blight upon it; and, on the other hand, we may, with holy moderateness, use these things as not abusing them, and get from them the utmost good they are capable of conveying to us.

(C. H. Spurgeon.)

We read in English history of the rare affection of Eleanor, wife of Edward

I. The king having received a wound by a poisoned dagger, she put her mouth to the wound to suck out the poison, venturing her own life to preserve her husband's. But the love of Christ was greater than this.

(R. B.)

The great trouble is that people take everything in general, and do not take it to themselves. Suppose a man should say to me: "Moody, there was a man in Europe who died last week, and left five million dollars to a certain individual." "Well," I say, "I don't doubt that; it's rather a common thing to happen," and I don't think anything more about it. But suppose he says: "But he left the money to you." Then I pay attention; I say: "To me?" "Yes, he left it to you." I become suddenly interested. I want to know all about it. So we are apt to think Christ died for sinners; He died for everybody, and for nobody in particular. But when the truth comes to me that eternal life is mine, and all the glories of heaven are mine, I begin to be interested.

(Moody.)

I. WHAT IS THIS FAITH? Faith is a grace, by which we believe God's Word in general, and in a special manner do receive Christ, and rest upon Him for grace here and glory hereafter.

1. There is assent.

2. Consent.

3. Affiance. Resting on Christ.

II. HOW, AND WHY, ARE WE SAID TO LIVE BY FAITH? Distinct graces have their distinct offices. In Scripture language we are said to live by faith, but to work by love. There must be life before operation. Now we are said to live by faith —

1. Because it is the grace that unites us to Christ.

2. Because all other graces are marshalled and ranked under the conduct of faith. It is the first stone in the spiritual building, to which all the rest are added. Without faith, virtue would languish, our command over our passions be weak, and the back of patience quite broken, and our care of the-knowledge of Divine things very small.

3. Because whatever is ascribed to faith, redounds to the honour of Christ. The worth lies in the object, as the ivy receives strength from the oak round which it winds. Faith does all, not from any intrinsic worth and force in itself; but all its power is in dependence upon Christ. We are said to live by faith, as we are said to be fed by the hand; it is the instrument.

4. Because faith removes obstructions, and opens the passages of grace, that it may run more freely. Expectation is the opening of the soul (Psalm 81:10).

III. OBSERVATIONS CONCERNING THIS LIFE.

1. Life must be extended, not only to spiritual duties and acts of immediate worship, but to all the actions of our natural and temporal life. A true believer sleeps, eats, drinks, in faith. Every action must be influenced by religion, looking to the promises.

2. We never act nobly in anything, till we live the life of faith.

3. We never" live comfortably, till we live by faith.

4. The life of faith is glory begun. First we live by faith, and then by sight (2 Corinthians 5:7). Faith now serves instead of sight and fruition (Hebrews 11:1).

(T. Adams.)

Barnabas, Cephas, Galatians, James, John, Paul, Peter, TitusJerusalem, Syrian AntiochBehalf, Body, Christ, Cross, Crucified, Death, Faith, Flesh, Longer, Love, Loved, Nevertheless, Neverthless, Yet1. He shows when he went up again to Jerusalem, and for what purpose;
3. and that Titus was not circumcised;
11. and that he resisted Peter, and told him the reason;
14. why he and others, being Jews, believe in Christ to be justified by faith, and not by works;
20. and that they live not in sin, who are so justified.

Galatians 2:20

     1170   God, unity of
     1680   types
     2048   Christ, love of
     2206   Jesus, the Christ
     2218   Christ, Son of God
     2227   Immanuel
     2324   Christ, as Saviour
     2525   Christ, cross of
     2530   Christ, death of
     3254   Holy Spirit, fruit of
     5110   Paul, teaching of
     5136   body
     5281   crucifixion
     6027   sin, remedy for
     6030   sin, avoidance
     6166   flesh, sinful nature
     6214   participation, in Christ
     6645   eternal life, nature of
     6647   eternal life, experience
     6689   mercy, of Christ
     6746   sanctification, means and results
     6752   substitution
     6755   union with Christ, nature of
     6756   union with Christ, significance
     7028   church, life of
     8020   faith
     8022   faith, basis of salvation
     8102   abiding in Christ
     8116   discipleship, cost
     8296   love, nature of
     8412   decisions
     8451   mortification
     8475   self-denial
     9313   resurrection, spiritual

Galatians 2:14-21

     8316   orthodoxy, in NT

Galatians 2:17-21

     5775   abuse

Galatians 2:19-20

     6139   deadness, spiritual

Galatians 2:19-21

     2414   cross, centrality

Galatians 2:20-21

     1436   reality
     7797   teaching
     8822   self-justification

February 10. "I am Crucified with Christ; Nevertheless I Live" (Gal. Ii. 20).
"I am crucified with Christ; nevertheless I live" (Gal. ii. 20). Christ life is in harmony with our nature. A lady asked me the other day--a thoughtful, intelligent woman who was not a Christian, but who had the deepest hunger for that which is right: "How can this be so, and we not lose our individuality! This will destroy our personality, and it violates our responsibility as individuals." I said: "Dear sister, your personality is only half without Christ. Christ was made for you, and you were …
Rev. A. B. Simpson—Days of Heaven Upon Earth

September 25. "The Faith of the Son of God" (Gal. Ii. 20).
"The faith of the Son of God" (Gal. ii. 20). Let us learn the secret even of our faith. It is the faith of Christ, springing in our heart and trusting in our trials. So shall we always sing, "The life that I now live I live by the faith of the Son of God, who loved me and gave Himself for me." Thus looking off unto Jesus, "the Author and Finisher of our faith," we shall find that instead of struggling to reach the promises of God, we shall lie down upon them in blessed repose and be borne up by them …
Rev. A. B. Simpson—Days of Heaven Upon Earth

December 18. "The Faith of the Son of God" (Gal. Ii. 20).
"The faith of the Son of God" (Gal. ii. 20). Faith is hindered most of all by what we call "our faith," and fruitless struggles to work out a faith which is but a make-believe and a desperate trying to trust God, which must ever come short of His vast and glorious promises. The truth is that the only faith that is equal to the stupendous promises of God and the measureless needs of our life, is "the faith of God" Himself, the very trust which He will breathe into the heart which intelligently expects …
Rev. A. B. Simpson—Days of Heaven Upon Earth

From Centre to Circumference
'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. ii. 20. We have a bundle of paradoxes in this verse. First, 'I am crucified with Christ, nevertheless I live.' The Christian life is a dying life. If we are in any real sense joined to Christ, the power of His death makes us dead to self and sin and the world. In that region, as in the physical, death is the gate of life; and, inasmuch as what we die to in Christ is itself …
Alexander Maclaren—Expositions of Holy Scripture

The Duty of Remembering the Poor
POVERTY is no virtue; wealth is no sin. On the other hand, wealth is not morally good, and poverty is not morally evil. A man may be a good man and a rich man; it is quite certain that very frequently good men are poor men. Virtue is a plant which depends not upon the atmosphere which surrounds it, but upon the hand which waters it, and upon the grace which sustains it. We draw no support for grace from our circumstances whether they be good or evil. Our circumstances may sometimes militate against …
Charles Haddon Spurgeon—Spurgeon's Sermons Volume 2: 1856

"And if Christ be in You, the Body is Dead Because Sin,"
Rom. viii. 10.--"And if Christ be in you, the body is dead because sin," &c. This is the high excellence of the Christian religion, that it contains the most absolute precepts for a holy life, and the greatest comforts in death, for from these two the truth and excellency of religion is to be measured, if it have the highest and perfectest rule of walking, and the chiefest comfort withal. Now, the perfection of Christianity you saw in the rule, how spiritual it is, how reasonable, how divine, how …
Hugh Binning—The Works of the Rev. Hugh Binning

Nor have I Undertaken that in the Present Discourse...
25. Nor have I undertaken that in the present discourse, as it more pertains to thee, who hast laid open the hiding-places of the Priscillianists, so far as relates to their false and perverse dogmas; that they may not seem to have been in such sort investigated as if they were meet to be taught, not to be argued against. Make it therefore more thy work that they be beaten down and laid low, as thou hast made it, that they should be betrayed and laid open; lest while we wish to get at the discovery …
St. Augustine—Against Lying

Or are we Indeed to Believe that it is for any Other Reason...
41. Or are we indeed to believe that it is for any other reason, that God suffers to be mixed up with the number of your profession, many, both men and women, about to fall, than that by the fall of these your fear may be increased, whereby to repress pride; which God so hates, as that against this one thing The Highest humbled Himself? Unless haply, in truth, thou shalt therefore fear less, and be more puffed up, so as to love little Him, Who hath loved thee so much, as to give up Himself for thee, …
St. Augustine—Of Holy Virginity.

Thus the Spirit of Man, Cleaving unto the Spirit of God...
29. Thus the spirit of man, cleaving unto the Spirit of God, lusts against the flesh, that is, against itself: but for itself, in order that those motions, whether in the flesh or in the soul, after man, not after God, which as yet exist through the sickness man hath gotten, may be restrained by continence, that so health may be gotten; and man, not living after man, may now be able to say, "But I live, now not I, but there liveth in me Christ." [1916] For where not I, there more happily I: and, …
St. Augustine—On Continence

So Great Blindness, Moreover, Hath Occupied Men's Minds...
43. So great blindness, moreover, hath occupied men's minds, that to them it is too little if we pronounce some lies not to be sins; but they must needs pronounce it to be sin in some things if we refuse to lie: and to such a pass have they been brought by defending lying, that even that first kind which is of all the most abominably wicked they pronounce to have been used by the Apostle Paul. For in the Epistle to the Galatians, written as it was, like the rest, for doctrine of religion and piety, …
St. Augustine—On Lying

Neither do they Confess that they are Awed by those Citations from the Old...
7. Neither do they confess that they are awed by those citations from the Old Testament which are alleged as examples of lies: for there, every incident may possibly be taken figuratively, although it really did take place: and when a thing is either done or said figuratively, it is no lie. For every utterance is to be referred to that which it utters. But when any thing is either done or said figuratively, it utters that which it signifies to those for whose understanding it was put forth. Whence …
St. Augustine—On Lying

Introduction to Apologia De Fuga.
The date of this Defence of his Flight must be placed early enough to fall within the lifetime, or very close to the death (§1. n. 1), of Leontius of Antioch, and late enough to satisfy the references (§6) to the events at the end of May 357 (see notes there), and to the lapse of Hosius, the exact date of which again depends upon that of the Sirmian Council of 357, which, if held the presence of Constantius, must have fallen as late as August (Gwatk. Stud. 157, n. 3). Athanasius not only …
Athanasius—Select Works and Letters or Athanasius

The Main Current of the Reformation
I One of the greatest tragedies in Christian history is the division of forces which occurred in the Reformation movements of the sixteenth century. Division of forces in the supreme spiritual undertakings of the race is of course confined to no one century and to no one movement; it is a very ancient tragedy. But the tragedy of division is often relieved by the fact that through the differentiation of opposing parties a vigorous emphasis is placed upon aspects of truth which might otherwise have …
Rufus M. Jones—Spiritual Reformers in the 16th and 17th Centuries

Whether God Became Incarnate in Order to Take Away Actual Sin, Rather than to Take Away Original Sin?
Objection 1: It would seem that God became incarnate as a remedy for actual sins rather than for original sin. For the more grievous the sin, the more it runs counter to man's salvation, for which God became incarnate. But actual sin is more grievous than original sin; for the lightest punishment is due to original sin, as Augustine says (Contra Julian. v, 11). Therefore the Incarnation of Christ is chiefly directed to taking away actual sins. Objection 2: Further, pain of sense is not due to original …
Saint Thomas Aquinas—Summa Theologica

Bread and Wine Cont.
(4) We have yet to ask the great question, what is the specific blessing expressed by the elements, and therefore surely given to the faithful by the sacrament. Too many are content to think vaguely of Divine help, given us for the merit of the death of Christ. But bread and wine do not express an indefinite Divine help, they express the body and blood of Christ, they have to do with His Humanity. We must beware, indeed, of limiting the notion overmuch. At the Supper He said not "My flesh," but "My …
G. A. Chadwick—The Gospel of St. Mark

The Great Debt She Owed to Our Lord for his Mercy to Her. She Takes St. Joseph for Her Patron.
1. After those four days, during which I was insensible, so great was my distress, that our Lord alone knoweth the intolerable sufferings I endured. My tongue was bitten to pieces; there was a choking in my throat because I had taken nothing, and because of my weakness, so that I could not swallow even a drop of water; all my bones seemed to be out of joint, and the disorder of my head was extreme. I was bent together like a coil of ropes--for to this was I brought by the torture of those days--unable …
Teresa of Avila—The Life of St. Teresa of Jesus

Relation ii. To one of Her Confessors, from the House of Dona Luisa De La Cerda, in 1562.
Jesus. I think it is more than a year since this was written; God has all this time protected me with His hand, so that I have not become worse; on the contrary, I see a great change for the better in all I have to say: may He be praised for it all! 1. The visions and revelations have not ceased, but they are of a much higher kind. Our Lord has taught me a way of prayer, wherein I find myself far more advanced, more detached from the things of this life, more courageous, and more free. [2] I fall …
Teresa of Avila—The Life of St. Teresa of Jesus

Estimate of the Scope and Value of Jerome's Writings.
General. The writings of Jerome must be estimated not merely by their intrinsic merits, but by his historical position and influence. It has already been pointed out that he stands at the close of the old Græco-Roman civilisation: the last Roman poet of any repute, Claudian, and the last Roman historian, Ammianus Marcellinus, died before him. Augustin survived him, but the other great Fathers, both in the East and in the West, had passed away before him. The sack of Rome by Alaric (410) and …
St. Jerome—The Principal Works of St. Jerome

Galatians.
The Commentary is in three books, with full Prefaces. Book I., Ch. i. 1-iii. 9. Addressed to Paula and Eustochium, a.d. 387. The Preface to this book begins with a striking description of the noble Roman lady Albina, which is as follows: Only a few days have elapsed since, having finished my exposition of the Epistle of Paul to Philemon, I had passed to Galatians, turning my course backwards and passing over many intervening subjects. But all at once letters unexpectedly arrived from Rome with the …
St. Jerome—The Principal Works of St. Jerome

Twentieth Day. Holiness and Liberty.
Being made free from sin, ye became servants of righteousness: now present your members as servants of righteousness unto sanctification. Now being made free from sin, and become servants unto God, ye have your fruit unto sanctification, and the end eternal life.'--Rom. vi. 18, 19, 22. 'Our liberty which we have in Christ Jesus.'--Gal. ii. 4. 'With freedom did Christ set us free: stand fast therefore, and be not entangled again in a yoke of bondage.'--Gal. v. 1. There is no possession more …
Andrew Murray—Holy in Christ

Charity and Rebuke.
And now abideth faith, hope, charity, these three; but the greatest of these is charity.--1 COR. xiii. 13. The second main point of difference between a true and a false Charity, we want to remark, is, Divine Charity is not only consistent with, but it very often necessitates, reproof and rebuke by its possessor. It renders it incumbent on those who possess it to reprove and rebuke whatever is evil--whatever does not tend to the highest interests of its object. This Charity conforms in this, as …
Catherine Booth—Godliness

Second Great Group of Parables.
(Probably in Peræa.) Subdivision A. Introduction. ^C Luke XV. 1, 2. ^c 1 Now all the publicans and sinners were drawing hear unto him to hear. 2 And both the Pharisees and scribes murmured, saying, This man receiveth sinners, and eateth with them. [For publicans see p. 76, and for eating with them see p. 349. The Pharisees classed as "sinners" all who failed to observe the traditions of the elders, and especially their traditional rules of purification. It was not so much the wickedness of …
J. W. McGarvey—The Four-Fold Gospel

The Critical Reconstruction of the History of the Apostolic Age.
"Die Botschaft hör' ich wohl, allein mir fehlt der Glaube." (Goethe.) Never before in the history of the church has the origin of Christianity, with its original documents, been so thoroughly examined from standpoints entirely opposite as in the present generation. It has engaged the time and energy of many of the ablest scholars and critics. Such is the importance and the power of that little book which "contains the wisdom of the whole world," that it demands ever new investigation and sets …
Philip Schaff—History of the Christian Church, Volume I

This Question I Should Briefly Solve, if I Should Say...
24. This question I should briefly solve, if I should say, because I should also justly say, that we must believe the Apostle. For he himself knew why in the Churches of the Gentiles it was not meet that a venal Gospel were carried about; not finding fault with his fellow-apostles, but distinguishing his own ministry; because they, without doubt by admonition of the Holy Ghost, had so distributed among them the provinces of evangelizing, that Paul and Barnabas should go unto the Gentiles, and they …
St. Augustine—Of the Work of Monks.

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