Author: Dana

One of my students shared this week about serving in the city during the Thanksgiving holidays. A few teachers and a bunch of teenagers spent several nights in a church and went out to feed the poor, encourage the hopeless, and invite all to follow Jesus. My student shared with his teenage classmates the clear difference he saw between two opposite kingdoms. So much is obvious: light/darkness, order/chaos, peace/anxiety, freedom/bondage, life/death… but at the end of his talk, he made an interesting statement. “The devil is just as active here where we live as in the inner city.”

I think we would all agree, but we don’t think about it too much because the enemy’s tactics are subtle and the results may not be as obvious: sincerity/hypocrisy, kindness/judgment, contentment/greed, generosity/stinginess, passionate/lukewarm… As always, Jesus is our Answer… He must be my Center, my Source, my Life. If I know I am lukewarm, the solution is not to pretend to be passionate… then I would be a lukewarm hypocrite. No, I must go to Jesus and confess a cold heart. He is the God of holy fire. He can make me passionate and there will be nothing fake about it. If I am consumed with ‘stuff’, I must go to Jesus who reminds me that even gaining the whole world does no good for eternity. When I experience his priceless love, I’ll want to share this love and my ‘stuff’ with those in need. If my kindness is lacking, I need to sit at the feet of Jesus, the Fountain of kindness. Then I must do exactly as He instructs. He’ll show me how to live while molding me into his image.

As we clothe ourselves with Christ, we have everything we need to stand strong in the kingdom of Light. His truth is around the waist (“I am the way and the truth and the life” – Jn 14:6). His righteousness protects the heart as a breastplate (“He is our righteousness” – I Cor 1:30). His faith extinguishes the arrows of the evil one (“He is the author and perfecter of our faith” – Heb 12:2). The gospel of peace makes our feet ready to go anywhere He leads (“For He himself is our peace” – Eph 2:14). His salvation protects the mind and gives us confidence to come to the Father (“He became the source of eternal salvation for all who obey him” – Heb 5:9). And He is the sword that cannot be defeated (“In the beginning was the Word and the Word was with God and the Word was God” – Jn 1:1). (See Eph 6:10-18)

“The Lord is gracious and compassionate, slow to anger and rich in love. The Lord is good to all; He has compassion on all that He has made. As far as the East is from the West, that is how far He has removed our transgressions from us. Praise the Lord, oh my soul, praise the Lord.”

“For He has rescued us from the dominion of darkness and brought us into the kingdom of the Son He loves, in whom we have redemption, the forgiveness of sins.” (Col 1:13-14)

Watchman Nee, a Chinese preacher imprisoned the last twenty years of his life, taught that the first four verses of Romans 7 tell a story about a woman and two men. The first man is this woman’s husband and he is unquestionably perfect. She is far from perfect and, try though she might, she can never fully please him. Oh to be married to the second man, who also is perfect but with a difference… He is full of grace and mercy. If the first husband died, she could marry the second, but there is no chance of him dying. The first man will never pass away. What a hopeless situation!

There is one other way the woman can be released from her first husband… if she dies. And that, says the apostle Paul, is what has happened to all who are in Christ. The first husband represents the Law… exact, perfect, and eternal. The second husband is Jesus… perfect, eternal, and fulfilling the Law completely. We are the woman… human, imperfect, and in great need of help. Married to the Law, we could never measure up. But when Christ died, we died… for we are in Him. “For we know our old self was crucified with Him so that the body of sin might be done away with, that we should no longer be slaves to sin – because anyone who has died has been freed from sin.” (Rom 6:6-7)

And since He rose, we also have been given new life. “We were buried with Him through baptism into death in order that, just as Christ was raised from the dead through the glory of the Father, we too may live a new life. If we have been united with Him like this in his death, we will certainly also be united with Him in his resurrection.” (Rom 6:5-6) As resurrected children we are given a new Husband. “So, my brothers, you also died to the law through the body of Christ, that you might belong to another, to Him who was raised from the dead, in order that we might bear fruit to God. For when we were controlled by the sinful nature, the sinful passions aroused by the law were at work in our bodies so that we bore fruit for death. But now, by dying to what once bound us, we have been released from the law so that we serve in the new way of the Spirit, and not in the old way of the written code.” (Rom 7:4-6)

What a plan! God knew our incapabilities and provided everything we need in Jesus. And now He lives in us! He is the very righteousness of God; He is our righteousness. We now live by faith in this risen One who loves us and gave himself for us. Hallelujah!

“I have been crucified with Christ and I no longer live, but Christ lives in me. The life I live in the body, I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me.” Galatians 2:20