The Cross, Part 5

“Follow Me As I Follow Christ”

By Tammy Lacock

This week, Warren Litzman seeks to help us truly understand who we are as born-again believers, now that we are living in God’s grace.

In John 12:26, we have a Scripture that must be rightly divided. Jesus is preaching the kingdom gospel, a gospel meant for the nation of Israel which was based on outer works and serving Him to please God. Christ could not yet reveal His gospel of grace because He had not yet died on the cross. It wasn’t until after His death, burial, and resurrection that he raised up the Apostle Paul to deliver this new gospel, one that no longer requires works for salvation but tells us we are saved by grace, by Christ’s work on the cross. By God’s grace at the Cross, a radical change took place within us as believers. Because Israel rejected Christ as their Messiah, they had no inner change. They are still holding onto their own outer works for salvation and God’s signs, wonders, and miracles for hope. To the believer, however, the Holy Spirit delivered the incorruptible seed of Christ into our spirits, making us one spirit in Him (1 Corinthians 6:7). We are brand-new creations in Him (2 Corinthians 5:17).

Warren goes on to explain that the first time we get a glimpse into grace and our new life in Christ is in the garden of Gethsemane. When Christ drinks of the cup, we are poured into Him before His death. Our old lives and all of our sins — past, present and future — were poured into Him. At the cross, when He died, we died and were buried too. Yet when He arose, we arose too, to a brand-new life in Him, literally.

It’s important to understand, as Warren discusses, that the nation of Israel has been set aside since their rejection of Christ as their Messiah. When once God spoke to them directly, He now only speaks to us through His Son in the born-again believer.

Through Christ, God now sees us as His bona fide sons and daughters, joint heirs with Christ. He no longer sees our old identities; He now sees Christ in us as our righteousness.

Paul tells us that to understand the fullness of God’s grace, we are meant to know Him now personally, the Christ that literally lives in us. By getting to know Him and falling in love with Him, we start to see clearly that all outer works and all outer things no longer matter. Paul considered everything else worthless and clearly said in Philippians 3:8, “Yea doubtless, and I count all things but loss for the excellency of the knowledge of Christ Jesus my Lord: for whom I have suffered the loss of all things, and do count them but dung, that I may win Christ.”

In 1 Corinthians 11:1, Paul says “Follow me as I follow Christ.” May we dive into his epistles and allow the Holy Spirit to comfort us and teach us of our new life in grace, our new life in Christ.