Word of Salvation – Vol.38 No.37 – October 1999

 

Dead With Christ

 

Sermon by Rev. W. Wiersma on Lord’s Day 16

 

Brothers and sisters, beloved in Christ,

How do you think of yourself?

What are you?

This is an important question, because what we think about ourselves has a powerful influence on how we behave.  Just as how we behave can have a great impact on what we think of ourselves.

To live Christianly it is important that we think of ourselves Christianly.  You cannot live a truly Christian life, if you do not think of yourself in terms of what a believer is IN JESUS CHRIST.

So there you have the main point.  To live as a Christian, you must know what you are in Christ.

And that requires two things.  It requires faith and knowledge.  It requires faith in Jesus Christ, for without that we cannot know what we are in Christ, or even that we are in Christ.

And it requires knowledge.  We must know what the Scriptures have to say about the subject of what believers are in Jesus Christ.

In Romans chapter 6, which we have just read, the apostle Paul says to the Christians, ‘Consider yourself dead to sin and alive to God, in Christ Jesus.’

That’s a remarkable statement, is it not?  Consider yourself dead and consider yourself alive, in Christ.

Dead, dead to sin.  Alive, alive to God.

Consider yourself, that means, think of yourself as.  Think of yourself as dead to sin.  Think of yourself as alive to God in Christ Jesus.

Now the basis for thinking of yourself as dead to sin and alive to God, the basis of such a view of yourself, is the death and the life of Christ.

In other words, when you believe in Jesus, you are joined to him by faith and you have a part in Christ’s death and resurrection.

This is quite different from the claims of something like the ‘power of positive thinking’.  That school of thought says, ‘you start thinking of yourself like this and it will happen.  Just think of yourself in whatever way you want and everything is possible.  If only you will stretch your imagination you can be anything and do anything you want.’

That is not what we are taught in the Scriptures.

Scripture says: This it is how it is for those who are in Christ.  This is how it is for Christians.  Keep it in mind, draw strength and comfort from it, because it is based on solid facts.  It is based on the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ.  It is based, not on wishful thinking, but on realities.

So our death to sin and being alive to God are consequences of Christ’s death and Christ’s life.  Consider yourself dead to sin, for Christ died to sin once for all.

Now there are two distinct aspects of Christ’s death mentioned in LD 16.  In question and answer 40 there is a reference to Christ’s death for our sin.

In Q and A 43 there is reference to Christ’s death as his final break with sin.

It will be helpful to consider both aspects of Christ’s death and see how they affect the believer’s view of himself.

The first aspect of Christ’s death is the fact that He had to die in order to save us from sin.

Why did Jesus have to die?

Because, says the Catechism, God’s justice and truth demanded it.

In saving sinners for himself, God does not let go of or deny justice and truth.

God always remains the dependable and reliable One.  God remains true to himself.  He is the God whose word is never broken, whose standards are never altered.

We may be glad about the fact that everything depends on God’s faithfulness to Himself.  If God was not faithful – true to His Word – we could not be sure of anything.  If God’s Word is not dependable, whom can we trust and depend on?  What could you believe, if God would not remain true to his word?  Everything would be relative.  Nothing would be sure.

But God is just and true.  Therefore He demanded the death of the Saviour.

Let us just note here that the Bible teaches that God is patient and does not always immediately carry out his threats, (which is just as well, otherwise none of us would have any hope at all).  But God’s patience does not mean that God will never carry out his threats.  Just because God does not immediately put things straight, that does not mean that God will never put things right.

Now the threat which God made, right at the beginning of human history, is that the punishment for sin is death.  The soul that sins shall die.

So, because we are all sinners, we all deserve the punishment of sin, namely, death.

To save us from death Jesus had to bear the punishment for us.  That is what He did.  Jesus took on himself the punishment which we deserve.  And God was prepared to accept Christ’s death as the punishment or satisfaction for our sins.

Christ’s death made atonement for our sins, and on that basis our sins are FORGIVEN.

All of them.

Let me put it this way.  ALL our sins are forgiven or NONE of them are forgiven.

I say it this way, because some people battle with this question.  Are ALL my sins forgiven?

The point is that our sins are forgiven because Christ died.  He paid the penalty.  He made atonement.  And on that basis, and on that basis alone, one and all of our sins are forgiven.

That marvellous arrangement of God was already hinted at in the Old Testament sacrifices.  The priest made atonement for the sins of the people by the sacrifice and blood of an animal.  And the result of the atonement was that the people’s sin was forgiven.  They could now safely live and work in God’s presence.  They did not have to fear being struck down by God’s wrath with the death penalty.

As Jesus himself put it: He gave his life a ransom for many!

His death was the price for our freedom.

We are dead to sin.  We who believe in Jesus Christ, we who accept this truth of God in Jesus Christ, we are dead to sin in the sense that God does not deal with us according to our sins any longer.  The hold of sin on us is gone because our sins are forgiven.  And you have nothing to fear from God’s wrath or punishment any longer when your sins are forgiven on the basis of the atonement which Christ has made by his death on the cross.

Those who believe in Christ Jesus need not fear death.  We have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ.

But Christ’s death not only affects our standing with God, that is, what God thinks of us and how God will deal with us.

Q & A 43 suggest that Christ’s death also affects our view of ourselves.

Through Christ’s death our old selves are crucified, put to death and buried with him.

We are dead to our old self.

What does that mean… that we are dead to our old self?

Let me try to explain it as simply as I can.

Our old self is the old sinful nature with which everyone is born since Adam and Eve fell into sin.  The old self is that nature which produces sins.  This old self can’t do anything else.  It cannot produce anything else but sin.

So it is this nature that we must be saved from if we are to be saved at all.  We have to be freed from the old self because it only gets us into trouble.

Now when Christ died for us, this old nature of sin was dealt with.  Everything that this nature stands for, and does, was dealt with.  It was condemned.  It was declared rotten, bad!

So the believer knows: I cannot expect anything good from myself.

That’s a hard conclusion to come to.  It is perhaps the hardest conclusion anyone ever has to come to.  It is the point at which many, many, people balk.

This truth, that I cannot expect any good from myself, is utterly humiliating.

But the believer knows that as surely as Jesus died on the cross so surely is my old nature declared judged and condemned.  Our old nature is a lost cause.

Well, where is our hope then to be found?

Where must we look for the kind of life that we should live?

We must look for it in Jesus.

He died.  He also rose from the dead.

He is our new life… He is our righteousness and holiness.

You might say, it is a matter of a totally new allegiance.

The non-Christian believes in himself; he expects that somehow he can fix his own problems; he can straighten things out between God and himself, because he thinks of himself as having these amazing abilities.  And, anyhow his sins are minor problems.

That’s the way the non-Christian thinks, and that is one reason why New Age teaching is so attractive for a lot of people.  New Age teaching says: Believe in yourself!  You have the power to deal with all your problems.  And to New Age philosophy sin is not a problem at all.  For it says: There is no such thing as sin.  Good and evil are both necessary parts to the whole of reality.  There is no God to whom you are responsible.  We are god ourselves.  Believe in yourself.

That’s the soothing message of New Age.

The Gospel teaches us to believe in Jesus Christ.  Rely on what He is, on what He has done for you and what you can do in His strength.

Consider yourself dead to sin and alive to God in Christ Jesus!

Stop looking at yourself for help.  Deny yourself!

Hope solely in Christ!

So the believer in Christ is freed from sin.

Believers no longer have any obligation to satisfy their old nature.  We don’t have to pamper our pride.  We don’t have to give in to its wishes and desires.

We don’t have to rely on our own strength.

We may now rely on Christ and on all He provides.

We may rely on the benefits which He has obtained for us.  We may rely on the power of His Spirit.

As Jesus himself said to his disciples: Abide in me, for without me you can do nothing.

Abide in me and you will bear much fruit.

So the person who trusts in Jesus has, in a sense, written himself off.  He denies himself.

The believer confesses that all his hope is only in Jesus.

In Christ, sin has nothing to do with me anymore.

Christ died to sin.

The Scriptures teach that Christ’s death was his radical break with sin.

Now, before and during his crucifixion Christ was intimately connected with sin.  You might even say, that all Jesus did and all that Jesus endured, had to do with sin.  His whole life on this earth was connected with sin because He was the Saviour who came to carry our sins and to suffer for our sins.  So, all that Jesus suffered, all that He did was somehow connected with sin.

But on the cross Jesus cried: ‘It is finished.’  And when He actually died, He said: ‘Father into your hands I commit my spirit.’

And though Jesus was buried (because He was dead and because that was predicted in Scripture) his body experienced no decay.  In fact Jesus rose from the dead because death no longer had a hold on him at all, for the power of death is sin.  And Jesus was finished with sin.

So after his suffering on the cross, after giving his life a ransom for many, there remained for Jesus life with God.  Jesus is no longer touched by sin.  Jesus is no longer affected by death.  He lives forever.

And Jesus shares that life with all those who are in Him.

We live in Him.

So, what is all important for us, is what we are in Christ Jesus.  Not what we do here and now, but what we are in Christ.  Not only having a share in his death, but also having a share in his life.

And Christ is finished with sin and death.

Therefore consider yourself dead to sin, dead to your old past.  You have nothing to do with it any more.  It is a little bit like saying that somebody is dead to the world.  What do we mean by that?  We mean that the person is so concentrated on something that everything else around him is at that moment blocked out.

That’s how it is to be with us.

Our attention should be so centred on Christ and on what we have and what we are in Him that we have no time for our sinful aims and thoughts.

What are you, in Christ?

Or should I first ask: Are you in Christ?

Do you believe in Jesus?  Do you know that you cannot save yourself, that you cannot expect anything good from yourself?  Do you see Jesus as the one in whom God gives us everything we need for life and godliness?

That’s the only way to peace with God.  The only way to security in the grace of God.

We need to know that in Christ we are dead to sin and alive to God.

Only this gives us a true incentive to live for God.

Only as we know that we have a share in the life of Christ and in all that life entails are we able to commit our lives to His service.

That’s what the apostle Paul was thinking about whenever he spoke so confidently of the future.

Consider yourselves alive to God in Christ Jesus.

For if you consider your future secure in Christ, you have every reason to express your thanks to God for providing so great salvation through such an amazing Saviour.

Allow me to close with the words of St.Paul in Ephesians 3:14-21.  (Quote)

AMEN