Christ lives in you!

517 christ in youThe resurrection of Jesus Christ is the restoration of life. How does the restored life of Jesus affect your daily life? In the letter to the Colossians, Paul reveals a mystery that can breathe new life into you: “You have learned what was hidden from you from the beginning of the world, even what was hidden from all mankind: a mystery which has now been revealed to all Christians . It is about an incomprehensible miracle that God has in store for all people on earth. You who belong to God may understand this mystery. It reads: Christ lives in you! And so you have the firm hope that God will give you a share in his glory” (Colossians 1,26-27 Hope for All).

The role model

How did Jesus experience his relationship with his father while he was on this earth? "For from him and through him and to him are all things" (Romans 11,36)! This is precisely the relationship between the Son as Godman and his Father as God. From the father, through the father, to the father! “Therefore Christ said to God when he came into the world: You did not want sacrifices or other gifts. But you gave me a body; he should be the victim. You do not like burnt offerings and sin offerings. That's why I said: I come to do your will, my God. That is what I am told in the Holy Scriptures" (Hebrews 10,5-7 Hope for All). Jesus gave his life unconditionally to God so that everything written about him in the Old Testament would find its fulfillment in him as a person. What helped Jesus offer his life as a living sacrifice? Could he do this of his own accord? Jesus said, "Don't you believe that I am in the Father and the Father in me? The words that I speak to you, I do not speak of myself. But the Father who abides in me does his works” (John 14,10). The oneness in the Father and the Father in him enabled Jesus to offer his life as a living sacrifice.

The ideal idea

The day you accepted Jesus as your Redeemer, Savior and Savior, Jesus took shape in you. You and all people on this earth can have eternal life through Jesus. Why did Jesus die for everyone? "Jesus died for all, so that those who live should no longer live for themselves, but for him who died for them and was raised" (2. Corinthians 5,15).

As long as Jesus inhabits you through the Holy Spirit, you have only one calling, one purpose and one goal: to make your life and your whole personality available to Jesus without restrictions and unconditionally. Jesus started his inheritance.

Why should you allow yourself to be completely absorbed by Jesus? “I beseech you therefore, brothers and sisters, by the mercies of God, that you present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, and acceptable to God. This is your reasonable worship" (Romans 1 Cor2,1).

Giving yourself completely to God is your response to God's mercy. Such a sacrifice means a whole lifestyle change. “Do not conform yourselves to this world, but change yourselves by renewing your minds, that you may examine what is the will of God, which is good and acceptable and perfect” (Romans 12,2). James says in his epistle: "For as the body without the spirit is dead, so also faith without works is dead" (James 2,26). Spirit here means something like breath. A breathless body is dead. A living body breathes and a living faith breathes. What are good works? Jesus says, "This is the work of God, that you believe on him whom he sent" (John 6,29). Good works are works that spring from faith in the Christ who dwells within you and are expressed through your life. Paul said, "I live, not I now, but Christ lives in me" (Galatians 2,20). Just as Jesus lived in union with God the Father when he was on earth, so too should you live in close relationship with Jesus!

The problem

For me, the ideal is not always true in every area of ​​my life. Not all of my works have their origin in the faith of the Jesus who is in me. We find the reason and the cause in the story of creation.

God created human beings to enjoy and to express His love in and through them. In his love he placed Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden and gave them dominion over the garden and all that was in it. They lived in Paradise with God in a close and personal relationship. They knew nothing of "good and evil" because they believed and trusted God first. Adam and Eve then believed the serpent's lie that they found the fulfillment of life within themselves. Because of their fall, they were expelled from paradise. They were denied access to the "Tree of Life" (that is Jesus). Although they lived on physically, they were dead spiritually. They had left the unity of God and had to decide for themselves what was right and what was wrong.

God decreed that blessings and curses be inherited from generation to generation. Paul recognized this original sin and wrote in the letter to the Romans: "Therefore, just as sin came into the world through one man (Adam), and death through sin, so death spread to all men, because all sinned" (Romans 5,12).

I inherited the desire to realize myself and to live from my own self from my first parents. In life in communion with God we receive love, security, recognition and acceptance. Without the personal and close relationship with Jesus and the absence of the Holy Spirit, a shortcoming arises and leads to dependency.

I filled my inner emptiness with various addictions. For a long time in my Christian life, I believed that the Holy Spirit was a force. I used this power and tried to overcome my addictions or lead a godly life. The focus was always on myself. I wanted to overcome my addictions and desires myself. This fight with good intentions was fruitless.

Recognize the love of Christ

What does it mean to be filled with the Spirit of God? In Ephesians I learned the meaning. "May the Father give you strength according to the riches of his glory, to be strengthened by his Spirit in the inner man, that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith. And you are rooted and grounded in love, that you may comprehend with all the saints what is the breadth and the length and the height and the depth, also know the love of Christ which surpasses all knowledge, that you may be filled until you have received all the fullness of God” (Ephesians 3,17-19).

My question is: What do I need the Holy Spirit for? To understand the love of Christ! What is the result of this knowledge of Christ's love that surpasses all knowledge? By knowing the incredible love of Christ, I receive the fullness of God, through Jesus who lives in me!

The life of Jesus

The resurrection of Jesus Christ is of comprehensive importance for every Christian, even for every human being. What happened then has had a major impact on my life today. "For if while we were still enemies we were reconciled to God through the death of his Son, how much more shall we be saved through his life, now that we have been reconciled" (Romans 5,10). The first fact is this: I am reconciled to God the Father through the sacrifice of Jesus Christ. The second one that I had long overlooked is this: He redeems me through his life.

Jesus said, "But I came to bring them life - life to the full" (John 10,10 from New Geneva Translation). What human needs life? Only a dead needs life. "You also were dead in your trespasses and in your sins" (Ephesians 2,1). From God's perspective, the problem is not just that we are sinners and need forgiveness. Our problem is much bigger, we are dead and we need the life of Jesus Christ.

Life in paradise

Are you afraid you can't be who you were because you gave your life fully and unconditionally to Jesus? Jesus said to his disciples just before he had to suffer and die that he would not leave them orphans: “In a little while the world will see me no more. But you see me, for I live, and you shall live also. In that day you will know that I am in my Father, and you in me, and I in you” (John 14,20).

Just as Jesus lives in you and works through you, you live in Jesus and work in the same way! They live in communion and fellowship with God, as Paul recognized: "For in him we live, move and have our being" (Acts 17,28). Self-realization in one's self is a lie.

Shortly before his death, Jesus declared the fulfillment of the paradisiacal state: "As you, Father, are in me and I in you, so they also shall be in us, so that the world may believe that you sent me" (John 17,21). Being one with God the Father, Jesus and through the Holy Spirit is true life. Jesus is the way, the truth and the life!

Since realizing this, I bring all my problems, addictions, and weaknesses to Jesus and say, “I can't do it, I'm unable to get these out of my life on my own. In unity with you Jesus and through you I am able to overcome my addictions. I want you to take their place and I ask you to undo the inherited debt of independence in my life.

A key verse of Colossians, "Christ in you, the hope of glory" (Colossians 1,27) says the following about you: If you, dear reader, have been converted to God, God has created a new birth in you. They received a new life, the life of Jesus Christ. Her stone heart was replaced with his living heart (Ezekiel 11,19). Jesus lives in you through the Spirit and you live, weave and are in Jesus Christ. Oneness with God is a fulfilled life that will last for all eternity!

Thank God again and again for the fact that he lives in you and that you allow yourself to be fulfilled in him. Thanks to your gratitude, this important fact is taking shape in you!

by Pablo Nauer