Day 4
Lisa Sheffler, author
A crucified Messiah was difficult for the Jews of Paul’s day to accept. If you were looking for someone to restore God’s Kingdom, defeat the forces of sin, evil, and death, and make all things right, you might excused for wondering how Jesus, a crucified carpenter from Galilee could be the one.
That’s why the resurrection changed everything!
If the tomb had remained closed, no one would have believed Jesus was the Messiah. But a risen Lord? Who was victorious over sin, evil, and death? You give your life to him. From death, God brought life, not just for Jesus in the tomb, but for anyone who believes. This new life starts from the moment we trust in Jesus and commit to following him.
In our final few verses for this week, we see Paul applying the pattern of the cross and the resurrection to those living a new life of faith in the Son of God.
Read
Galatians 2:19-21
19 “For through the law I died to the law so that I might live for God. 20 I have been crucified with Christ and I no longer live, but Christ lives in me. The life I now live in the body, I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me. 21 I do not set aside the grace of God, for if righteousness could be gained through the law, Christ died for nothing!”
What do you think it means that “Christ lives in me”?
Reflect
Paul announced something that would have been unthinkable before Christ, he died to the law so that he might live for God. Christ had fulfilled the law, so a new life in Christ meant the old law became obsolete. Paul needed Peter, and all those who are preaching the Mosaic law, to remember this and act accordingly. Righteousness, or being made right with God, cannot be gained through the law. If it could, then why would Christ have had to die? His sacrifice would have been for nothing. By returning to the law, Jewish Christians were rejecting God’s grace-gift — the very thing that enabled their relationship with God.
Paul was also emphasizing a believer’s identification with Christ by associating Christ’s death and resurrection with those who live by faith in Jesus Christ. We see in John 3, Jesus explained that gaining entrance to his Kingdom would require being born again. Later in Galatians, Paul will tell us that in Christ, we are a new creation. We are no longer slaves to sin, but free to live as God intended. While we will still be affected by sin and suffering while we remain here in our mortal bodies, we have already begun a transformation into what we will be in the age to come.
From death comes new life. It’s what we depict with baptism. Going under the water symbolizes death to our old way of life. The emergence from the water symbolizes our resurrection to new life.
What does this new life look like? Scot McKnight explains it like this:
“Those who have been justified, live justly; those who have been made holy in Christ, live holy lives; those who have experienced God’s love, love others; those who have experienced God’s forgiveness, forgive others; those who have been called from the world, no longer live in the world and call others to be “out with them”; those who have died to the flesh, live in the Spirit.”[1]
This is what it means to embrace our new life in Jesus — the old ways are gone, and we live by faith in Jesus Christ, the one who loves us and gave himself for each one of us.
[1] Scot McKnight, Galatians, The NIV Application Commentary (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan Publishing House, 1995), 131.
Respond
I kept our reflection on the passage short today and am inviting you to linger over Galatians 2:20, “I have been crucified with Christ and I no longer live, but Christ lives in me. The life I now live in the body, I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me.” Take time to meditate over this verse. Ask the Spirit to guide you as you read it slowly two or three times and reflect on each word.
What does this verse mean to you as one who has placed his or her faith in Christ? What is it to have been crucified with Christ, and yet still live? What would it mean for you to experience his love and sacrifice on your behalf, not just as a fact you acknowledge, but as a child of God who is in relationship with the Father? Ask the Spirit what this verse means to you in your life right now.