A parent may say, "I don't know what has gotten into you!" There's no implication of demon-possession or the occult here. But there seems to be some personality not seen or recognised before. An idea, an ideology, a hero, a peer… has worked on the fallenness of human nature.
That is what we, as parents, so often forget. Education and training are important and may prevent us from getting into "serious trouble", but they can't deal with sin and the tendency towards sin.
There are many things I am glad I didn't ever get into, many things up-bringing steered me away from, many activities I don't have to regret. That's pain that I've been spared. It's good to spare our children that sort of pain. But I was still a sinner in need of forgiveness.
When I was about eight, we were living in Allora. There was a decision day in church. I consciously responded to Jesus as my Saviour and Lord. I really meant it - so did the Lord. It wasn't the end of the matter - just the beginning in fact. I've grown a lot and learnt a lot since then - and I still mean it!
Later in Warwick, at around seventeen, I was deeply moved during a communion service. The organ was playing quietly as people moved forward to receive the elements. I had returned to my seat and was struck by the enormity of what Christ had done in dying for me. I could do no less than be available to him in whatever way he might use me. That's part of the long road that has led me into the ministry and to be with you this morning.
Christ doesn't call every believer to ordained full-time ministry, but he does call us all to ministry. He hasn't given us all the same gifts, but he does expect us to use all that he has given us. That way we can - all of us together - constitute his body.
But a body isn't a collection of bits and pieces that happen to be together in the one place. A body hangs together as an effective working unit that is "you" and "me". We are Christ's body because he is the Head and dwells, by his Spirit, in every member.
In Galatians 2 Paul describes his confrontation with Peter over the issue of whether Gentile believers should be required to keep the Jewish law. Peter had, in fact, been eating openly with Gentile believers until the arrival of a delegation of Jewish Christians from Jerusalem. The issue wasn't Jewish custom, but "the truth of the gospel" (Gal. 2.14).
There is only one way to be "justified" - put right with God. That one way is "by faith in Jesus Christ" and "not by observing the law" (v. 16). There was no point in Christ dying if a person could be made right with God through keeping the law (v. 21).
Paul describes the radical change of his life this way - "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" (v. 21).
"I have been crucified with Christ". The cross of Christ passed the death sentence on Paul's sin and on all his pretensions at goodness. The cross cut right across his personal rights and ambitions.
"Christ lives in me". Paul was very much alive - in a way more alive than he had ever been - but the whole principle and motivation of his life was radically changed. It was far more than saying, "From now on I must live for Christ". By faith in the Son of God who loved him and gave himself for him, Paul was allowing Jesus to live in and through him.
Someone has said, "The Christian life isn't difficult - it's impossible! Only Christ can live the Christian life and he wants to live his life through us!"
But the way to life is via the cross - knowing that Christ, the sinless one, has taken the sinners' sentence for me, that my personal claim to rightness is dead, that I am truly and fully alive only in him.
Nailed there by sinners'
envy and hatred,
scheming and strife,
dying he offers
all who will trust him
forgiveness and life -
there's no other way
to the resurrection
but via the cross!
Two thousand years
have come and gone
since Jesus died,
yet in him all my sin
and my guilt and my pride
were crucified.
No other way
could the debt of my sin
be satisfied.
Yet I am alive!
Praise God -
in him I'm alive!
In believers like me
he seeks to express
his love and his life.
There's no other way
to the resurrection
but via the cross!
As Paul put it, "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". By grace, we are alive in him and he is alive in us - hallelujah! He wants to live it out in us every day!
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