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Since there is no such thing as a perfect person, all of us struggle with the tendency to sin. Does this mean that we are doomed to keep committing the same old sins for the rest of our lives? Or does God have an answer?
People try all sorts of things to get free of the grip of sin. But so many times, they are struggling in their own strength.
Discover God's answer to the power of sin.
Gal 2:20 I have been crucified with Christ; it is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me; and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave Himself for me.
Co-crucifixion refers to the fact that when Jesus was crucified on the cross, we were crucified with Him.
Gal 2:20 I have been crucified with Christ; it is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me; and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave Himself for me.
Co-crucifixion means that I (the old me) am dead, and that Christ now lives in me.
Rom 6:6-7 knowing this, that our old man was crucified with Him, that the body of sin might be done away with, that we should no longer be slaves of sin. (7) For he who has died has been freed from sin.
Co-crucifixion means that the old man died on the cross with Christ; the old man is a reference to our sinful nature.
As a result, we are no longer slaves to the compulsion to sin.
The reason for that is that the old sinful nature is now dead, and if it is dead, we are now freed from the power of sin.
Rom 6:11 Likewise you also, reckon yourselves to be dead indeed to sin, but alive to God in Christ Jesus our Lord.
This is a faith transaction.
By faith, we must first consider ourselves to be dead to sin's power.
But that's only half the story; the other half is that we must exercise our faith in considering ourselves to be alive to God.
Eph 4:22 that you put off, concerning your former conduct, the old man which grows corrupt according to the deceitful lusts,
Col 3:9-10 Do not lie to one another, since you have put off the old man with his deeds, (10) and have put on the new man who is renewed in knowledge according to the image of Him who created him,
To express this concept a little differently, we need to exercise our faith in putting off the old man with his sinful deeds, and put on the new man which is in the image of Christ.
Rom 6:3-5 Or do you not know that as many of us as were baptised into Christ Jesus were baptised into His death? (4) Therefore we were buried with Him through baptism into death, that just as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, even so we also should walk in newness of life. (5) For if we have been united together in the likeness of His death, certainly we also shall be in the likeness of His resurrection,
Another responsibility that we have to fulfil is to follow Christ's command to be baptised in water (Mat 28:19-20).
Water baptism is where we publicly identify with what Jesus did on the cross for us.
Through baptism, we declare that we believe that we not only died with Christ, but we were also raised in His resurrection.
Therefore, if we have been crucified with Christ, we can now identify also with His resurrection and walk in newness of life, free from the power of sin.
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