Crucified with Christ

Galatians 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.”

Dying with Christ is an important teaching in Christendom. Here, Paul has explicitly mentioned crucifixion meaning that our old self should die and this death should be that terrible and in that method only and not an easy smooth one. In the verse’s context Paul says that the old person has completely died to sin and the law. Paul wants to make clear that he does not approve sin and if he approves that it would be unpardonable. The outcome is that we need to live to God. Justification should be done not by ourselves, the law, the world or anything else but by Christ alone. This should be the only path taken for salvation.

This requirement of justification by Christ alone is given to us because Christ should be exalted here. We are created to glorify Christ alone and if we try to show off any of our strengths or goodness, Christ is not being glorified there or it is that we are stealing the glory of Christ into ourselves. We are glorified along with Christ that means the reason for the glory is not our deeds but His.

Similarly, we are crucified with Christ meaning that even though the suffering was received by Him alone at that time, we should share the surrender of the flesh and self as Christ did. This surrender should happen for the old self to be humiliated and destroyed. We read in Proverbs 28:13 that he who confesses his sins and forsakes them. This confession is a part of repentance. We need to clearly acknowledge that Christ was crucified only because of our deeds and we hate our own selfish nature and are longing to forsake it. We need to see the distance between us and sin to be that of humiliation and glory.

In Colossians 2:20, 21 we see the expectations God has in us. He wants us to be beyond the law; that is we need to be in a perfect relationship that there is no need for law. Verse 23 says that the flesh is more powerful than the results of these laws. These doctrines of men help me succeed or survive in this world. God wants us to excel in spiritual warfare and so these laws do not help there. The problem in Christians is that they still believe that they are living in this world. That makes it very hard for us to forsake it completely. Jesus wants us to crucify the body that belongs to this world.

In Mathew 10:38, Jesus speaks to His disciples as soon as He had chosen them. Among the basic principles of discipleship was to carry the cross. Jesus says that this cross brings worthiness to us. This particular verse is said about family’s oppositions when the cross is taken. This message is not for discipleship alone, in Mark 8:34 we read the same statement as a message to “all”. This cross is the destiny to our earlier self and our hope of a new person.  Family or the world would demand that we ignore the cross completely and progress in life as they expect. Taking up the cross would hurt relationships as they are part of our previous personal lives. The cross is not correction. This is our hope of salvation.

The ownership “his” is also mentioned. This is a personal requirement where we identify things we are asked to suffer with individually. We have to accept that this life is not good and take up suffering for Christ’s sakes. Only this event enables us to be worthy of having Jesus in us. This worthiness comes when we love Him more than all the comfort the world gives us. Jesus repeats this again in Mathew 16:24 adding “deny himself”.  

The next verse (10:39 and 16:25) says that we need to lose what we consider as life for Jesus’ sake to live. This loss is not optional. We should not read this as this means martyrdom. To follow Jesus we need to lose what we call as life and then we’ll find what life actually is.

2 Tim 2:11-13 Let us commit ourselves to Christ up to the cross because it is a faithful statement. There is no other way to win. Jesus calls us to freedom through a small suffering that is not a punishment but a yolk. The verse Mathew 11:28 proceeds to the introduction of the yolk. Jesus needs us to love him so much that we would love to suffer for His plans to be executed. This suffering is not easy, but we are not alone in this. We are following a great successful warrior here. This person loves us and is living in us.