Crucifixion with Christ

"I am crucified with Christ– nevertheless I live; yet not I, 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." Galatians 2:20

The cross of our Lord Jesus Christ is the greatest mystery of divine wisdom and Almighty power, of eternal love and super-abounding grace, which could ever have been displayed before the eyes of men or angels. I call it a mystery, not only as incomprehensible by natural intellect, but because the very essence of a mystery, in the Scripture sense of the term, is to be hidden from some and revealed to others. Thus the Lord said to his disciples when they asked him why he spoke unto the multitude in parables, "Because it is given unto you to know the mysteries of the kingdom of heaven, but to them it is not given." (Matt. 13:11.) In the same spirit he on another occasion said, "I thank you, O Father, Lord of heaven and earth, that you have hid these things from the wise and prudent, and have revealed them unto babes– even so, Father; for so it seemed good in your sight." (Luke 10:21.)

The cross, then, is a mystery, not only as enfolding in its bosom the deepest treasures of heavenly wisdom and grace, but because the power and wisdom of it are hidden from some, and made known to others. The apostle, therefore, begs of the saints at Ephesus that they would pray for him that utterance might be given unto him that he might open his mouth boldly, to make known the mystery of the gospel, for which he was an ambassador in bonds. (Eph. 6:19, 20.) And again he says, "Although I am less than the least of all God's people, this grace was given me: to preach to the Gentiles the unsearchable riches of Christ, and to make plain to everyone the administration of this mystery, which for ages past was kept hidden in God, who created all things." (Eph. 3:8, 9.)

Salvation by the cross was of all doctrines the most offensive, and the most unintelligible. That the promised Messiah would be crucified, was unto the Jew, who anticipated a triumphant king, a stumbling block; that a crucified man was the Son of God was to the Greek foolishness, for it contradicted sense and reason. Thus the preaching of the cross was to those who perish foolishness. But there were those whose eyes were divinely enlightened to see, and their hearts opened to believe and receive it. He therefore adds, "But unto us who are saved it is the power of God." (1 Cor. 1:18.) Though foolishness to the learned Greek, there were those who saw in the cross a wisdom as much surpassing all other as the midday sun surpasses the faintest star; which made the apostle say, "We do, however, speak a message of wisdom among the mature, but not the wisdom of this age or of the rulers of this age, who are coming to nothing. No, we speak of God's secret wisdom, a wisdom that has been hidden and that God destined for our glory before time began. None of the rulers of this age understood it, for if they had, they would not have crucified the Lord of glory." (1 Cor. 2:6-8.)

This, then, is the mystery of the cross; this is the hidden wisdom which God ordained before the world unto our glory, that the Son of God, who as God the Son, is co-equal and co-eternal with the Father and the Holy Spirit, should take our nature into union with his own divine Person, and in that nature should suffer, agonize, bleed, and die; that by his sufferings, blood-shedding, and death an innumerable multitude of sinners should be redeemed from the curse of the law and the damnation of hell, and be saved in himself with an everlasting salvation. It is not my present object to enter further into the depth of this mystery as a display of the infinite wisdom, love, and grace of God; but I may briefly say that by the cross of our suffering, dying Lord, justice and mercy were thoroughly harmonized; every attribute of God blessedly glorified; the Son of his love supremely exalted; redemption's work fully accomplished; the church everlastingly saved; Satan entirely baffled and defeated; and an eternal revenue of praise laid up to redound to the glory of a triune Jehovah. Well then may we say, "Great is the mystery of godliness– God manifest in the flesh." (1 Tim. 3:16.)

But there never lived a man more deeply penetrated, or more thoroughly and inwardly possessed with a sense of the grace and glory displayed in this mystery than the apostle Paul. Such wisdom and power, such love and grace, such fullness of salvation did he see and feel in the cross, that, as a preacher of the gospel, he was determined to know nothing among men, but Jesus Christ and him crucified. United to Christ by a living faith, he could declare, "May I never boast except in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, through which the world has been crucified to me, and I to the world." (Gal. 6:14.) And knowing experimentally what it was to have sacred fellowship with Christ in his sufferings and death, he could speak of himself as being crucified with him, as if he were so one with Jesus in spirit, so conformed to his suffering image, and so baptized into his death, that it was as if Christ and he were nailed to one and the same cross. "I am crucified," he says, "with Christ– nevertheless I live; yet not I, but Christ lives in me– and the life which I now live in the flesh, I live by the faith of the Son of God, who loved me, and gave himself for me."

In opening up these words, I shall, with God's blessing, direct your minds–

I. First, to the grand foundation on which the whole of the text rests, as intimated in the last clause– the love and gift of the Son of God.

II. Secondly, the effect of that being made known to the soul by a divine power– it causes it to be crucified with Christ.

III. Thirdly, the consequence of this crucifixion with Christ; which is not, as we should expect, death, but rather life– "Nevertheless, I live."

IV. Fourthly, that self has no hand in this divine life; "Yet not I, but Christ lives in me."

V. Fifthly, that this life is a life of faith on the Son of God.

I. The grand FOUNDATION on which the whole of the text rests. Union with Christ is the grand, I may say the sole source and spring of vital godliness; for union must precede communion; and "fellowship with the Father and with his Son Jesus Christ" is indeed the very sum and substance, the very life and power and blessedness of all true religion. What fruit can the branch bear without union with the vine? And is not union maintained as well as manifested by abiding communion? "Abide in me, and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit of itself, except it abides in the vine; no more can you, except you abide in me." (John 15:4.)

But the original source as well as the closeness and individuality of this union and communion with Christ are pointed out by the language of the apostle, "who loved me and gave himself for me." He had a testimony in his own breast that the Son of God loved him, and gave himself for him; and it was the sweet enjoyment of this inward assurance of Christ's personal, individual love to his soul, and the flowing forth of faith and love toward him in return, which enabled him to say in the language of holy fellowship with him, "I am crucified with Christ."

Now, many of the saints of God may not be so highly favored as to take up into their lips Paul's language of strong, personal assurance. They may hope, and at times may rise beyond a hope, into a sweet confidence, by the shining in of the Sun of Righteousness, that the Son of God has loved them and given himself for them. But the strength of Paul's persuasion and the full expression of his confidence so far out-strip both their assurance and their language, that many real saints of God confess they come short both in heart and tongue.

Yet their coming short of this blessed certainty as an enjoyed reality in the heart, and as a declared confidence by the mouth– for conscience and tongue must move together where God works– does not affect the fact. Clouds and mists sometimes obscure the sun, but they do not blot him out of the sky. So the mists and fogs of unbelief may obscure the Sun of Righteousness, yet they do not blot him out of the spiritual hemisphere. He still loved you and gave himself for you who believe in his name, though you may not be able to rise up to the faith of Paul, or speak with the same fullness of assurance. The bud has the same union with the vine as the branch, but not the same strength of union; the babe is as much a member of the family as the grownup son, but has not the same knowledge of its relationship; the foot is as much a part of the body as the eye or the hand, though it has not the same nearness to the head, or the same honors and employments. If, then, you can find any inward testimony, be it but a rising hope of your interest in the Lord Jesus Christ, and that he loved you and gave himself for you, look with me to the three particulars connected with Paul's expression of his confidence– First, the Person of "the Son of God." Secondly, the love which he, as the Son of God, bore to his church. Thirdly, the fruit of that love, in giving himself for her; for that the church was the object both of the love and the gift, is plain enough from the apostle's words, "Husbands, love your wives, even as Christ also loved the church, and gave himself for it." (Eph. 5:25.)

A. In speaking here of the glorious Person of the Son of God, I do not wish to enter into the field of controversy. In fact, with me, the true, proper, and eternal Sonship of our blessed Lord is not a matter of controversy. I receive it as a most blessed truth, no more to be controverted than the inspiration of the Scriptures, the Deity of Christ, or the Trinity itself. Apart, then, from all controversy, looking at the words in the simplicity of faith, receiving them purely and plainly as the Spirit of God dictated them and left them on record by the hand of Paul, I would ask any child of God here present if they do not in themselves afford sufficient proof that the Son of God was the Son of God from all eternity? If any one doubts this conclusion, and I were to ask him "When did the love of Christ begin?" must not his answer, to be consistent with truth, be, "It had no beginning, for his own words are 'I have loved you with an everlasting love; therefore, with loving-kindness have I drawn you?'" (Jer. 31:3.) And he would rightly add, "It must from the very nature of God, from the eternity of his purposes and the infinity of his perfections, be eternal, for if this love knew beginning, it could know end."

But Jesus, as the Son of God, loved Paul; for we read, "the Son of God loved me;" if, then, this love was eternal, the Son of God must have been eternal, or he would have loved him as the Son of God before he was the Son of God. Thus, without entering into the field of controversy, to seek there for other arguments, in the simplicity and in the strength of faith, as taking our stand upon this one text, were there no other, we at once say, if the Son of God loved his church from everlasting, he was the Son of God from everlasting.

But, to bring this to a practical head, to a close and experimental bearing upon our own conscience, how can we know for ourselves that he is the Son of God who loved us from all eternity, unless we have some knowledge of him as the Son of God from all eternity? This makes me say that I have passed beyond the region of controversy– beyond the Arctic Sea ever shrouded in the chilling mists and fogs of dispute and uncertainty into the Pacific Ocean of a southern hemisphere, where we can look at the Sun of Righteousness as shining in the bright, clear sky. Those who doubt or deny his divine Sonship have never seen his glory as of the only begotten of the Father, full of grace and truth. Theirs is not the faith of Peter, "You are the Christ, the Son of the living God" (Matt. 16:16); nor of Nathanael, "Rabbi, you are the Son of God" (John 1:49); nor of Paul, when immediately he preached Christ in the synagogues that he is the Son of God (Acts 9:20); nor can they say with holy John, "And we know that the Son of God has come, and has given us an understanding, that we may know him that is true, and we are in him that is true, even in his Son Jesus Christ. This is the true God, and eternal life." (1 John 5:20.)

If we are to live a life of faith in the Son of God, we must know him in our own souls to be the Son of God, as John so plainly speaks. If we are to believe that he loved us from all eternity, we must have some knowledge of him as the Son of God from all eternity. But, how can we have this knowledge or this faith unless he is pleased to reveal himself to our soul? As Paul speaks in this very Epistle, "When it pleased God who separated me from my mother's womb, and called me by his grace, to reveal his Son in me." (Gal. 1:15, 16.) God revealed his Son in Paul's heart, and by this revelation he knew for himself that he was the Son of God; for he received him as such into his inmost soul and into his warmest affections. And when the Son of God was thus revealed in his soul, the love of God was shed abroad in his heart by the Holy Spirit; and as that love was shed abroad, it raised up a firm persuasion that the same Son of God loved him, and had loved him from all eternity. For when the Son of God was revealed, love was revealed in him, and with him, and through him. Yes, the Son of God himself came with such power into his soul, shone into his heart with such heavenly beams, and revealed his love and blood and grace so gloriously and so conspicuously that he could say, in the sweet language of assurance, "the Son of God loved me."

B. But look with me at his love. When did this love begin? As I said before, this love knew no beginning; for if this love knew beginning, it might know end; if it knew rise, it might know decline. If you can assign an origin to anything, you must assign to it a termination; for everything which in time began to be, may in time cease to be.

1. It was then necessarily eternal; and in this consists its peculiar blessedness, that, being from eternity, it will last to eternity; having no beginning, it will know no end. What would heaven be, if it lasted only a few ages, and then an end, a blank, a dissolution, an annihilation, a ceasing of love? What else but a very ceasing to be? for God being love, the end of his loving would be the end of his being. The very thought, the remotest prospect, would change the anthems of heaven into wailings of mourning and lamentation. It would thoroughly damp, if not fully extinguish the joys of the saints, that they could look forward to a period when those joys would cease, and a Triune God, he who is God the Son, would love them no more.

2. But his love was not only eternal– it was infinite. We speak sometimes of the attributes of God, and we use the words to help our conception. But God, strictly speaking, has no attributes. His attributes are himself. We speak, for instance, of the love of God, but God is love; of the justice of God, but God is just; of the holiness of God, but God is holy; of the purity of God, but God is pure. As he is all love, so he is all justice, all purity, all holiness. Love, then, is infinite, because God is infinite– his very name, his very character, his very nature, his very essence is infinite love. He would cease to be God if he did not love, and if that love were not as large as himself, as infinite as his own self-existent, incomprehensible essence. The love of the Son of God as God the Son, is co-equal and co-eternal with the love of the Father; for the holy Trinity has not three distinct loves, either in date or degree. The Father loves from all eternity; the Holy Spirit loves from all eternity. The love of the Father, of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit, as one, equal, indivisible, infinite Jehovah cannot be otherwise but One. We therefore read of "the love of God," that is the Father (2 Cor. 13:14); of "the love of the Son," in our text; and of "the love of the Spirit." (Rom. 15:30.)

This love being infinite, can bear with all our infirmities, with all those grievous sins that would, unless that love were boundless, have long ago broken it utterly through. This is beautifully expressed by the prophet. "Oh, how can I give you up, Israel? How can I let you go? How can I destroy you like Admah and Zeboiim? My heart is torn within me, and my compassion overflows. No, I will not punish you as much as my burning anger tells me to. I will not completely destroy Israel, for I am God and not a mere mortal. I am the Holy One living among you, and I will not come to destroy." (Hosea 11:8, 9).

3. But his love is also unchangeable, "I am the Lord, I change not; therefore you sons of Jacob are not consumed." (Mal. 3:6.) "Jesus Christ the same yesterday, and today, and forever." (Heb. 13:8.) Thus this love knows neither variableness nor shadow of turning– but is always fixed on the same objects, without the least change, the least addition, or the least declension. It is hard to conceive love that knows no variation, if we measure the love of God by our own. We are naturally mutable creatures, overwhelmed by infirmities through the fall, and, therefore, ever subject to changes; but he changes not. Our love to him is ever sinking or rising, as fluctuating as the tides of the sea, as variable as the winds in the sky; but his love to us, whose hearts he has touched by his grace, is as immutable as his own immutable Being.

4. And from this circumstance his love is indissoluble. Our love to each other is soon dissolved. How a little strife, a little envy, a little difference of opinion, an angry word, or a reported tale, may alienate our affections from one another! How soon jealousy, suspicion, or dislike may creep into our warmest feelings and sever the closest ties! Were we to review the chains which have bound us at various times to our warmest friends, how many would lie upon the ground with broken links; links, alas! so severed as to yield scarcely any prospect of re-union in this time-state. I fully admit that a spiritual union is never really broken; but Christian communion and that sweet communion which should exist among brethren are often so interrupted that they seem almost utterly gone. What would be our condition for time or for eternity if the love of Christ to us resembled our love to each other? But one of the sweetest features of the love of the Son of God to his saints is, that it is indissoluble.

C. But, now let us look at the FRUITS, and RESULTS of that love with which Christ loved his church. And what heart can conceive or what tongue express the height, the depth, the length, and the breadth of that love? As the apostle speaks, "that you, being rooted and grounded in love, may be able to comprehend with all saints what is the breadth, and length, and depth, and height; and to know the love of Christ, which passes knowledge?" (Eph. 3:17, 18.) Could he have afforded a greater, a richer, a clearer evidence of this love than by giving himself for us? There is something in this expression which seems to outstrip all conception and all expression. As viewed by faith, there is something so large, so comprehensive, and yet so inexpressibly touching in the words "gave himself for me," that I despair of bringing it before your minds as my heart could desire.

But let us make the attempt; and in doing so let us first, if the Lord enables, take a view by faith of the Son of God as lying in the bosom of the Father from all eternity as his only-begotten Son. If thus enabled to contemplate the glories of heaven, the bliss and blessedness that fill those celestial courts, the sweet employments ever going on in the worship and adoration of angels, and what far surpasses all human thought, the holy fellowship and divine intercommunion between the three Persons of the sacred Godhead, and that from all eternity– shall we then not see what Jesus left in leaving the bosom of God?

Now if, lowering our view, we cast a glance at the sins and sorrows of this lower world, what it is in itself, as a mere earthly abode, and what sin has made it with all its dreadful consequences; then to look at the Son of God freely giving himself out of the bosom of his Father and all the bliss and glory of heaven, to come down to this world of sin and grief– we seem for a few moments lost in wonder at love so great, at love so free, at love so self-sacrificing as this. How broad to spread itself over such a seething mass of sin and sorrow; how long to know neither beginning nor end, but to stretch from eternity to eternity; how deep to sink so low as the gates of the grave; how high to raise from thence poor lost sinners to the glories of heaven!

And when we take a further view of what the Lord Jesus Christ gave himself unto as well as gave himself from, for we must take both into consideration; when we see by the eye of faith the condescension of his glorious Majesty in taking our flesh in the womb of the Virgin; when we think how he tabernacled here below amid such scenes of misery and abomination as daily met his eye; when we view him in Pilate's judgment hall exposed to the buffetings of the crude Roman soldiers, scourged and mangled, as if he were the vilest malefactor, and then see him hanging upon the cross, and there dying the most painful and ignominious death that the cruelty of man had ever devised; and when we remember that he who bled and suffered there was the Son of God who thus gave himself to redeem us from the lowest hell, how lost we seem to be in wonder!

These are the things which the angels desire to look into; for they in heaven beheld his glory before they saw him in the manger, ministered to him in the wilderness, strengthened him in the garden, viewed him on the cross, and watched over his sepulcher. A part of the great mystery of godliness is that "God manifest in the flesh" was "seen of angels" (1 Tim. 3:16); seen by them as the Son of God in heaven; seen by them as the Son of man on earth. To see him, then, with angels' eyes is to look at what Christ came from, and what Christ came unto; what he was in heaven and what he was on earth; the glories of his Father's house, and the ignominy of Pilate's judgment hall; the bliss of his Father's bosom and the tortures of Calvary's cross; the love of his Father's heart and the hidings of his Father's face; the worship of adoring angels and the shouts of the blasphemous multitude; the glory of the only begotten Son and the bloody sweat of Gethsemane.

And do you not see in the expression "gave himself," how freely, how fully, how voluntarily, how unreservedly he yielded himself up to the lowest depths of shame and sorrow! No force but the gentle force of love; no compulsion but the compulsion of grace; no constraint but the constraint of doing his Father's will, which was his delight (Psalm. 40:8), moved him to give himself. He could give no more; he would give no less. And all this he did to save our souls from the bottomless pit. Now these heavenly mysteries are not matters of mere doctrine or theoretical speculation, but to be received into a believing heart as a matter of personal and living experience; in a word, they are to be revealed to our soul by the power of God, and made experimentally and feelingly ours by the sealing testimony of the Holy Spirit upon our breast. Now just as we are put into possession of these divine realities by an inward experience of their heavenly power, can we make use of the apostle's language, to which I now come.

II. The EFFECT of the love of Christ being made known to the soul by a divine power– it causes it to be crucified with Christ. Let us seek, if the Lord enable, some spiritual entrance into the experimental meaning of these words– "I am crucified with Christ."

A. And take them first in their simple meaning, neither adding to, nor diminishing their literal signification. To be "crucified with Christ" is to be nailed to the cross with him. But this could not be actually done; for Jesus had no partner in his cross, though there were those who were crucified by his side. It was, then, in the feelings of his soul that Paul was crucified with Christ. This blessed man of God had such a view in his bosom of the crucifixion of the Lord of life and glory, that it was as if he were nailed to the same cross with him, as if the same nails that pierced the hands and feet of the blessed Redeemer were struck through his hands and his feet. It was not in body, but in soul; not in his flesh, but in his spirit, that he was thus crucified with him. In this sense he was nailed side by side, or rather to the same cross, with the suffering God-Man. In this sense, therefore he mystically and spiritually suffered as Christ suffered, died as Christ died; and was thus made conformable to his suffering, dying image.

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