Christ in and through you!

How do we live a life empowered by God’s free-flowing grace? Well, step one. No, I’m just joking. You know, often we want to know how to live in God’s grace or hard to live a life of victory, and so we look for rules and principles and steps. And there’s some merit in that, often, but you know, living empowered by God’s free flowing grace is really just the result of having a revelation of who He is, of His love and of His grace, then it impacts you!
 
I remember years back, talking to a friend of mine and um, they were just saying that it’s so difficult to be a Christian and that the world has it so easy. He said that we have to do all this stuff, we have to live up to the 10 commandments – it’s difficult to live godly when everything around you is, is, um, you know, ungodly.
 
But the truth is that it’s going to be more difficult for the unbelievers long-term than it’s going to be for us. The Christian life isn’t difficult; it’s impossible. We often feel discouraged because we are struggling to live the abundant life and we’re struggling to live for Jesus. We feel like we’re not good enough as a Christian, as a believer. God doesn’t want us to feel like that. Whenever you feel feelings of condemnation, guilt and shame; whenever you’re feeling like you’re not good enough – you need to remind yourself of the truth that it’s not God making you feel like that. It’s the devil or it’s just your conscience condemning yourself. The Christian life is impossible.

You can’t live out the Christian life in your own strength – you need Jesus! Galatians 2:20 says, Paul Speaking, my old identity has been co-crucified with Messiah and no longer lives, for the nails of his cross crucified me with him. That is basically just saying that, you know, when he died, we died. We can go further and say that when he rose, we rose. The point here is, is that my old self, my old man, my sinful nature has been crucified with Christ. The moment I said yes to Jesus, I identified with him in his death and in his resurrection. I’m a new man, even when I don’t think like one, the truth is that the old man is dead. Scripture goes on to say that, the essence of this new life is no longer mine for the anointed one, Jesus, lives his life through me. We live in union as one. This is the key to successful Christian living. Okay? It’s realizing that I’m not living for Jesus. He’s living in me and he’s living through me. In a way we are living for Jesus but it’s more correct to say that Christianity is not about you trying to live for God. It’s not about you trying to be a good Christian, follow Jesus and live for him. Christianity is about Jesus living in you and Jesus living through you.
 
I live my life empowered by the faith of the son of God who loves me so much and gave himself for me and dispensers his life and to mine (Galatians 2:20 TPT). That’s awesome! This new life in Christ means that you’re a new creation. The old has gone and the new has come! This new life that you have now in Christ isn’t empowered by your ability to live for God. It’s not empowered by your ability to do what’s right and to live holy and to resist sin. It’s empowered by the faith of the son of God who loves us so much that he gave himself for us! We live our lives flowing from the grace of God and the faith of God in us.

Faith isn’t a work that you have to try and build up. Faith is a natural byproduct of being a believer and being one with Christ, okay? And this says also that he dispenses his life into mine. That’s awesome. The King James puts it like this and says, 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 the faith of the son of God who loved me and gave himself for me.
 
We’re living our lives empowered by Jesus in us. Whatever you’re going to face today, you can overcome it because of Christ in you. Whatever challenges come your way, you don’t have to face it alone because Jesus is in you and Jesus will strengthen you. He will give you the wisdom to overcome. He will strengthen you to overcome. He will show you the way that you should go and help you to get through. Isn’t that awesome? You don’t have to tackle life alone. You don’t have to make decisions by yourself because you can make decisions with God. I mean, he is in you. You are one with him. Wherever you go. He goes, he’s with you right now, and, and he’s got better ideas than you have. You might feel like you’re at a brick wall. You might feel like you don’t know what to do next. Like your business is failing, or your marriage is failing, or life has just failing, and you don’t know what to do. Hey, just stop and look to Jesus and ask him to lead you. He’s your shepherd. He wants to lead you. He wants to guide you. He wants to help you to be able to live in victory, to be able to live the abundant life, to be able to, to be all that God created you to be. And he will do it in you and he will do it through. You. Do not have to do it on your own. This is a really encouraging truth that you need to establish in your heart.