A Christ Vision

But you are not in the flesh but in the Spirit, if indeed the Spirit of God dwells in you.  Now if anyone does not have the Spirit of Christ, he is not His.  And if Christ is in you, the body is dead because of sin, but the Spirit is life becaus eof righteousness.  But if the Spirit of Him who raised Jesus from the dead dwells in you, He who raised Christ from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies through His Spirit who dwells in you.
Romans 8: 9-11 NKJV

It's something that people for generations of christianity have struggled to come to grips with.  In fact, the apostle Paul refered to it as the "Mystery among the Gentiles" {Colossions 1:27}.  It is intricately connected not only to christianity, but to ourselves as well.  What is this mystery which so many have struggled to accept and to understand?  Well, it might help just a bit if I were to point out one of the better known and accepted truths of christianity which has been pointed out by many a pulpit pounder over the ages.  That is that each and every one of us, as a result of the fall in the garden of eden, was born into sin.  It is this sin condition which we carried with us, until He came along.  Yes, Christ Jesus came not only to cleanse us of our sin condition, but to put away that sin nature once and for all.  Once this happened, then we were returned to our original "Factory settings" which we carried with us before sin entered the world.  We humans were created by our heavenly Father in a most unique way.  For we were created by God with our bodies, our earthly vessels on the outside and our spirit on the inner part of this vessel.  When we are told in scripture that we were created in Gods own image {Genesis 1:26}, I believe it is refering to this spirit image of God within us.  We are, therefore, in body and spirit.

"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."
Galations 2:20 NKJV

And so, was it our earthly vessel which was crucified with Christ Jesus as Paul states in Galations 2;20?  No, for this was the spirit which we carried within us before we came to know Jesus, this was the spirit of error {1 John 4:6}.  The spirit of error being the very sin nature which we once carried.  This is what was put to death by Christ Jesus, that He might once again dwell within us.  This, friends, is that great mystery among the Gentiles which Paul referes to.  How does this bring us to where we are today?  For those who have accepted Christ Jesus, the spirit of truth (Jesus) is in, and that spirit of error has been kicked out by the sacrafice of Jesus.  And so, the original seetings we once had have once again been restored to these earthly vessels of ours.  For it is our spirit which is intimately in contact with our heavenly Father when we need Him.  It is unto our spirits that He will whisper His voice to His children.   I believe that this is the reason which Jesus became sin on our behalf, that our close relationship with God would be restored.  Far from being simly sinners saved by grace, we are now new creations in Christ Jesus.  Because of sin our body is dead, but because of Christ our spirit is once again in righteousness.  Each day we now live AS Christ Jesus who is in us.

~Scott~