Genesis 2: 21 - 23 NKJV
I've been asked more than a few times if I'm a christian. My usual response is something along the lines of, "not only am I a christian, but I walk with Jesus every day." Walking with Jesus, I've heard that phrase tossed about in the church more and more. What does it mean to walk with Jesus? Well, in my opinion, I really don't think that we can ever walk with Christ unless we truly know Him. How do we come to know the man Jesus? Again, I really don't think the institutional church does us too many favors when it comes to knowing Jesus. I mean, really knowing Him. How would you like to know Christ as you know your most personal friend? Instead of "being like" Jesus, how would you like to share that close, intimate relationship with Him? See, modern theology has taught us that there is no way that we can develop a personal relationship with Christ. Jesus bled and died on the cross, rose again three days after that and promptly ascended into heaven to sit at the right hand of the Father. This is where the disconnect lies between who Jesus WAS and who He is today. I don't dispute the scripture which claims that Jesus is indeed in heaven with our heavenly Father. However, this is just part of His story. As I've written before, that cross wasn't the end of the road for Him, but a new begining. It is at the cross where we, as believers, get sidetracked. All too often we see the cross of Jesus as the end of His journey. He was now risen, justified and complete, what else was there for Him to accomplish? If you follow the doctrine of the church, this is what you will come to believe. Believe this, and your search for a intimate relationship with Christ will be that much more difficult. For how can we have a close relationship with someone we hardly even know? From scripture, we understand that God created woman out of man {Genesis 2:22}. Well, our own relationship with Jesus is similar.
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."
Galations 2: 20 NKJV
So, who is Jesus? Who is this which many have described as the perfect man? Too many christians cannot answer this question because they do not share a personal relationship with Christ. Can you describe Jesus the same way that you would your best freind? Are your feelings as deep for Him as your closest family member? I would say that many fail to achieve this level of intimacy with Him. For the longest time my own view of Jesus was one of a long distance relationship. Jesus was in heaven and I was here on a fallen world just waiting for His return so that I could finaly meet Him. You've all heard that sermon before. There was a seperation, a distance between us. I did not realize that which the apostle Paul tells us in Galations, that Jesus was as close as our next breath. How close? Well, Paul tells us that not only did Jesus live in him, but that he had died with Christ. What? I've never heard any sunday morning pulpit pounder preach on this! I'm guessing that's why I failed to realize the truth of Christ in me. It is Paul who tells us that our old man, our old sin nature, died on that cross with Jesus. This is why we need to see the cross of Jesus not as the end of the road but as a new begining. We no longer need worry about how God will see our sins. He saw them, and Jesus put them to death. As Jesus proclaimed on the cross, "IT IS FINISHED!" The way is now clear for a more personal relationship with Christ. I would say that only thing standing in our way of a more personal relationship with Jesus is our own understanding of who we really are. If we're to take Pauls words to heart, then we know that we...are Jesus. Everythig we will ever see and experience, we do as He who lives in us. There is no longer a void between ourselves and Christ. I would suggest that there never was. It is we who have created that void through our own teachings. It is the desire of Jesus to be in a personal relationship with us. Can you relate?
6knowing 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. 7For he who has died has been freed from sin. 8Now if we died with Christ, we believe that we shall also live with Him, 9knowing that Christ, having been raised from the dead, dies no more. Death no longer has dominion over Him. 10For the death that He died, He died to sin once for all; but the life that He lives, He lives to God. 11Likewise you also, reckon yourselves to be dead indeed to sin, but alive to God in Christ Jesus our Lord.
Romans 6: 6 - 11 NKJV
~Scott~
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