The Gospel in a Nutshell Part Three in a Series of Three

In Christ

With this clear understanding of God’s love, we read in Ephesians 2:4-6: “But because of his great love for us, God, who is rich in mercy, made us alive with Christ even when we were dead in transgressions; it is by grace you have been saved. And God raised us up with Christ and seated us with him in the heavenly realms in Christ Jesus.”

In this powerful statement Paul is bringing out the key phrase that runs all through his epistles. If we deleted this phrase, there would be little left of Paul’s exposition of the gospel. This recurring phrase is the central theme of Paul’s theology and the means of our salvation.

In verse 4, Paul tells us that God saved us because he loved us. In verse 5, he tells us that he made us alive and saved us by grace; finally, he raised us up and “seated” us in heaven: all of this in Christ Jesus. The key phrase is: “in Christ.”

This phrase is also expressed in other similar phrases such as “in him” or “through him,” “in the beloved,” or “together with him,” etc. These phrases are synonymous and imply the “in Christ” motif or theme. The truth behind the phrase was first introduced by Christ himself when he told his disciples, “Abide in me” [John 15:4 KJV].

The words “in Christ” are the undergirding words of the gospel, and if we do not understand what the New Testament, especially Paul, means by the expression “in Christ,” we will never be able to understand the wonderful message of the gospel, the good news of salvation.

The phrase “in Christ” is the very heart of the gospel message. As Christians, there is nothing we have except that we have it “in Christ.” Everything we hope for and enjoy as believers — the peace of justification, holy living, victory over the power of the flesh, sanctification, the blessed hope of glorification which we will have at the second coming of Christ — all of these wonderful ramifications of the good news of salvation are always ours “in Christ.” Outside of him we have nothing but sin, condemnation, and death, which we inherited from Adam.

Though God loves us unconditionally, and because he is a holy and righteous God, he cannot save us by simply excusing our sins. We regularly excuse the mistakes of our children and the sins of others, but God cannot do that unconditionally because he is a righteous God.

Solidarity

So the question is, “How did God save mankind?” How can God justify the ungodly [Romans 4:5] who believe in Jesus and yet maintain the integrity of his holy law which condemns the sinner? Does he bypass the law? God cannot say, “I am sovereign and, therefore, I don’t have to keep my own law. Since I love this rebellious, sinful human race unconditionally I will take them to heaven.” God cannot do that, because he is always true to himself. So the answer to the problem is the “in Christ” idea.

The expression “in Christ” is a rather difficult phrase to understand just as “you must be born again” was difficult for Nicodemus. “‘How can a man be born when he is old?’ Nicodemus asked. ‘Surely he cannot enter a second time into his mother’s womb to be born!’” [John 3:4]. Likewise, the concept of “in Christ” is a difficult idea for us to understand. This is especially true of the Western mind, because in the Western world we think in terms of individuals, whereas the “in Christ” idea is based on what is known as biblical solidarity — the many in one.

To help us understand what the term means, we will look at two examples in the Bible, which will also help us understand what God is saying in Ephesians 2. The first example is found in the book of Romans. Quoting from the Old Testament, the apostle Paul is addressing Jewish believers at Rome. God is speaking to Rebekah, the wife of Isaac: “She was told, ‘The older will serve the younger’” [Romans 9:12].

God was talking in “solidarity” language. When he used the word “older,” he was not referring to Esau, but to the Edomites, who were descendants of Esau. When he used the word “younger,” he was not talking of Jacob the individual, but of the Israelites, who were the descendants of Jacob [see Genesis 25:21-23]. It is true that the Edomites, Esau’s descendants, did serve the Israelites, Jacob’s descendants. That is solidarity.

Another example in the New Testament that is helpful in understanding what Paul means by the phrase “in Christ” is in Hebrews 5-8. Paul is trying to convince the Jewish Christians that Christ, as their High Priest in the heavenly sanctuary, is far superior to the Levitical priest of Judaism. These Jewish Christians were in constant danger of giving up Christ and returning to Judaism. So Paul told them, To give up Christ as your High Priest and to go back to Levi as your priest is a step backward. Don’t give up reality for a substitute.

But to convince them not to give up their faith in Christ as their High Priest, Paul had to prove that Christ, as the believer’s great High Priest, is superior to the Levitical priesthood of the earthly sanctuary that was practiced in Old Testament times. How did he do it?

1. Christ could not belong to the Levitical priesthood because, according to the law of Moses, he had to be a descendant of Levi. Christ was born under the tribe of Judah. Both Joseph and Mary were of the tribe of Judah, so Christ is said to be the High Priest according to the order of Melchizedek [Hebrews 7:7-10], a priest who existed in the time of Abraham [Hebrews 6:20].
2. Having established this fact, Paul then explained that Melchizedek was superior to Levi. The proof he gave was that Levi paid tithe to Melchizedek [Hebrews 7:10]. However, if you read the Old Testament, Levi, as an individual, never paid tithe to Melchizedek. It was Abraham who paid that tithe. The explanation is that even though Levi, the great grandson of Abraham, did not exist when Abraham met Melchizedek, he was in the loins of his father, therefore Levi was implicated in paying tithe to Melchizedek in Abraham. Because you and I were in Adam when he sinned, we therefore suffered the consequences of his sin.

Likewise, at the incarnation, God took the corporate life of the human race to which we belong and which needs to be redeemed, and, in the womb of Mary, God united the human race and the divine life of Christ so, when Christ was born into this world, he was both God and man. The human aspect of Christ was really the corporate life of the human race whom he came to redeem. That is why Jesus is called the second or last Adam (mankind) [1 Corinthians 15:45].

Qualified

Now this did not save us but it did qualify Jesus to be our legal Substitute or Representative. With this in mind, we go back to Ephesians 2:5. Paul says that God made us, who were dead in trespasses and sins, alive. That is, spiritually alive when we were united with the divinity of Christ at the incarnation. Then he adds: “By grace you have been saved.” This is a powerful statement. He meant that by his perfect life and sacrificial death, he fully satisfied the law in order for the human race to be saved by grace.

He Did It All

There are two things that the law demanded of Jesus as our Substitute in order to save us totally from sin.

1. Jesus had to obey the law perfectly. Throughout the 33 years of his life he obeyed the law perfectly. He told the Jews that he came not to do away with the law but to fulfill it [see Matthew 5]. In Romans 10:4, Paul tells us that “Christ is the end [completion or fulfillment] of the law so that there may be righteousness for everyone who believes.” Because Jesus’ humanity was our corporate humanity and we were in him by God’s act, then his obedience can be reckoned or imputed to us because we were in him when he obeyed the law perfectly.
2. Still, this was not enough to save us because we are sinners, and the law says, “The soul who sins is the one who will die” [Ezekiel 18:4]. In the Jewish system, the male was not a man until he reached the age of 30. So Jesus, having obeyed the law perfectly from birth to manhood, took our corporate humanity to the cross. There he submitted that humanity to the wages of sin, so when he died on the cross it was not just one man dying “instead” of all men, but all humanity died in him.

Even though the Bible teaches that Christ died for us, or in our place as our Substitute, the reason he could die for us is because all men were in him. In other words, his death was a corporate death [“One died for all, and therefore all died” (2 Corinthians 5:14)]. All men died in one man, Jesus Christ. This does not mean that we paid the price for sin. He paid the price, but we were implicated in that death even as Levi was implicated when Abraham paid tithe to Melchizedek. https://www.secondcoming.org

Compelling Love

This is clearly brought out in 2 Corinthians 5:14: “For Christ’s love compels us, because we are convinced that one died for all.” Yes, one died for all, but “therefore all died.” All died when one died for all because all were in him. This is what Paul is saying in Ephesians 2:5: “It is by grace you have been saved.”

It is the perfect doing in Christ’s life and sacrificial death, the doing and dying of Christ that fully satisfies the law of God on behalf of the whole human race. By that dual act, Christ changed the status of the human race from condemnation to justification unto life. This is the incredibly good news of the gospel [see Romans 5:18].

This point is so important that we will look at another text, 1 Corinthians 1:30: “It is because of him that you are in Christ Jesus.” Notice that three people are involved. There is a “him”; a “you,” which is in the plural form; and Christ. The next part of this verse identifies the “him.” “Who has become for us wisdom from God.” So the “him” is God. Paul tells us that God took the whole human race and put us all into Christ. The “you” is us, and Christ is the Son of God. This is what God did for us in the incarnation.  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tiSLwdphAZc&list=PLzdrN4ZnrM5Y3-3rnnzyl5ToI-0WuXGPj&index=3

A New History

Then Paul says that God made Christ to be wisdom for us. The word “wisdom” means “special knowledge.” Remember what Jesus said in John 8:32: “Then you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free.” By the truth, he meant himself. In verse 36 we read: “If the Son sets you free, you will be free indeed.” This special knowledge is Jesus Christ and him crucified.

As Paul wrote to the Corinthians, “It is because of him that you are in Christ Jesus, who has become for us wisdom from God: that is, our righteousness, holiness, and redemption. Therefore, as it is written: ‘Let him who boasts boast in the Lord’” [1 Corinthians 1:30-31].

This can be illustrated very simply. Take a piece of paper, which represents us, and place it in a Bible, which represents Jesus Christ, because John 1:14 tells us that he is the Word of God who became flesh. By doing this, the two of us have become one. If we wrap the Bible in brown paper, go to the post office, and mail it to another country, the paper that represents us goes there, too. The paper can never claim that it went on its own, but it can claim, and legally so, that it went in the Bible. Say that after the parcel containing the Bible arrives, there is a fire in the post office and the Bible is burned. What happens to the paper? The paper (us), which is in the Bible (Christ), is burned, also.

The history of the Bible becomes the history of the paper, because the two have become one. Where the Bible goes, the paper goes. What happens to the Bible happens to the paper. This illustrates how God saved us in Christ. God put us in Christ so that he could rewrite our history in Christ and change our status from condemnation to justification. This is what Paul means when he says that “by grace you have been saved.”

Out of This World

After Christ redeemed us by his life and death, Paul tells us in Ephesians 2:6: “God raised us up with Christ….” We were with him in the incarnation; we were with him in his perfect life; we were with him on the cross; and now we are with him in the resurrection. He went to heaven and sat on the right hand of God, and we were there with him. Paul says in Ephesians 2:6: “God raised us up with Christ and seated us with him in the heavenly realms in Christ Jesus.”

What God did for us in Christ is God’s gift to mankind, but because God created us with a free will, there has to be a human response. That response is faith. Paul says in Ephesians 2:8-9: “By grace you have been saved, through faith — and this not from yourselves, it is the gift of God — not by works, so that no one can boast.” Salvation is entirely, one hundred percent, a free gift to us, given at infinite cost to God.

Faith’s Reality

This gift does not become ours automatically. We must believe, and have faith. Faith, as defined in the New Testament, involves three major elements.

1. To have genuine faith, we must first know the gospel. We must know the truth as it is in Christ, for Paul says in Romans 10:17, “Faith comes from hearing the message, and the message is heard through the word of Christ.” That is why Jesus gave the commission to go into all the world and preach the gospel to every creature [see Mark 16:15].
2. Just knowing the gospel is not enough. We must believe this truth as it is in Christ. Belief means a mental assent to this truth. Jesus said, “Whoever hears my word and believes him who sent me has eternal life and will not be condemned; he has crossed over from death to life” [John 5:24]. Unfortunately, too many Christians stop there.
3. The third element is very important. We must obey this truth. Paul reminded the Christians in Rome, “Through him and for his name’s sake, we received grace and apostleship to call people from among all the Gentiles to the obedience that comes from faith” [Romans 1:5]. In Romans 10:16 (KJV), he tells the Jewish nation, The reason you are lost is because you “have not all obeyed the gospel.” In Galatians 5:7, he told the Galatians, “You were running a good race. Who … kept you from obeying the truth [the gospel]?”

Obeying the Good News!

To obey the gospel simply means to surrender the will to the truth as it is in Christ. Because you and I are sinners, the law condemns us to die. We have no choice. Die we must. But we can choose to die in Christ, a death which took place 2,000 years ago, and we can now accept His death as ours. There is hope because Jesus did not remain in the grave. He rose from the dead. If you choose to die out of Christ, there is no resurrection to life because the wages of sin is “good-bye” to life forever. Even though you become a Christian, you will die. But that death is only a sleep, because there is the hope of the resurrection [see 1 Corinthians 15:20-23].

It is my prayer that you will not reject this wonderful good news of salvation. The question that Philip, the deacon, asked the first Gentile who requested baptism was, “Do you understand what you are reading?” [Acts 8:30]. Jesus commanded: “Go into all the world and preach the good news to all creation. Whoever believes [has faith] and is baptized will be saved” [Mark 16:15,16].

Predestined

The moment we accept the gift of salvation through faith in Jesus Christ, we receive all the blessings that come to those who hear, believe, and obey the gospel. Ephesians 1:3-6 records our joy: “Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us in the heavenly realms with every spiritual blessing in Christ. For he chose us in him before the creation of the world to be holy and blameless in his sight.”

In Christ we are holy and blameless. “In love he predestined us to be adopted as his sons through Jesus Christ, in accordance with his pleasure and will to the praise of his glorious grace, which he has freely given us in the One he loves.”

Faith Works!

Paul says that we not only have peace through Jesus Christ, but in Ephesians 2:10 he tells us that God “created [us] in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do.” Genuine justification by faith not only brings us peace with God and hope of eternal life, but it changes our whole attitude of life so that the Holy Spirit dwells in us. Through the Holy Spirit we begin to live a life of good works and loving obedience to his word, which is the fruit of salvation. These good works have no merit, but are the evidence of our justification by faith.

Believing is Seeing!

This is the good news of salvation that God sent His Son to bring to all mankind. The question is, What must I do to be saved? The answer is, “Believe [have faith] on the Lord Jesus Christ and you will be saved.” Freed from the condemnation of the law, let Christ live in you that the world may see Christ in you, the hope of glory. This is my prayer for you in Jesus’ name. Amen.

From “The Gospel in a Nutshell” J Sequeira