By
Arthur J Licursi
The
threefold aspects of Paul’s “gospel of the grace of God”
encompass Christ delivering the believer from …Sin’s
Penalty…Sin’s Power …and ultimately from the very presence of
Sin.
Our
Heavenly Father, by the offering of His dear Son for us, and
then giving of His Son’s life to us to be our new life, has
made provision for our total liberty from Sin.
How
can this be?
1) The
Penalty for our sins is paid in full by the shedding of Christ’s
blood.
·
The shed
Blood of Christ on the cross effectively cleanses us from all sins that we
have committed, and may yet commit.
Romans
3:25 Whom God hath set forth to be a propitiation through faith in his
blood, to declare his righteousness for the remission of sins that are past,
through the forbearance of God;
Romans
5:9 Much more then, being now justified by his blood, we shall be saved from
wrath through him.
With
our "sins paid for", still we needed also to have Sin, as the
indwelling nature of fallen mankind, dealt with.
2)
Sin’s
Power as our fallen nature is now broken by our death with Christ.
·
Identifying
with Christ’s Death on the cross as our death (as the Old Man) makes sin,
which is still present in our “flesh” to be “of no effect”. Sin
cannot tempt we who are crucified with Christ. We may be accused and tempted
by the lies of the nature of the Evil one still resident in our flesh body,
but for we who know and trust that we were crucified in Christ’s body on
the cross, Sin has no power over us.
Galatians
2:20 I am crucified with Christ: nevertheless I live; yet not I, but Christ
liveth 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.
Romans
6:7 For he that is dead is freed from sin.
3)
Sin’s Presence
·
Because
He overcame death, rising to newness of life, we one
day we will shed these human, temporal, physical bodies, which presently
contain sin as a fallen nature, and put on an immortal, glorious, spirit
body. Temptation, sin, and pain will then be over…replaced by eternal
peace, joy and righteousness in the presence of our Lord. This then is the
blessed hope of every believer who trusts in Christ.
1
Cor. 15:52 In a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trump: for
the trumpet shall sound, and the dead shall be raised incorruptible, and we
shall be changed.
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