"IDENTIFICATION WITH CHRIST"

“IDENTIFICATION WITH CHRIST”

Galatians 2: 20; 1 Thessalonians 4: 14-18

What I have to say relates to the thought of being “with the Lord.” How little we take in the glorious prospect of being with Him. I suppose nothing is more precious to our hearts than that we are to be always with Him. The few moments that we enjoy of special nearness to Christ would surely give us some little impression of what it must be to be always with Him. This is the Lord’s desire, as He said to His Father, “Father, I will that they also, whom thou hast given me, be with me where I am; that they may behold my glory, which thou hast given me.” I desire with the Lord’s help to indicate something of the road that leads to being with Him. Most Christians have some knowledge that we are to be with Him, and look forward to that day, but I feel that we but feebly understand the road to that blessed end. I have read these two passages, one speaking of our initial identification with Him, and the other — the final one — our being actually with Him: I desire to touch on what lies between.

I believe our first identification with Christ is in what the Apostle says, “I am crucified with Christ.” We have not known Christ after the flesh, and those who did henceforth know Him thus no more for ever. There were those who were with Him here. What profound privilege was theirs. Two of them said to the Lord on one day, “Master, where dwellest thou?” He said, “Come and see” and it says they “abode with Him that day.” I am sure that day stood out to them because of impressions received in their hearts. One day with Him! The Lord in grace truly sojourned with men, but they spent one day with Him. Later the Lord chose twelve “that they might be with him.” For the greater part of three and a half years there were twelve with Him — “Ye are they which have continued with me in my temptations,” as He says afterwards. What they gathered up, who can tell! They share with us what they can. As John says, “That which we have heard, which we have seen with our eyes, that which we contemplated, and our hands handled,” not “he” but “that.” That is, they had come in touch with substance to engage their minds, their eyes, and their hands and they say, we declare it to you, that you might have fellowship with us. That is their unique part. The twelve have their own distinctive part for they were with Him here in His flesh and blood conditions. We begin in the passage I have read in Galatians, “I am crucified with Christ.”

I would say a few words about being crucified with Him, about having died with Him, about being buried with Him, about being raised with Him; and then as on that platform say a word about suffering with Him, walking with Him, supping with Him, sitting with Him — not that I could say much about these, but I believe that these positions lead to our being with Him for ever. If we are not prepared to start at the first position we will not enjoy some realisation now of the last. The apostle Paul says, “I am crucified with Christ.” He had no link with Christ after the flesh. He begins his identification with Christ as placing himself alongside Christ on the cross. I would commend that to all of us. If we are to enter into the great and holy things that can be enjoyed with Christ, we must be with Him as crucified. It is, of course, not a question of what is literal, but of what is reached in the mind. Paul speaks of reckoning. I would like to have seen where and how he worked things out. Again and again he says, “I reckon.” That is to say, conclusions were reached in his mind, and one conclusion is that, because of what he was after the flesh, what he knew himself to be, he put himself alongside of Christ on the cross. I fear we understand little of the meaning of the cross. It signified that man is lifted up from the earth as unfit to be on it, and is thus exposed in shame and dishonour and subject to the curse of God. Paul says, “I am crucified with Christ.” “I,” not some part of me. He had learned what his own heart was to such an extent that he says, I am unfit to be on the earth, and I place myself alongside of Christ crucified. It is our weakness at this point, dear brethren, that robs us of the enjoyment of what lies beyond. Let us judge self-complacency, and accept that, after the flesh, our place is alongside of Christ on the cross, for He was there for us. Paul makes it a personal matter, though he does not overlook that everyone else is the same as he, for he says “our old man is crucified with Christ.” He extends this thought to all of us; the moral being we have derived from Adam fallen can only be dealt with by crucifixion. We need to pay more attention to this truth. The spring of true unity lies in accepting our place with Christ as crucified. The end is that we are to be caught up together to be with Him. If each arrives at this, that the only way for what I am to be dealt with is that I am crucified with Christ, how it must promote unity. Self-vindication, self-seeking, self-righteousness, will soon disappear if I come to this, “I am crucified with Christ.” That is the only way to deal with what I discover myself to be. This the starting point on the road that leads to being “always with the Lord.”

The next thought is that we have died with Christ from the elements of the world. In his mind Paul not only accepted that he should be alongside Christ as crucified, lifted up in shame, dishonour and condemnation, but that his life in this world should be terminated. Death is the termination of our life here. Paul says, I am alongside Christ in this position. I crave that we might all reckon like that. The closing up of the life of Jesus involves, in our reckoning, that our life is terminated in respect of the elements of this world. If we think together in this matter, how it will promote unity. If everyone here accepts the first, “crucified with Christ,” and, then the second, “died with Him,” we would be on the road that leads to a unity that is of God. The elements of the world have no application to a dead man. Paul accepts that the death of Christ was for him, his life is thus terminated in regard to the elements of this world.

But then in the same Epistle, as also in Romans, he says, “buried with him.” Paul, as it were, comes to the grave of Jesus and places himself with Christ in that grave. “Buried with him.” What does burial mean? Crucifixion means that I am unfit to be on the earth and am exposed under the judgment of God; death means my life here is terminated; but burial means that even so I must disappear, be put out of sight. Oh! dear brethren, that we were all of one mind in this matter “buried with him!” Now much there is that needs burying. Every feature of the flesh needs burying, not only needs to be crucified and dead, but buried. It is to be noted that the chapter in Genesis which speaks so much of going up to the house of God, is a chapter of many burials, for if God is to be served in His house many burials must take place. How much must be put out of sight. Abraham says, “That I may bury my dead out of my sight.” The Apostle Paul disappears from his own sight, as a man after the flesh, in burial. But these exercises are only the beginning of the great road that leads to being always with Him.

The next step is, “If ye then be risen with Christ,” Colossians 3: 1. What a wonderful thought that is. Now it is not Christ crucified, Christ in death, Christ in the grave: we have already been identified with Him thus, but alongside of Him now as “risen with him through the faith of the operation of God, who hath raised him from the dead,” Colossians 2: 12. Some of us have been speaking of those wonderful forty days in which Christ was known as risen from the dead. How wonderful those forty days when He assembled with them. One longs to enjoy more what relates to Him risen. It says, “being seen by them during forty days, and speaking of the things which concern the kingdom of God; and being assembled with them,” Acts 1: 3, 4. One great subject engaging us as risen is “the kingdom of God.” The Lord also speaks then of the Holy Spirit that should come as the power to enjoy what belongs to the resurrection realm. In John 21 Peter says “I go a fishing.” One of the days when he might have realised the blessed company of Christ risen he says “I go a fishing.” And Nathanael and Thomas and Zebedee’s two sons and two others say, “We also go with thee.” What a humbling exposure. Think of using one of such days to go fishing. As risen with Him, each day is of great value, and yet some of us still go fishing. It may be that we fish for earthly things and miss through them what we might enjoy of the company of Christ. Many have turned away from the truth of the assembly, where Christ’s presence is known, to conduct gospel campaigns. I am not speaking against the preaching of the gospel, but many have turned from where the presence of Christ may be realised to fish for men. Others seek a place for themselves and thus miss the presence of Christ. The position reached in our meditations is that the saints are now in view as risen with Him, living in that realm in which He is “the firstborn from the dead,” Colossians 1: 18. That position makes way for the greatest possible privileges.

We are now in line to suffer with Him, not suffer for Him in this connection; though that is a great privilege too, but suffer with Him. The Apostle Paul says, “If indeed we suffer with him, that we may also be glorified with him,” Romans 8: 17. I believe the Lord is longing for this feature to mark His own: that we suffer with Him, as sharing His feelings. They are portrayed to us when He was there, but He still has them. What are His feelings in respect of the sorrows of the saints? The Lord would have us alongside of Him in our feelings. Think of the sorrows that abound amongst the saints today, the variety of them, the depth of them, and how the Lord feels them. It is said, when He saw Mary weeping and the Jews with her weeping, that Jesus wept; showing that He is moved by the sorrows His people pass through; He would have us suffer with Him in such holy things. Then what are His feelings in relation to the state of His people? As He looked on Jerusalem, He wept over that city, showing what He feels as to the conditions amongst His people, surely true now as to the state of the assembly. Do we suffer with Him as to the state of the assembly? That is what He seeks. What are His feelings about mankind? When the Lord found a man who was deaf and could not speak right it says He groaned, or “sighed deeply.” Are we suffering with Him in His feelings in relation to man? It is only as we travel the road that I have indicated we can know anything about suffering with Him.

This way leads to another great and wonderful position. The Lord speaks of those who “walk with him.” “Thou hast a few names even in Sardis which have not defiled their garments; and they shall walk with me in white: for they are worthy,” Revelation 3: 4. Christ and the overcomer walk together. I think it is clear there have always been those who walk with God and specially so at the end of every dispensation. I do not know anything greater than Enoch walking with God for 300 years. In the midst of a world that was more corrupt than we have any conception of, here is one who walks with God. Noah too, walked with God. At the end of the assembly’s history the Lord has in mind that there should be those who “walk with him.” It is evident Enoch walked in white: his garments must have been pure, else he could never have trodden the same path as God walked in. The Lord conveys His mind to those who walk with Him. I do not think we know all that God told Enoch. We could not suggest that God was silent for those 300 years. The veil is lifted once, and Enoch prophesies, “The Lord has come amidst his holy myriads,” Jude 14. God told him that He would come with myriads to execute judgment, it is as though it has come to pass in Enoch’s soul, for he says “Behold, the Lord has come amidst his holy myriads,” showing how final the word of the Lord is to Him. That is surely a sample of what must have taken place during that long walk with God. How great the privilege to walk with Christ. It is not here that He walks with us: what grace marked Him in walking with those two going to Emmaus; but He has in mind that we should walk with Him on the same road that He is on, walking together in holy communion. “Can two walk together, except they be agreed?” Think of Christ and the overcomer being entirely of one mind. God and Enoch were entirely of one mind for 300 years. The Lord would have this feature that we should walk with Him in white.

That leads us to the word of Christ to the assembly of the Laodiceans. “If any man hear my voice, and open the door, I will come in to him, and will sup with him, and he with me,” Revelation 3: 20. I do not speak about “will sup with him” now, but as to “he with me.” At the end of the assembly’s history the Lord is, outside the door in the profession, knocking, calling on any one heart to open to Him. Think, dear brethren, of what it must to sup with Him, to eat the same fare as He eats, to enjoy what He enjoys, who could speak of this? Lazarus no doubt illustrates it. “Lazarus was one of them that sat at the table with him,” John 12: 2. You might say it was Lazarus’s house, and Christ was with him, but Scripture does not put it that way. The Lord really provided the fare on that august occasion. Lazarus was with Him at the table. The Lord would give us access to this great privilege of supping with Him at the close the day, enjoying what He is enjoying.

The last thought in this scripture is of sitting with Him. “To him that overcometh will I grant to sit with me in my throne,” Revelation 3: 21. It is not yet a matter of reigning with Him but of companionship with Him in a most exalted place. Not on the throne yet, but sitting alongside of Christ in His throne, in that place of exaltation,

in nearness to and communion with Him there.

This line will soon issue in those who can reign with Him. “Blessed and holy is he that hath part in the first resurrection: ...they shall be priests of God and of Christ, and shall reign with him,” Revelation 20: 6. The Lord will publicly associate such with Himself when He reigns. How important that we should be with Him in the rule that He now maintains amongst God’s people.

The scripture in Thessalonians indicates that we are to be actually with Him always, and in the greatest nearness that can be conceived. The figure used in Revelation 21 is that of a wife and a bride. The wife refers to the inner, private, holy intimacy and communion with Christ, which is the portion of the assembly. How little we take in such a thought. “His wife hath made herself ready,” Revelation 19: 7. As the bride, she is to be with Him publicly, His companion, known as His. “Come hither, and I will show thee the bride, the Lamb’s wife,” Revelation 21: 9. This nearness is eternal. Scripture says, “I saw a new heaven and a new earth: for the first heaven and the first earth were passed away; and there was no more sea. And I John saw the holy city, new Jerusalem, coming down from God out of heaven, prepared as a bride adorned for her husband,” Revelation 21: 1-2. This is being with Him on the most exalted level, in the greatest intimacy that can be conceived and that for ever: “so shall we ever be with the Lord.”

I desired to speak thus to our hearts and consciences of this great subject. We must not think of these things as automatic, that will be true somehow inevitably. The way to the present enjoyment of them is the road I have indicated. We begin as in genuineness we arrive at “I am crucified with Christ.” Do we know our own hearts like that? No other way could effectively deal with what I am. Then we have “died with Christ” from the elements of the world. Have we put ourselves alongside of Christ in that position? Then “buried with Him”, recognising that what we are after the flesh can only be fully dealt with as buried, as out of sight for ever, making way for the power of God to operate in our souls so that we know what it is to be “risen with him”, and as on that platform to enter into these holy things: to suffer with Him, to walk with Him, to sup with Him, to sit with Him, and to be in the nearest place to His heart for ever and ever.

I commend the road to all. It is a road that calls for constant exercise, constant facing of these things in our minds, so that in the judgment that we reach of ourselves it is true, and by the Spirit’s power we may enjoy what it is to be with Him at the present time. May it be so for His Name’s sake.