December 22, 2002

IN WHAT SHALL BE BOAST?

Galatians 6:14

   "God forbid that I should glory save in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, by whom the world is crucified unto me, and I unto the world" (Gal. 6:14). We must take note of words given great prominence in the Bible. Christ's death is related in detail in all four gospels. But the meaning of His death is interwoven throughout the rest of the NT.

Romans 1:4 declares Christ is declared to be the "Son of God with power...by the resurrection of the dead..." We read: "the death of His son" (5:10), "baptized into His death," "with Him by baptism unto death," "the likeness of His death," and " death has no more dominion over Him" (6:3,4,5,9)! In the Lord's Supper we "show the Lord's death..." In Philippians Christ was "obedient unto death" (2:8), and we are made "conformable unto His death" (3:10). Colossians 1:20 mentions "the body of His flesh through death." Hebrews says He was "made...lower than the angels for the suffering of death ," that He would "taste death for every man," and that through death, He would "destroy him that had the power of death, that is the devil" (2:9,14). Finally "by means of death" He would accomplish redemption (9:15).

   Paul used "dead" over twenty times in his letters declaring that Christ was "risen from the dead"! In addition he wrote "Christ died for the ungodly" ( Rom. 5:6), "when we were sinners, Christ died for us" (5:8), and that we were reconciled to God "by the death of His Son" (5:10). He wrote of a brother "for whom Christ died" (1 Cor. 8:11), and "Christ died for our sins" (15:3). And were we still under law, then "Christ died in vain" (Gal. 2:21). Colossians 2:20 considers that we "died with Christ." 1 Thessalonians 4:14 says, "Jesus died and rose again," and 5:10 says "our Lord Jesus Christ...died for us."

   Paul wrote "we preach Christ crucified. ..Jesus Christ, and Him crucified..." and "had they known, they would not have "crucified the Lord of glory" (1 Cor. 1:23, 2:2, 8). "He was crucified through weakness, yet He lives by the power of God" (2 Cor. 13:4), and again, that He had been "set forth crucified" among the Galatians. We must appreciate the unceasing emphasis upon Christ's death of the cross. God forbids us let anything overshadow what He accomplished there!

Ivan L. Burgener