In the previous message, we saw that we need to be those who live and walk by the Spirit. In this message we want to see our need to live and walk under the crucifixion of Christ. To live and walk by the Spirit is to walk in Christ's resurrection, through His crucifixion, and by the compound Spirit (Phil. 3:10; 1:19b).
The crucifixion of the Lord on the cross has two significant aspects—the objective aspect and the subjective aspect. The objective aspect of Christ's death refers to His redemption. He died for our sins to redeem us. In other words, Christ died a vicarious death for us. This was the objective aspect He accomplished on the cross apart from us about two thousand years ago in the distant land of Palestine. There is also the subjective aspect of the death of Christ. Christ died on the cross not only for us but also with us (Gal. 2:20a). When He died on the cross, He was not dying by Himself. He died with us.
People have different opinions about who actually died on the cross. Some unbelieving Jewish scholars would say that a martyr by the name of Jesus died on the cross for his religious teachings. They would say that he was martyred on the cross by the Jewish religionists through the hands of the Roman government. Other unbelievers would say that Jesus was a great man with the highest ethics of human life. According to their opinion, such a great, good, and wise man, whose teachings were on the highest plane of human ethics, was killed by his opposers.
Among the believers of Christ, there are also a number of views concerning who died on the cross. Many believers of Christ are shallow and superficial, and in their spiritual understanding they are just at the threshold of God's economy. They know only that Christ died for them on the cross as their Savior. To them Christ was not merely a martyr or a good man but a Savior. This understanding is right, but it is only partially right. This is a shallow, superficial understanding of who died on the cross.
First Corinthians 15:3 says that the first thing Paul delivered to the saints in the gospel was that Christ died for our sins. The word for means that He died a vicarious death. We needed Him to die for us as our Substitute. As our Savior, He represented us to die for our sins to accomplish redemption for us. This is right, but this is not a deep understanding of the death of Christ. If we are to be those who live and walk under the crucifixion of Christ, we need a deeper understanding of Christ's death.