In Galatians 2:20 Paul said, “It is Christ who lives in me,” and in Philippians 1:21 he said, “To me, to live is Christ.” This indicates that Christ lives in us in order that we may live Him. Christ is not only our life but also our living that we may be one with Him in both life and living. Christ lives within us as our life, and we live Him without as His living. When we live, He lives; when He lives, we live. Not only do we live by Christ, live together with Christ, live in Christ, and live for Christ, but we also live Christ.
To live Christ is not only to live a sanctified, spiritual, and victorious life, but to live a person, that is, to live a life that is Christ Himself. Because Christ lives in us, we can live Him by enjoying His divine dispensing and thus be one with Him both in life and in living. We must practice living Christ daily, taking Him as our life and person. This is the destiny given by God to us in His economy, and it is the goal of our Christian living.
Christ’s living in us is also that we may have Him formed in us. In Galatians 4:19 Paul said, “My children, with whom I travail again in birth until Christ is formed in you.” Galatians shows us that Christ has been revealed in us (1:16), He is now living in us (2:20), and He will be formed in us. To have Christ formed in us is to have Christ fully grown in us. First, Christ was born into us at the time of our regeneration, then He lives in us in our Christian life, and eventually, He will be formed in us at our maturity.
Christ’s being formed in us indicates that our whole being is being constituted of Christ. This is a living, organic matter. Christ is living now in us so that He may be the constituent of our entire being-our mind, emotion, and will, that is, that He may constitute every part of our soul so that every part of our being will bear His form, His image.
Christ’s living in us also enables us to magnify Him. Paul said, “As always, even now Christ will be magnified in my body, whether through life or through death” (Phil. 1:20). For Christ to be magnified is for Him to be shown or declared great (without limitation), exalted, and extolled. Hence, to magnify Christ is to express Christ without limitation. When we magnify Christ, we display to the whole universe that the Christ who lives in us and the Christ whom we live is unlimited. Even when Paul was suffering mistreatment in prison, he still could exhibit Christ in His unlimited greatness. By rejoicing in the Lord in his sufferings, he showed forth the unlimitedness of the Christ whom he experienced and enjoyed. Furthermore, in this way Christ was expressed, exalted, and extolled through him. If Christ is magnified in our body, we become Christ’s living witnesses, testifying of His ability, power, patience, love, wisdom, and everything, all of which are unlimited.
The word magnify means to make something large to our sight. Although Christ is universally great and His dimensions-the breadth, the length, the height, and the depth- are unlimited and immeasurable (Eph. 3:18), He is virtually non-existent in the eyes of the unbelievers. Hence, we should magnify Christ in our daily life that He may appear great in others’ eyes. Consequently, through our magnifying of Christ they will turn to Christ and know that Christ is unlimited.
Home | First | Prev | Next