In 2 Corinthians 5:15 Paul says, “He died for all that those who live may no longer live to themselves but to Him who died for them and has been raised.” Worldly people always live to themselves, but the love of Christ constrains us to live to Him and not to ourselves. To live to ourselves means that we are under our own restraint, leading, and control, mindful only of our own aim and goal. This is not only to live for ourselves but also to live to ourselves, taking ourselves as the aim for our living. The apostles, however, had the ambition to live to the Lord, to be well pleasing to Him; they were absolutely under the Lord, under His leading, restraint, and control. Everything they did was for the accomplishment of the Lord’s purpose and desire. Since they were this kind of people, they did not live to themselves but to the Lord.
Paul did not live to himself; he lived to Christ, his Master. The Jewish rabbis lived to the law, doing everything with the law as the goal. Paul was very different from the rabbis; his only goal was to be well pleasing to his Master. Paul did not seek to be well pleasing to the Lord by working but by living every aspect of his daily life to Him. Similarly, we should not seek to please ourselves but rather to please the Lord by living to Him. Whatever we do should be to Him. Since we are to the Lord, our time and money are also to Him. Nothing should be to ourselves, because none of us live to ourselves but to Him.
Second Corinthians 5:14 says that because “the love of Christ constrains us,” we live to Christ and not to ourselves. The love of Christ has already been manifested through His dying on the cross on our behalf. The Greek word for constrain means “to press on from all sides, to hold to one end, to forcefully limit, to confine to one object within certain bounds, to shut up to one line and purpose (as in a narrow, walled road).” In such a way the apostles were constrained by the love of Christ to live to Him. Today we are also constrained by the love of Christ; this love limits us, confining us to the narrow way that leads to the unique aim—Christ Himself.
Although we love the Lord Jesus, we are not always willing to take His way. Without being walled in by Him, we would escape from Him. Therefore, the love of Christ constrains us; it presses us from every side and holds us to one aim, leaving us with no other way to take. Actually, this is not our choice. If the choice was truly ours, we would be somewhere else today rather than in this way. Thank the Lord for the love of Christ that constrains us; we are constrained by the love of Christ to live to Him.
In ourselves, by our natural life, we cannot live to the Lord. Only through Christ’s resurrection, that is, only through the issue of His death, are we able to live to Him. Christ died for all so that we would no longer live to ourselves but to Him. Hence, the death of Christ causes us to live to Him and not to ourselves through His resurrection.
When we are constrained and limited by the love of Christ, we remain in His death. Christ’s death always brings in resurrection and makes His resurrection life our portion. Therefore, to be constrained by the love of Christ means to remain in His death, which brings in the enjoyment of His resurrection. In the resurrection of Christ, that is, in the issue of His death, we live to Him.
The believers’ living to Christ proves that we are the Lord’s and that Christ is our Lord, who died to purchase us to Himself. Our living to the Lord is a declaration that we belong to Him and that our aim is to live to Him; it is also a testimony that Christ is our Lord and that He died to purchase us to Himself (Rev. 5:9). Since we are the Lord’s, we no longer live to our own enjoyment, career, or future; we only care for Christ, who is our Lord, for He paid the highest price to purchase us with His precious blood. Since we belong to Him, we take Him as the only aim in our life, and we live to Him.