HEART THOUGHTS from Helen

"Crucified with Christ"

"I have been crucified with Christ and I no longer live, but Christ lives in me. The life I live in the body, I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me." NIV

I'll never forget the day that the above verse of Scripture came alive for me. I'm not talking about my salvation experience here; I'm talking about an "AHA moment" when God reveals Himself afresh through His Love Letter to us. You know, those moments when the light shines on a passage and it bounces off the page to your brain and into your heart. It was the early '80's and we lived in Calhoun Falls where Dennis was pastor of First Baptist Church while completing his Master of Divinity at Erskine Theological Seminary. I, in the meantime, earned my "PHT" (putting hubby through) degree, learning what it means to be a pastor's wife, raising two boys and using my nursing skills at the local clinic. Nights and some days were spent typing papers
for Dennis on an old Royal manual typewriter.

My prayer closet consisted of a rocking chair squeezed between the bed and the double windows in our small bedroom overlooking a prolific fig bush in our backyard. As the early morning sun shown revealing a new day, our dear Old English Sheepdog, Oliver, liked to prop his big fuzzy head on my foot and glance at me through shaggy bangs that almost covered his mismatched blue and brown eyes.

One such morning, Galatians 2:20 rose from the dead, so to speak, in my heart. We all know or think we know about crucifixion. At least we've read about it and watched it on television and in movies. The only thing we can actually say about it is that crucifixion means "death" in the most horrible fashion imaginable. In as much as I can identify with crucifixion, which is not at all, it declares that I am dead. My flesh may be still walking around in this earth suit, but as Eugene Peterson puts it in THE MESSAGE, my ego is no longer central. What I want is not uppermost in my mind. I am dead to myself.

In the biography of Amy Carmichael, Elizabeth Elliot's title to the book seems to explain it beautifully: A CHANCE TO DIE. A chance to die...to self. Paul puts it this way in 1 Corinthians 15:31, "I die daily". Sounds pretty radical, doesn't it? If I die daily to myself, the Word says, Christ lives in me. Christ died once so that I may have the choice to die daily to my own flesh so that He might live in me. It's not me that's living this life, it is Christ living in me, through me, for me. Each day, the life that I now live in my body, I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me. Now I don't know if that's 'theologically' correct, but I know that the Good News of that verse freed me to realize anew the grace of God through faith in Jesus Christ.

I almost ran to my spiritual mentor with gladness of heart. "Did you know that I've been crucified with Christ? It's no longer ME that's living, but Christ living in me, and that the life I'm now living, I'm not living for Helen or in Helen's strength or knowledge, but I'm living it by faith in the Son of God who loved me and gave Himself for me?"

Wise person that he is, he smiled a knowing smile. He already knew that.

Did you know that?

"I have been crucified with Christ. My ego is no longer central. It is no longer important that I appear righteous before you or have your good opinion, and I am no longer driven to impress God. Christ lives in me. The life you see me living is not "mine," but it is lived by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me. I am not going to go back on that. " Galatians 2:20 (THE MESSAGE)