No longer I

My old self has been crucified with Christ. It is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me. So I live in this earthly body by trusting in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me. I do not treat the grace of God as meaningless. For if keeping the law could make us right with God, then there was no need for Christ to die. (Galatians 2:20-21 NLT)

No longer I... 

Those three words bring two very different 'worlds' into focus. It is either "I" that is in control, or it is Christ. There is no 'happy medium' between the two as so many of us try to formulate. The more of "I" Christ controls, the less of "I" takes the driver's seat. We want to be in control, so we do our best to create and live by some set of 'rules', but we don't do a very good job of it. We have the 'rules' or 'standards' as laid out by man, yet we violate at least some of them some of the time. Do you always drive the speed limit? Do you always give 100% to your job while you are there? Do you always obey the rules? Not likely. That is why the 'rules' don't and never will make us 'whole' or 'holy'.

So I live...

We live in this earthly body, but we are to live spiritual lives in this earthly body. The more we turn over to the Spirit of God within us, the more we find living by the rules isn't very uplifting or 'faith-building'. We find the rules to be a little confining at times, so we want to 'fudge' a little. We find the rules to be a little confusing at times, so we make up our own interpretation of the rules. That is perhaps why living by the rules isn't the answer to becoming more like Christ. A life of faith requires us trusting the Spirit of God within us to guide our steps, help us with confusing thoughts, and bring us into places of safety when we want to go out on our own. 

I do not...

Treating grace as meaningless or trivial isn't something we want to do - ever! We want to embrace grace as a way of life, helping us move beyond the need to formulate our 'rule-keeping' lives into a place of grace-filled faith that looks forward to the safety his boundaries provide. We are never 'made right' by the rules. The rules simply help us to live within boundaries. Think of the rules God desires for us to keep as his commands. When he tells us to love one another, that isn't an easy rule to keep. When Christ dwells within and is in control of our actions, we find love is an outpouring of his grace within our lives. We love because he does. 

No longer I, but Christ who lives within me. Those are words we might need to repeat from time to time in order to remind ourselves that we need to let go of what we 'think' will make us righteous and reach for the only thing that will. Christ in us, the hope of all we could ever need or want. There is no other way to live. Just sayin!