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In our last lesson, we studied the steps whereby our Redemption was wrought for us in Christ from the time of His crucifixion to His resurrection.
When Christ ascended into heaven with His own blood, He had obtained eternal redemption for us upon the basis of His substitutionary death and resurrection on our behalf.
Hebrews 10:12-14 states "But He when He had offered one sacrifice for sin forever, sat down on the right hand of God... Henceforth expecting His enemies to be made the footstool of His feet for by one offering He hath perfected them that are sanctified."
When Christ sat down at the Father’s right hand, man had been perfectly, completely, and eternally redeemed; legally upon the basis of the fact that he had been legally identified with Christ in His redemptive work.
In our last lesson, we noticed that man’s spiritual death was due to the fact that he had been legally identified with Adam in the fall. Now we shall study the steps in man’s identification with Christ, whereby He became legally redeemed from spiritual death.
There are six steps in man’s identification with Christ. They are as follows:
1. I Was Crucified with Christ.
Galatians 2:20 says "I have been crucified with Christ," and Romans 6:6 "Knowing this that our old man was crucified with Him, that the body of sin might be destroyed, so that we no longer should be in bondage to sin."
Romans 4:25 gives this to us: "Who was delivered up for our trespasses," because there on the cross, God made Him to become legally one with us. It was our spiritual death, our trespasses, but the words, "My God, my God, why has thou forsaken me," came from the lips of Christ, our sin-substitute. He suffered, but it was our crucifixion in the eyes of Justice. Our sin put Him there.
2. I Died with Christ.
Romans 6:5 -- "For if we have become united with Him in the likeness of His death," and Romans 6:8, "But if we died with Christ." As He died, we died with Him. Christ would not have died physically if He had not first had our spiritual death laid upon Him.
So, there followed as a result of our identification with Him in crucifixion, the death of His body which had then become mortal, subject to death, as Adam’s had when he died spiritually. In the crucifixion, we legally died with Jesus. As His spirit left His physical body and went into Hell, we were identified with Him (Psalm 16:10, Acts 2:31).
There may arise in the minds of some a question concerning the meaning of the words spoken by Jesus on the cross to the dying thief: "Verily I say unto thee, today thou shalt be with me in paradise." It is well to remember that according to Luke 16:19-31 that Hades, in the Greek, Sheol in the Hebrew was divided into two parts: the place of comfort with father Abraham, and the other, the place of torment. Paradise was without a doubt that place of rest with Abraham, and called by our Lord "Abraham’s bosom." Most students of scripture accept that Abraham’s Bosom was emptied at Jesus’ resurrection, hence the reading in Matthew "And the graves were opened and many bodies of the saints that slept were raised" the inference is that these saints went with the risen Christ into heaven. Undoubtedly, the thief who asked our Lord to be remembered when He came into His Kingdom, as the first trophy of grace, went with Christ into Hades, and at Jesus’ resurrection and ascension accompanied the redeemed into heaven. The place of comfort in Hades would be synonymous with paradise, for Father Abraham was there and it was there that Lazarus was comforted. Read Matthew 27:52-53, cf. 1 Peter 3:18-19, 1 Peter 4:6, Ephesians 4:8.
3. I Was Buried with Christ
"We were buried therefore with Him through baptism into death" (Romans 6:4). "Having been buried with him in baptism" (Colossians 2:12).
Baptism is a type of our burial with Christ; His body lay in the tomb but his spirit went to Hades (Acts 2:31). Thus in His death as well as in His crucifixion, Christ was identified with man’s penalty. Thus the demands of justice were satisfied by Jesus' identification with man. The penalty Jesus paid was not His, but rather, man’s - whom He had been substituted for. In the mind of God, it was you and I in the place of suffering bearing judgment that was due us. On the basis of identification, the man who receives the redemptive work of Jesus, need not go to Hell, but goes free, while the man who refuses Jesus' redemption on his behalf, bears his (own) penalty by going to Hell. The debt owed to sin is death - spiritual death, eternal separation from God (Romans 6:23).
When the penalty of man’s High Treason was paid, man was freed from his bondage to Satan. In Romans 6:1-11, we have given to us our identification with Christ in crucifixion, death, and burial. We have the following fact revealed: The body of sin, or the body of spiritual death was destroyed (verse 6).
Man was released from spiritual death because he died in Christ Jesus and adequately paid his penalty. When the penalty had been paid, man stood before God justified, or declared righteous. We are now glad that we know the meaning of our word "righteousness."
Socrates, called the father of philosophy, taught that before one could speak intelligently on any subject, must be able to define the terms that he uses. (To refresh your mind refer to chapter 4). "Righteousness" means the ability of man to stand in the presence of God free from sin and condemnation as though there had never been any spiritual death within his spirit.
When God could declare man righteous (Romans 5:1a) and legally freed from spiritual death, He had the right to impart life - His own nature, to the spirit of man. This makes man a new creature (or new creation) as 2 Corinthians 5:17 tells us. So after Jesus had been declared righteous in His spirit, because our penalty was paid, and Himself (Jesus) should not be there as He never committed any sin (no sin, no penalty), He was made alive. The identification of man and Jesus that had been so complete that the next step is:
4. I Was Made Alive with Christ.
"And you being dead through your trespasses and the uncircumcism of you flesh, you did He make alive with Him" (Colossians 2:13). Ephesians 2:5 ... "Even when we were dead through our trespasses made us alive together with Christ."
In the previous chapter we saw that when God raised Jesus from the dead, He said "Thou art my son, this day have I begotten thee" (Hebrews 1:5, Acts 13:33).
He was the firstborn from the dead. He was the first man to be born out of spiritual death into Eternal Life. He was the first man over whom the dominion of death was broken.
"Death no more hath dominion over Him, for the death that He died, He died unto sin once" (Romans 6:9-10). When He was identified with us on the cross, death seized dominion of Him, but when he paid our debt, our penalty, through the shed blood (Colossians 1:14) the dominion of death was broken. He was released. Being identified with Him, we were identified with His release. His release became our release. He died unto sin in His death, and He was begotten of God in the realm of life in His resurrection.
Romans 8:29 states, "For whom He foreknew, He also foreordained (planned) to be formed to the image of His son, that He might be the first born of many brethren."
The "many brethren" were legally identified with Him in His birth out of death into life at His resurrection. He was the first to vitally experience it. In legally being made alive with Jesus, we were conformed to His image.
The word "conform" carries the connotation to be made exactly alike. It means to be made according to a certain pattern.
In His being made sin in His crucifixion, He had been conformed to our image in spiritual death. Now His being made alive, with Him we are conformed to the image of the first born. All that He is, we become. That is why we are joint-heirs with Him (Romans 8:17). We were legally born out of death into life with Him.
In Romans 6:11, He tells us that we are to reckon ourselves dead unto sin and live unto God in as much reality as Christ is dead unto sin and alive unto God. The reason for it lies in the fact that we were together born again, made alive legally in Christ Jesus.
A man vitally receiving this life of God is actually born out of death into life when he personally accepts Jesus Christ as His Saviour.
Our identification with Christ, in His death and resurrection means in reality, that all Christ gained in His triumph now belongs to the New Creature in Christ. It is as though Adam had gone to Hades, suffered the judgment that was due him, and had been released, freed from the bondage of spiritual death that came as a result of his disobedience, and then legally acquitted for his crime of High Treason, given the right to receive eternal life - the nature of God, and to walk again in fellowship with his maker.
If Adam could have done this, the human race that had been identified with him in his spiritual death would never have been under the dominion of death. But, Adam could not do this. So God in His great love wherein He loves us sent His son to do it.
In Adam all humanity died spiritually (Romans 5:12) and as a basis of identification with Jesus in His death, burial, and resurrection all humanity was made alive with Him. "For as in Adam all die, so in Christ shall all be made alive" (1 Corinthians 15:22).
The man or woman, who has accepted Christ as Saviour and Lord, may walk in fellowship with the Father, and as free from satanic dominion as though Adam had never sinned or been spiritually dead.
At the New Birth, a man passes from the authority of Satan to the Lordship of Christ (Colossians 1:13-14 cf. Acts 26:18). "Who delivered us out of the authority of darkness and translated us into the Kingdom of the Son of His Love." This is because when Christ was released from Satan’s authority, the next step was to put off from Himself the forces of Satan.
The Word tells us in Ephesians 1:20-23 that when God raised Christ from the dead, that He raised Him high above all government, and authority and power, and dominion, and every title of sovereignty used either in this age, or the age to come.
5. I Was Raised with Christ.
Ephesians 2:6 says "And I was raised up with Him." Our battle in this world is with the principalities and powers and the world rulers of this darkness, with the spiritual hosts of wickedness in the high places.
Ephesians 6:12 says: "For ours is not a conflict with mere flesh and blood, but with the despotisms, with the empires and the forces that control and govern this dark world and the spiritual hosts of evil arrayed against us in heavenly warfare." (Weymouth translation).
These are the rulers that Christ disarmed and displayed as His conquest in the very throne room of Satan.
Colossians 2:15 - "And the hostile princes and their rulers He shook off from Himself and boldly displayed as His conquests when He triumphed over them" (Weymouth’s translation).
Hebrews 2:14 - "That through death He might bring to naught him that had the authority of death, that is the devil." Thus Jesus Christ in His death rendered Satan powerless in his opposition to redeemed man. We are identified with Christ in this victory over Satan. It is only because of our identification with Him, that we thus can triumph over Satan.
Christ always was greater than Satan. He did not have to conquer him for Himself. It was because of His identification with us as a man, He met the forces of Satan in conflict and defeated them. This victory which Christ secured is our victory. Therefore, we were raised with Him as representative head of a New Creation. This New Creation of Christ has broken the Lordship of Satan through its head in His death and resurrection. Therefore, Satan has no more right to rule over the New Creation than he has over Christ Jesus Himself. For the redeemed ones are divinely united with Christ, and His freedom is theirs. Satan is lord in the realm of death. He has no right in the realm of Christ, for Christ has redeemed us from the power of darkness by His blood (Colossians 1:14).
6. I Was Seated with Christ.
After Christ’s spirit had been freed from Hades, He re-entered His body that had been entombed and embalmed for three days and nights, raising it to immortality.
Acts 2:31 "He foreseeing this spake of the resurrection of Christ, that neither was He left in Hell nor did His flesh see corruption." Before His ascension to sit down at the Father’s right hand, He appeared one time to His disciples telling them that all authority in heaven and on earth had been given to Him. Matthew 28:18 . "All authority hath been given unto me in heaven and earth."
As a man He possessed authority over the world rulers of this spiritual darkness. With that authority He sat down at the right hand of His Father.
Acts 2:34-35 "For David ascended not into the heavens; but He saith himself: The Lord said unto my Lord, sit thou on my right hand till I make thine enemies the footstool of thy feet."
Hebrews 10:13 tells us that He is waiting for His enemies to be made His footstool. Let us study this in connection with Ephesians 1:20-23. "Which He wrought in Christ when He raised Him from the dead and made him to sit at His right hand in the heavenly places far above all rule and authority, power and dominion and every name that is named, not only in this world but also in that which is to come; and He put all things under His feet and gave Him to be head over all things to the Church, which is His body the fullness of Him. . . That filleth all in all."
He legally put all things under His feet (that is, under His body - the Church) in His resurrection. He is waiting today for His enemies, Satan, sin, and sickness to be put under His feet.
The Church is Christ’s mystical body. On this earth in the realm of the preaching of the Gospel of salvation and deliverance, the Church brings to pass vitally what Christ has wrought legally.
We are seated with Him (Ephesians 2:6) "And made us to sit with Him in heavenly places." He is waiting for us in His Name to vitally take what legally is ours and in His Name put every enemy of ours under our feet that we might reign as kings with Him.
Study with great care Romans 5:17. The identification of man with Christ has destroyed the work of Satan in humanity.