CHRIST IN ME: by Andrew Murray

“Examine yourselves to see if your faith is really genuine.” 2 Corinthians 13:5

Christ is in me. What a difference it would make if we could take time every morning to focus on the thought. Christ is in me.
Christ made it clear to His disciples. The Spirit would teach them; “When I am raised to life again, you will know that I am in my Father, and you are in me, and I am in you” (John 14:20). Through the power of God we who believe were crucified with Christ and raised again with Him. As a result Christ is in us! Through faith in God’s Word, the Christian accepts it.
Paul expresses this thought in the prayer of (Ephesians 3:16); “I pray that from His glorious, unlimited resources He will give you mighty inner strength through His Holy Spirit.” Notice that it is not the ordinary gift of grace, but a special revelation of the riches of His love that Christ may dwell in your heart by faith. Have you been able to grasp that?
Paul said: “I fall to my knees and pray to the Father” (Ephesians 3:14). That is the only way to obtain the blessing. Take time in prayer in His presence to realize: ‘Christ dwells in me.” Even in the midst of your daily schedule, look upon your heart as the dwelling place of the Son of God. Then Christ’s words: “Those who remain in me, and I in them, will produce much fruit.” (John 15:5) will become your daily experience.

The Cross of Christ: by Andrew Murray

 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. Galatians 2:20

The cross of Christ is His greatest glory.  Because He humbled Himself to the death of the cross, God has highly exalted Him (Phil 2:8-9).  The cross was the power that conquered Satan and sin.
The Christian shares with Christ in the cross.  The crucified Christ lives in him through the Holy Spirit, and the spirit of the cross inspires him.  He lives as one who has died with Christ.  As he realizes the power of Christ's crucifixion, he lives as one who has died to the world and to sin, and the power becomes a reality in his life.  It is as the Crucified One that Christ lives in him.
Our Lord said to His disciples, "Take up your cross and follow Me..." (Matt. 16:24).  Did they understand this?  They had seen men carrying a cross, and they knew it meant a painful death.  All His life, Christ bore His cross - the death sentence that He would die for the world.  Similarly, each Christian must bear his cross, acknowledge that he is worthy of death, and believe that he is crucified with Christ and that the Crucified One lives in him.  "Our old man was crucified with Him" (Rom. 6:6).  "Those who are Christ's have crucified the flesh with its passions and desires" (Gal. 5:24).  When we have accepted this life of the cross, we will be able to say with Paul, "But God forbid that I should boast except in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ" (Gal. 6:14).
This is a deep spiritual truth.  Think and pray over it, and the Holy Spirit will teach you.  Let the disposition of Christ on the cross, His humility, His sacrifice of all worldly honor, His spirit of self-denial, take possession of you.  The power of His death will work in you, you will become like Him in His death, and you will "know Him and the power of His resurrection" (Phil. 3:10).  Take time, dear reader, so that Christ through His Spirit may reveal Himself as the Crucified One.

Christ is Christianity: by TA Sparks

The time is coming, yes, and has already come, when true worshippers will worship in spirit and in reality. Indeed, the Father looks for men who will worship Him like that. (John 4:23 Phillips)

Jesus said to the woman, "the hour comes, and now is." Then He dismissed the whole system that had existed up to that time. It was the whole system of Judaism according to the Old Testament. In one sentence, He dismissed the whole dispensation. And He introduced an altogether new order of things.

What did He mean? Because when He said the hour comes, and now is, He did not mean literally just an hour and so many minutes. He meant that it was the first hour of the new day. With this hour an altogether new day has come. What is the new day? If you would have asked Jesus to put it into a short sentence, He would have said, "Well, I am here." The hour is not just a matter of time but a matter of PERSON. The new dispensation is the dispensation of Jesus Christ. Christ is the new dispensation. "I am here," He said. You go through that Gospel of John. He is centering everything in Himself. "I am the Way; I am the Truth; I am the Life; I am the Shepherd; I am the Vine; I am the Resurrection." It is a Person. It is that which lies behind everything. Christianity is Christ. Christ is Christianity. That is where it all begins and it never departs from HIM. The development of the Christian life is only the development of Jesus Christ in the life.

Discipleship is Christ in You – by Henry Blackaby

To them God willed to make known what are the riches of the glory of this mystery among the Gentiles: which is Christ in you, the hope of glory.
Colossians 1:27

The heavenly Father’s plan from the beginning of time was to place His eternal Son in every believer. If you are a Christian, all the fullness of God dwells in you.  Christ’s life becomes your life.  When Christ lives in you, He brings every divine resource with Him.  Every time you face a need, you meet it with the presence of the crucified, risen, and triumphant Lord of the universe inhabiting you.  When God invites you to become involved in His work, He has already placed His Son in you so that He can carry out His assignment through your life.

This has significant implications for your Christian life.  Discipleship is more than acquiring head knowledge and memorizing Scripture verses.  It is learning to give Jesus Christ total access to your life so He will live His life through you.  Your greatest difficulty will be believing that your relationship with Christ is at the heart of your Christian life.  When others watch you face a crisis, do they see the risen Lord responding?  Does your family see the difference Christ makes when you face a need?  What difference does the presence of Jesus Christ make in your life?

God wants to reveal Himself to those around you by working mightily through you.  He wants your family to see Christ in you each day.  God wants to express His love through your life.  There is a great difference between "living the Christian life" and allowing Christ to live His life through you. 

Is the Way Written in us? By E. Stanley Jones

since what may be known about God is plain to them, because God has made it plain to them.  For since the creation of the world God's invisible qualities--his eternal power and divine nature--have been clearly seen, being understood from what has been made, so that men are without excuse. Romans 1:19-20

Three facts are beginning to form in our minds:

1. There ought to be a God behind, in and through the universe “If there isn’t a God, we would have to invent one to keep people sane,” said Jean-Jacques Rousseau, a skeptic.  Life wouldn’t add up: it would be, in Shakespeare’s words, “a tale told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, signifying nothing.”  There must be a God.

2. This God, if He is to be good and trustable, must be like Jesus Christ.  Our practice of religion must follow the pattern of Christ, or come to a halt.  There is nothing else on the field.  As a Hindu said to me: “There is no one else seriously bidding for the heart of the world except Jesus Christ.”

3. If the very nature of God is Christlike, then we would expect that He acts in a Christlike way, not only in the revelation of Scripture, but in His creation as well.  In other words, when He made all things, He made them to work in a certain way, and that way would be according to Christ.  If the Way were written only in the Scriptures, then we might battle over the authority of the Scriptures—their authorship, their authenticity, their worth.  But suppose the Way is written in the nature of reality as well as the Scriptures.  Then the Way is inescapable for everybody.

If Jesus is only a moralist imposing a moral code on humanity, then of course we can question that code and His authority.  But suppose Jesus is the Revealer of reality’s nature.  That makes Him different.  He not only reveals that nature of God—He reveals the nature of life.  The Christian way becomes not a side issue but the central issue of life.

Do Not Mistake the True Meaning of the Cross: by AW Tozer

 May I never boast except in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, through which the world has been crucified to me, and I to the world. Galatians 6:14

All unannounced and mostly undetected there has come in modern times a new cross into popular evangelical circles.

It is like the old cross, but different: the likenesses are superficial, the differences fundamental!

From this new cross has sprung a new philosophy of the Christian life with encouragement for a new and entirely different evangelistic approach. The evangelist tries to show that Christianity makes no unpleasant demands; rather, it offers the same thing the world does, only on a higher level. The modern view is that the new cross does not slay the sinner, it redirects him!

The philosophy back of this kind of thing may be sincere, but it is as false as it is blind. It misses completely the whole meaning of the cross.

The old cross is a symbol of death. It stands for the abrupt, violent end of a human being. In Roman times, the man who took up his cross and started down the road was not coming back. He was not going out to have his life redirected: he was going out to have it ended! The cross did not try to keep on good terms with its victim. It struck cruel and hard, and when it had finished its work, the man was no more!

The race of Adam is under death sentence. God cannot approve any of the fruits of sin. In coming to Christ we do not bring our old life up onto a higher plane; we leave it at the cross. Thus God salvages the individual by liquidating him and then raising him again to newness of life!

From Day to Day: by Andrew Murray

"Though our bodies are dying, our spirits are being renewed every day" - 2 Cor. 4:16.

All Christians, young or old, must learn the absolute necessity of fellowship with Jesus every day. This lesson is not always taught at the beginning of the Christian life. The grace we have received of the forgiveness of sins and of joy in the Holy Spirit can only be preserved by daily renewal in fellowship with Jesus Christ Himself.
Many Christians backslide because this truth is not clearly taught. Some are unable to stand against temptation or their old nature. Though they strive to do their best to fight against sin and to serve God, they have no strength. They have never really grasped the secret that the Lord Jesus will continue His work in the believer every day from heaven. But there is one condition: Time alone with the Lord Jesus each day is the indispensable condition of growth and power.
Read Matthew 11:25-30. Listen to Christ's word: "Come to Me...and I will give you rest...Let Me teach you...and you will find rest for your souls." Let the Lord teach you just how gentle and humble He is. Bow before Him, tell Him that you need Him and His love; He will let His love rest on you. This applies not only to young Christians but to all who love the Lord.
'Dear Lord, I want to please You. Enable me to enjoy this blessed experience of fellowship with You each day. Help me learn the lesson to spend time daily -without exception- in fellowship with You. Amen.