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Crucified With Christ
19 Plays8 months ago
Join Chris as he looks to Galatians 2:20 and Romans 12:1-2 and discusses what it means to be "Crucified With Christ" in a world that consistently encourages us to live for our desire above all else.
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Transcript
Introduction to Faith 168 Podcast
00:00:22
Christian McKenzie
Welcome to another episode of the
Society's Self-Centered Nature vs. Scripture
00:00:24
Christian McKenzie
Faith 168 Podcast. Of course, the best-looking host is here tonight. I will be the only one on, but I will try to do my best without Brother Rob and Brother Brandon, but I'm sure that they wish that they could be here tonight. But as I'm looking through the Bible and looking at things that we could possibly talk about and discuss. I'm reminded of the world that
Human Desires vs. Biblical Teachings
00:00:55
Christian McKenzie
we live in right now. The world that we live in is very self-centered. The world that we live in focuses on our desires and our fulfillment.
00:01:10
Christian McKenzie
And while all of those things sound really good when we talk about it, well, why are you here? Sometimes our purpose, we think, is to fulfill our desires and do what we want to do. But that's not what Scripture tells us. And I think that's one of the biggest divides in our country right now is the fact that instead of focusing on others around us and being a community and seeking the will of God, we're seeking to fulfill our desires and our desires will conflict with everyone else's desires around us.
00:01:46
Christian McKenzie
And so that's why it's very important when we look through Scripture
Division During Election Season
00:01:50
Christian McKenzie
to see the unity that God calls us to in following His will. And as we follow His will, He's going to call us in many different directions and give us many different gifts to fulfill His will that enable us to work together as a body to do what He has called us to do.
00:02:11
Christian McKenzie
But to do these things, we must put ourself aside. And that's something that the world really does not want us to focus on. We see that during this time of an election season, that there's been this great divide of what we want, how we think the country needs to be run. And it's created division amongst families. It's created division amongst churches and friends.
00:02:41
Christian McKenzie
And in society, we see this great division. But again, even when it comes to running our country, we must not seek our will, but the will of God. And even if the person that's going to be running the country in January isn't the one that you wanted, we're called to pray for those that are leading, that they would be successful, that they would seek the will of God as they lead. But all of this comes to an understanding that we have to put ourselves aside. And that's not an easy thing
00:03:26
Christian McKenzie
Because we are humans, we don't want to put
Significance of Galatians 2:20
00:03:30
Christian McKenzie
ourselves aside. We want what we want and we're going to do our best to get it. And especially as the world tells us over and over and over, focus on yourself. Do what you want to do. It becomes even more difficult to listen to what God has called us to do.
00:03:51
Christian McKenzie
But I have an all-time favorite verse that I like to read that reminds me who I am and what I'm called to do. And it's what Paul writes in Galatians chapter two, verse 20. It says, I have been crucified with Christ. It is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me. In the life which I now live in the flesh, I live by faith in the Son of God who loved me and gave himself for me.
00:04:21
Christian McKenzie
And I've talked about this verse before. I'm sure that we've had a podcast where we dove into the scripture and and discuss this from many different angles, but it's still relevant to this time. It's a scripture that never, never gets old when we read it because we need it in our lives. We need to be reminded often that it's all about Jesus.
00:04:52
Christian McKenzie
And I'm a guilty person of seeking my desires. There's so many things in this world that I want to do. And sometimes I begin to pursue those things without consulting God. And every once in a while, my will and God's will align. And it seems really cool at the time, but a lot of times our wills do not align. And when my will does not align,
00:05:16
Christian McKenzie
with the will of God, that I must put my will, I must put my desires to the side and follow Him. And Paul writes this very important thing that I have been crucified with Christ. And this comes to this understanding that I am dead, that I no longer I am alive, and that's what he said. I have been crucified with Christ, and I no longer live. And this isn't something new. Paul didn't make this up and say, hey, this is Paul's words, and and I'm running off of what Paul thinks. No, Paul is focused on Jesus, and Jesus is the one who said, if you want to follow me, you must deny yourself
00:06:09
Christian McKenzie
take up your cross and follow Me, and to deny yourself as the same understanding of being crucified with Christ, that I have died, my desires no longer take precedence in my life, and I am going to follow the will of God first and foremost and everything than I do and yes I mean that that sounds radical but everything that I do when it comes to this podcast I seek the will of God when it comes to my daily routines God where are you leading me today I know I have this this setup routine where I might come into the office and I might do this at a certain time or that at a certain time but I still have to seek God even in the mundane parts of my life and say you know what
00:06:58
Christian McKenzie
Here's my desire. Here's my will. Here's my schedule, God. What do you want me to do with it? Because when I put my faith in Jesus, I died. When I put my faith in Jesus, I had to deny myself so that I could take up my cross and follow Him. And so I have been crucified with Christ and I
Living as a Sacrifice
00:07:21
Christian McKenzie
no longer live. And Paul talks about this too when you look over in the book of Romans as well.
00:07:28
Christian McKenzie
when he's talking about being buried with Christ by baptism into death, that just as Christ was risen by the glory of the Father, so shall we walk in the newness of life and then follow Him in that. And we see this picture in that same area in Romans of being crucified. I have been crucified.
00:07:51
Christian McKenzie
with Christ. and And so this is very important to understand in the Christian walk is that as you take each step, you don't take it for your glory or for your desire, but you take each step following the will of God because you no longer live. And it goes into this next point, but Christ lives through me. I always used to hear this thing growing up and People make fun of it now, but WWJD, what would Jesus do? Or what we kids used to yell out during VBS, we want jelly donuts.
00:08:32
Christian McKenzie
And that's what our life should be centered on. What would Jesus do? What would Jesus be calling me to do? How would Jesus react to these situations? Because ultimately what people need to see in our lives are not more of us because we are fallen humans just like them. So they already have enough fallen humans in their life to look at. What they need to see in us is Jesus.
00:08:59
Christian McKenzie
Not that we're not gonna mess up, not that we don't fall and stumble, but we can be an example of who Christ is by
Trusting God's Plan: A Personal Testimony
00:09:10
Christian McKenzie
following his will and putting his will before our desires. So it's no longer I who lives, but Christ lives through me. And the life that I now live in the flesh, how do I follow his will? I follow it by faith.
00:09:29
Christian McKenzie
faith in the Son of God, in Jesus Christ our Lord, who loved me and gave himself for me. And when we read those things, it's awesome to think about what God has called us to do And how simple it is to actually follow that. It's not that we have to be perfect. It's not that we have to understand everything before us. All we have to do is have faith in the Son of God.
00:10:01
Christian McKenzie
who loves us and gave himself for us. I'm going to do what he has called me to do. I'm going to live and walk in his footsteps and follow his will for my life. And there's a scripture that I think goes with this very well when you go back a couple books to Romans chapter 12.
00:10:24
Christian McKenzie
And we understand a portion of this sacrifice that we were talking about. I've been crucified with Christ. It's no longer I who live, but Christ lives through me in the life that I now live in the flesh. I live by faith in the Son of God who loved me and gave himself for me.
00:10:42
Christian McKenzie
And so there's why we do all of this. There's why we give it ourselves up. There's why we follow Jesus in faith because he loves us and he gave himself for us. And it reminds me of what we're called to do in Romans chapter 12 verse 1 and 2 where Paul writes, I beseech you therefore brethren,
00:11:05
Christian McKenzie
by the mercies of God that you present your bodies a living sacrifice wholly acceptable to God which is your reasonable service and do not be conformed to this world but be transformed by the renewing of your mind that you may prove what is that good and acceptable and perfect will of God and so we are called to be a living sacrifice Just as Christ was a sacrifice for our sins, where he literally walked up that hill, Golgothis Hill, was nailed to a cross and bled out for us to redeem us.
00:11:48
Christian McKenzie
And now that we have been redeemed, we are called to be a living sacrifice, meaning that as we live here in this world by faith, we are going to give ourselves up, sacrifice ourselves for the will of God, sacrifice our desire in whatever we think we want to do and say, God, what do you want me to do? I've shared my testimony many times on where I'm at today.
00:12:14
Christian McKenzie
I live in a small little town in southern Illinois. And if you would have asked me several years ago, Chris, do you want to go to a small southern town in southern Illinois? I'd say, of course not. I don't want to go to Illinois. I want to go somewhere else. But as my wife and I prayed about where God was calling us, my desire was to go to a different place.
00:12:41
Christian McKenzie
My desire was not to go north, but maybe a little bit further south. But as we prayed about that, we realized that God was opening all the doors for me and my wife to come to Southern Illinois. And we had to make a choice in that moment. We could follow our desires and move somewhere to Tennessee, or we could follow God's will and go to Southern Illinois.
00:13:09
Christian McKenzie
And we have to sacrifice our desires at that moment to follow God's will. And guess what? I know this, and looking back, I can fully affirm this, that God has blessed me here in southern Illinois more than I could have been blessed over in some part of Tennessee that we were looking to go to.
00:13:34
Christian McKenzie
It didn't look like the place where we would receive a blessing. It didn't look like the place where we would be able to raise a family. But God worked all things out so that we could be here and do what he has called us to do. But what it took was for us to say, you know what, God's will comes first. I wish I could say that I do that every time.
00:13:57
Christian McKenzie
and in every situation and I'm giving you one good example in my life but for that one good example I have a million bad examples that I could give you where I didn't follow God's will and I didn't receive his blessing and what I was doing and I had to suffer the consequences for that as I was brought back into his will and turned back around from where I was
Reasonable Service to God
00:14:20
Christian McKenzie
to follow him where he was calling me but we have to understand that his will is not to rain on our parade and to keep us from having fun or doing what we want. His will is to show us a place where we are going to have life and life more abundant.
00:14:40
Christian McKenzie
His will is going to take us to places where we can experience the glory of His blessings over and over. And a lot of times it's in a way we never expected it. Again, I live in a small town in southern Illinois When people heard that I was coming out here, they would pull me aside and ask me, are you sure? Is that really where you want to go? You're not going to make it. And I honestly, I couldn't see how we would. Yet God
00:15:13
Christian McKenzie
worked a miracle. he He took something that looked like it would be impossible to do and made it possible. And he blessed me for that. I had his peace. I had his joy. He provided every need that I i had. I didn't get all of my wants. and you know I did not always have the biggest TV or the nicest car, but he took care of me.
00:15:40
Christian McKenzie
the whole way and we have got to give ourselves and present ourselves as a living sacrifice, holy and accept acceptable to God, which is, he says right there, your reasonable service. And why would that be our reasonable service to give o ourselves as a living sacrifice for God?
00:16:05
Christian McKenzie
It's a reasonable service when we look at what Jesus did for us. We can read in Romans 5.8 that God demonstrates his love toward us in this way, and that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us. And so it's a reasonable service because we got something completely undeserved when Christ went to the cross for us.
00:16:32
Christian McKenzie
We were still sinners, undeserving of His love, undeserving of His mercy, undeserving of His forgiveness. And even as He hung on the cross and people mocked Him and and made fun of Him and told Him to come down if He was really the Son of God, He could have wiped them off of the face of the earth, but instead He said, Father, forgive them. They know not what they do. And so our reasonable service
Transforming Through God's Will
00:17:00
Christian McKenzie
is to present ourselves as a living sacrifice for Him because He presented Himself as the perfect sacrifice for us when we did not deserve it. And then it says, don't be conformed to the world. That's what it means to be a living sacrifice.
00:17:26
Christian McKenzie
that we don't conform to the world, we only conform to the will of God. And I want to tell you the truth, when I read through the Bible, there are some things that in my flesh, in my thinking and my ways of living that I want to say I disagree with that and I don't want to do it but I look at the Bible and I know that it is the holy and perfect Word of God that God speaks to me through His Word and I have to come to this point that if it's in His Scripture if I am contrary to it then I am the one in the wrong and not His Word.
00:18:09
Christian McKenzie
There are so many things that it calls me to do that it would be so much easier in this world to reject that portion of scripture and accept what the world is telling me to do. It would be so easy to do that, but to be a living sacrifice, I must not be conformed to the world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind that you may prove what is that good and acceptable and perfect will of God.
00:18:39
Christian McKenzie
And if anyone ever told you as a Christian that you're just some gullible dummy that that can't think for themselves, well, the Bible tells us right there that we need to use our minds, that when we submit to his will and seek his truth, which is the only truth, man, it's going to open our eyes up to see the world as it truly is and give us the ability to walk in the world yet stay separated from the world. And so when I look to His truth, it transforms me. When I look to His word, it transforms me and it shows me how I am supposed to walk while I live here in this world for Him. And it's not always easy, but here's what I always have as I walk in His will.
00:19:37
Christian McKenzie
And this is something that the world cannot claim.
Philippians 1:21: Living for Christ
00:19:40
Christian McKenzie
I have His joy, I have His peace, and I have His blessing. And my friends, as Christians, that is what should matter the most to us. His joy, His peace, His blessings, His forgiveness, His favor, those are the things we are seeking as we walk in the flesh.
00:20:05
Christian McKenzie
And then it reminds me too of another thing that Paul wrote in Philippians 1.21, another all-time favorite verse for me. I know as a pastor, I got pretty much the whole Bible is an all-time favorite verse of it for me. But Philippians 1.21 says, for me to live is Christ and to die is gained. And what Paul was saying there, as long as I live, I'm gonna be this living sacrifice.
00:20:33
Christian McKenzie
As long as I am drawing oxygen into my lungs, as long as I can speak words from my mouth, as long as I can be your hands and feet here in the flesh on this earth, Jesus, I'm going to live for you and do everything I can for you until that moment you say that's enough, it's time to come home, welcome home my good and faithful servant for me to live as Christ.
00:21:02
Christian McKenzie
and to die is gain. Yes, I'm looking forward to the day I get to embrace Jesus. But before we die for Christ, one thing we need to do is live for Him here in this world. It's easy to talk about dying and going to be with Him.
00:21:26
Christian McKenzie
but it's another thing to live for Him while you still draw breath here in this world. So I want to encourage you, if you're a Christian, to be a living
Dedicating Time to Serve Jesus
00:21:40
Christian McKenzie
sacrifice, to remember that you have been crucified with Christ and that it's no longer about you living, but Christ living through you and the life that you now live in the flesh and you live by faith in the Son of God who loves you and gave himself for you. And you were called to be a living sacrifice for him. So go out this week and live faithfully for Jesus 168 hours of the whole week.
00:22:10
Christian McKenzie
And if you're not a Christian and you're listening to this, I want you to know that we are all undeserving of the grace of God, yet He died for us anyway. And He died for you. Even if you don't believe Him, He wants a relationship with you and He's calling out to you today. And He wants you to put your faith in Him. And so if you're not a Christian today, my prayer for you would be to take that step of faith.
00:22:39
Christian McKenzie
to seek out Christ while He might be found to turn away from this world and let Jesus transform you. And if you're not a Christian and you want to take a step of faith, I encourage you to reach out to us on our Facebook page, the Faith 168 Facebook podcast, Facebook page.
00:23:04
Christian McKenzie
And I'd love to talk to you a little
Conclusion and Prayer
00:23:06
Christian McKenzie
bit more about what it means to be a follower of Christ, what it means to seek His desire and His will in your life and put yourself aside.
00:23:16
Christian McKenzie
But again, I want to encourage everyone to live faithfully for Jesus, 168 hours this week. And we're going to have a time of prayer before we end this podcast today. Let's pray. Father, thank you so much for the opportunity to seek out your word and your will in our lives.
00:23:40
Christian McKenzie
And what a wonderful thing it is to experience your love and your grace that we don't deserve. Help us in this world to be living sacrifices for you. Help us in this world to put ourselves to the side and let your light shine through us so that we might reach others with your gospel, with your good news, so that they might experience that same grace and that same love that we have.
00:24:17
Christian McKenzie
Father, I pray that you be a blessing to the lives of those that are listening this podcast, that you continue to give me and the other co-hosts, Brother Brandon and Brother Rob, the words from your scripture and from your spirit to speak to them so that they could be encouraged to live faithfully for you here in this world. It's in Jesus' name I pray all of these things. Amen.