In Him: The Astounding Implication of Our Union With Christ

At the heart of the Christian faith is the good news that Jesus came for the weak, the frail, the guilty and the shameful. He came to save sinners, and yet when we find ourselves (as we so often do) in any of the aforementioned categories, our first response is not to remind ourselves of the gospel and rest in our Savior’s grace. Instead, we are prone to turn inward in endless, fruitless introspection. We turn to disciplines and human willpower, things which “have indeed an appearance of wisdom in promoting self-made religion and asceticism and severity to the body, but … are of no value in stopping the indulgence of the flesh” (Colossians 2:23). And when these things fail us, when we stumble yet again, we begin the cycle anew, never progressing and never finding that soul-stabilizing assurance we so desperately seek.

So the question is: Why do we do this? What’s missing from the equation? We’re stuck in a rut that just keeps getting deeper, and all we seem to be able to do is spin our wheels. We need something to pull us out, something to lift us above the mire of sin and suffering and set our feet on solid ground … and that something is union with Christ.

A vine and its branches. The body and the head. A foundation and its cornerstone. Marriage between a husband and a wife. These are the pictures we find in Scripture which ultimately point to the believer’s union with Christ, a central yet often neglected doctrine of the Christian faith. Louis Berkhof, in his Systematic Theology, defines union with Christ as “that intimate, vital, and spiritual union between Christ and His people, in virtue of which He is the source of their life and strength, of their blessedness and salvation.” In short, union with Christ encompasses all of the benefits of our redemption from justification to sanctification and, ultimately, to glorification.

But why exactly is our union with Christ so important? How does a doctrine help us when we’re struggling with discouragement, distress, and the despicable desires of our own sinful nature? Well, in order to understand that we have to go back to the beginning.

If we fail to grasp the overarching theme of the whole of Scripture, then we are bound to muddle up the individual bits and pieces along the way. The Bible opens with the story of how God created a perfect world and how mankind, through the temptation of Satan, brought it all crashing down. But God had a plan, and that plan was the redemption of the fallen world and fallen human beings through His Son, Jesus the Messiah. (And that’s just the first three chapters!) From there, we move on to how God sets about bringing His plan to fruition by drawing out and setting apart a people for Himself from which the promised Savior would come. The story continues with various accounts of His people’s perpetual failure juxtaposed with God’s unceasing faithfulness towards them. Time and time again, God leads His people back to repentance, and time and time again they spurn His love and go after false gods, slaying His prophets and ignoring His heartfelt pleas. Finally, at the end of the Old Testament, God goes incommunicado for a period of roughly four hundred years.

The New Testament opens with the arrival of the long-awaited Messiah, yet rather than embracing the One whom God promised from the beginning to send, His own people reject and kill Him. You would think the story would end here, that God would finally and for all time leave the people He tried repeatedly to save to their own inevitable and inescapable doom … but He doesn’t. The crucified Son of God rises from death, leaves His tomb, tells His followers to “proclaim the gospel to the whole creation” (Mark 16:15), and ascends to Heaven where He sits down “at the right hand of God” (v. 19). The rest of the Bible contains letters written to the fledgling church to combat heresies; encourage the oppressed, persecuted, and suffering; and instruct believers in how they are to live as Christ’s body in this fallen world, all culminating in a glorious vision of the things to come when Christ returns to claim His bride and take her home!

Great story, huh?

So here’s where we tend to get hung up: The Bible is obviously a story about God’s plan of redemption through Jesus; it’s about Him and what He has done, and yet because of our fallen inclinations we tend to place the emphasis on ourselves. We brush past the ninety-five percent of Scripture narrative that tells us who God is for us, and hone in on the five percent that tells us what we ought to do. But the Bible is not God’s “10 Steps to Improve Your Life” guidebook for believers. It is not our manual for how to fix the world. It is an epic tale of good versus evil, of how God is rescuing us from a dying world that is neither good nor even neutral, but depraved, dark, and at war with Him under the command and control of the devil himself. Do we find in God’s commands a gracious blueprint for our lives that teaches us how best to flourish in such sordid conditions? Absolutely. But to divorce Scripture’s exhortations from the other ninety-five percent of gospel-heralding, grace-infused, identity-bestowing, status-forward, united-to-Christ language that comes before it is an impotent and ineffectual way to preach Christian living. In Scripture, the indicatives (who we are in Christ) always come before the imperatives (what we are to do). In other words, our obedience flows from a “because of” not a “so that” reality.

So, back to our union with Christ. Let’s take a look at John 15:

Abide in me, and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit by itself, unless it abides in the vine, neither can you, unless you abide in me. I am the vine; you are the branches. Whoever abides in me and I in him, he it is that bears much fruit, for apart from me you can do nothing. (John 15:4–5)

Here we have a wonderful picture of the vitality which comes through our union with Christ: Just as snapping a branch off of a vine kills it and destroys its ability to produce, so failing to abide in Christ withers us and stunts our ability to “bear fruit.” Many take the reverse approach, believing that our obedience is what keeps us abiding in Jesus, but the picture He gives us is clear — abide first, obey second. The next logical question, then, is how do we abide in Jesus?

The answer is deceptively simple: We keep our focus on Him. We enamor ourselves with who Christ is and what He has done for us. We grow in love for Him by acquainting ourselves with how He first loved us (1 John 4:19). We behold Him and receive Him in faith through the means of grace: the preaching of the Word on Sunday mornings and the administration of the sacraments of communion, baptism, and prayer. We come together with our brothers and sisters in Christ-forged unity to love, encourage, and exhort one another (1 Thessalonians 5:11). In so doing we remind ourselves of who we are in Christ, of how we have been freed from the bondage of sin, of what awaits us in Heaven, and of the truth that God loves us even though we were His enemies. This is where the power of the Christian life comes from! It is what Paul meant when he said, “Walk by the Spirit, and you will not gratify the desires of the flesh” (Galatians 5:16).

Walking by the Spirit is to live each day trusting and putting our faith in that mysterious, vital union we have with God through Christ. It is to rely on our relationship with Him as opposed to our own righteousness. When we do this, then Paul says we will be empowered and invigorated to say “no” to the flesh. Unfortunately, as a result of Revivalistic roots and rampant pietism in the American evangelical church, we are conditioned toward messages that center on the Christian rather than on Christ, that give us clever tips and techniques rather than the gospel, and that use fear rather than grace as the source of their motivation. We have stumbled over the stumbling stone, just as Israel did:

What shall we say, then? That Gentiles who did not pursue righteousness have attained it, that is, a righteousness that is by faith; but that Israel who pursued a law that would lead to righteousness did not succeed in reaching that law. Why? Because they did not pursue it by faith, but as if it were based on works. They have stumbled over the stumbling stone, as it is written,

“Behold, I am laying in Zion a stone of stumbling, and a rock of offense;
    and whoever believes in him will not be put to shame.”

Brothers, my heart’s desire and prayer to God for them is that they may be saved. For I bear them witness that they have a zeal for God, but not according to knowledge. For, being ignorant of the righteousness of God, and seeking to establish their own, they did not submit to God’s righteousness. For Christ is the end of the law for righteousness to everyone who believes. (Romans 9:30–10:4, emphasis mine)

If we fail to put the doctrine of our unity with Christ and all of its implications (including righteousness by faith) in their proper place, then we will also fail in understanding the why and how of our obedience. We will rush headlong into the what without the proper power or motivation and end up discouraged and disillusioned. So let’s talk about those implications. First, we are united to Christ by the decree of God’s election (Ephesians 1:3–12). Before you even existed God knew He would save you, and in that sense you have been united to Christ from eternity past, chosen in Him before the worlds were made, irrevocably predestined for eternal life through the love of God from which nothing — neither sin, nor suffering, nor any power in Heaven or on earth —can separate us (Romans 8:38–39)!

Second: We are united to Christ as our representative or “federal head,” meaning that everything He did from His baptism, to His fulfillment of the Law, to His suffering, resurrection, and ascension was all done on behalf of those chosen in Him to be saved, His bride. He lived, suffered, and died in our stead so that through faith our sin would be imputed to Him, and His righteousness to us. Just as in Adam (our original representative) all sinned and became subject to death, so in Christ we are justified and made righteous by God’s grace through faith (Romans 5:12–21).

And finally, we are united to Christ by the personal indwelling of the person and work of the Holy Spirit: “In him you also, when you heard the word of truth, the gospel of your salvation, and believed in him, were sealed with the promised Holy Spirit, who is the guarantee of our inheritance until we acquire possession of it, to the praise of his glory” (Ephesians 1:13–14). The Spirit does many things for and through the believer, including leading us in the truth of God (John 16:13); comforting us with the assurance of our salvation (Romans 8:15–16); uniting us in love and truth with our brothers and sisters in the faith (Ephesians 2:18–22); sanctifying us (2 Thessalonians 2:13); bestowing God’s gifts upon us for the good of our brethren (1 Corinthians 12); interceding for us when we have not the words to pray (Romans 8:26); and so much more.

Now let’s bring it full circle: How does the doctrine of our unity with Christ help us when we’re struggling with discouragement, distress, and the despicable desires of our own sinful nature? When we look into God’s Word and see the story of His love for us in Christ despite our failings, we grow in our love for Him. When we grow in our love for Jesus, we focus on or “abide in” Him. And when we abide in Jesus, united to Him by faith and trust, we understand more and more deeply that this union means the why of our obedience is not to earn or maintain the life He has given us, but because that life is indeed already ours. Unity with Christ frees us to rest in the truth that we are eternally secure in Him, that He has accomplished everything necessary for our salvation, and that the how of our obedience is by His Spirit, not our own strength or willpower.

Jesus said, “Those who are well have no need of a physician, but those who are sick. I came not to call the righteous, but sinners” (Mark 2:17). The astounding implication of our union with Christ is that no matter how weak, frail, guilty, or shameful we might find ourselves, we can rest in our Savior’s grace, fully assured that He alone is the source of life, strength, blessedness, and salvation for sinners! All the benefits of our redemption are wrapped up in Him, and by faith we have been united to Him — all that is His is now ours! Let this glorious reality lift you up, beloved, out of the mire of your sin and your suffering and set your feet not on the shifting sands of self, but on the solid rock of Jesus Christ.