Dying Daily and Our Life in Christ

Spiritual growth is making real in our daily experience what is already true for us in Christ.

Our progressive sanctification is an ever putting off all that belongs to the old man, and putting on all that belongs to the new man in Christ.

The old nature of man in Adam has not evolved better over the last two thousand years.

Has the carnal mind with its urges become so good to the Holy Spirit that we no longer need to subject it to the Holy Spirit?

Undisciplined self-gratification has never been compatible with strong, vibrant, mature spiritual growth.

You cannot be a mature believer and live anyway you choose. You cannot give nature all that it desires without defrauding the grace of God.

Romans chapter seven pictures every Christian’s spiritual battle in progress. Our old nature, though judged and condemned and deposed in the death of Christ is forever revolting against the sentence of death. It struggles daily to regain its lost supremacy.

The believer who is in Christ not only has died with Christ, but is bound to “die daily” with Him so long as he is in the flesh.

The two natures, at present are dwelling together, even though they are at perpetual war with one another. When one is weak the other is strong. When one loses the other conquers.

The crucifixion we have undergone as believers in Christ is personalized in our own person. The believer is “always bearing about in his body the dying of the Lord Jesus.” Our spiritual battle is a spiritual intimacy with Christ against the forces of Satan. Christ began a spiritual warfare that has not ended for us (Col. 3:9, 10).

We are new creatures in Christ whose inward man is “renewed day by day.” The new man from above battles daily with the forces of evil.

The cross and the resurrection of Christ extend their influence and power over the Christian’s life until the day we are presented perfect to our Father in heaven. The development of the Christian toward perfection is always going in two opposite directions. There is the mortifying, suppressing, subjecting the natural man, and the nurturing, renewing and developing the spiritual man who lives within.

In the crucifixion of the old man we make the death of Christ our own. The carnal mind must always be delivered up to death for Christ’s sake. This is our life-long experience.

If we are to become like Christ in our daily practice we must subdue our sinful desires, behaviors and bring them under the influence of the cross.

Our sanctification is prolonged and perpetuated in our daily experiences.

We are to have the same mind of Christ. We have been judged in the person of Christ knowing that He bore our sins in His death, follow on in the path of the cross judging and mortifying all that we find in our lives contrary to Christ. Anything that is opposed to Christ in our lives must die. We must deny and die to the expression of the old life as we knew it before we become Christians. We must refuse the indulgence of the old man.

The Holy Spirit is always bringing us to the surrender of self in all its forms to the will of God.

Our Savior’s suffering is never more beautiful than when reproduced in our daily lives as we die to self, fleshly desires and unholy ambition.

However, no amount of self-denial of the old nature will make us holier, unless we are brought at the same time into a deeper intimate relationship with the Holy Spirit. As we abide in Christ we walk as Christ walked.

Self-denial creates voids in our soul that must be replaced with Christ and divine affection. It is our desire to appropriate the eternal life Jesus has given us. This new life in Christ creates within the believer a hunger and thirst for more of Him. Meditation on the Word of God and contemplation of the character of Christ promotes that end. In the process He conforms us to the likeness of Christ until, we have attained the fullness of the stature of Christ, His life constantly imparted and His character reflected in our lives (2 Cor. 3:18).

Daily communion with Jesus is a certain way of overcoming sin in our lives. Our growth in grace and knowledge of Christ can never fail to promote the subjection of nature. Our natural man cannot endure the burning heat of the unclouded presence of Christ.

May our steady gaze upon Christ blind our hearts to the desires of the unregenerate life-style.

Oh, blessed day when the battle is over and we cease from our putting off and putting on and we are presented spotless in Christ “when this corruptible shall have put on incorruption, and this mortal shall have put on immortal.

Even so, come Lord Jesus.Selah!

Message by Wil Pounds (c) 2006

Anyone is free to use this material and distribute it, but it may not be sold under any circumstances whatsoever without the author’s written consent.

The Day I Died

God takes sin seriously. Sin is a terrible thing in the Christian’s life. That is why God did not overlook sin, but dealt with it in one complete stroke of judgment by sending Christ to die for us on the cross.

Now that we have been saved by grace can we live any way we so please? Can we sin it up now that our fire insurance has been paid in full?

The apostle Paul responded to that arrogant attitude saying, “How shall we who died to sin still live in it?” (Romans 6:2).

We died to sin. “Died” is in aorist past tense, indicating a once for all death in a judicial sense. We legally died (vv. 2, 6, 7, 8, 10, 13, 18). It refers to a single action that has taken place and has been completed in the past.

The idea of our death to sin is basic in this great chapter, and is essential to the sanctification of all believers.

“We died to sin.” When did you die?

The apostle Paul does not say we are going to die to sin, or we are presently dying to sin. He does not say we are continually to die to sin. The apostle has in mind a completed past action.

We “have died” to sin is already true of us if we have entered into a vital union with Christ. Charles Hodge notes, “it refers to a specific act in our past history.”

The apostle Paul tells us there is a watershed, a before Christ and after he came into our lives. Before Christ describes the old man, the old self, what I was like before my conversion. The after Christ came in describes the new man, the new self, what my life has been like after I was made a new creation in Christ. The before Christ ended with the judicial death of the old self. I was a sinner. I deserved to die. I did die. I received my righteousness in my Substitute with whom I have become one. It describes my resurrection. My old life is finished, and a new life to God has begun.

Our continuing in sin is unthinkable says Paul because God by His grace took us from the position of being in Adam and transferred us into the kingdom of Christ. It is something God has already done. It is not something we do, or have done, but something God has done to us. We have been joined to Jesus Christ. The old life ended in that transaction, and a new life has begun at the same time.

In Romans 6:1-11 the apostle Paul compares our dying to sin to how Christ died to sin. Although He had never experienced personal sin, He died to sin by suffering its penalty on the cross. “The wages of sin is death.” He died as our substitute. He was punished for our sin in our place once for all on the cross. Jesus died to sin once for all. His relationship to sin is finished forever. By dying in our place on the cross He put an end to its claim upon us once for all. Jesus died. That will never happen again. It will never be repeated. It is a completed action in the past. Paul makes this emphatically clear in verses 9-10, “knowing that Christ, having been raised from the dead, is never to die again; death no longer is master over Him. For the death that He died, He died to sin, once for all; but the life that He lives, He lives to God.”

Moreover, Paul tells us that our old life of sin in Adam is over. We died. Just as Christ can never go back and die again, we can never go back to the old life in Adam. That part of our lives died. The result of our vital union with Christ in His death and resurrection is that our old life in Adam is past, over with, and we now have a new life in Christ.

Our life is divided into two parts at the point in which we believed on Christ and were born again. At a specific act in past history we accepted Christ as our Savior and we became new creatures in Christ (2 Cor. 5:17).

Can you point to a time in your life and see the change before and after Christ separated by the new birth? When we put our faith in Christ as our Savior and were born again the old self died through union with Christ and was buried. The penalty of our sins was paid in full by Christ’s atoning death. At the same time the believer rose again from death, a new person, to live a new life in Christ. We were crucified with Christ and rose with Him to new life.

We died to the life of sin. God counts the utterly perfect righteousness of the risen Christ as ours. He sees us risen in Him. We live a new life in Christ. The old one died, and it was buried.

Does your life have a dividing line marked Christ?

“O for a thousand tongues to sing. . .” the triumph of His grace in a thousand different languages!Selah!

Message by Wil Pounds (c) 2006 Anyone is free to use this material and distribute it, but it may not be sold under any circumstances whatsoever without the author’s written consent.

Crucified with Christ

When Christ died on the cross the work of salvation was completed and Christ provided access for all believers into God’s holy presence. Therefore, salvation is by grace alone, through faith alone in Christ alone.

God is a real person and our relationship with Him can be cultivated as with any other relationship. We have been saved to live in fellowship with Him. We can enjoy the riches of the Christian life only as we grow in intimacy with Christ. The presence of our Lord in our lives brings this intimacy and these riches in glory with Him.

If there is no peace, joy, longsuffering, patience, live, etc., it may well be that we are out of fellowship with Him, or that we have not come into a living relationship with Him. We must spend time in His presence every day. It is terribly easy to get our minds set on a thousand good things, but not on Christ. No religious activities or feelings can substitute for the cultivation of the presence of God in our lives.

“I have been crucified with Christ, and it is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me . . .” (Galatians 2:20 NET).

“When Christ bids us come and follow, He bids us come and die,” said Bonhoeffer.

The victory in the Christian’s life comes as we die to selfishness and follow Him.

The apostle Paul wrote, “To me, to live is Christ and to die is gain” (Phil. 1:20). Again he wrote, “The life I live in the body, I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave Himself for me” (Gal. 2:20). Paul can write this because he has been crucified with Christ.

The Christian life is impossible to live if you do not know Christ as your Savior. It is impossible if you have never put your faith in Christ. Nothing in the unsaved person’s life can satisfy God’s righteousness. God will not accept our self-righteousness in the slightest degree. Self-crucifixion by a lost person will not save you.

It is only after an individual has put his faith in Christ and been born again that God brings a person to self-crucifixion so Christ will be magnified.

Have you made a commitment to Jesus Christ as your personal Savior? Have you trusted in His saving grace at the cross? Have you put your faith in His death and His blood to cover all your sins? If you never have, you need to do so right now.

When we are crucified with Christ we allow Him to strip away everything that keeps us from having an intimate fellowship with Him. It is like letting Him strip off all our old worn out clothing and letting Him robe us in His perfect righteousness. Anything that would keep us from following into the fullness of His life needs to be nailed to the cross daily. Selah!

Message by Wil Pounds (c) 2006

Anyone is free to use this material and distribute it, but it may not be sold under any circumstances whatsoever without the author’s written consent.

The Day I Died

God takes sin seriously. Sin is a terrible thing in the Christian’s life. That is why God did not overlook sin, but dealt with it in one complete stroke of judgment by sending Christ to die for us on the cross.

Now that we have been saved by grace can we live any way we so please? Can we sin it up now that our fire insurance has been paid in full?

The apostle Paul responded to that arrogant attitude saying, “How shall we who died to sin still live in it?” (Romans 6:2).

We died to sin. “Died” is in aorist past tense, indicating a once for all death in a judicial sense. We legally died (vv. 2, 6, 7, 8, 10, 13, 18). It refers to a single action that has taken place and has been completed in the past.

The idea of our death to sin is basic in this great chapter, and is essential to the sanctification of all believers.

“We died to sin.” When did you die?

The apostle Paul does not say we are going to die to sin, or we are presently dying to sin. He does not say we are continually to die to sin. The apostle has in mind a completed past action.

We “have died” to sin is already true of us if we have entered into a vital union with Christ.

Charles Hodge notes, “it refers to a specific act in our past history.”

The apostle Paul tells us there is a watershed, a before Christ and after he came into our lives. Before Christ describes the old man, the old self, what I was like before my conversion. The after Christ came in describes the new man, the new self, what my life has been like after I was made a new creation in Christ. The before Christ ended with the judicial death of the old self. I was a sinner. I deserved to die. I did die. I received my righteousness in my Substitute with whom I have become one. It describes my resurrection. My old life is finished, and a new life to God has begun.

Our continuing in sin is unthinkable says Paul because God by His grace took us from the position of being in Adam and transferred us into the kingdom of Christ. It is something God has already done. It is not something we do, or have done, but something God has done to us. We have been joined to Jesus Christ. The old life ended in that transaction, and a new life has begun at the same time.

In Romans 6:1-11 the apostle Paul compares our dying to sin to how Christ died to sin. Although He had never experienced personal sin, He died to sin by suffering its penalty on the cross. “The wages of sin is death.” He died as our substitute. He was punished for our sin in our place once for all on the cross. Jesus died to sin once for all. His relationship to sin is finished forever. By dying in our place on the cross He put an end to its claim upon us once for all. Jesus died. That will never happen again. It will never be repeated. It is a completed action in the past. Paul makes this emphatically clear in verses 9-10, “knowing that Christ, having been raised from the dead, is never to die again; death no longer is master over Him. For the death that He died, He died to sin, once for all; but the life that He lives, He lives to God.”

Moreover, Paul tells us that our old life of sin in Adam is over. We died. Just as Christ can never go back and die again, we can never go back to the old life in Adam. That part of our lives died. The result of our vital union with Christ in His death and resurrection is that our old life in Adam is past, over with, and we now have a new life in Christ.

Our life is divided into two parts at the point in which we believed on Christ and were born again. At a specific act in past history we accepted Christ as our Savior and we became new creatures in Christ (2 Cor. 5:17).

Can you point to a time in your life and see the change before and after Christ separated by the new birth? When we put our faith in Christ as our Savior and were born again the old self died through union with Christ and was buried. The penalty of our sins was paid in full by Christ’s atoning death. At the same time the believer rose again from death, a new person, to live a new life in Christ. We were crucified with Christ and rose with Him to new life.

We died to the life of sin. God counts the utterly perfect righteousness of the risen Christ as ours. He sees us risen in Him. We live a new life in Christ. The old one died, and it was buried.

Does your life have a dividing line marked Christ?

“O for a thousand tongues to sing. . .” the triumph of His grace in a thousand different languages!

Message by Wil Pounds (c) 2006

Anyone is free to use this material and distribute it, but it may not be sold under any circumstances whatsoever without the author’s written consent.

The Common Grace of God

God owes us nothing.

God owes us nothing, yet He has poured out His blessings on every man and woman.

The two aspects of grace are available to all humanity in general and special or saving grace.

Common grace is available to all human beings without discrimination. The first mention of grace is found in Genesis 6:8. “Noah found grace in the eyes of the LORD.” God extended His grace 120 years while Noah preached righteousness.

Fallen man has a fallen nature and without common grace mankind would be ultimately self-destructive (Rom. 1:18-2:16; 3:9-20). God in His common grace causes the sun to shine on the just and the unjust. This is the kind of grace that keeps radically depraved humanity from self-destruction.

Common grace gives order to life in spite of the curse of sin. The earth yields its fruit in abundance in spite of the thorns and briars. Depraved mankind knows the difference between good and evil, has religious aspirations, does good deeds, gives philanthropic gifts to others in need all because of common grace.

The effects produced by common grace or the influence of the Spirit common to all men are natural revelation whereby the creation testifies to the Creator through out the universe, presence of truth, good and beauty, fear of future punishment, a natural sense of right and wrong, restraints of governments, fear of God, religious interest not attended by genuine spiritual regeneration by the Holy Spirit, etc. Charles Hodge observes that the influences of common grace “are all capable of being effectually resisted. In all these respects this common grace is distinguished from the efficacious operation of the Spirit to which the Scriptures ascribe the regeneration of the soul.”

The response of most people to God’s common grace is “contempt for the riches of His kindness, tolerance and patience” (Romans 2:4). How tragic that man in his arrogance and pride refuses to accept common grace.

To despise the riches of God’s grace is a terrible sin with eternal consequences.

The purpose of God’s common grace is to cause us to turn to Him to receive even greater grace.

Yet, in spite of our sinful depravity, God is good to us. He reaches down to us in His love and grace to save us. He wants us to repent and acknowledge His goodness and accept the riches of His saving grace.

A good example of common grace leading to effectual saving grace is the Gentile man Cornelius who feared God, gave alms generously and prayed regularly, but was never saved until the apostle Peter shared with him the good news of salvation through the atoning sacrifice of Christ Jesus (Acts 10:1-48). It was common grace that led Cornelius to be devout, but he still needed efficacious saving grace. He responded to the light he had received through common grace, and God brought him to the greater light of the good news of Jesus Christ whereby he could believe and be saved. God the Holy Spirit moved him beyond common grace which does not save, to the saving grace of God in Christ Jesus.

The most uncommon thing that has ever happened is found in Romans 5:6-8. “For while we were still helpless, at the right time Christ died for the ungodly. For one will hardly die for a righteous man; though perhaps for the good man someone would dare even to die. But God demonstrates His own love toward us, in that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us” (Romans 5:6-8).

It was “while we were still sinners,” that God did everything to save us sinners. God sent His only begotten Son to come and die in our place on the cross.

God does not owe us anything. We deserve to go to hell. He does not owe us a chance to be saved. The only thing we deserve is judgment because we have disobeyed God.

The Bible says, “The soul that sins will surely die.” “For all have sinned and come short of the glory of God.” “The wages of sin is death.”

We need more than common grace to save us. We need His special saving grace. “God commends His love toward us in that while we were yet sinners Christ died for us.” We need His special grace that lifts us out of our sins and saves us.

Christ’s death for you demonstrates God’s unfathomable love for you. It commends itself to us to embrace Jesus Christ as our personal Savior. It calls every sinner to turn from his or her sins and put their faith in Jesus Christ and be saved.

“For God so loved the world, that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him shall not perish, but have eternal life” (John 3:16).

God loves you and wants you to respond to His love today. Will you believe on Him and receive His free gift of eternal life? “We love Him because He first loved us.”

Everyone receives God’s common grace, but have you responded to His special saving grace? “For by grace you have been saved through faith; and that not of yourselves, it is the gift of God; not as a result of works, so that no one may boast” (Ephesians 2:8-9).

Jesus Christ is our only hope. Only Jesus Christ could offer a sacrifice for our sins and pay the penalty in full. In His life and death Christ did all that God required of us. That is how much He loves you and wants you to come to Him and receive eternal life. If you have never done so please respond to His saving grace today.Selah!

Message by Wil Pounds (c) 2006

Anyone is free to use this material and distribute it, but it may not be sold under any circumstances whatsoever without the author’s written consent.

Come with Boldness for Grace and Mercy

Come with Boldness for Grace and Mercy

 The main argument of the Epistle of Hebrews is that “we have a great High Priest” (Heb. 4:14; 1:3; 2:17f; 3:1; 4:14-12:3). Jesus has passed through the upper heavens to the throne of God (1:3). The writer of Hebrews makes it clear that Aaron was a “high priest,” but Jesus Christ is “the great High Priest.” No Old Testament priest could ever assume that awesome title.

Jesus is great because He is both God and man. He is “Jesus, the Son of God.” He is the Savior who became flesh, and He is “the Son of God.” Jesus affirmed His humanity and His deity. As a great High Priest Jesus has “passed through the heavens” and ascended to the Father. He is enthroned. It is His “throne of grace” to which we go as believers.

On the Day of Atonement the high priest of Israel would go behind the veil and sprinkle blood on the “mercy seat” (Lev. 16). However, every believer in Jesus Christ is encouraged to “come boldly unto the throne of grace” where He ministers grace and mercy. We are invited to go to our High Priest at any time, in any circumstance, indeed daily, and find help in our need. There is no trial too great, or temptation too strong that our great High Priest cannot give us His grace and strength.

“Let us draw near” to our great High Priest “that we may receive mercy.” Where do you turn when you have a sense of sin and guilt and unworthiness? When we go to Jesus we receive mercy. Jesus did not give us what we deserve, but what we do not deserve. At the throne we experience and learn that God pardons, loves and accepts us in His grace.

Grace is the power of God working in us. At the throne of grace He gives us strength in the inner life to conquer temptation. The grace of God is always well-timed. It comes just when we need it. We find the infinite mercy of God’s love and grace working in us when we come to His throne.

Moreover, we are not just encouraged to go to the throne when we are in need. We are to “draw near with boldness.” We have “confidence to enter.” The blood of Jesus gives us perfect confidence in drawing near to our righteous Father. We enter in with boldness and confidence because we enter covered with the perfect righteousness of Christ.

Jesus encourages us to enter in with the highest level of confidence, and the unhesitating assurance that there is nothing that can hinder us. The writer of Hebrews has in mind our drawing near to God’s throne without fear, without doubt, with no other feeling but that which a child feels in going to his loving father. 

The Scriptures admonish us to draw near with boldness. Jesus the Son of God is our High Priest. We do not have to work ourselves up emotionally or psych ourselves up to enter into his presence. No, the living, loving High Priest, who is able to sympathize and give grace for timely help, breathes and works this boldness in the soul that is willing to lose itself in Him. All that He asks of us is to make ourselves available to Him. This boldness is natural when we are gazing with our eyes fixed upon Him! Jesus, found and experienced within our heart by faith, is our boldness. As the Son, whose house we are will dwell within us, and by His Spirit’s working, He will be our boldness and our entrance to the Father. Selah!

Message by Wil Pounds (c) 2006

Anyone is free to use this material and distribute it, but it may not be sold under any circumstances whatsoever without the author’s written consent.

Are You in Adam or in Christ?

Charles Hodge asked a crucial question: “If God requires one thing, and we present another, how can we be saved? If He has revealed a method in which He can be just and yet justify the sinner, and if we reject that method and insist upon pursuing a different way, how can we hope to be accepted?”

The safest answer, of course, is in the Scriptures. What has God revealed?

The first man sinned, but not just once; Adam sinned many times. Before he sinned the first time he was righteous. His righteousness was of his own doing, as a created being. It was the righteousness of a man. However, Adam never had the righteousness of Jesus Christ upon him. What he lost was his own self-righteousness.

When you and I put our faith in Jesus Christ as our Savior we are not merely given back a human righteousness that Adam had before the fall. We are given the perfect righteousness of Jesus Christ. God gives us “much more” in abundance, a superabundance of grace. He gives us the full weight of His perfect righteousness.

Adam did not stand in his own righteousness. He fell. If we attempt to stand in our own righteousness we, too, shall fall.

The gift of God in Christ far surpasses the effects of Adam’s sin and all other transgressions we have committed.

The humbling fact is we were all in Adam once, and we fell in him. He brought sin and death to the human race by his own sin.

How can you and I escape the effects of the fall of Adam on us?

We can stand in a divine righteousness provided by our divine substitute that will never be taken from us. It is God’s gift to us in His grace. The poet expressed it beautifully:

Jesus thy Blood and righteousness

My beauty are, my glorious dress.

The apostle Paul wrote that we have received, “God’s abundant provision of grace and of the gift of righteousness reign in life through the one man, Jesus Christ” (Rom. 5:17).

We “reign in life” even now through Jesus Christ. We have been elevated to a position far above what Adam had before his fall. We not only have been “recovered from the fall, but made to reign through Jesus Christ.”

The righteousness of Jesus Christ has been put to our account, put upon us and it is a righteousness in abundance, ever superabundance.

Because it is of divine grace, all of the glory belongs to God alone. Adam stood at the head of the human race and brought death upon all, so our Lord Jesus stood for man and brings life to all who believe on Him.

Every one of us is in Adam. However, the most important question is, are you in Christ? We have Christ only through faith.

We are under grace because we stand before God as justified men. Grace is the state of justification. Because we have been justified, we remain justified and we can never be condemned.

We have been justified by grace alone, through faith alone in Christ alone. There is no other way to have a right standing with a just and holy God. “Oh to grace how great a debtor.”

God was under no duress or compulsion to save us. Nothing made Jesus Christ die for our sins on the cross. Nothing made God credit the perfect righteousness of Christ to our account. God did it because He chose to do so out of grace.

If you are objecting to God’s revealed word saying how can I be saved by something someone else has done for me, it is probably because you are not saved.

The good news for all in Adam is that a righteous God by a judicial act declares sinful men to be in a right standing before Him, not on the basis of their own merits because they have none as sinners, but only on the basis of what Jesus Christ has done by dying in our place on the cross. Jesus took the penalty of death for our sins upon Himself and died on our behalf. Now those sins have been punished and God imputes the perfect righteousness of Jesus Christ to our account.

You are in Adam, but are you in Christ?Selah!

Message by Wil Pounds (c) 2006

And for Our World.

God’s mercy and grace give me hope—for myself and for our world. Billy Graham

Life is too Short to Be

Be patient and understanding. Life is too short to be vengeful or malicious. Phillips Brooks

The Church of Christ

All of us who are trusting in Jesus Christ as our Lord and Savior are members of the true church of Christ. We are members of His body. We have experienced the forgiveness of our sins, according to the riches of His grace. “We are accepted in the Beloved,” and we are “redeemed through His blood.”

The moment we put our faith in Jesus Christ we are born again, and at the same time placed in the body of Christ in a vital union with Him. The essence of saving faith is to rest upon Christ alone for eternal salvation. We trust in the atonement and the righteousness of Jesus Christ to save us. Saving faith is to trust in Jesus Christ and what He has done for your salvation.

Our justification is an instantaneous act from the moment we believed on Christ as our Savior.  Justification is completed in one instant never to be repeated. It is complete the moment a sinner believes on the atoning death of Jesus Christ. In that moment is the remission of all our sins. In that moment we are made clean by the blood of Jesus.

What a gracious joy to know that in one single instant we are declared just, complete in Christ, without a sin, freed from all its condemning power, guilt and iniquity. In an instant a person is pardoned. Never again will the Christian ever be unjustified! “There is therefore, now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus” (Romans 8:1).

From the Day of Pentecost on as each believer became saved he also became a member of the body of Christ. It is impossible to be saved and not be a member of the church, which is Christ’s own body, because a part of the divine work of salvation is the uniting of the individual to Christ by the baptism with the Holy Spirit (1 Cor. 12:13).

Every Christian is baptized by the Holy Spirit into the body of Christ at the moment he or she believes on Jesus Christ to be saved. We are by the Holy Spirit brought into the body of Christ. This baptism into the body of Christ is not limited to any particular group of believers. Every Christian, from the moment he believes in Christ and is saved is baptized by the Holy Spirit into the body of Christ and therefore the universal church of Christ. The church of all the people of God, all the redeemed, all believers is the real and only Church of Christ.

Are you a member of the true church of Christ? Are you a member of His body? Have you been saved by the grace of God alone through faith in the atoning sacrifice of Christ?

It is obviously true that an individual may be saved and not be a member of a local organized church. All born again believers should declare their identification with the death and resurrection of Jesus by believer’s baptism, and become a member in a Bible-believing congregation.

Moreover, water baptism and church membership are not required for salvation. The true church of Christ is composed of all people who have repented of their sins and put their faith in Jesus Christ as their Savior and who are thus joined together in one living union by the baptism of the Holy Spirit.

Does an individual have to be baptized in order to be saved? Yes, if you are referring to the baptism of the Holy Spirit when you believed on Christ as your Savior; however no, if you are referring to water baptism.

The New Testament refers to the “church” in two ways. The main emphasis is on the church as a living organism, a vital living union of all true believers in Jesus Christ.

The second category is the local church, which is composed of professing Christians in any local community (1 Cor. 1:2; Gal. 1:1; Phil. 1:1).

The only candidates for membership in a visible local Bible-believing church are individuals who have put their faith in the work of salvation of Jesus Christ, and have given testimony of their salvation by water baptism.

Every person who is a candidate for baptism and church membership must give a clear testimony as to their salvation. Am I saved? Have I believed in Jesus Christ? Have I been born again? Church membership is simply the recognition of the profession of saving faith in Jesus Christ. It is to join the fellowship of other believers of kindred spirit.

You do not have to be a member of the local Church of Christ, or be baptized by one of their officials in order to be saved.

If you are looking for a perfect church, you will not find one on this earth. If you did find one, they would not let you become a member because you are not perfect. However, do find a local group of believers in the area where you live who are saved by grace through faith, and who are nearest to the Scriptures in doctrine, the ordinances of the church and practice. Become a member of the local church regardless of what tag their wear.Selah!

Message by Wil Pounds (c) 2006 Anyone is free to use this material and distribute it, but it may not be sold under any circumstances whatsoever without the author’s written consent.