“CHRIST IN YOU!” ”

Preached by Rev. Ed Brouwer at The Gathering Place, Osoyoos

Pulpit Series    Volume 20    Issue 20           September 5th, 2010

“Christ in you, the hope of glory”  Colossians 1:27

The Gospel is the mystery of mysteries!

In the time before Christ came to earth it was hidden, but now - today - in this hour, God, in His infinite mercy has revealed it by the Holy Spirit.

Now, I say it has been revealed and yet in some sense it is still hidden.  I say this because unless the Spirit of God reveals the gospel to us individually, we remain in darkness.

Light is awesome, but it does not help you if your eyes are closed. 

II Corinthians 4:4  “In whom the god of this world has blinded the minds of them who do not believe, lest the light of the

glorious gospel of Christ, who is the image of God, should shine unto them.”

Each separate individual must have Christ revealed

to them and in them by the work of the Holy Spirit,

or else they will remain in darkness,

even if he/she goes to church,

sings in the choir serves on the board,

feeds the homeless or preaches to the masses.

Friends, we live in an hour when the Gospel is clearly revealed and readily accessible.  Never before has it been easier or more acceptable to share the Gospel message. 

However, the danger for us in Canada is that the gospel has become a household word.

Pray that you never

undervalue the “good news”.

Christ in you, the hope of glory.

“Immanuel, God With Us.”  Think of it! 

· The Ancient of days came as a child

· The Ever-Blessed

· A man of sorrows and acquainted                  with grief

Is here with us!

The idea is original, astounding, Divine!

The prince of darkness had no idea about God’s plan to save man kind.  If he had even an inkling, he’d never have had Christ crucified.

My friends, the heart of the Gospel is founded in the Truth of God! 

The Son of the Highest was born at Bethlehem and at His birth, before He had worked a single deed of righteousness or shed a drop of blood, the angels sang, “Glory to God in the highest, on earth peace, good will toward men.”

They knew that the Incarnation had within itself, a wealth of good things for men!

“Unto us a Child is born, unto us a Son is given,” and in that Child and Son we find our salvation!

“Being found in fashion as man, He humbled Himself and became obedient to death, even the death of the Cross.”

He took upon Himself the form of a Servant and was made in the likeness of sinful flesh. 

His was a life of grief and humiliation, followed by a death of agony and scorn. 

Up to the Cross He carried all our load.  Oh, what has Christ not done for us?

He cast our sins into the depths of the sea.

He has redeemed us from the curse of the Law, being made a Curse for us.

When I think of:

· who He is

· what He is

· what He has done

· what He is doing

· what He will yet do

I can not help but say, “He is my all and all!  My salvation, my hope, my life!”

Whatever Christ is, His people are in Him.

· They were crucified in Him

· They were dead in Him

· They were buried in Him

· They are risen in Him!

In Him they live eternally.  In Him they sit gloriously at the right hand of God, “who has raised us up together, and made us sit together in the heavenly places in Christ

Jesus.”

In Him we are “accepted in the Beloved,” both now and forever!

Now, dear Friends, seek Christ or else you will miss the mark altogether!

Never settle for books or conversations.

Do not be content with Christian people talking to you, or preachers preaching to you, or the Bible being read to you, or prayers being offered for you.

Anything other than Jesus

will leave you short of salvation!

You have to reach out and touch Christ, and nothing short of this will save you! 

You must become desperate for Him!

The more we are filled with Christ, the more we feel our own emptiness!

The more we know of Him, the more we long to know Him!

Paul, writing to the Philippians, when he had been a Christian for many years, still said, “O’ that I may know Him.”

Paul, do you not know Christ yet?

“Yes,” he says, “and no.”

Grow in faith and enlarge your receiving power until you take Christ into your inner most soul by the Holy Spirit. 

It is Christ in you by faith that becomes the hope of glory.

Jesus is the hope, the pledge,

the guarantee of glory!

Christ has entered into covenant with God to bring His people home to glory.  He has pledged Himself to bring every sheep of His

flock safe to His Father’s right hand and He will keep His engagement, for He never failed one Covenant promise yet.

Moreover, this we do know, that the Christ who is come to live with us will never be separated from us.

If He had not meant to stay, He’d not have entered our heart at all.

My friends, Christ knew what He was doing. He counted the cost, He had foreseen all the evil that would be in us and about us, and when He came, He came with the

intent to stay.

“I am persuaded that neither life, nor death nor things present, nor things to come shall separate us from the love of God which is in Christ Jesus our Lord.”

Christ in you means you in glory, as surely as God lives!  No question about that!

Go your ways and rejoice in Christ Jesus and let men see who it is that lives in you!

Let Jesus speak through your mouth, weep through your eyes

and smile through your face!

Let Him work by your hands and walk within your feet, and be tender through your heart.

Let Him seek sinners through you!

Let Him comfort others through you until the day breaks and the shadows flee away!

Consider:

John 7:37-39  “In the last day, that great day of the feast Jesus stood and cried, saying, If any man thirst, let him come to me and drink.  He that      believes on me, as the scripture has said, out of his belly shall flow rivers of living water.”

Jeremiah 2:13  “For my people have committed two evils; they have forsaken me the fountain of living waters, [and] hewed them out cisterns, broken cisterns, that can hold no water.”