How Can I Live The Christian Life?

What exactly is the Christian life?

Psalm 1:1, “Blessed is the man who walks not in the counsel of the ungodly, nor stands in the path of sinners, not sits in the seat of the scornful.”

Contrast King David’s warning with how not to walk, sit or stand with the Book of Ephesians in the New Testament.

Ephesians 2:6, “And raised us up with him and seated us with him in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus.”

Ephesians 4:1, “I therefore, a prisoner for the Lord, urge you to walk in a manner worthy of the calling to which you have been called.”

Ephesians 6:11, “Put on the whole armor of God, that you may be able to stand against the schemes of the devil.”

I want to summarize Christian life in three words: sitting, walking and standing. If you ever wondered what it means to be a Christian, this is it. Sitting represents our position in Jesus Christ. Walking represents our Christian practices. Standing represents the posture that a Christian has in spiritual warfare. Sitting speaks of our belief system. Walking represents our behavior and standing speaks of our battle. The Book of Ephesians goes through three of these phases or parts of what it means to be a Christian.

Sitting

The Bible says you are seated in the heavenly places. In Ephesians 2, Apostle Paul says that we have been raised with Christ. Jesus died for you and you died with Him on the cross. Not only did you die with Jesus, you were buried and raised with Him. That is why we need to get baptised because we identify with Jesus’ death.

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

Ephesians goes one step further. It says my identity as a Christian is not hanging on the cross or just being raised with Jesus and walking in newness of life. My current identity with Jesus is being seated. 1 John 4:17 says as He is so are we in this world. It doesn’t say as He was.

In newness of life, Jesus is seated at the right hand of God right now, above principality and powers. He is at the place of rest and the Bible says that you are not only identifying with Christ in His death, burial and resurrection but also in His being seated in the seat of power in heavenly places. This is why I believe we will go to Heaven because technically, we are already there. Christians don’t live for Heaven; they live out of Heaven. They are seated in heavenly places in Christ Jesus. That is who you are.

It is interesting that when God created Adam, God’s day of rest was the next day. Adam’s first day on earth was God’s day of rest. When God saves us, we step into Christ and Christ is seated in power in the Heavenly places. We step into the finished works of Jesus.

Today, we live in a culture where you can identify yourself with something that is not factually true. There are people who identify themselves as particular animals for example. You can claim to identify yourself as whatever you want but if it is not grounded in reality, it is deception. As Christians, we don’t identify with Jesus to make it real; Jesus makes it real and gives us the opportunity to be identified with Him.

14 Benefits a Christian Has Through Christ

• We are blessed in Christ with every spiritual blessing, (Ephesians 1:3).
• We were chosen before the foundation of the world, (Ephesians 1:4).
• We have been redeemed through the blood, (Ephesians 1:7).
• We have obtained an inheritance, (Ephesians 1:11).
• Because we are seated, we have been sealed with the Holy Spirit of promise, (Ephesians 1:13).
• In Jesus, we have been made alive together with Christ, (Ephesians 2:5).
• We are saved by grace, (Ephesians 2:5).
• Christians are raised up with Christ, (Ephesians 2:6).
• Christians are seated with Christ in the heavenly places, (Ephesians 2:6).
• We have been created in Christ for good works, (Ephesians 2:20).
• We are brought near to God by the blood of the Lamb, (Ephesians 2:13).
• We gained access to the Father, (Ephesians 2:18).
• We are citizens of Heaven, saints, member of God’s body, bride, heirs, God’s building, (Ephesians 2:19).
• Loved by Christ, (Ephesians 3:19, Ephesians 5:2, 25.)

In case you are constantly reminded about what you don’t have, I want to remind you about who you belong to. However, what trips people up is they don’t feel it. The Bible never asks you to feel it but to know it. You shall know the truth, not feel the truth and then the truth shall set you free.

I want to highlight that you don’t sit down; you get seated. You cannot do that. We are to abide in Christ, indicating that it is a fact we are already in Him as a Christian.

Walking

Paul cautions us in Ephesians 2, “But once you walked according to this world.” In other words, we lived like the world and we must not do that anymore. Later, he also says that God created us for good works which we have to walk in. So we are not saved by good works but for good works, that we may walk in them.

• In Ephesians 4, we are told to “Walk worthy of our calling”.
• Ephesians 4:17, “You should no longer walk like the rest of the gentiles walk, in the futility of our minds, having their understanding darkened.”
• Ephesians 5:2, Paul says walk in love.
• Ephesians 5:8 tells us to walk as children of the light.
• Ephesians 5:15 says we should walk in wisdom.

Notice that the Bible commands us to walk; it does not say we are walking. This means that because of Christ, we have all we need to walk but it is still a choice to actually walk. Walking is not like other exercises in that it is very restful.

As a Christian, the Spirit of God powers your new desires in Christ so to walk, work and live it out is not actually hard. To live a Christian life is not hard if you are a Christian. You can be seated in Christ and not walking. There are people who are trying to live the Christian life who have never experienced a seated Christian life. A Christian life is not about living righteous; it is about being righteous, which you do through repentance and your belief in Jesus. It is not hard to walk, just hard to make the decision to walk.

If you are finding the Christian walk hard, I want to ask you – not are you a church person but have you been born again? Do you have the new nature that wants to do good? If you have been, have you fully believed what the Bible says about it? The Christian walk is about being seated first. God does not expect people to walk who have not sat. We have too many people today who are seated in Christ but do not want to walk.

The grace of God that does not change my life will not save my soul.

Charles Spurgeon

As you practice your Christian walk, two things will happen: you will close doors to demons and open the door to intimacy with the Holy Spirit. If you don’t walk, you will gain unnecessary weight and burdens, not because it is God’s will. The Bible says in Titus that the grace of God which saves us teaches us to deny ungodliness and look forward to Christ. If the grace of God did not change your life, I really wonder if it saved your soul.

Standing

This is our battle posture. This includes to stand when hell breaks loose in our lives.

Ephesians 6:13, “Therefore take up the whole armor of God, that you may be able to withstand in the evil day and having done all, to stand firm.”

An evil day is a day when hell breaks loose. The Bible doesn’t tell us why this happens but what we should do when it does – not to sit or to walk but to stand. It is better to be a warrior in a garden, than a gardener in war.

Verse 17 warns of fiery darts of the enemy. That is the equivalent of long-range sniper shots today. As you are walking your Christian walk, suddenly you will get bombarded from out of nowhere with persuasive, convincing, compulsive, pushy, condemning, doubting, fearful, intimidating, anxious thoughts. This is when you take your posture as a warrior. You might be in a danger zone but you are a dangerous person to the enemy because you have the Spirit of God living inside you, God’s angels are surrounding you, and God’s armor is upon you. Do not fear or fret, child of God. Stand and you will withstand whatever comes against you. If you don’t know what to do, stand. If you prayed, stand your ground.

What you have to do is learn to extinguish, Ephesians 6:17. Do not accept those thoughts as your own. They are not the way God thinks about you, they are how the devil thinks about you.

Sometimes the warfare changes and is not just that hell broke loose in your situation or your thoughts are getting bombarded. Sometimes, the enemy gets very close. At that moment, you have the Sword of the Spirit, which is meant for close combat. You don’t yield or fumble in that evil presence. The Sword of the Spirit is the Word of God. When the enemy closes in, you resist the devil and he will flee. The enemy has no defence system for the weapon you have.

Sermon by Vladimir Savchuk; Blog By Edward Gardiner.

Watch The Full Sermon Here: