"The life which I now live.......Galatians 2:20
'The life which I now live'...what is it like? It is not "now" as distinct from yesterday, but now that I am a Christian as distinct from the days when I was not a Christian.
The whole theme of Galations is justification by faith, and therefore Paul has only two tenses - the past, in his old unregenerate state before he knew the LOrd: and the present now that he knows the Lord - and the word "now" refers to that time, from the moment of his conversion right on......till God takes him.
What Paul says about his life "now" is laid down in the New Testament as the normal experience for the child of God.
He says in Ephesians "Ye were sometimes darkness but 'now' ye are light in the Lord" Eph. 5:8.
Again in Colossians, "But 'now' ye also put off all these.."Col. 3:8.
"Now" that is to say, since the day you came to Christ, in this new, present experience of Christ as your Lord and Saviour.
So Pauls word 'now' postulates to every child of God this simple truth, that what is laid down in Gal. 2:20 is the normal experience of a child of God.
God does not have a special way for a few.....What Paul says in Galations concerns the life you and I now live: and God has made the wonderful provision of His sovreign grace for every day, for every Christian.
Its secret is in Christ. For Paul not only said "I have been crucified with Christ" but also "nevertheless I live; yet not I but Christ liveth in me" Gal 2:20.
When you have seen yourself nailed with Christ to the cross, the next thing is to let the whole of your being be open to the indwelling and outflowing of the Christ who came in when you were saved.
"Christ liveth in me" and that is the secret of the life I now live, when I am living a normal Christian life.
'The life which I now live'...what is it like? It is not "now" as distinct from yesterday, but now that I am a Christian as distinct from the days when I was not a Christian.
The whole theme of Galations is justification by faith, and therefore Paul has only two tenses - the past, in his old unregenerate state before he knew the LOrd: and the present now that he knows the Lord - and the word "now" refers to that time, from the moment of his conversion right on......till God takes him.
What Paul says about his life "now" is laid down in the New Testament as the normal experience for the child of God.
He says in Ephesians "Ye were sometimes darkness but 'now' ye are light in the Lord" Eph. 5:8.
Again in Colossians, "But 'now' ye also put off all these.."Col. 3:8.
"Now" that is to say, since the day you came to Christ, in this new, present experience of Christ as your Lord and Saviour.
So Pauls word 'now' postulates to every child of God this simple truth, that what is laid down in Gal. 2:20 is the normal experience of a child of God.
God does not have a special way for a few.....What Paul says in Galations concerns the life you and I now live: and God has made the wonderful provision of His sovreign grace for every day, for every Christian.
Its secret is in Christ. For Paul not only said "I have been crucified with Christ" but also "nevertheless I live; yet not I but Christ liveth in me" Gal 2:20.
When you have seen yourself nailed with Christ to the cross, the next thing is to let the whole of your being be open to the indwelling and outflowing of the Christ who came in when you were saved.
"Christ liveth in me" and that is the secret of the life I now live, when I am living a normal Christian life.
