“I through the law died to the law that I might live to God. 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” (Gal. 2:19,20).
How do we get the benefits of Christ’s righteous life? At what point is it that we touch Him and make the connection? At what point in His ministry does He touch us and effect the union? It is at the lowest possible point where a man can be touched- and that is death. He takes the point of death-and there, when we are actually dead, we step into Christ.
The ceremony of baptism is the symbol of Christ’s death and resurrection. If we died with Christ, we are certain to live again, for Christ is alive. Therefore if we die with Him, we shall live with Him. When we acknowledge our life forfeited and give up all claims to everything connected with it, that very moment we dies with Christ. What do we naturally have in ourselves? Sin! The lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, the pride of life, envy, malice, evil speaking, evil thinking-all these things make up the natural life of every one on earth.
When we are ready to give them up and pay the forfeit, then it is that we can die with Christ and take His sinless life instead. In yielding up that life of ours, we give up all these things and then we are dead with Christ.
That newness of life which we have is a sinless life. When one rekons that he has no life of his own and the life he lives in the flesh he lives by the faith of the Son of God, then his life is hid with Christ in God. What can that person fear that man can do to him? A questioner may say, “You make it out that we ought never to sin anymore-you leave no room for sin.” But is that not what the Bible says? “Sin shall not have dominion over you, for you are not under the law but under grace” (Rom. 6:14). By death we make no provision for the flesh to fulfill its lusts or desires.
Waggoner, General Conference Bulletin, 1891, No. 10
