The Life of Christ in You

“My drive in life comes from a fear of being mediocre. That is always pushing me. I push past one spell of it and discover myself as a special human being, but then I feel I am still mediocre and uninteresting unless I do something else. Because even though I have become somebody, I still have to prove that I am somebody. My struggle has never ended, and I guess it never will.” Madonna in Vogue Magazine, April 1991.
 
Many Christians live like this as well, striving and struggling to prove that they are somebody. They have placed their faith in Jesus, they believe he died for their sins, and have surrendered their lives to him. But now, having depended on Christ for salvation, they depend on themselves to live it out. It’s easy to do. We thrill to the glory of the empty tomb and the risen Savior on Resurrection Sunday, but return to the grind of trying to earn or maintain God’s approval on Easter Monday.

Consider rather the words of Paul in Galatians 2:20: “I have been crucified with Christ. It is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me. And the life I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me.” The Christian life begins with faith in Christ, and the Christian life continues with faith in Christ. There is no earning or achieving in the equation. The perfect life required by you to be right with God was lived by Christ and is now yours by grace, through faith (which was also a gift to you).

The Christian life is the life of Christ in you, lived by faith as you trust the One who loved you and gave himself for you. So your struggle ought not to be proving to God or anyone else that you are somebody. Rather, spend yourself in connecting mind and heart with the truths of Galatians 2:20 and living life each day out of trust in what God says is true about you.