In the incarnation, Christ clothed himself in our collective humanity, and in his finished work, he didn’t just die, rise, and ascend for us, but he died, rose from the dead, and ascended as us. Also, Jesus didn’t just die, rise, and ascend as us, but in clothing himself, with our humanity, he lived as us. He wasn’t just our vicarious representative by the death he died. He also lived the life that he lived vicariously representing us, so that he could redeem our whole story. This is one of the great and glorious mysteries of the gospel. We have talked about the fact that all of our sin and failures are not on our record, but Jesus took them in himself as part of his record, at the Cross. That is so remarkable, and I will be forever grateful, but it’s even bigger than that. When Jesus died on the Cross he took in himself, everything that we had ever done and everything that we ever were. Not just our sin, but our whole story was taken up into Christ and crucified and buried. On Easter morning, when Peter and John entered the tomb and found it empty, they didn’t realize that during the night, the whole world, including broken humanity, had died in Christ, and a whole new world and a whole new humanity had been raised up in Jesus. Jesus wasn’t lying in that empty tomb, and neither were you or I. The death he died, the resurrection and ascension that was his was reckoned as yours, but the life that he lived (his story) is also reckoned as yours. I am not saying that you don’t have a history, but I am saying that your history was brought into union with HIS STORY. Your history was sanctified and brought into union with His story. You see, it’s not just that your sin is no longer on your record because it was taken into his record at the Cross, but when Christ clothed himself in humanity, he took on your whole story so that you can now you have his. You are in Christ and what is true for him is true for you. His history is your history. Your present moment and set of circumstances is now his present moment and set of circumstances, and your future is his future. This morning in prayer, I was reflecting on some things in my past, as far back as my childhood before I had put my faith in Christ and his finished work, and I was telling the Lord again about some things that I done or not done. That’s when the Lord spoke so clearly to me, saying, “That’s not your story anymore. I took your story so that you can have mine. I clothed myself with your humanity and in the life I lived, the death I died, and in my resurrection/ascension, I redeemed and sanctified everything about your life story. Your life is hidden with Christ in God. Colossians 3:4 says in light of that, “When Christ WHO IS OUR LIFE…” Wow, so great a salvation.
