Daily Devotional Day 72

At salvation, we must believe into Jesus Christ. It is an act of faith that God honors. When we believe into Christ, we are then in Christ. If we are in Christ by faith, we have experienced all that He did. When He went to the cross, He brought us to the cross with Him. He knows the end from the beginning with no time constraints. He is able to do this. It is amazing.

Not only did He bring us to the cross, but He brought us to the grave all the way through the resurrection. His death is ours, and His life is ours. Romans 6:7. "He who has died is freed from sin." If we don't experience death and the freedom it provides, then we haven't been able to understand the sacrifice of Christ. We do not understand baptism and what it is designed to do.

In baptism, we believe and are brought into the death, burial, and resurrection of Jesus Christ. His judgment becomes our judgment. His victory is ours, for we were all by faith in Him through this process. He died, and we died. It says in the covenant that "the soul that sins must die" (Ezekiel 18:4- 20, Romans 6:23). If we don't die in faith, then we still have a debt to pay. Jesus died so that He could bring us to our death. The debt is fully paid!

The cross is not merely a substitutionary instrument of death. It is OUR instrument of death! This is how we die to sin and rise again. It says in Romans 6:4 that we are "buried with Him, therefor by baptism into death, so that just as Christ was raised from the dead by the glorious power of the Father, so too might we habitually live and behave in newness of life".

Here, we see that we deal a final blow to our natural man by bringing it to the cross and burying our natural man by faith in the waters of baptism. Baptism is meant to bring death, burial, and resurrection to us through faith. Faith in the operation of God. Faith in this procedure is meant to rein in the natural strength that dominates us all day, every day. Believing into Christ is paramount to walking in newness of life.

Ask the Holy Spirit to reveal the power of the cross to you. Remind yourself today and every day that we have resurrection power! Sin no longer has a hold on us! We are free and in newness of life! Hallelujah!