I want to just give you my encouragement and thanksgiving for your faithfulness, both to this class and also to the training for biblical counseling ministry. It's been a great joy to be able to study these truths with you. On a personal level, I had the joy this past week to receive three packets of completed essays from three students who had taken this class in previous sessions, and it's just great to see the fruit of that labor.

Those students are going to be moving on to phase three of ACBC certification, and I know that they're going to be used by the Lord to bless many. It just was a reminder to me that there is a finish line, and the work that God is doing in each of your lives as you put pen to paper, and as you study God's word is going to bear fruit in the days and the years to come.

I just want to give that encouragement to you to press on and to continue to remain faithful. These are real precious truths that we're able to study from the scriptures. If anything, I hope that you will continue to be blessed yourself, and just encouraged by the truth of God's word as you study these wonderful topics.

I'm excited tonight to look at the doctrine of the believer's union with Christ. I think this is going to be a wonderful study, and I hope you all have your handouts that I sent out last night. It's a topic that my wife and I were talking about last night, just really doesn't receive as much attention as it really needs to in our hearts and our lives.

It's a topic that I think can bring much encouragement and hope to the struggling believer, and one that we need to come back to time and time again, especially as we wrestle with issues of sanctification and counseling issues as well. I'm going to go ahead and pray for us.

We'll dive into our study, and thanks again for joining us tonight for our class. Let's pray. Gracious Heavenly Father, thank you so much for your mercy and grace in our lives, and we thank you that we can come boldly and confidently into your presence. On the basis of all that your son has accomplished for us, we thank you that we are accepted in Christ, that we come to you not on the basis of our own works or our own righteousness, but we come to you on the basis of Christ and his finished work.

We thank you for this beautiful truth of our union with Christ. We pray that our study tonight would result in a greater appreciation of this doctrine, that Lord, if any of us are weary, that we would be strengthened. If any of us are discouraged, that we would be given hope, and that we would be able to take this truth and understand it in a way that we could clearly communicate it to others and help others in their walk with you.

We just thank you for the ministry of your spirit who lives in us and who teaches us your word. We pray that, Father, you would indeed guide us and lead us tonight as we open your word, and we just give this time to you. Thank you for each of my brothers and sisters in Christ and their faithfulness.

Give them perseverance and steadfastness as they continue to write their essays, and we just thank you for this time in Jesus' name. Amen. Amen. Okay, well, we are looking at the topic tonight of the doctrine of the believer's union with Christ, and this indeed is a wonderful topic. I'm going to go ahead and read the theology exam question for us.

The question is, "Describe the doctrine of union with Christ explaining its biblical basis and implications for Christian living." So as I prayed, I just want to encourage you to look at this as an opportunity to learn and to study a very wonderful doctrine. This is a doctrine that we want to handle well.

We want to be able to use this doctrine in counseling ministry. I have had opportunity myself to use this doctrine in counseling ministry, and it has had a very helpful effect on counselees who are struggling with sin or who are struggling with despair. And so you want to know this doctrine well enough to use to counsel others.

And just on a personal level, I want to encourage you to take this doctrine and feed your own souls with this truth. This is a great buffet of truth is contained under the heading of the doctrine of union with Christ, and those who have hungry souls will find themselves well satisfied in studying and understanding these things.

And I would just encourage you to come back to this doctrine time and time again in your own Christian life. Just whenever you're discouraged, whenever you're perhaps weary of battling with sin, whenever you feel that maybe you're at a standstill in your spiritual life and you're having trouble moving forward or you're discouraged in ministry, whenever your soul is dry, I would just encourage you to come back to this doctrine and just to refresh your own souls in the truth of our vital union with the Lord Jesus Christ.

It really is just an amazing truth that as believers in Christ, we have the privilege of not only being near Christ, as it were, the disciples were near Christ. You know that even on the eve of Christ's death, the disciples gathered in the upper room for the last supper, and they were in that sense physically near Christ.

We have the privilege not only of being near Christ or even around Christ in the sense of being influenced by Christ as he is in close proximity to us, but it really is an amazing truth that we as believers are united with Christ. We live in a vital spiritual union with the Lord Jesus Christ so that his life flows into our lives.

It is a beautiful picture that's found time and time again in the scriptures, and this union is so real. It is so permanent in nature that Paul says in Ephesians chapter 1 that all of the blessings that we have received in salvation, we have received in Christ. By virtue of our living vital union with Christ, we have been blessed with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places.

There is no blessing apart from Christ. There is no acceptance by God apart from the person of Christ. But in Christ, there is every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places, and we as believers in Christ, we have been placed in this vital, permanent spiritual union with our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ, so that if you want to think of it this way, the Father cannot reject a single believer without also rejecting his son, Jesus Christ.

That's how permanent and how vital this living union is, the believer being united to Christ. The Father cannot reject the believer without also rejecting his son, and the Father will never reject his son. The Father has declared that it is in his son that he is well pleased, and if we have been placed in Christ, then the Father is pleased with us.

This is just amazing truth. So we're going to see in our study tonight that it is because the believer has been placed in this vital living union with the resurrected Christ, that we are able to pursue sanctification. We are able to bear fruit. We are able to move forward, as it were, in our Christian lives to progress and to grow and to become more holy.

It's because we have been united with Christ that these things are possible. So I use this doctrine in counseling ministry just to encourage counselees that you can grow, and you can change, and you can overcome sin. It's a battle, and yes, you will struggle with temptation, and yes, the flesh sets itself against the Spirit, and the Spirit against the flesh, and there's a battle.

There's a real spiritual battle, but I just use this doctrine to encourage counselees that because you are living in a vital union with Christ, his life flows into your life. Therefore, on the basis of this doctrine, I have every confidence that you can grow, that you can change, and that you are no longer living under sin's dominion.

Sin is not your master. That power has been broken because of your union with Christ, and I want to encourage you to use this doctrine in that way. The best resources on this topic I've put on your handout there. Wayne Grudem has a really good section in his Systematic Theology on union with Christ, and I want to commend that reading to you.

And then two books that I would recommend and highly encourage you to purchase and to have on your bookshelves. These two books are well worth the price of admission. The first is John Murray's book, Redemption Accomplished and Applied. Now that book has a really good chapter on the doctrine of union with Christ, but I'd encourage you to get that book and read the entire thing and use it as a reference because that is a very helpful work on the issues dealing with salvation and sanctification.

And then a second book I would encourage you to purchase is Anthony Hokema's Saved by Grace. That book has an excellent chapter on the doctrine of union with Christ as well. Hokema does a really good job distinguishing the aspects of salvation which occurred in eternity past, the aspects of salvation which occur in time, and then the future aspects of salvation.

And he walks you through the doctrine of union with Christ in reference to what happened in eternity past, what happened in time, and what is going to happen in eternity future. And just a very good treatment of this doctrine by Hokema in Saved by Grace. So I would encourage you to purchase that and to have that on your bookshelves and use that as a reference as you go forward.

And then on your handout, a new book that's recently come out is Rankin-Wilburn's Union with Christ, The Way to Know God. This book was recommended by John MacArthur and the folks at Grace Books International, and I haven't gotten through the entire book yet. But so far, the gist of it is this is a very readable explanation of the doctrine of union with Christ.

If you want to have a book that you put into someone's hands that's kind of a layman's explanation of this doctrine and its application to life, then that would be a good work to have handy. Rankin-Wilburn's Union with Christ, The Way to Know God. And then I would recommend that you look up the blog post by Justin Taylor.

That blog post is really helpful. It's called Union with Christ, A Crash Course, and that's on the Gospel Coalition blog and a very helpful work that summarizes some of the main points that various authors have made in their treatment of this doctrine. I think reading that website will help you get a summary of this doctrine and then hopefully give you a foundation for future studies on this subject.

So I'd encourage you to look up Justin Taylor's Union with Christ, A Crash Course. Well, with that said, let's dive into the next page of your handout and begin our look at the doctrine of the believer's union with Christ. Now, as I mentioned, there's just an ocean of truth here.

We're going to try to summarize a number of points that might be helpful, but I'd encourage you to make this a lifelong study, a lifelong pursuit of understanding this doctrine and then relating so many of the different aspects of Christian life to this central doctrine of the believer's union with Christ.

And so we're just going to be able to do a brief summary here, but I do want to introduce the key point that the doctrine of the believer's union with Christ is one of the most encouraging truths in all the Bible. So let me say that again. The doctrine of the believer's union with Christ is one of the most encouraging truths in all the Bible.

Is there anyone here tonight who doesn't need encouragement? Anyone here who just, you know, you just sort of float through life and everything goes smoothly, 100% all the time, you never get discouraged, you never get downcast? I mean, if you're saying I never need encouragement, then I guess you don't have to study this doctrine too well, but I'm setting you up because I think all of us would confess that we need encouragement on a daily basis.

Just encouragement to persevere in the faith, encouragement to continue to battle for holiness, encouragement to continue in ministry. And if you need encouragement, then this is the doctrine that you want to go to. This is one of the most encouraging truths in all the Bible. And you want to use this doctrine as a weapon, a weapon against discouragement.

You want to be able to explain this doctrine to a counselee. And you definitely don't want to view this doctrine as one of these sort of abstract, impractical, theological truths that you actually never use in real life. I hope that even this week that many of you will take this doctrine and use it in your own life, Monday morning, Tuesday morning, Tuesday night, Wednesday morning, use this doctrine to encourage your own heart and to fill your own heart with hope and with strength.

This is one of the most encouraging truths in all the Bible. If you look at your handout there, John Murray writes this, he says, "Union with Christ is the central truth of the whole doctrine of salvation. It is not simply a phase of the application of redemption. It underlies every aspect of redemption." That's how central this doctrine is.

We're going to try to establish this as we go along, how so many different areas of the Christian life and so many different aspects of our salvation are really tied in with this great idea that the believer is united with Christ permanently and lives in a vital relationship with Him.

Wayne Grudem has put it this way, he says, "Every aspect of God's relationship to believers is in some way connected to our relationship with Christ. From God's counsels in eternity past before the world was created, to our fellowship with God in heaven in eternity future, and including," listen to this, he says, "including every aspect of our relationship with God in this life.

All has occurred in union with Christ." What Grudem is saying there is that every aspect of the Christian life is related in some way to the doctrine of the believer's union with Christ. And Martyn Lloyd-Jones, the great preacher, speaks of the encouraging, uplifting effect that this doctrine ought to have upon our souls.

He says, "Here, then, is the doctrine that is before us, the doctrine of our union with Christ. Once more, we must say that it is one of the most glorious aspects of the Christian truth, one of the most profound, one of the most stimulating, one of the most comforting.

Indeed, I rather like to use the word exhilarating. There is nothing, perhaps, in the whole range and realm of doctrine which, if properly grasped and understood, gives greater assurance, greater comfort, and greater hope than this doctrine of our union with Christ." Now, underline the word "assurance," underline the word "comfort," and underline the word "hope," and just use this handout as a reference for your counseling ministry in the years to come.

Whenever you work with a counselee who needs any of these things, maybe a counselee who needs assurance of God's love, maybe a counselee who needs comfort after a season of sorrow, maybe a counselee who needs hope in a time of despair, anytime you minister to a counselee who needs any of these things, then pull out this handout, Theology Exam No.

18, and remember that the doctrine of the believer's union with Christ is able to give assurance, comfort, and hope to the believer in Christ. So, this is one of the most encouraging truths in all the Bible. Now, I have two statements there on the handout, just two aspects of the doctrine, and I think these two statements cover the heart of this doctrine.

I think that this is a very simple way of summarizing the main points that underlie the doctrine of union with Christ. By the way, these two points are adapted from Wayne Grudem's "Systematic Theology," and Grudem actually has four different aspects of our union with Christ. I've just taken the first two of his four, so if you're reading this and you go to Grudem and you say, "Wait a second, Dan didn't cover all four." That was on purpose because I think the first two really cover the heart of the doctrine, and for simplicity's sake, for brevity's sake, I'd like you to just focus on the first two with me.

But if you want an expanded treatment, go ahead and read Grudem's "Systematic Theology." But the statements are very simple. The statement number one, letter A, is that we are in Christ. We are in Christ. I'll just do a ballpark figure here, but the phrase "in Christ" or some kind of equivalent, sometimes the New Testament authors use the phrase "in Christ," sometimes they say "in Him," sometimes they say "in the Lord," sometimes they say "in Christ Jesus." But if you were to take all of the times that the New Testament writers refer to this concept of being in Christ, it is estimated that they use this phrase or its equivalent over 200 times in the New Testament.

That's how central this doctrine is in the New Testament Scriptures, the idea that as believers we are not just near Christ or around Christ, we are literally in Christ. We are joined in a permanent union with Christ. And what you'll find is that the New Testament writers, they relate different aspects of our salvation, different aspects of the blessings of salvation to the core reality that we are in Christ.

It is because we are in Christ that we have these blessings and that such dramatic change has occurred in our life. Just a sampling of these passages, 2 Corinthians 5, verse 17, Paul says, "Therefore, if anyone is," and there's the phrase, "in Christ." Now, if you mark in your Bibles, I would just encourage you to perhaps over the next year, read your New Testament, and every time you see the phrase "in Christ" or "in Him" or "in Christ Jesus," just circle that phrase, and you'll find that you will be doing a lot of circling.

This is one of the verses that you would want to circle that phrase, "in Christ." "Therefore, if anyone is in Christ," Paul says, "he is a new creation." "The old has passed away; behold, the new has come." A simple statement that no one can be placed in vital spiritual union with the Lord Jesus Christ without having their lives dramatically changed.

You become a new creation with new affections and new desires and a new purpose and new goals and new passions for life because you are now in Christ. You are now living in union with Him, and His life, His strength, His blessings flow into your life, and you cannot remain the same.

If anyone is saying, "Well, I believe in Christ, and I'm in Christ, but my life is completely the same as it was before I came to know Christ," then you have reason to question the reality of that person's salvation and spiritual experience. Being in Christ means that our hearts and lives are transformed.

We become new creations. Now, we celebrate this every time we perform baptisms at church. We know that baptism is a vivid picture of the believer's union with Christ in His life, death, and resurrection. I instruct baptism candidates that when you go in the waters and you come back up, it is representing death to your old life and rising again to live a new life in Christ.

All this has occurred in your life because you are joined to Christ. You are literally immersed into the person of Christ so that when Christ died on the cross, you died as well. When He rose again, you rose to live a new life, and you cannot continue living the way you did before because you have risen with Christ to live a new life, and you are a new creation.

All of that relates to the central doctrine of union with Christ, that that person is in Christ. John 15, verse 4, is another key passage worth our careful consideration. Jesus said to His disciples on the eve of His death, He said, verse 4, "Abide in Me, and I in you." The word "abide" simply meaning to remain or to stay.

Jesus is saying, "Stay close to Me." And then He gives this picture of union. He says, "As the branch cannot bear fruit by itself unless it abides in the vine, neither can you unless you abide in Me. I am the vine, you are the branches. Whoever abides in Me and I in him, he it is that bears much fruit.

For apart from Me, you can do nothing." Now, that is a simple picture of union with Christ. He is the vine, we are the branches. The branches are not just near the vine. The branches are living in a vital union with the vine. The life of the vine flows into the branches.

And it is only as that life flows into the branch that the branch is able to bear fruit. And so Jesus says, "Apart from Me, apart from this union, you can do nothing." Nothing that is truly spiritually fruitful will occur apart from the believer's union with Christ. We'll get back to that passage in just a moment.

But let me look at Galatians 3:28 where Paul says, "There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither slave nor free, there is no male and female. For you are all one," there it is again, "in Christ Jesus." In Christ Jesus. So, mark this truth down and again we'll expand upon this as we go.

The doctrine of the believer's union with Christ not only changes the way that we view the Christian life, but mark this down, it also changes the way that we view other Christians. If I am living in vital union with Christ, and if you are living in vital union with Christ, then it is an imperative that we live in unity with each other.

It changes the way we view our relationships in the church. And Paul even says that if you are living in vital union with Christ, this truth is so transcendent, it is so defining in terms of our relationships with one another, that there is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither slave nor free, there is no male and female.

Those distinctions are secondary, and they must be submitted to underneath the primary umbrella that if you are in Christ, and if I am in Christ, then we must recognize one another as believers, and we must live in unity with one another. And so, the first aspect of our union with Christ is that we are in Christ.

Now, I think you might be saying that's really sufficient to describe this doctrine. I mean, what more is there really to say than to say that we are in Christ, and that truth is repeated over 200 times in the New Testament. Well, I want to look at the second aspect of our union with Christ, and that is that Christ is in us.

Christ is in us. Now, if you take these two aspects together, we are in Christ. Literally, if you look at Romans 6, the idea of being immersed into the person of Christ, being completely and permanently identified with Him, and being joined with Christ in this vital union that is described in John 15 as the vine and the branches, and you might be saying, I don't know what else you need to say than to describe the fact that we are completely identified with the person of Christ.

But if you take that a step further, and you look at this idea that Christ is in us, there you have total identification. We are in Christ, and Christ lives in us. Galatians 2 verse 20, Paul makes that amazing statement, "I have been crucified with Christ. It is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives," there it is, circle that, "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 up for me." Christ lives in me. That is total identification. And in fact, Paul goes on to say in the book of Colossians that this concept of Christ living in us, living in the believer, is such an amazing concept that he calls it a mystery.

You notice there in Colossians 1 verse 27 where Paul says, "To them God chose to make known how great among the Gentiles are the riches of the glory of this mystery." And the word mystery in the New Testament is a technical term that's used to describe a truth that was not known in Old Testament times that has now been revealed in the New Testament era.

So what Paul is saying here is that there was a truth that the Old Testament prophets did not foretell, that the Old Testament prophecies did not predict. And now in the New Testament era, now that Christ has come, these truths are now being brought to light. And so Paul says there is a mystery that was not known for generations in the past, but has now been made known in the church age.

What is the mystery, Paul? What is this radical truth that no one ever knew about for hundreds of years? And he tells us in verse 27, "The riches, the glory of this mystery, which is Christ in you, the hope of glory." If you read the Old Testament, the Old Testament did predict that the Messiah would come.

The Old Testament did say that Christ would come and that he would establish his kingdom and that he would rescue Israel. The Old Testament did say that the Christ, the Messiah, would come through the line of Abraham and through the line of David. So the Old Testament did predict the coming of Christ.

What the Old Testament did not foretell is this amazing mystery is that the Messiah would not only live and die and rise again, but that believers who place their faith in the Messiah would be so identified with who he is. They would be so placed in this union that Christ, the Messiah, would actually live in them.

That they would be found in Christ and Christ would live in them. Paul says this is a mystery. Christ in you was not known in Old Testament times. And he says this is the hope of glory. Just an amazing truth that Christ lives in us. There have been times in counseling ministry where I've sat with a believer who's just dealing with, you know, a sin or a struggle or just something that seems insurmountable.

And on the basis of what the Bible teaches, I've been able to say to that believer, I believe that Jesus lives in you. And because Christ lives in you, I believe there is hope for this situation. I believe you can overcome this sin. I believe you can grow. I believe you can overcome temptation.

And it's not because you have so many resources in yourself. But the Bible says that if you place your faith in Jesus Christ, that Jesus Christ lives in you. And this is the hope of glory. If he lives in you, then I've got hope for you, brother. And I have hope that you can change and that you can grow.

And this is exactly what the apostle Paul says in Romans 8 verse 10. Where he says, "But if Christ is in you, although the body is dead because of sin, the spirit is life because of righteousness." Jesus living in the believer makes all the difference in the world. And that is why we don't give that kind of hope to an unbeliever.

If I'm counseling an unbeliever or someone whom I think is an unbeliever or someone who is not bearing the fruit of salvation, then I'm not going to give that same hope and assurance to an unbeliever. I'm going to say that actually I don't have hope for you apart from Christ.

The only hope I want to offer you is hope in Christ. But if I have assurance that this person is a believer, then I want to give that person hope. I want them to feel motivated to grow and to change. And I can offer that assurance and motivation because Christ indeed lives in them.

So those two statements sort of summarize the doctrine of union with Christ. Let me move to the next page of your handout and walk you through some reasons why this doctrine is important. Roman numeral number two, the importance of this doctrine. Why study the doctrine of union with Christ?

Well, letter A, union with Christ is important because of what is experienced apart from Christ. Why is it important to be united with Christ? Well, apart from Christ, there is no spiritual blessing. In other words, what would your spiritual experience be like apart from this living vital union that you have with Christ?

And the answer is you and I would be under God's wrath. We would be under God's condemnation. We would be living in darkness. We would be spiritually blind. We would be dead in our sins and trespasses. Romans 1 verse 18 describes the spiritual condition of those who live apart from Christ.

Paul says, "For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men." Ephesians chapter 2 says, "We were dead in our sins and our trespasses." Ephesians chapter 4 verse 17 describes the unbeliever as being darkened in understanding, alienated from the life of God because of the ignorance that is in them.

This is not abstract theological content. This is the reality of what our lives would be apart from our union with Christ. If you want to truly appreciate the doctrine of your union with Christ, ask yourself the question, "What would my life be like apart from this union?" The praise song that many of us sing in our churches says, "I once was lost in darkest night, yet thought I knew the way.

The sin that promised joy in life had led me to the grave. I had no hope that you would own a rebel to your will. If you had not loved me first, I would refuse you still. But as I ran my hell-bound race, indifferent to the cost, you looked upon my helpless state and led me to the cross.

And I beheld God's love displayed. You suffered in my place. You bore the wrath reserved for me. Now all I know is grace. Hallelujah. All I have is Christ. Hallelujah. Jesus is my life." You didn't know it, but that song is celebrating the doctrine of union with Christ. Apart from Christ, hell, condemnation, punishment, wrath, darkness, running a hell-bound race.

But in Christ, through union with Christ, we have life. We have every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places. And so John Calvin has said, "We must understand that as long as Christ remains outside of us and we are separated from him, all that he has suffered and done for the salvation of the human race remains useless and of no value for us.

All that he, that is Christ, possesses is nothing to us until we grow into one body with him." Through union with Christ, we receive all the blessings of salvation. And that moves us to letter B on your handout. The second reason why this doctrine is important is because of the emphasis of this doctrine in Scripture.

The emphasis of this doctrine in Scripture. Listen to what David Reitmeier writes in his reflection on the phrase "in Christ" in the New Testament. He says, "Paul expresses personal appropriation of the work of Christ by the term 'in Christ.' It is the apostle's favorite term to describe the personal and dynamic relation of the believer to Christ and appears in a variety of contexts.

The phrase is found 8 times in Galatians, 34 times in Ephesians, and 18 times in Colossians. The phrase and its cognates occur some 200 times in Pauline literature." Theologian Bruce Demarest is even more precise. He states that the biblical writers, especially Paul and John, were anything but reluctant to expound the imagery of the believer's union with Jesus Christ.

Indeed, expressions such as "in Cristo," "in Kyrio," "in Cristo Jesu," "in Otto," etc. occur 216 times in the Pauline corpus and 26 times in the Johannine writings. Amply attested in the New Testament, union with Christ proves to be a central verity, indeed a touchstone reality of the Christian life and experience.

Anthony Hokema says, "Once you have your eyes open to this concept of union with Christ, you will find it almost everywhere in the New Testament." Paul can't even introduce his epistles in the opening salutations without a reference to the doctrine of the union with Christ, the believer's union with Christ.

Did you ever notice that? I mean, look at the salutations, Ephesians 1 verse 1. "Paul, an apostle of Christ Jesus by the will of God to the saints who are in Ephesus and are faithful," there's the phrase, "in Christ Jesus." Philippians 1 verse 1, "Paul and Timothy, servants of Christ Jesus to all the saints," here it is, "in Christ Jesus who are at Philippi with the overseers and deacons." And Colossians 1 verse 2 says, "to the saints and faithful brothers in Christ at Colossae, grace to you and peace from God our Father." So this doctrine is important because of the emphasis of the doctrine in Scripture.

Let me move to the next page of your handout, letter C. A third reason why this doctrine is important is because of its connection with the blessings of salvation. It's as simple as Ephesians 1 verse 3 where Paul says, "Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ who has blessed us," here he is again, "in Christ with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places." So apart from Christ, there is judgment and woe, but in Christ, there is every spiritual blessing.

And Paul goes on to enumerate the specific blessings of salvation. And you'll note here he takes pains to repeat the phrase, "in Christ" or "in Him" in order to pound into our minds and into our hearts the understanding that none of these blessings come to us apart from Christ.

All of these blessings are ours because of the vital spiritual union that we have with Christ. He talks about the blessing of election in verse 3, "even as He," that is the Father, "chose us," believers, "in Him," that is in Christ, "before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and blameless before Him." Paul talks about the blessing of adoption in verse 4, "in love He predestined us for adoption to Himself as sons through Jesus Christ according to the purpose of His will, to the praise of His glorious grace with which He has blessed us," here it is, "in the Beloved," who is that?

That is Christ. Paul talks about the blessing of redemption, being bought from slavery. He talks about the blessing of forgiveness of sins, our sins being removed from us as far as the east is from the west. Verse 7, "in Him," there are that phrases again, "we have redemption through His blood, the forgiveness of our trespasses according to the riches of His grace which He lavished upon us." "In all wisdom and insight making known to us the mystery of His will according to His purpose which He set forth in Christ as a plan for the fullness of time to unite all things in Him, things in heaven and things on earth." And then Paul talks about the blessing of an eternal inheritance in heaven.

Verse 11, "in Him we have obtained inheritance having been predestined according to the purpose of Him who works all things according to the counsel of His will, so that we who were the first to hope in Christ might be to the praise of His glory." And then there is the blessing of the Holy Spirit.

Verse 13, "in Him you also when you heard the word of truth, the gospel of your salvation, and believed in Him were sealed with the promised Holy Spirit who is the guarantee of our inheritance until we acquire possession of it to the praise of His glory." The blessing of election, the blessing of adoption, the blessing of redemption, the blessing of forgiveness, the blessing of an inheritance eternal in the heavens, the blessing of the promised Holy Spirit, Paul says repeatedly over and over again, all of these blessings come to us in Christ by virtue of our union with Christ.

We have received every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places in Christ. So if you love any of these blessings, or if you love all of these blessings, then you must also love the doctrine of the believer's union with Christ. What about the blessing of sanctification? What about the Christian life?

What about Monday to Friday? How I live each and every day? What about marriage? What about how do I deal with my roommate? What about how I conduct myself at work? How does the doctrine of union with Christ relate to those issues of sanctification? I'm glad you asked because Romans 6, verse 1 explains that the doctrine of the believer's union with Christ is the foundation for all of our pursuits in sanctification.

In fact, if we are not united with Christ, then there is no hope that we are going to grow in our sanctification. It is only because we are united with Him that we can pursue greater Christlikeness and greater holiness. Paul says in Romans 6, verse 1, "What should we say then?

Are we to continue in sin that grace may abound? By no means. How can we who die to sin still live in it? Do you not know that all of us who have been baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into His death?" Now, notice there, that's not water baptism.

That's what we call a dry verse. There's no water there. The word "baptizo" literally means to immerse or to submerge. Paul is speaking here of our immersion into the person of Jesus Christ, which occurred at the moment of our conversion. When you and I believed in Jesus Christ, we were literally immersed into His person, immersed into His power.

The Bible talks about a baptism of fire, a baptism of suffering, a baptism into water. Here, Paul is talking about our immersion or our baptism into the person of Christ. We were literally immersed into Christ Jesus. That's union. Paul says there, "Do you not know that all of us who have been literally immersed into Christ Jesus were immersed into His death?" We were so totally identified with the person of Christ that when He died, we died.

As Paul said, "I have been crucified with Christ." Verse 4, "We were buried therefore with Him by baptism into death, in order that just as Christ was raised from the dead, by the glory of the Father, we too might walk in newness of life. For if we have been united with Him in a death like His, we shall certainly be united with Him in a resurrection like His.

We know that our old self was crucified with Him in order that the body of sin might be brought to nothing, so that we would no longer be enslaved to sin. For one who has died has been set free from sin. Now, if we have died with Christ, we believe that we also will live with Him." Now, that's a passage I've used in counseling ministry just to tell believers that you are not a slave to sin.

You do not need to live in bondage to sin. Yes, there will be a battle, but you do not need to have a sin as a functional master over your life. On the basis of this text, I am telling you that you are not a slave to sin, and you're united with Christ.

And I'm excited to see what God's going to do in your life as you meet with me and as we look at God's Word together. This is one of the ways you use the doctrine of union with Christ with a believer in counseling ministry, just reminding them that when Christ died, you died, and when He rose, you rose, and you are no longer a slave to sin because you are united with Christ.

St. Clair Ferguson names eight ways the salvation is in Christ. I'd encourage you to get his work and just look at that in further detail. A summary of that shows up on Justin Taylor's blog at the Gospel Coalition. Eight ways the salvation is in Christ. He said we are initially united with Christ in regeneration, the glory of our new birth, of being made alive in Christ.

It is at regeneration that we are united with Christ. Number two, we appropriate and continue to live out this union through faith. Paul says the life I now live in the flesh, I live by faith in the Son of God. Number three, we are justified in union with Christ.

Paul says, I count everything as lost because of the surpassing worth of knowing Jesus Christ, my Lord. Christ Jesus, my Lord, for His sake, I've suffered the loss of all things and count them as rubbish in order that I may gain Christ and may be found, here's the key phrase, in Him.

Not having a righteousness of my own that comes from the law, but that which comes through faith in Christ. Paul doesn't want to be found in himself and have God judge him on the basis of his own accomplishments. He wants to be found in Christ and be clothed with the righteousness that comes from Christ.

Number four, we are sanctified through our union with Christ. Jesus said, apart from me, you can do nothing. Number five, we persevere in the life of faith in union with Christ. We'll say more about that in just a moment. Number six, we are even said to die in Christ.

Revelation 14 verse 13, blessed are the dead who die in the Lord from now on. Number seven, we shall be raised with Christ. Number eight, we shall be eternally glorified with Christ. So note, all of the blessings that we receive, we receive in Christ, election, adoption, redemption, forgiveness, the gift of the Holy Spirit, our eternal inheritance in heaven, and then all of these different aspects of salvation are communicated to us that they occur by virtue of our union with Christ.

We are regenerated in Christ. We are justified in Christ. We are sanctified in Christ. We persevere in Christ. We die in Christ. We will be raised in Christ. We will be glorified with Christ. John Owen writes that union with Christ is the cause of all other graces that we are made partakers of.

They are all communicated unto us by virtue of our union with Christ. Hence is our adoption, our justification, our sanctification, our fruitfulness, our perseverance, our resurrection, our glory. And Millard Erickson says that in one sense, union with Christ is an inclusive term for the whole of salvation. The various other doctrines are simply subparts.

Now, you get the idea why I said to my wife last night, you know, we just don't make a big enough deal about this doctrine as we ought to in the church and in our Christian lives. I mean, this ought to be, as Martin Lloyd-Jones said, I mean, this is the exhilarating doctrine that brings assurance and comfort and hope and joy.

We ought to make a much bigger deal of the truth that we are united with Christ. And indeed, James Stewart has made this observation that union with Christ, rather than justification or election or eschatology or indeed any of the other great apostolic themes, is the real clue to an understanding of Paul's thought and experience.

So I'm going to touch on some of this fairly briefly because I'm running out of time here. But let me just pause in a moment. So this is how it works in my life. And maybe you can relate to this. Maybe this helps you. Maybe you'll say, Dan, that's just you and I can't relate to that at all.

So this is how it works in my life. When I pray and when I come into the presence of God the Father, and I remind myself of the fact that He is a holy God and I'm a sinful man, I immediately feel a sense of unworthiness to come into His presence.

And I immediately go to my many failures, my many sins, sins of omission, sins of commission, my lack of godliness, my wrong frame of mind and heart when I come in the morning. I don't know about you. Maybe some of you wake up every morning and you just feel instantly godly when you wake up in the morning.

For me, it takes a couple cups of coffee just to feel half a Christian in the morning some days. And you know what I mean, it's just you're dry, you're struggling to pray, you feel very unworthy to come into God's presence. And that's when I use this doctrine that Father, you will accept my prayers and you will accept me not because of who I am, not because of what I've done, not because of the good frame of my heart, not because of the bad frame of my heart.

You will accept me because I am united with your Son. And because I am coming to you in Christ, through Christ, with Christ, because of Christ, on the basis of Christ, because you love your Son and I'm united with Him, you will accept my prayers. And I remind myself that not only do I have the right and the access to come into the presence of the Father, but because of Christ, because I'm coming in Christ, I have the right to come boldly, with confidence, with access, with freedom of speech, to lay all of my cares and all of my concerns and everything that is on my heart to come to my Father because He accepts me on the basis of His Son.

And I remind myself that He is pleased with Christ. He will never reject His Son, the Lord Jesus Christ. Therefore, He cannot reject me. And I remind myself that it's the Spirit's ministry to testify to the believer's union with Christ so that I have this confident prayer language. I can cry out, "Abba, Father," and know that the Father will accept me.

That's how it works in my life. When I'm struggling to pray or I'm struggling to just act as a Christian, I use the doctrine of union with Christ. "Father, you will accept me because you accept your Son, and I am in union with your Son." And I want to just encourage you to use it in that way.

I think if any Christian who has a formal prayer language that is distant, that is cold, needs to take this doctrine and use it, learn to wield it in the Christian life, so that you indeed experience the love of the Father in your life and the confident access that you have into His presence.

Now moving quickly to letter D. I've got way more material than time here, but letter D is this doctrine is important because it is the foundation for the believer's sanctification. We noticed this already. I'm going to skip to the middle part of your handout there. The believer is united with Christ in His death, His resurrection, His ascension, His heavenly session.

We will share in His promised return. This then, Sinclair Ferguson writes, is the foundation of sanctification in Reformed theology. It is rooted not in humanity and their achievement of holiness or sanctification, but in what God has done in Christ and for us in union with Him. It is seeing oneself in this context that enables the individual Christian to grow in true holiness.

This keeps the focus in our sanctification where it belongs. The focus belongs on Christ. You say, "I'm struggling with my sanctification. I don't know if I'm going to make it. The Christian life is hard. How do I know I'm going to make it to the end?" That leads us to point letter E.

Union with Christ is the basis for the believer's perseverance. Just a quick note here. You look at Ephesians 1 verse 4. He chose us in Him before the foundation of the world, relating the concept of union with Christ to what happened in eternity past. Then you notice the concept of being in Christ related to our future resurrection.

1 Corinthians 15 verse 22, "For as in Adam all die, so also in Christ shall all be made alive." Richard Gaffin, a professor at Westminster Seminary, puts it this way, "Here we see a comprehensive sweep of our union with Christ from eternity to eternity, eternal in origin. We are predestinated in Christ.

There is an eternal end where we are glorified in Christ." This is in reference to permanent union rooted in election. Our union will reach its final consummation in glorification. Therefore, at the end of Romans chapter 8, Paul says that nothing, not even death, can separate us from the love of Christ.

Once a believer is said to be in Christ, it is never said in the Bible that that believer is then placed at some point outside of Christ or out of Christ. In fact, John 17 verse 21, Jesus uses this beautiful language. He says, "I in them and you in me, that they may become perfectly one, so that the world may know that you sent me and love them even as you love me." I mean, that's just amazing language, isn't it?

The Father loves the believer with the same love that he loves the Son. So how can that be? How can the Father love me with the same love that he loves Jesus, when Jesus is perfect and I'm sinful? Well, the key there is what Jesus says in John 17 verse 23, "I in them and you in me." It is because of union with Christ that the believer is loved by God the Father.

Again, very briefly, four pictures of union with Christ. I'm going to just touch on these and you can do some more study of these on your own. We cover the vine and the branches. The branches are not only near the vine, but the branches are in vital union with the vine.

John 15 verse 4, "Apart from me you can do nothing." You have the picture of the head and the body, 1 Corinthians 12 verse 12. It talks about the body of Christ and Christ is the head of the body. The head is in vital union with the members of the body.

Here's another picture of union. You have the picture of the marriage of Christ and the church, which is mentioned in Ephesians 5 verse 31. "Therefore a man shall leave his father and his mother and hold fast to his wife and the two shall become one flesh." This mystery is profound, Paul says, and I'm saying that it refers to Christ and the church, just as a husband and a wife are united and become one flesh in marriage.

Christ lives in union with his church. That is a beautiful picture of this doctrine. Letter D would be the picture of the cornerstone and the living stones. Paul talks about in Ephesians chapter 2, Christ being the cornerstone and then the whole structure of this beautiful new temple being joined together.

It grows into a holy temple in the Lord that we're being built together into a dwelling place for God by the Spirit. The idea of unity and yet the cornerstone being joined together with the living stones, another beautiful picture of this doctrine. So how do we apply this in counseling ministry?

Well, learn whenever someone needs hope, point them to this doctrine. Whenever someone feels that God has forsaken me, any believer who's suffering needs to be told that God is not punishing you. If you are in Christ, that God may be pruning you, God may be sanctifying you, but he's not punishing you.

Just use this doctrine to give hope to the believer. When you counsel, you're going to be working with people who struggle greatly with sin or struggle greatly with weak faith. They may be praying that prayer of the Father in Mark chapter 9 who said, "Lord, I believe, but help my unbelief." You want to give them hope so that they know that God the Father accepts their prayers.

The way you do that is you point them to their union with Christ. God accepts you because he accepts Christ and point them to the fact that you can overcome sin because Jesus has lived and died and risen again on your behalf. Number two, the believer should be encouraged that the power of sin has been broken in his or her life.

I mentioned Romans 6 verse 6, "We know that our old self was crucified with him in order that the body of sin might be brought to nothing so that we may no longer be enslaved to sin." Verse 14, "For sin will have no dominion over you since you are not under law but under grace." In counseling ministry, you're going to have the opportunity to personalize that.

It's one thing to hear that in kind of a general context, "Sin shall have no dominion over you." It's another thing to sit with Bill in a counseling room and say, "Bill, this sin of anger that you struggle with with your family, this sin will not have dominion over you because you are united with Christ." Letter C, as I mentioned, the believer should be encouraged to come boldly into God's presence through the work of Christ.

So many passages there, but I just encourage you to look at Romans 8 verse 15 where Paul talks about this beautiful dynamic of the Christian life. "For you did not receive the spirit of slavery to fall back into fear, but you have received the spirit of adoption as sons by whom we cry, 'Abba, Father.'" The spirit ministers the work of Christ to our hearts.

The result is we experience nearness to God our Father. We cry, "Abba, Father," not the formal language of father so much like the Von Trapp family in Sound of Music where the children line up and they say, "Father" from a distance, but it's "Abba, Dada, Papa." Every language has this equivalent of the young child who cries out for his or her father.

And Paul says, "The spirit himself bears witness with our spirit that we are children of God, and if children, then heirs, heirs of God." This is amazing. Fellow heirs with Christ. So I always used to think that it's that the father takes this incredible inheritance that he wanted to give to the son, and he gives it to the son.

And then the son takes a little bit of that inheritance and kind of portions it out to those who believe in him. And that would be enough, right? I mean, it would be enough just not to go to hell. It would be enough not to be judged for sin.

It would be enough just to kind of get into the doghouse of heaven. I mean, Lord, I don't really need anything else, just any place in heaven. That's all that I need. But that term, fellow heirs with Christ, joint heirs with Christ, means that because we are united with Christ, that we receive the full inheritance that the father gives to Christ, and we receive it with Christ.

It says, "provided that we suffer with him in order that we may also be glorified with him." I mean, that's just amazing. That's just amazing grace, that we would be fellow heirs with Christ because we are joined in union with him. And then the last point is that the doctrine of union with Christ teaches us to love one another.

As Justin Taylor says, "There is no union that is not also fellowship with other believers." Jesus said this, "If you receive him, you receive me." How you treat a member of the body of Christ is how you treat the head who is Christ. Next time you relate to any believer in Christ, just remind yourself that you are relating to someone who is in union with Christ, and it ought to teach us to love one another.

Now, this is just for free, and if you need to go, feel free. I went over time today, and if you need to go, feel free to sign off. Just want to give you some food for thought in a couple minutes. Having worked through this whole idea of identity, and I just want to draw out some thoughts here in relation to the doctrine of union with Christ.

The last IBCD conference was on the issue of identity, and this is not fully formed in my own thinking, but something I've been thinking through in relation to counseling ministry, and you can help me with this if you have any further thoughts on it. You look on the left-hand side of this column, and you look at an example of how a person should ideally look at their identity, that their primary identity is in Christ.

That's who I am. I'm a Christian. I'm in Christ. Christ is in me, and that is the primary identity that informs every other identity in my life, and so there are some secondary identities underneath that primary umbrella. A sister in the church might be saying, "I'm also a daughter.

I'm also a friend, and then lastly, I'm a student," and you will notice, if that's properly ordered, that a person could actually experience some hardships as a student, as a friend, and as a daughter, and still experience joy and fulfillment of the Christian life because the primary identity is not threatened, but what happens in the disorder desires of our heart is we tend to, on the right-hand side, we tend to get it wrong.

We tend to see our primary identity possibly as a student. I am a student. A perfectionist might be saying, "I'm a straight-A student, and that's who I am," and then underneath that, I'm also a friend, a daughter, and then possibly last is functionally the idea that I'm in Christ.

What happens when these identities are mixed up is that when that primary identity is threatened and when the person fails in a course or possibly drops out of school or does not succeed at the task that is before her, then her life falls apart. She spirals into despair. She spirals into depression because she has been finding her primary identity as a student instead of her primary identity being in Christ, and to work with people, repentance and faith is to bring them to a point where they see their primary identity is in Christ, and then everything else falls underneath.

You can work through the example of possibly a workaholic who rightly ordered, sees himself, his primary identity is in Christ. Underneath that is the identity of husband, father, and the leader of a company, but in the disordered functional desires of how a person tends to see life, he may begin to see his primary identity as the leader of a company, and so that drives him to overwork, and that drives him to damage his own health and his relationships with his family and his church because he sees that that is his primary identity, and underneath all of that at the bottom is his identity in Christ, and so repentance and faith is moving that person back to the rightly ordered desires.

Now, I'm just throwing that out there as food for thought. I'm still working through this aspect of relating the doctrine of union with Christ to issues of identity, and so don't take this as inspired truth, but you can think through this with me, but I do think that the doctrine of union with Christ has relevance to those types of issues, and if you want more teaching on that, you can look at the IBCD conference that is available for free at ibcd.org on identity crisis.

Okay, I have used up my time tonight, and I do thank you for your patience, and thank you for being with us tonight. I do pray that that was a help and that you'll write a fantastic essay on the doctrine of union with Christ. I'm going to go ahead and close our time tonight, and thank you again for being with us.

Let's pray. Father, that is our one boast, that Lord, you accept us because you accept your Son, and that we come to you as we are united with your Son, and that you will never cast us out, for to do so would mean you would have to reject the work of your Son on our behalf.

We just thank you that you will never do that, and we thank you that you love us with the same love that you love your Son. We just pray that you would help us to rejoice in these truths and then to use them in a ministry to others, and I thank you for each of my brothers and sisters here.

Bless their week. Make it a great week of study, we pray, and may we bear much fruit for your glory, and we ask this in Jesus' name. Amen. Amen. God bless you all. We hope to see you next Sunday at 5 p.m., and we'll go over theology exam number 19.

God bless.