Union with Christ

What does it mean to be in union with Christ and what are the repercussions of this somewhat mystical concept? As a new Christian, I heard others talk of being “joined to Christ” or in “union” with Christ, but I didn’t really understand what they meant.

My idea of this union became more fully developed when I considered my relationship with my wife. It seems obvious, but before our wedding, we did not enjoy the full benefits of the marriage relationship. For example, we were “on our own” when it came to most of the duties of daily life, including caring for ourselves, preparing meals, and keeping our living spaces clean. We were not able to enjoy uninterrupted companionship throughout the day and at night. Much of the “effort” of living was duplicated in parallel, while the trajectories of our lives were growing closer together until they would meet on the day of our wedding.

Prior to being married, it was difficult to imagine what was ahead of us, but this did not stop us from becoming lost in our imagination about what the future held. I distinctly remember thinking how wonderful it would be to not be forced to say “Goodbye” at the end of the day but instead, enjoy uninterrupted companionship throughout the night.

Looking back through the lens of over 10 years of marriage has given me perspective on what the marriage union entails. The benefits of this union are far greater than what I imagined they would be, and reflecting on them provides insight into what Christians mean when we say we are united to Christ.

Our marriage has come with great benefits, and along with this, great responsibilities. Soon after becoming married, it became obvious that in addition to the joys of uninterrupted companionship, the marriage relationship required effort to maintain. While not always the case but more often than not, the “work” required to maintain a happy marriage flows naturally out of the love my wife and I have for each other.

As a bachelor, it was easy to leave my apartment in an unkempt state, since I was the only one who had to live there. Books, clothes, laundry, papers, etc. were often left strewn about the floor. In my mind, I knew that it was “good” to have a clean apartment, but this knowledge did not always translate into practice. After being married (and with a little help from my wife), this “head knowledge” has not remained locked inside my (thick) skull! Because I share a home with my wife, and more importantly, because I love her, I keep my dirty clothes off the floor!

I recall a story my father told along these lines. When he was a bachelor, he did not care whether his socks were “inside out” or “right side out” when he put them into the laundry. My mother, on the other hand, preferred all of the socks to be “right side out”. When they were married, my father learned of her preference and from that day forward, he never put an “inside out” sock into the laundry again! Was he motivated to do this because of my mother laid down the “law” with him? No, he was motivated to do this because he loved her and wanted to please her, driven by her love and desire to please him.

And so it is with our union with Christ. The marriage analogy is not perfect, since a marriage is a union of equals, but it is perhaps the closest metaphor we have to describe our response to the blessings we receive in being united to Jesus. Seeing things from his perspective, perhaps a better analogy is that of a parent-child relationship. The parent has unrestrained love for the child and does things for the child without any expectation of reward. So too, Jesus bestows on his children the gift of salvation, of union to himself and adoption into his family. Fittingly, the Bible describes our union with Christ in language that encompasses both parent/child and husband/wife relationships.

A child does not ask to be born to receive the blessings of his parents, and similarly, we do not ask to be born again in Christ. The Bible tells us that God’s children were chosen “from the foundation of the earth” in Jesus. “Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us in Christ with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places, even as he chose us in him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and blameless before him.” (Ephesians 1:3-4 ESV)

It is important to notice here what God expects of those whom he chooses–"that we should be holy and blameless before him”. No earthly parent can expect this kind of response from their children and no husband or wife will see such a high degree of devotion. It is only because of Christ that God can have such expectations. As a result of the forgivness for sin and work of justification that is accomplished by Christ, God’s children are indeed holy and blameless. When God sees his children, he doesn’t see filthy sin-stained human garments, he sees the righteous, sin-free clothing of Jesus.

Our Response

What is our response to all of this? Returning to our marriage analogy, the response can be nothing but obedience out of gratitude. Just as I no longer leave my dirty clothes on the floor and just as my father made certain that his socks were turned the right way around, we look to our heavenly “spouse” for guidance in the way we conduct our Christian lives. Just as I desire to conform my will to my wife’s needs, so do I desire to conform my will to Christ’s.

Looking at this from another perspective, consider a sailboat. The boat will not go far in the water unless there is wind to propel it. So too, the Christian will be “dead in the water” without something from God to move us. Our union with Christ and the good news he brings is the “wind” we need to move the boat that is our Christian life. Without this wind, all the self-help books on how to live our “best life now” or attain a “purpose-driven life” will be meaningless, because they will be counciling us on how to steer the boat without actually providing the force we need to get there.

The theologian Robert Reymond reflects on the meaning of our union with Christ in his ”New Systematic Theology of the Christian Faith”.

“Union with Christ is the fountainhead from which flows the Christian’s every spiritual blessing–repentance and faith, pardon, justification, adoption, sanctification, perseverance, and glorification. Chosen in Christ before the creation of the world, and in the divine mind united with Christ in his death and resurrection, the elect, in response to God’s effectual call, are through God’s gift of faith actually united to Christ. Their union with Christ is in no sense the effect of human causation. ‘The union which the elect have with Christ is the work of God’s grace, whereby they are spiritually and mystically, yet really and inseparably, joined to Christ as their head and husband’ (Larger Catechism, Question 66). By virtue of his actual union with Christ the Husband in his death and resurrection, the Christian, as Christ’s ‘bride,’ is forgiven of his sin and liberated from the law—his previous ‘husband’–and made capable of doing that which he could never do before, namely, ‘bear holy fruit to God’ (Rom. 7:4-5). To the degree that the Christian ‘reckons himself dead to sin but alive to God in Christ Jesus’ (Rom. 6:11), that is to say, to the degree that the Christian takes seriously the reality of his Spirit-wrought union with Christ, to that degree he will find his definitive sanctification coming to actual expression in his experiential or progressive sanctification. The holiness of the Christian’s daily walk directly depends upon his union with the Savior.”

As Reynolds notes, we are in union to the law prior to being united to Christ. The apostle Paul described the law as a “schoolmaster” whose job it was to bring us to Christ. “Wherefore the law was our schoolmaster to bring us unto Christ, that we might be justified by faith” (Galatians 3:24 KJV)

How does the law act as our schoolmaster? By revealing sin. Without the “mirror” of the law, we cannot possibly know the depth of our sin problem and our need for a Savior. The law gives us the “bad news” that we have fallen short of its demands, and it places us in the vulnerable place where our sins must be dealt with. Thankfully, the law does not leave us hanging, but fulfills its function of driving us to Christ. In his letter to the Galatian church, Paul goes on to say that after we are in union with Christ, we are “no longer under a schoolmaster” (Galatians 3:25 KJV). The law has finished one of its primary tasks in bringing us to the only person who can remove the sin it revealed–Jesus Christ.

Having been freed by the promise of the gospel from the bondage of the “bad news” of the law, we are now free–for the first time–to obey God from right motivation. Just as I was free to obey my wife from the motive of love, I am free to obey my Creator because of the gratitude that comes from being united to Christ. The “wind” that is needed to propel the boat of my life is now blowing with full force, allowing me to move toward my destination and to live the Christian life.

What does this have to do with Adventism?

Simply put, the Adventist church has missed a primary function of the law–to drive sinners to Christ. While much effort is expended in holding up the ten commandments as the revelation of God’s character and a standard of holiness, virtually no effort is made to show that everyone–including Adventists–fails to meet the law’s demands. Having relegated the law to merely a code book for how to live a good life, the law is emptied of its power to deliver the “bad news” and drive the sinner to his Savior. And being primarily a code book, the law is either trivialized into something able to be “kept”, or it becomes a heavier and heavier weight that cannot be lightened other than through more “spiritual exercise”.

If the law can be softened in any way so that it can be perfectly “kept”, the Adventist church has a legitimate claim of being one of the only churches to actually keep all of the commandments. Much is made about observance of the fourth commandment, but the “keeping of the day” does not resemble what was commanded to the Israelites upon pain of death (for more information, see here). What’s more, the Sabbath is fitted with additional man-made requirements governing everything from personal amusements to sexual activity (or lack thereof). Instead of pointing to the Savior and finding its fulfillment in him as described in Hebrews 4, the Sabbath becomes a convenient way to measure whether someone is part of God’s remnant church.

Let me suggest that one can spend their entire lifetime faithfully observing the Sabbath, but if done from the motivation of trying to meet the law’s demands rather than from love for the Savior and his finished work on our behalf, it will amount to nothing. Nobody will be able to say to God on Judgment Day, “Lord, look at my Sabbath-keeping” and expect to be found not guilty. “All have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God”, and as such, we are all guilty. Unless the law shows us our guilt and leads us to the Savior who can acquit us, we’re still guilty and we’re still in our sins. Unless we have felt the weight of the law and our absolute guilt in the eyes of a Holy God, we are still facing eternity apart from him, even if we spend the rest of our lives in faithful church attendance and Sabbath-keeping.

What does this have to do with “former Adventism”?

Some have left the Adventist church and embraced their newfound freedom in Christ but have unwittingly created a false dichotomy in their minds between union with Christ and faithful obedience to him. Before objecting to this statement out of hand, consider that it is God who authored the law, and that the law is part of his revealed will for his children. We do ourselves a disservice when we try to divorce our union with Christ from obedience to Christ’s revealed will that is contained in his law. The law is not the end of God’s will, but neither is it merely a “warm-up” to the Christian life. God did not give the law to the Israelites for the sole purpose of leading them to Christ, only to later nullify it in a “bait and switch” procedure.

The apostle Paul describes his own struggle with the law in Romans 7. He agonizes over his failure to meet the law’s demands, yet he does not back away from acknowledging his service to the law of God, even saying that he “delighted” in it (Romans 7:22). Paul was not speaking about some unknown law that was only revealed in Christ, he was speaking about the law that includes the commands delivered at Sinai (Romans 7:7-8).

How do we reconcile Paul’s assertion that he had to die to the law in order to live for Christ (Romans 7:4, Galatians 2:19-20)? A parallel sentiment is conveyed in Galatians 4:21-30 in Paul’s analogy of Hagar (the slave woman) and Sarah (the free woman). To reconcile all of these apparent contradictions, we must understand that Paul was speaking of dying to his attempts to obtain righteousness through the law. As long as Paul was still trying to gain heaven by living up to the law’s demands, he was “under the law”, in bondage to the schoolmaster, and a child of the slave woman (Galatians 4:24-25). But in dying to his attempts at works-righteousness, Paul was joined to Christ’s perfect righteousness, adopted into God’s family as a child of the free woman, and no longer under the care of the schoolmaster (Galatians 4:26, Galatians 3:25).

There is no contradiction in Paul’s condmenation of those who attempt to keep the law for salvation (Galatians 1:6-10, Galatians 2:11-21), while simultaneously proclaiming his “delight” in the law, since Paul’s motivation is not observance of the law to be saved, but as a result of having been saved. He even goes so far to say that those who are “in the flesh” (under the bondage of the law) cannot ever submit to it. “For the mind that is set on the flesh is hostile to God, for it does not submit to God’s law; indeed, it cannot.” (Romans 8:7 ESV)

Just as I delight in serving my wife because of my love for her, so I delight in the law of my Creator and the Lord Jesus Christ (Psalm 1:2, Romans 7:22). It is because I am married that I obey (albeit imperfectly) my wife, and it is because of my union with Christ that I obey (albeit imperfectly) his commands. May it be done from right motivation and a justified heart, to the praise of his glory.