Crucified with Christ

J.C. Philpot (1802-1869)

You will observe that it is only by virtue of “the cross of Christ,” that is, by a spiritual union and experimental communion with Christ crucified, that this inward crucifixion can be really effected. There are two things whereby the inward, spiritual, and experimental crucifixion of a child of God is distinguished from that of a Papist, a Puseyite, or a Pharisee. The first is that it is by “the cross of Christ,” that is, it flows from a spiritual knowledge of union with a crucified Jesus. “I am crucified with Christ.” I do not crucify myself, nor does my flesh crucify my flesh. The second feature is that the whole of the old is crucified; it is not one limb but the whole body which suffers crucifixion as the Apostle says, “Knowing this, that our old man is crucified with Him, that the body of sin might be destroyed, that henceforth we should not serve sin” (Romans 6:6). In the literal crucifixion, though the nails were driven through the feet and hands, the whole body was crucified; so spiritually, though the nails may chiefly be struck through the working and moving members of the old man, yet the whole of him is crucified with them. So not only our worldly spirit but our whole flesh, with all its plans and projects, with all its schemes, motives, and designs, is nailed to the cross; and especially our religious flesh, for this is included in the “affections” of it, which are crucified (Galatians 5:24).

Now arises another question. Is this crucifixion with our consent or against our consent? To this I answer that it is partly voluntary and partly involuntary. We may illustrate this by the example of Peter. The Lord said to him, “Verily, verily, I say unto thee, when thou wast young, thou girdedst thyself, and walkedst whither thou wouldest: but when thou shalt be old, thou shalt stretch forth thy hands, and another shall gird thee, and carry thee whither thou wouldest not” (John 21:18). The Lord was here referring to Peter’s crucifixion. Do we not see from this that Peter would shrink from being crucified but that he would be carried to the cross against his will? Yet we read in ecclesiastical history that when that time arrived, Peter begged of his executioners to crucify him with his head downwards because he could not bear to die in the same posture with his crucified Lord. Thus we see in the actual, literal crucifixion of one of the Lord’s most highly favored followers there was a shrinking from the cross and yet a submission to it. “The spirit was willing, but the flesh was weak.” The natural “I” was unwilling, the spiritual “I” was willing.

So it is with us in a spiritual sense. The coward flesh rebels against and cries out under the nails of crucifixion, but the spirit submits and, when favored by divine help, counts itself unworthy of such an honor and such a blessing. No man ever spiritually crucified his own flesh. This is God’s work, who in so doing spares not for our crying. Perhaps we are hugging close some bosom idol, some secret lust, some rising ambition, some covetous plan, or pleasing prospect. This may be as dear to us almost as our natural life. Can we then drive through it the crucifying nails? Or if we could, would that crucify it? No. God Himself must take it with His own hand and drive through it the nails of crucifixion; yes, and so drive them through this worldly spirit, this covetous heart, this proud, unbending mind, this self-righteous, self-pleasing, self-exalting affection, this deceptive, delusive, soul-destroying, fleshly religion, that it may ever after live a dying life. It is He, not you, who thus crucifies it, that its hands can no more move to execute its designs than the hands of a man nailed upon a cross, and its feet no more walk in the plan projected than the feet of a crucified man can come down from the cross and walk abroad in the world. Here is God taking your darling schemes, your favorite projects, your anticipated delights, so that they become to you dying, bleeding, gasping objects.

Have you not again and again experienced this in providence? Have not all your airy castles been hurled down, your prospects in life blighted, your hopes laid low, your projects disappointed, in a word, all your schemes and plans to get on in life so nailed to the cross that they could move neither hands nor feet but kept dying away by a slow, painful, lingering death? Did you approve of all this? Very far from it, but you were in God’s hands and could not fight against his cutting strokes. Thus, then, you have a proof in yourself that your worldly schemes and projects were taken by the hand of God, contrary to your wish, for you loved them too dearly to part with them, but were as if torn from your bosom by God’s relentless hand and nailed to the cross, not by you but by Him.

Yet mercy was so mingled with these dealings, and your heart was so softened by a sense of God’s goodness in and under them, that there was a sweet spirit of submission given you, which mingled itself with this unwillingness and subdued and overpowered it. Thus you were made willing in the day of His power that God should take the idols out of your bosom with His own hand; you consented generally that they should be crucified because by this lingering death only could the life-blood of your worldly spirit be at all drained out of your breast; for crucifixion is a gradual death which drains life and blood slowly away.

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