“Christ is All” — Colossians 3:11

      Three simple words. Yet these three words are full of instruction. Here is our creed, the foundation of our faith and the cause of our hope. These three words are the joyful expression of every true believer’s heart. Christ is God’s all to chosen sinners; and Christ is our all before God.

In Salvation

Christ is all in the salvation of God’s elect. Our election in eternity was in Christ. God has chosen us in him as our covenant Head. In the matter of our redemption Christ is all. He alone is our Redeemer. He bore our sin. He paid our debt. He satisfied the justice of God for us. And he did it all by himself. Christ is all in our justification too. We stand accepted and acquitted before God, only by his righteousness and shed blood. His name is “the Lord our Righteousness.” The quarrel between God and our souls was taken up by Christ and settled by Christ. And Christ is all in sanctification. We are positionally sanctified in Christ. We are experimentally sanctified by the power of God the Holy Spirit forming Christ in us in regeneration. We shall be perfectly sanctified by the glorification of our bodies and souls in union with Christ. Salvation, from start to finish, is the work of Christ.

Practical Christianity

Christ is all in what we call practical Christianity. Christ alone gives me comfort and hope before God. Christ alone gives me strength for every trial and grace to persevere in the faith. Christ is all to be known, all to be chosen, all to be loved, all to be desired, all to be delighted in, all to be thought upon, all to be followed and all to be obeyed. We need no law but Christ and the example he has left for us to follow. Does any believer need a higher, more compelling motive for anything than Christ himself?

In Preaching

Christ is all to be preached. The Bible in its entirety is a book about Jesus Christ. No doctrine and no precept can be rightly understood apart from Christ. Christ is the key which unlocks the treasure chest of Holy Scripture. “He is,” as Philip Henry wrote, “the treasure in that field, the marrow in that bone, the manna in that dew, the diamond in that ring, the milk in that breast (John 5:39).”

In Heaven

Christ is all in heaven. The foundation of that city is Christ. The gate to that city is Christ. The light of that city is Christ. The joy, bliss and happiness of heaven is Christ. The praises of the redeemed in heaven for all eternity are the praises of Christ. The reward of God’s saints in heaven is Christ himself. Heaven is Christ and Christ is heaven to my soul.

      What is Christ to you? To some he is nothing. To others he is something, but not much. To many, Christ is all in some things, but not in others. But to the poor, hell-deserving sinner, who has been redeemed by the Savior’s blood, clothed in his righteousness and renewed by his Spirit, Christ is all in all.

Don Fortner

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