Fruitfulness Explained - Abiding Crucified

This morning the key to all you and I will ever be is summed up by two words "in Christ". Our identification with Him in His work on the Cross brought us salvation. Our continuing with Him brings everlasting rewards.

When we were saved we became born again what? Christians. A Christian is one who is "in Christ".

Jesus tells us the secret to being "in" Him. Open with me to John 15 as Jesus invites us into living His life – the Christian Life. The Christian Life is being "in Him". To be in Christ is to abide in Him.

Listen again the Christ's words in John as we continue to savor the depths of the truths Christ Jesus offers to us this day. John 15.1-7 repeatedly tells us we are "in" Him. That is the basis for our abiding.

How does it continue into daily life? Paul addresses that in Galatians 2.20. That is our next portion of God's Word we need to look at. Please stand with me.

Galatians 2:20 I have been crucified with Christ; it is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me; and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave Himself for me.   NKJV

Now let me translate this vague concept of being "crucified" with Christ into a very vivid, sobering, and life transforming reality.

In the justice of the Roman Empire, murderers were often subjected to the result of their crime. This gruesome form of punishment was called staking where the murderer was tied to the one that they had killed. As their bodies were staked to the ground the death of the murdered one infected and eventually killed the murderer.

The word for staking the criminal to the crime to execute him is the same word that is used for crucifixion. Only when P