This is message one in a series of five messages: all of the messages are available at www.familyministriesbridgeville.com
Listen to the audio above while following along in the transcript below which is also available for download at www.biblestudyministriesinc.com
As we come to look in the word of the Lord, there is an indispensable principle that we all need to understand and apply, and that is total reliance on God’s Holy Spirit. This is His word and only the Lord can reveal the Lord. Before I go to prayer I’d like to share this verse from 1 Corinthians 2:9&10, “Just as it is written, things which eye has not seen and ear has not heard that have not entered into the heart of man, all that God has prepared for those who love Him, for to us God revealed them through the Spirit, for the Spirit searches all things, even the depths of God.” So, trusting the Holy Spirit, let’s commit our little session unto Him.
Heavenly Father, we thank You that You have not left us on our own when it comes to understanding Your heart, seeing the Lord Jesus, but You have put in us Your Life, the indwelling Holy Spirit. Lord, we ask You today to give us a vision, give us a revelation of the Lord Jesus. We thank You that we can trust You to do it. We know You desire it more than anyone in this room. We trust You, Lord; meet us where we are and take us where You would have us go. We thank You in advance that You are going to over-answer our request because we ask it in the precious name of our Lord Jesus. Amen.
Greetings! The Lord is very gracious to give me this privilege again to address you at another Hashawha. My first gathering with Family Ministries was in 1978, as far as my records go. That’s almost half a century ago; that’s a long time. My first record of Hashawha was 1988, and that’s still thirty-seven years ago. So, it’s a wonderful privilege. I honestly did not anticipate ever having this privilege again. This is fresh from the Lord. My heart is full and I’m thankful for the responsible brothers who extended the invitation, and for the assurance the Lord put in my heart that this would be pleasing to Him that we gather together in His name and in His will.
I hope you haven’t come to get a battery recharged. You don’t have a battery. And I hope you haven’t come to have your cup filled. I hope you’ve come to behold the Lord in a fresh way; He wants to sink a well in your heart and in my heart. We’re here to see Him; we want to know Him. I think it’s been pretty widely advertised that our weekend together will be around the theme “The Exchanged Life”. If you didn’t know, now you know. That’s going to be our theme. I think it makes sense in an introduction lesson to tell you exactly what I mean when I say, “the exchanged life.” I’m not going to put the confines of a definition on that, but more of a description. What is this exchanged life?
That title, as far as I am able to trace it back, comes from Hudson Taylor. It might have been earlier than that. I don’t know, but after fourteen years as a missionary in China, Hudson Taylor wrote down his testimony, and he describes those fourteen years in the Lord’s service as a missionary in a foreign land as bondage and constant conflict. He said, and these are his words, “I prayed, I agonized, I fasted, I strove, I made resolutions,” and then he said, “and it almost ended in despair.” That was after fourteen years being a missionary! But the faithful Lord brought someone into his life, a man named John McCarthy. John McCarthy presented to him in a fresh way (I’m sure he heard it before) how to have union with the living, risen Savior. He said, “Hearing that, the scales fell from my eyes, and all the weight and the strain was gone.” That’s the testimony of a missionary. God discovered this to this missionary, this discouraged Christian, who had for years been a Christian walking with the Lord. He was so excited about what had taken place in his life that in 1869 he wrote a letter to his sister to explain what happened. For the last 150 years, that letter has been known as the exchanged life. If you go on Google and search “Hudson Taylor exchanged life” it will come up, and you can read that letter. That’s where I borrowed that title.
Those two words in my heart are the closest description of what it really means to be a believer, a Christian. I’m not going to fight for those two words. If you don’t like “exchanged life” it doesn’t matter. I know you don’t want to hear about the exchanged life from John McCarthy or Hudson Taylor or Ed Miller or any human being; you want to hear it from the Lord Himself, and He wants to give it to us, from His word, from His Bible. You might say, “What are you talking about from His Bible? You got up there and don’t even have a Bible.” I’ve got all the verses written in a font that I can read out of my notes.
John 6:45 says, “It’s written in the prophets, ‘They shall all be taught of God. Everyone who has heard and learned from the Father comes to Me.’” How are you going to know if it’s from God? The answer is if it leads to Jesus. Everyone who is taught of God, Jesus said, “Comes to Me.” My earnest prayer, not only for this session but for the weekend, is that we’ll see the Lord in a living way and a fresh way.
Very simply, we’re going to try to describe the life that God created us to live, the Christian life. Some call it the “Victorious Life”, some call it the “Abundant Life”, some call it the “Crucified Life”, some call it the “Consecrated Life”, some call it the “Surrendered Life”, some call it the “Spirit Filled Life.” It doesn’t matter what you call it; we’re talking about the life that God created us to live, the Christian life. So, I’m not fighting for a title, but for this weekend, please, we’re going to look at the exchanged life. That’s the life He desires for me and for you—for His body.
As I prepare to show you what I’m including in the exchanged life, let me give you an overview of the text and how we’re going to be looking at this. The text is really John chapter 13-17, those five chapters. That was one day before the Lord Jesus would hang on the cross. These are the words He spoke the night that He was betrayed. As far as John’s record is concerned, His ministry to the world is finished, and He now turns to His own, His disciples, those that He has redeemed. His teaching, His miracles, His conflict with the religious leaders, all of that is done, and now He addressed His own. John 13:1, “Before the Feast of Passover, Jesus knowing that His hour had come, that He would depart out of the world to the Father, having loved His own who were in the world, He loved them to end,” actually the Greek is, “He loved them to the uttermost.” Almost all Christians when they study these five chapters will admit that these are probably five of the most precious chapters in all of the word of God. They are only in John; it’s not in Matthew, it’s not in Mark, it’s not in Luke; it’s only in the gospel of John. Many have called this the farewell discourse of the Lord Jesus. Others have called it the valedictory of the Lord Jesus.
Let me ask this question; if you knew, like Jesus knew, the hour had come and you were going to die, if you knew that, what would you want to communicate to those you are leaving behind? What would your last words be; what would you want to say to your children, grandchildren, family, friends, and Christians? What would you want to leave? Because that’s exactly what we have in these five chapters. Jesus has lived for thirty-three and a half years, He’s going back to His heavenly Father, and He said, “Before I go, I’ve got to share this.” It’s very important, the last words of our Lord Jesus.
There was so much on His heart; He was so full. When you read these chapters, there is so much in these five chapters. He had to remind them of many things. He wanted to warn them about certain things. He had to encourage them in certain things. Even so, we read in John 16:12, “I have many more things to share with you, but you can’t bear them now.” I want you to picture our Lord Jesus with His heart so full, He’s leaving and He says, “I’ve got to share this.” As you go through these five chapters, and you go through it by reading it over and over and over again, you are pretty sure to follow the spotlight of the Holy Spirit and to see what He’s emphasizing. I think the one thing above all others that He speaks of in these five chapters is that He says, “Before I go, I’ve got to tell you how God created you to live; I want to tell you about the exchanged life. I want to tell you about the Christian life. When the Holy Spirit comes and dawns that on you, in that day,” John 16:23, “You will not question Me about anything.” Once the reality of the exchanged life dawns on you, you’re going to have a satisfied heart, and all the questions will be gone. Now, I’m talking about questioning questions. You’re still going to have inquisitive questions, and that’s rooted in faith, and that’s good. John 10:10, “Jesus said, ‘I am come that they might have life and that they might have it more abundantly.’” That’s what this weekend is about. With the light, and it’s probably twilight, that the Lord has given me, I’d like to share what He’s shared with me about life and life more abundantly, about the Christian life, the life that God created you to live, and created me to live.
So, how did God create man to live? How did He then redeem man to live that way? We need to take a little step back. It depends on your view of the age of man. When I say to take a little step, I’m talking about six to ten thousand years. We’ve got to look back a little bit and start at the beginning. Don’t get weary if you’ve heard what I’m saying before. I heard that a person retains only 10% of what he hears. That means I have to say it ten times, and I probably will. To discuss the fall of man in the Garden of Eden, all of that would take many, many weekends like this, many sessions; tomes have been written on Genesis chapters two and three. I just want to fly over it; I want to look at it broadly.
I want to touch on the big things. The first and chief of all things is this, Genesis 1:27, “God created man in His own image, in the image of God He created them, male and female He created them.” I know the theologians love to discuss, “What is the image of God? Soul, spirit, mind, emotion, will, and all that kind of thing.” I’m going to cut right to the chase. 2 Corinthians 4:4, “In whose case the God of this world has blinded the minds of the unbelieving, so that they might not see the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ who is the image of God.” Plain and simple, and you don’t have to wonder, “What does He mean by the image of God?” It’s Jesus; it’s a Person—Christ, the image of God. Colossians 1:15, “He is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of all creation.” The image of God is Jesus, the Son of God, the second Person of the Godhead; it’s the Lord Jesus Himself. God created man because He wanted to look down at His creation and see the Son; He wanted to see Jesus in His creation. He created man in the image of God, Christ, so that He could see Christ. It was God’s plan that every person that followed on, if Adam had not sinned, God would look down and see His Son everywhere. That’s the first point, “How did God create man to live?” He created man to put the invisible God on display; that’s how He created him.
The next thing that I see in these early chapters is that He created man to be a receiver and not a giver. Genesis 2:16, “The Lord commanded the man, saying, ‘From any tree of the garden you may eat freely.” Man was made on the last day at the end of the creation, so he wouldn’t have a part; he couldn’t help God, not with a drop of water, and not with a grain of grass. God made him at the end. Man’s first day was to enter rest, to enter into God’s rest. 100% everything was provided, and man just had to receive it, freely eat. To crown it off we read Genesis 3:8, “They heard the sound of the Lord God walking in the garden in the cool of the day.” How did God create man to live? It was to put Christ on display, to receive everything that God had, and to walk in intimate union with the living God. That’s how God created man to live. God’s original intention depended on God’s life. There was no independent life; Adam could not have an independent life. There was only one life, and it would be the life of the Lord.
You know the story; you’ve read the records. Man did not continue to live as God created him to live, to manifest the Son of God and to receive from the Lord and to walk in intimacy with Him. So, God gave another tree. You know the story, the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. God said, “This is how I created you to live; will you do that, will you say yes?” See, that tree was a test, “Are you going to trust My life or are you going to exercise independent life, your own life?” Adam and Eve had to walk in dependence upon the Lord, and they would reign as kings.
One more fact and then we’ll leave the history and come to the New Testament, and I’m referring to Satan. You know that Satan was in the garden, and you know the story. You’ve heard it and you’ve read it. There’s a little light shed on Genesis in the book of Isaiah where Satan is described, Isaiah 14:12-14, “How you have fallen from heaven, oh star of the morning, son of dawn; you’ve been cut down to the earth, you who have weakened the nations. But you’ve said in your heart, ‘I will ascend to heaven; I will raise my throne above the stars of God; I will sit on the mount of the assembly and the recesses of the north; I will ascend above the heights of the clouds; I will make myself like the Most High.” “I will,” that’s Satan, “I will ascend, I will raise my throne, I will sit.” Now, here’s the subtlety, “I will make myself like the Most High, and I don’t need His life to do it. I can be like God without the life of God.” That’s what Satan said, and that’s how he fell. He brought the lie to the garden, “You don’t need the life of God; you have your own life. Make your own decisions. You don’t like being dependent on anybody. You can live without the Lord.” That’s what Satan thought and that’s what he brought to the garden and that’s what he whispered in the ear of Eve, “Exercise your own life; make your own decision. Did God say that if you ate you would die that day? Did He say that?” Genesis 3:4, “The serpent said to the woman, ‘You surely will not die.’” Verse 5, “God knows in the day you eat from it, your eyes will be open, and you will be like God. If you have independent life, make your own decisions; choose yourself and you’ll be like God. Now, prove it.”
Well, I know in this group that I’m not telling you anything you haven’t heard, but you know the sad story. Eve listened to that lie, and they died; that moment they died. You might say, “How did they die?” What is death? It’s separation. Listen to Ephesians 4:18, “Being darkened in their understanding and excluded from the life of God.” That’s what they lost, the life of God, the only life, and they died; they existed, but they died without His life. Proverbs 20:27 says, “The spirit of man is the lamp of the Lord.” When they made a decision to live independently, the lamp went out. John 1:4, “In Him was life and that life was the light of man.” What happens when the life that’s the light goes out? The life went out and the light went out, and man was plunged into darkness. He died; He died that day, and the way God created him to live, to manifest His Son, to be a receiver, to have fellowship with God, that was all set aside.
Romans 3:23, “All have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God.” 1 John 3:4, “Everyone who practices sin practices lawlessness.” Sin is lawlessness. Genesis 5:3, “Adam had lived one hundred and thirty years and he became a father of a son in his own likeness according to his image.” Everything is different now. Romans 5:12, “Therefore, just as through one man sin entered the world, and death through sin, death spread to all men, for all have sinned.” It’s a familiar story. God created you, man, Adam, to need God, to need His life, to display His Son, to receive from God all blessing, to walk in the cool of the day with intimate union with God; that’s how God created man to live. Then man, sadly, chose to live an independent life; we even have Independence Day which celebrates this. Man is so proud. It takes God to be a man as God created men to live; it takes God to be a woman as God created women to live; it takes God to be a Christian. So many have listened to the lie. The only value that you will ever have in your life is if God dawns on you what it means to live the exchanged life; that’s the only value of anybody.
Let me get back to the history that’s in detail, this sad history. After the Fall, man now lives in darkness like an animal because he’s lost the life excluded from the life of God. He’s no longer the man that God created Him to be. Nothing has changed as far as God’s intention is concerned. His original intention never goes away. The way He created you to be is the way He wants you to be, and the New Testament is not the first time the exchanged life is mentioned; it’s back there in the Garden of Eden. I know a vast majority who are here and have heard my focus, you might be a little surprised, and maybe shocked, at what I’m about to say because in law and grace there’s a law of the exchanged life. The exchanged life is based on that law, and that law is inflexible; it’s an unchangeable law. When God announces a law, that’s His will; it’s as perfect as God is perfect. That’s why the Ten Commandments, the moral Law, that’s just a transcript of who He is.
The law of life was simple. Here’s how God created man to live, and that law is not going away, “I’ve given you My Life; be perfect.” That’s the law. “If you’re not, there’s no exchanged life.” That’s the law of the exchanged life; be perfect and enjoy Me forever. 1 Peter 1:16, “Like the Holy One who called you, be holy yourselves in all your behavior; it’s written, ‘You shall be holy because I’m holy.’” That’s the law of the exchanged life. Matthew 5:48, “Therefore, you are to be perfect, as your heavenly Father is perfect.” See, we tone that down. That’s literal. Galatians 5:3, “I testify that every man who receives circumcision, that he’s under obligation to keep the whole Law.” James 2:10, “Whoever keeps the whole Law and stumbles in one part, he’s become guilty of all.” That’s the law of the exchanged life. All you have to do to live the exchanged life is to be perfect, all day, every day, every hour, every hour—that’s it! It’s easy! Let’s go home. (laughter). Not yet.
You know the sad story. The race descended from Adam and fell short; it couldn’t do it. Hebrews 7:9, “The Law made nothing perfect.” Romans 3:19, “We know that whatever the Law says, it speaks to those under the Law, so that every mouth might be closed and all the world become accountable to God, because by the works of the Law no flesh will be justified in His sight.” Galatians 3:10, “As many as are of the works of the Law are under a curse; it is written, ‘Cursed is everyone who does not abide by all things written in the book of the Law to perform them.’” Romans 3:12, “All have turned aside and together they have become useless; there’s none that has done good, not even one.” So, Adam, the first man, our representative, he blew it. So, what’s needed? How will God provide?
I’m not a theologian and I’m not going to attempt to do what John Calvin and Spurgeon and some others have done; they say, “Somewhere in eternity past there was a counsel, and at the counsel was the Trinity, God the Father, God the Son and God the Holy Spirit, and they discussed this, and they said, ‘We’ve got a problem because man has sinned…’” It don’t know about all of that; I don’t see that clearly in the Bible, but I know there was a time, and I have an idea it had no starting point, and I think it was always God’s plan, when God the Son in communication with God the Father agreed, “Let’s start all over again. We need a new beginning.” 1 Corinthians 15:47, “The first man was Adam. The first man is from the earth, earthy. The second man is from heaven.” The second man? There were millions of people from Adam to the time Jesus came to the earth. Why is He called the second man? God is going to start over.
1 Corinthians 15:45, “So, also it is written that the first Adam became a living soul, and the last Adam a life-giving Spirit.” Why is He called Adam? It’s because God is going to start all over again. Jesus volunteers, and He says to God the Father, “I’ll come, and I’ll be a man, and I’ll put on display what it means to live as God created man to live, and I’ll come and I’ll undo all the damage the first Adam has ever done, and I’ll pay the penalty of his disobedience. I’ll put it on display, so everyone can see the exchanged life. After I put it on display, just before I go back to you, My Father, I’ll explain it to them; I’ll describe it to them,” which is what He does in John 13-17.
I think many of you know that when Jesus was born in Bethlehem as a little baby, He spoke. His words are recorded. I actually wrote to the people who wrote the red letter edition and said, “This is not in red letters,” and I complained. I said, “These are words of Jesus; they should be in red letters.” Anyway, the whole Bible should be in red letters. Okay; that’s Paul Greenlee kind of stuff. Alright… Hebrews 10:5, “When He comes into the world He says,” see, that’s incarnation. What did Jesus say when He came into the world? “’Sacrifice and offering You do not desire, but a body You’ve prepared for Me. In whole burnt offerings and sacrifices for sin, You’ve taken no pleasure.’ And then I said, ‘Behold, I’ve come (in the scroll of the book it’s written of Me) to do Your will, oh God.’” When Jesus came into the world, He said, “Thank You, You’ve prepared a body for Me through the virgin Mary, and I’m going to live on the earth as a man, humanity. I’ll volunteer; I’ll do what Adam couldn’t do. I will obey perfectly the law of the exchanged life, and will never sin. We all know the gospel, John 3:16, “God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son. Whoever believes in Him will not perish.” This is God’s provision. I hope it thrills your heart all over again, like my heart was thrilled when we sang, “Jesus Loves Me This I Know”. I’m referring to the great truths of our creed; this is what we believe. Remember what Gabriel told Mary, Luke 1:35, “The angel answered and said to her, ‘The Holy Spirit will come upon you, and the power of the Most High will overshadow you. For that reason, the Holy Child shall be called the Son of God, Emmanuel.’” Do you know what that means? It means God with us. He said, “I’m going to start over. There’s going to be a second man; there’s going to be a last Adam. I’m going to put God back in man. Emmanuel—God with us: that man, by the life of God, is going to live and put on display the exchanged life, and you will see with your eyes by studying the history what is this exchanged life.
The last Adam, the second man came, first of all (and I think we’re all grounded in this) to undo all the damage that the first Adam ever did, and all of that takes us to the cross and we see how He took the penalty and all of the rest. We’re grounded in that; we know what He did. We’re going to focus this weekend on the second part of His ministry, that He put on display the exchanged life, and before He went to His Holy Father God, He explained it, and then He turned to His disciples and said, “You need to know that because, as the Father sent Me, now I’m sending you to the family.” That life is a possibility; it’s God’s provision. That’s what we want to look at. Our Lord Jesus came as the last Adam to represent man; He didn’t come to a garden paradise where there was one serpent to tempt Him. He came to a wilderness, dark, broken and lost, and there are generations of serpents tempting Him. I think most Christians are familiar with that first part, but we need to look at the second part.
Galatians 4:4&5, “When the fullness of time came, God sent forth His Son, born of a woman,” please don’t miss this, “born under the Law, so that He might redeem those who are under the Law.” This is the law of the exchanged life; you have it as a gift, and you can live it by grace. He had to earn it; He did it by Law. When He was born, He came under the Law; He lived under the Law, and He lived the exchanged life. He never sinned. He had to do it because that’s the Law. In another connection we’ll go a little deeper into that, but Jesus came to put that Life on display. I think most Christians who are so grounded in the first part, have never really considered the second part, that Jesus died on the cross as my substitute. We got that, “Thank You, Lord, You took my place, You’re my substitute.” Here’s the part Christians have missed, “He now wants to live in my place as my substitute. I know He died as my substitute, but now He wants to live as my substitute.
What I want to do is set before you the testimony of Jesus from the lips of Jesus. I don’t want you to think this is my bright idea, or somebody else’s. This is what Jesus said as He testified that He lived the exchanged life. He was anxious, first of all, for people to know that He was being indwelt; it wasn’t only His life, it was another life. John 14:10&11, “Do you not believe that I am in the Father, and the Father is in Me. The words I say to you I do not speak on My own initiative. The Father abiding in Me does the works. Believe Me; I’m in the Father, and the Father is in Me. Otherwise, just believe because of the works.” John 14:20, “In that day you’ll know I am in the Father, and you in Me, and I in you.” That was the source of His life; He lived depending on the One who lived inside of Him, His Father. He testified, I said it was in some counsel; He volunteered. That wasn’t quite true. John 6:38, “I have come down from heaven, not to do My will, but the will of Him who sent Me.” John 7:28&29, “Then Jesus cried out in the temple, teaching and saying, ‘You both know Me and where I’m from; I have not come of Myself; He who sent Me is true, whom you do not know. I know Him because I’m from Him; He sent Me.” John 8:42, “If God were your father, you’d love Me; I proceeded forth and have come from God. I have not even come on My own initiative.” “He sent Me, way back in eternity past.” He was depending on another, another Life.
Thirty-three and a half years He lived on the earth. Listen to John 5:19, “Jesus answered and was saying to them, ‘Truly, I say to you the Son can do nothing of Himself unless it’s something He sees the Father doing. Whatever the Father does, these things the Son does in like manner.’” Verse 30, “I can do nothing on My own initiative.” You see, that’s the exchanged life. Jesus came, and He says, “The way I’m living My life, I’m depending on the One who lives inside of Me, My Father, and I am doing nothing on My own initiative.” We read the gospels, and oh, the wonderful teaching: the Sermon on the Mount, the many parables He taught, and not only the large parables about the sower and about the tares and the marriage feast and the fig tree and the ten virgins, but even the little parables, the fishers of men, and the sick need a physician, and new wine and the old skins pass away, and building your house on a rock, and the One who is stronger than the strong man. It was Jesus’ personal testimony. He talked to Nicodemus, He talked to the woman at the well, He talked to the rich young ruler, He looked up in a tree and He talked to Zaccheus. Listen to His testimony, John 7:16, “Jesus answered them and said, ‘My teaching is not mine, but His who sent Me. If anyone is willing to do His will, He’ll know the teaching, whether it’s of Me or whether it’s of the Lord.” He said, “All those things you heard, you heard the Sermon on the Mount, you heard the parables, it wasn’t Me; it was My Father. He told Me what to say and I said it. He told Me when to say it, and that’s when I said it.” That’s how He lived; that’s how God made man to live. That’s the exchange life.
We say, “One thing is sure, that I can study the gospels and I can see all the miracles Jesus did; He turned water into wine, and did so many mighty miracles. He fed the multitude, walked on water, healed disease, cleansed the leper, raised the dead, cast out demons. Marvelous; listen to Jesus!” John 5:36, “The works which the Father has given Me to accomplish, the very works that I do, testify about Me, that the Father has sent Me. John 14:31, “So that the world may know that I love the Father, I do exactly what the Father commanded Me.” John 10:37, “If I do not the works of My Father, don’t believe Me. If I do them, believe the works, and then you may know and understand that the Father is in Me and I am in the Father.” Do you see how Jesus is testifying of His own life? He’s saying, “I didn’t come on My own; He sent Me. I do nothing on My own initiative; I can’t say a word unless He tells Me the word. I’m listening to the One in My heart; I’m listening to the One on whom I am depending. All these miracles you see, I didn’t work a miracle.” Jesus never worked a miracle. After Pentecost, listen to Acts 2:22, “Men of Israel, listen to these words: Jesus the Nazarene, a man attested to you by God with miracles and wonders and signs which God performed through Him in your midst.” Who did the miracles? It was the Father in the Son. Who did the teaching? It was the Father in the Son. Who did the directing? How did He know to go to Nain, and how did He know to go to the Syrophoenician? He was getting orders from within; it’s the exchanged life. Jesus put it on display; that’s how He lived. He was sent by the Father, He initiated nothing, all His words were from the Father, all His miracles were from the Father, and He said, “My food is to do the will of Him who sent Me to finish His work.” John 6:38, “I’ve come down from heaven, not to do My will, but the will of Him who sent Me.” Philippians 2:8, “Being found in appearance as a man, He humbled Himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even the death on the cross.”
You might say, “Well, at least there’s one thing He did; He died for me.” Listen to 2 Corinthians 5:19, “God was in Christ reconciling the world to Himself, not counting their trespasses against them.” Even on the cross it was the Father in the Son; He always trusted the One who lived inside Him. He wanted them to know that this is the exchanged life; this is how God created you to live. 1 Peter 2:22, “When being reviled, He did not revile in return. When suffering, He uttered no threats.” But what did He do? “He kept entrusting to Him who judges righteously.” That was His life, to be dependent on the One that lived inside Him because He’s putting on display the way God created you to live, and He created me to live, and He created His church to live. John 12:44, “Jesus cried out and said,” this is the most amazing verse, “he who believes in Me does not believe in Me.” Jesus said that, “He who believes in Me does not believe in Me, but in Him who sent Me. He who sees Me, sees Him who sent Me.” John 13:20, “I say to you, he who receives whomever I send receives Me. He who receives Me, receives Him who sent Me.”
Do you remember when Philip came to Jesus, and he said, “Do you know what would satisfy us? Show us the Father.” Jesus answered in John 14:9, “Have I been so long with you and you’ve not come to know Me, Philip? He who has seen Me has seen the Father; how can you say, ‘Show us the Father.’ Do you not believe that I’m in the Father and the Father is in Me?” That’s how God created man to be, to put the One who is on the inside on display for all the world to see. When it comes to us, if they see you, they shouldn’t be seeing you; they should be seeing the One who lives inside of you.
As I get ready to close this introduction, I want to return to John 13-17. I told you that Jesus has come, and now He’s ready to go back to His Father God, and He wants to explain what He has just put on display. After He went to the cross and rose again, He appeared to the disciples, John 20:21, “Jesus said to them again, ‘Peace be with you; as the Father sent Me, I send you,’ and when He said this, He breathed on them, and said, ‘Receive the Holy Spirit.’” He breathed on them; He’s starting over; that’s a new creation. That’s how it started; God breathed into them the breath of life. He said, “I’m calling you now to live as I lived, as the Father sent Me I’m sending you, but you are going to need a Life within.” He breathed on them a new creation. And even before Pentecost He sent the Holy Spirit and came into them.
He demonstrated that life, and now He’s going to explain it. John 6:57, “As the Living Father sent Me, and I live because of the Father, he who eats Me will live because of Me.” We’ve got to feed on Christ if we’re going to live. Let me jump to the end, 2 Corinthians 4:10&11, “Always carrying about in the body the dying of Jesus, so that the Life of Jesus, also, may be manifest in our body. We who live are constantly delivered over to death for Jesus’ sake, so that the Life of Jesus may be manifest in our mortal flesh.” Brothers and sisters, that’s the teaching, that’s the doctrine, that’s the creed, that’s the theory, but if you want it to be reality, you’ve got to trust the Lord. I have no right to live an independent life, and you have no right to live an independent life. I was bought with a price, and I’m not my own. You were bought with a price, and you don’t belong to yourself. You have no right to somebody else’s property; you have no right to yourself. Independent life is the devil’s lie to suggest to us that we can live the Christian life, and we can keep the Law and we can be perfect as God is perfect, and you don’t need His Life, and you can do it. As I said earlier, it takes God to be a Christian. It takes God to be a man, a woman, a child, parent, a teacher, a coach, a boss, an employee; we need His Life. That’s the exchange, His Life in place of my life. That’s what this all about.
I know it sounds attractive to say, “Well, God gave me a will, and I have a mind, and I can choose my own way. I have plans and I have ambitions, and I can set my own schedule. I know what I want, and I want a wife and I want a family. I can choose my vocation, and I can choose where I live, and I can make all these choices,” and you cannot. You just exist; you cannot. You’ve got to listen to the One who lives inside, and move when He moves, speak when He speaks, and go when He sends, and do what He says. That’s the exchanged life. Trust me, I don’t know what plans you are planning or making for yourself, but it’s death. When God dawns on you the realities of this exchanged life, this life is richer and fuller and more satisfying than you could ever dream in your own ideas or ambitions. Until we live as God created us to live, we’re not living; we’re existing.
We’re going to take these five chapters, we don’t have time for everything, but there are four great principles that Jesus emphasizes, and He says, “Do you want to know what the exchanged life is? It’s this, and if you don’t have this, you don’t have the exchanged life. And it’s also this, and this and this. We want to look at those four things, those four principles that Jesus describes as the exchanged life. This is so far beyond human wisdom. Only the Spirit of God can teach this. May God give us hearts that desire to live as God created us to live, and to live as He redeemed us to live and purchased us to live because without the exchanged life, there is no life! Let’s pray.
Father, thank You so much for Your word, not what we think we know or understand, but all that You’ve inspired; make that real in our lives. Lord, we thank You so much that our Lord Jesus has come and put on display this wonderful life as our representative, so that we also might live it. Teach us, we pray, the exchanged life. We ask in Jesus’ name. Amen.