Daily Devotional for Wednesday, December 18

Christ Was Crucified for All

"For I through the law am dead to the law, that I might live unto God. I am crucified with Christ: nevertheless I live; yet not I, but Christ liveth in me: and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by the faith of the Son of God, who loved me, and gave himself for me;' Galatians 2:19, 20.

Have you been to the doctor's office lately? If so, you probably noticed there is a wall of paperwork between you and the physician. As I completed the forms, I was reminded that we are all different. We have our unique age bracket, gender, income, ethnicity and so forth. We are asked to check the boxes that apply, and we all check different boxes. And yet, for all of our individuality, there is a common ground upon which we all stand before God. 

Paul spoke of two spaces in which all mankind stand before God as equals: the Law and the grace of God. Hear Paul's instruction in Romans 3: 19, "Now we know that what things soever the law saith, it saith to them who are under the law: that every mouth may be stopped, and all the world may become guilty before God." The sin of Adam constitutes a universal curse and produces an all-inclusive death sentence under the Law of God which demands perfection which no man can deliver (Romans 5: 12). 

In Galatians 2:20, Paul spoke of our opportunity to become beneficiaries of the grace of God which is expressed through the crucifixion of Jesus the Son of God. As sin is a universal death sentence, the offering of Jesus represents a universal pardon, "Therefore as by the offence of one judgment came upon all men to condemnation; even so by the righteousness of one the free gift came upon all men unto justification of life" (Romans 5:18). 

FINAL THOUGHT 
No matter our differences, we all have a need for what the crucifixion provides: 
deliverance from the death penalty of sin and eternal life through Jesus.