The Christian Life Is NOT "All Of Him And None Of Me"

I've been working on a manuscript for a book based on the 101 Lies Taught In Church videos that I posted on YouTube two years ago. Some of these lies seem true at first glance. Here’s one that sounds like an expression of genuine humility. “The Christian life is all of Christ and none of me.” A person who would make this statement could almost sound noble, like a super-spiritual person. In fact, it almost has a ring of humility to it - but it’s still a lie.

Your Christian life is not all of Him and none of you. Think about it this way: When Jesus came into this world in human form, was it all of God and none of Him? No, to the contrary, it was all of God and all of Him. Jesus and His Father were in complete union so that He was 100% man and 100% deity at the same time.

Theologians call it the hypostatic union — meaning, that Jesus was not 50 percent man, and 50 percent God, he was 100 percent God, and 100 percent man. He was the God-man. So Jesus might have said as a man, “it’s all of God, and all of me.” Today, in the same way, you and I have come into union with God through Jesus Christ.

In the first chapter of Genesis, we see God created everything in the universe. His assessment of each aspect of creation is to see that it was “good.” Then, having finished, "God saw all that He had made, and behold, it was very good."Genesis 1:31

Anything God makes is good, and that includes everything about us before the Fall. Our minds, our souls, our bodies, and our individual personalities, all are good. A biblical view of man must maintain this perspective. In the first century, Paul warned Timothy about false teachers who would forbid believers from participating in good things God created — things like eating certain foods, or entering into marriage — out of a false understanding of spirituality:

"For everything created by God is good, and nothing is to be rejected if it is received with gratitude; for it is sanctified by means of the word of God and prayer."1 Timothy 4:4-5

The same is true in regard to our individual humanity. God hasn’t created us to be nonentities. That’s the goal of many Eastern religions, such as Buddhism. The goal there is to be cured of the illusion that you are a distinct individual. Buddhists want to be lost again in the “universal consciousness,” the “All,” like a cup of wine being poured back into the vat. That’s “salvation” from the Eastern point of view. This point of view is, in fact, the exact opposite of the Bible’s.

1 Corinthians 6:17, says,"But the one who joins himself to the Lord is one spirit with Him."

Yes, we desire to be united with Christ, but that does not mean personal annihilation. In fact, not only do you not cease to exist as a person, you actually become more of an individual than ever before! God likes different individuals. That’s why He made so many of us.

The Bible’s message is not “Christ instead of your life,” or just “Christ in your life” that gives you your identity. It is Christ as your life. So it is all of Him in us, but it’s also all of us in Him. There’s a oneness there. There’s a union.

If you believe that “it’s all Christ and none of you,” you are likely to become passive in your Christian walk. You could say, “Well, I’m only a conduit and I just wait for Him to do it through me. He does it all and I do nothing.” That perspective fails to recognize the union believers share with Christ.

We are co-laborers together with God. We put our neck in the same yoke with Jesus. He said “take my yoke upon you.” Together, as co-laborers with God and empowered by Him, we move forward. We act in a way that it is our personalities and our physical bodies through which He acts. It is your will in your mind that He activates, but He does it through you. Not “instead of you.”