What then are we to say?  Should we continue in sin in order that grace may abound?  By no means! How can we who died to sin go on living in it?  Do you not know that all of us who have been baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into his death?  Therefore we have been buried with him by baptism into death, so that, just as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, so we too might walk in newness of life.  For if we have been united with him in a death like his, we will certainly be united with him in a resurrection like his.  We know that our old self was crucified with him so that the body of sin might be destroyed, and we might no longer be enslaved to sin.  For whoever has died is freed from sin.  But if we have died with Christ, we believe that we will also live with him.  We know that Christ, being raised from the dead, will never die again; death no longer has dominion over him.  The death he died, he died to sin, once for all; but the life he lives, he lives to God.  So you also must consider yourselves dead to sin and alive to God in Christ Jesus.  Therefore, do not let sin exercise dominion in your mortal bodies, to make you obey their passions.  No longer present your members to sin as instruments of wickedness, but present yourselves to God as those who have been brought from death to life, and present your members to God as instruments of righteousness.  For sin will have no dominion over you, since you are not under law but under grace.(Romans 6:1-14) (NRSV)

After this, when Jesus knew that all was now finished, he said (in order to fulfill the scripture), "I am thirsty."  A jar full of sour wine was standing there. So they put a sponge full of the wine on a branch of hyssop and held it to his mouth.  When Jesus had received the wine, he said, "It is finished." Then he bowed his head and gave up his spirit. (John 19:28-30) (NRSV)

The story is told of a young boy who wasn't doing very well at math in school.  He was doing horribly in math - his grades were so low you couldn't even limbo under them.  Well, his parents decided to do something about it.  They heard that a school down the road, a Catholic school, had an excellent math program and many students who went there excelled in Math.  So the boy's parents transferred him to the Catholic school.  On the first day after school the mother noticed a marked improvement - as soon as the boy came home from school he ran up the stairs to his bedroom, cracked open his books and began to study his math.  For the next year at this school his grades in Math were A+ and he maintained that average right up to the time he graduated.

The mother always marveled at this change and finally on the day of graduation asked the boy why he changed, why was he so good at math now - what was the secret?

The boy didn't have to think; he had the answer right away.  He said, "Well, on the first day I went to that school, the very first day, I walked in through the front doors and I saw a huge statue of a man hanging on a giant plus sign and I knew then that these people were serious about math!"

I wonder - do you see the cross of Christ as a giant plus sign?   There are many who do not.  They don't see the cross as positive, but they see it as something that is foolish, or something that is to be ignored.  So Scripture says:

"The message of the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God." (I Corinthians 1:18) (NIV)

For those of us who are being saved, it is the power of God - it is a giant plus sign.

How do I know?  Where is the "plus", the triumph here?  Listen to Christ's words today from the cross.  "It is finished." It has been suggested that if our Savior's hands had not been nailed to the cross, He would have punched a triumphant fist into the darkness signifying victory, even as we saw the winter Olympians do after each competition.

Make no mistake, this is not a cry of despair.  No.  It is a cry of completion; it is a cry of fulfillment; it is a shout of victory.  "Tetelestai."  It takes three English words to express the one Hebrew word.  "It is finished." We can go in so many directions with this word - this word of completion - this morning.  We can say how the work of salvation is finished.  Nothing more can be added, nothing more is needed from us.  It is done.  It is complete.

We can also say that the word of God has been fulfilled.  Take in your hands all the suffering servant prophecies in Isaiah, all the descriptions of the meek and lowly king in Zechariah, and then look to the cross of Christ and you see it all fulfilled in that one hanging there.

In Genesis we see God telling Satan:

I will put enmity between you and the woman, and between your offspring and hers; he will crush your head and you will strike his heel." (Genesis 3:15) (NIV)

Where do we see this promise fulfilled?  We see it in the cross of Christ.

In the books of Leviticus and Deuteronomy we read of all the sacrifices that were to be performed by the priests in the tabernacle.  Do you know that there were to be no chairs in the tabernacle.  It was symbolic meaning that the priest's work was never done.  They were constantly offering sacrifices on behalf of the sins of the people, so they were never able to sit down.

And do you know what Scripture says happened after Jesus Christ, the perfect sacrifice, died, was buried and ascended into heaven?  It says He sat down at God's right hand (Hebrews 1:3, 10:12).  It is symbolic - it means that it is finished.  All the sin sacrifices of the Old Testament point to Jesus Christ and now the perfect lamb who was without spot or blemish has been sacrificed and the whole Old Testament sacrificial system has been completed and finished, once and for all (Hebrews 10:18). The work of Salvation is now completed, the Word of God is now fulfilled.  It is finished.

The cross, certainly is a large plus sign.  But let's make this more personal today - how is the cross a plus sign for you and me?  How is this a word of conquest for US, a word of triumph for YOU who believe.

This is a word of triumph for you and me because there on the cross our three great enemies are now defeated, the world, the self-life and the devil. These three forces are distinct from one another but they always work in concert with one another.  They work together to oppose and crush the Christian life.  And you need to know today that these three forces are defeated through faith in the cross of Christ.

There is first the world.  Now we must be careful when we speak of the world, for God created the world and we read in Genesis 1 when God saw everything that He had made he said it was very good.  The world is filled with beauty and order and awesome mystery.

But when we talk about the world as a force opposing the Christian life, and being an enemy of the Christian life we are talking about the material, that which we can see and feel and taste.  And the world becomes our enemy when that is all we can focus on - when we see only the created and fail to see the Creator.  When we are so limited in our focus that all we live for is only what we can see and touch and taste.  Do you know people like that?  The world is full of them, they are people who live with absolutely no sense of the infinite and the eternal.  They are people who live for the next 6-49 lottery.  They are people who live for the next long weekend, or any weekend.  They are people who live for the next party.  They are people, that Maurice Boyd calls a mile wide but an inch deep.

But I do not want us to think of others - I want to think of ourselves.  Are we simply living for that which we can see and touch and taste?  Are you?  Because you need to know as a follower of Christ that you are freed from that kind of life.

You do know, don't you, that with the cross of Christ that enemy is destroyed in you and me?  It is finished.  The war has been won.  So Paul writes to the Galatians:

May I never boast except in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, through which the world has been crucified to me, and I to the world." (Galatians 6:14) (NIV)

He is saying that through faith in the cross, I now see the world for what it is - that it is worldly; that it is temporal, fleeting; that it cannot satisfy for any length of time.  And now it holds no allurement for me.  It is finished.

Consider the next enemy we have in the Christian life and that is the self.  scripture calls it the sinful nature, or the old King James version called it the "flesh".  It is that attitude in us that is at war with God.  It is that which in us that demands our own way, that seeks to tear others down and apart.  it is that in us which delights in sexual immorality and idolatry, and hatred and anger and envy, and dissension and drunkenness (Galatians 5:19-21).  It is that attitude in us that is consumed with what we shall eat, and what shall I drink and with what shall I be clothed?   It is an enemy to the Christian life.  But do you know that that enemy has been defeated in you?  That war is finished.  Paul says in Galatians:

"I have been crucified with Christ and I not longer live, but Christ lives in me." (Galatians 2:20) (NIV)

And again in Romans:

"For we know that our old self was crucified with him so that the body of sin might be rendered powerless, that we should no longer the slaves to sin." (Romans 6:6) (NIV)

The self-life has been dethroned, and now the Holy Spirit has now been enthroned in your life, so that old nature now has become subservient.  That which you and I allowed to have its own way in us for so long is now a servant to a new master.  That war with self is finished.

But there is another enemy to the Christian life and that is Satan.  Paul says that he masquerades as an angel of light (2 Cor.  11:14).  Peter describes him as a roaring lion prowling about looking for someone to devour (I Peter 5:8).  And Jesus refers to him as the prince of this world.  (John 12:31).

Each of these descriptions suggest a different method of deception - depending on the person.  He masquerades as an angle of light to deceive the very children of God.  He transforms himself to a roaring lion with all fierceness and ferocity to overwhelm the timid and afraid.  He transforms himself as the prince of this world offering to men and women all the kingdoms of this earth for a moment's loyalty.

He comes to us in whatever method necessary to entrap us and snare us to catch us up and do us harm.

But the good news is that the war with the devil is finished.  It has been won.  In Colossians we read:

"And having disarmed the powers and authorities, he made a public spectacle of them, triumphing over them by the cross." (Colossians 2:15) (NIV)

Now you say, "Those are three enemies, but I'm not sure how I have won victory over them.  How does Christ's battle on the cross and His victory become mine?"   We need to understand that when we placed our faith in Christ, we became identified with Him, so that His death became our death.  So Paul writes in Galatians 2:20 - this fact that is true for all who believe - "I am crucified with Christ." So closely related, the Lord Jesus Christ in His death, the burial and resurrection, that as far as God is concerned, when He died I died, when He was buried I was buried, when He was raised I was raised.  Every born-again believer lives on the resurrection side of the cross.  The old way of the world, the old man of sin, the old monarch of Satan is now dead in us.  Because Jesus not only died for us but AS us.

It means that as we place our faith in Him, we are saying that we accept the cross of Christ as our cross; we accept His death as our death; I take my place with Him as one who has died to the world.  The old self was put to death and the new self, the self born of God, was raised in us.  The old monarch, the devil, who used to rule my life, is now deposed and I now have a new sovereign.  The identification is that close and real.

This past Friday night Stephen Spielberg re-released the hit movie "E.T."  It is a story of how one boy named Eliot finds E.T. and as they develop a relationship, Eliot becomes fully identified with E.T.  When E.T gets drunk at home alone, Eliot experiences the symptoms at school.  When E.T. gets sick, Eliot gets sick.  The identification is that close and real.

But that's just a movie.  But haven't we all known parents who, when their children get sick, so identify with their children that every needle that their child gets, they feel it too?

So the cross of Christ.  Through faith we are now identified with Him in His death.  So now we have died to the world, we have died to self, and the devil no longer has control of us.  It is finished.

You see, some of us need to change our thinking.  We are thinking that we need to get victory over the world, our selfish desires and Satan.  We are thinking that somehow we have got to get victory over these three enemies.  But that type of thinking is "backwards Christian soldiers".  The truth of the matter is that we already have victory over all three of them and we need to stand firm in the victory that is ours in the finished work of Christ on the cross.

Rev. Tony Evans tells of a young woman in his church who was a chain smoker.  She couldn't throw off this addiction to cigarettes that she had.  She said, "I need to get free." Rev. Evans said to her, "No, you already are free.  You need to stand firm in the freedom that you already have!" When she grasped the concept that freedom didn't come from the outside in but from inside out as she stood firm, she was able to give up in one week what she had not been able to give up in 10 years, because she stood firm in Christ rather than try hard in self. It's as if Jesus says to us, "Stand firm in my victory, don't try to get victory.  Borrow my victory, because I have already gained victory.  I have already fought the battle and won the war!"  We don't need to beat the world, the self-life or Satan, for they have already been beaten for us.

But we do need to stand firm in the fact that Christ has won the war.  It is a constant fight for us - against the world.  I don't know about you, but recently I've been really tempted to play the lotteries - I said this to Janet about three weeks ago.  And then I got this flyer in the paper yesterday from the CNIB.  I would love this stuff they offer as prizes.  But then I have to give my head a shake and say, "No, I will not be won over by that which rusts and spoils and thieves break into to steal."

Against the self.  I find it very easy to insist in my own way in family life, in friendships and in my relation with God, and then I think, "No - that is the old me, that is the old self and he has been put to death on the cross."  It is finished.

Against Satan.  He comes and uses the world and the self and offers me the kingdoms of this world and I think, "No - you are a defeated personality.  I will not be lured by you any longer."

In Texas they celebrate June 19th.  It has spread to a number of other states.  It is the celebration that on June 19th, two years after the Emancipation Proclamation was signed, that freed the slaves.  The problem occurred that even though it was signed, it took two years for Texans to get the message.  It took two years for the word to get to Texas, that if you didn't want to, you didn't have to plow those fields any more.  That if you didn't want to, you didn't have to stay on the plantations any more.  If you didn't want to, you didn't have to answer to the master of the house any more.  You could change your situation.  Somehow they didn't get the message, so that they lived as slaves, thought as slaves, worked as slaves, walked as slaves when there was in fact a document in Washington that declared them free at last.

Many of you are held in the chains of the world, of self and you need to know that the Emancipation Proclamation has been signed - it is finished, on the cross - and you are free to leave the ghetto of sin, the plantation evil, and the estate of Satan.  You are free to walk out of here - free at last, free at last, thank God Almighty, you're free at last.

When you realize that - that it is all finished - then the cross becomes a giant plus sign.

Copyright MBC and Tom Cullen - March 2002

---