Galatians 2:20
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.

What a wonderful verse that encapsulates the whole of the Christian faith, that holds within it all our hope for this life on Earth.  And what a wonderful truth that Christ lives in us.  So then we can’t help but be different.  We can’t help but be changed, because He has within Himself an awesome power and a fullness of everything good, and now all of that is within us to make us into something we weren’t before.  The addition of Christ into our brokenness and our emptiness brings such a stark change, an immediate filling to the brim of a heart once cold and desolate.  What a thrill to the soul that Jesus Himself would reside so close.  That deadness that once took up so much space is cast out by His light.  Things long dormant within us rise up in His presence, invigorated with His life to go forward in service, in praise, in worship of our God.

And this life we have left over, though still in the flesh, can never be the same.  We now live this life by faith in something so much greater than ourselves.  We now live by faith in Someone so much greater than we could have ever hoped Him to be.  He is the Son of God, and that worthy title of Jesus Christ holds so much more than we may realize at times.  This is eternal God sent by the Father, the obedient Son, the one who willingly gave Himself as the Son of sacrifice.  This is God Himself in flesh and bone being abused by His creation, so much different than the flesh we dwell in, for contained within Him is all the power and majesty and glory of the eternal and living God.

And then how can we not be completely humbled by His motivation?  For His motivation was, yes, His love, but His motivation was also us.  He loved us and gave Himself for us is what it says, and so we have to take Him at His word.  And in that we can find comfort and hope and value.  And if that does not draw our hearts into a deeper connection with our Lord, nothing else ever can, because these worthless hunks of flesh that we may sometimes see ourselves to be mattered enough to Him that He gave the most precious thing that ever existed—Himself—for it, for us, the us that dwells inside this flesh and fails and stumbles and falls and sins.

And as we consider all of this, how could we do anything but stand in amazement of Jesus our Lord?  Indeed, perhaps we can hardly stand at all but are compelled to fall on our faces before Him and surrender every part of us to every part of Him.  For if we have seen our Savior afresh and anew this day, we can only echo the cry of others who have beheld His glory and were never the same.  And with this clear vision, we can’t help but sing along with the angels’ song of “Holy, holy, holy,” giving all glory and honor and blessing and power unto Him, the worthy Lamb, the King of kings, the Lord of all, the Son of God, and still, though He is all these things and more, our Savior.