Earlier I have written about who Jesus is to me. I was inspired by the question asked in scripture where Jesus said “who do you say I am” and also by the message my pastor was sharing. Initially, my first thoughts were he’s my friend, my provider, my hiding place or refuge, my anchor, and the lover of my soul. Yet as I contemplated, as I challenged you to contemplate, I realized there was even more. That’s what I want to talk about today. Although these things Christ is to me, these roles that He plays in my life are for me.  They are not just offered or done for me, but it’s honestly what he offers to be to all of us. Yet I think each of those roles that he takes is worth examining. Even if we have them in common. So I want to look at things he is to us that we all have in common.

First, he’s, my Redeemer. One of my favorite Big Daddy Weave songs is “I am redeemed.” See, I’m not the only one who sees Christ as my Redeemer. In the song he’s talking about how Christ has redeemed him and set him free from the chains and the stains and guilt of his sin. There’s a scripture that says “I have redeemed you, I have called you by name, you are mine.” Even God declares himself as our Redeemer. But what does it mean that he’s our Redeemer? A Redeemer is someone who redeems and that means someone who repays or recovers or saves something for something else. So, we are saved from sin, from death and separation from God. And we are saved to Christ. We are saved in order that we can have a relationship and the connection to God. Pretty amazing isn’t it when you think about it. That he said he didn’t just save us from something as I was so often told as a child. Now I can understand as a more mature Christian that I was saved to something as well. The amazing thing that I’ve come to realize is I wasn’t saved to service or work but instead I was saved in order to be connected and have that relationship with the creator and the maker of my soul. So, if the Redeemer is someone who redeems, then Christ is our Redeemer. He saved us and recovered us from eternal punishment and to eternal life. That’s not just true for me, that’s for all who call him Lord, who call him savior, and who know him as their Redeemer.

Along the same line but with a different angle, not only is Christ our Redeemer but he is the one who has justified us. Christ’s justification of us it’s very unique. Justification is simply the action of showing that’s something is right. Theologically it means the action of declaring or making righteous in the sight of God. So, he saved us from sin and death, in order that we can have the relationship with God which we can’t have without justification. God is holy and we have to be holy to be part of his kingdom and we’re not. This is where justification comes in. He puts us in right standing before the father. It’s interesting because like I said this is unique to Christ. That he justifies us not based on our actions is unique to the Christian faith.  In many other faiths you have to earn it or justify yourself.  That is not so with Jesus. We are sinners, and as long as we are in our flesh we will continue to sin. Yet by grace, simply through faith, he justifies us. It’s a state of grace that we live in. I’ve always loved that scripture that says “Though our sins are as scarlet, he makes us white as snow.” I’ve always wondered how can red blood, a scarlet flow, purify and make anything white, gleaming, and new.  Just like so many other things about God it is a mystery and it’s not something that we are ever going to be able to fully understand in this life, yet we see the reality and the truth of it even if we can’t fully wrap our mind around it. After all, how can we be justified when we’ve done nothing to deserve it or earn it. Even more than that, how can such an amazing justification be free to us by faith and belief alone, it’s given. It’s unfathomable to our human minds. We only give when we get. But here Christ is giving freely his whole life, his lifeblood poured out to cleanse us and justify us, and once again this is not just for me, but this is for us all. For any who would believe and call on his name.

Not only has Christ redeemed us and justified us, but he also defends us. It’s interesting in Job you see this picture of God’s throne whether you consider it figurative or literal. Where Satan actually approaches God and accuses one of God’s people, Job. He doesn’t actually accuse Job of what he’s done wrong, no he says if you weren’t good to him then he would not be good to you. Now we all know the story of what happened in the end, but I want to point out that you see here Satan as the accuser of the brethren. The Bible actually calls him that, and in Job you see him doing that. We have an accuser, and he has plenty of evidence against us. More importantly, we have an advocate. First John 21 says that “Christ is our advocate with the father.” It says “I am writing these things to you so that you may not sin, but if anyone does sin we have an advocate with the father, Jesus the righteous. He is the propitiation for our sins and not for ours only but also for the sins of the whole world.” When someone would propitiate in ancient times, they were doing something to appease their gods. But in this context, it is something different because there’s nothing that we can do to appease God for the wrongs that we’ve done. So, when it’s talking about how Christ was the propitiation for our sins it’s referring to Christ sacrifice and how God righteousness was completely satisfied by the death of Christ on the cross. It’s not as if God was some God that was angry about something, and he was appeased. No, it’s that God is perfect and holy and can have no part with anything that is not perfect and holy. A sacrifice was required to make right what was wrong. Christ then received the punishment that we deserved. Sin was committed, punishment had to be given, Christ took the punishment for all of us, for the whole world. That’s amazing. Our defender is the one who took the punishment on our behalf. It’s baffling and it makes no sense when you look through the eyes of the world wisdom. 

It’s also very humbling when you realize what he did for us while we were still his enemies. And greater still that not only did he take the punishment for us, but he also continues his defense of us as a says in Hebrews 7:25 that Jesus lives to intercede for us. He is able to save us, he’s our Redeemer, he was the propitiation for our sins, and scripture goes on to declare that he could do this so that we can come to God through him because he always lives to intercede for us. Every moment, even with all that he already has done, he still is working on our behalf making intercession for us before the father, advocating for us. That whole if God is for you who can be against you thing is real. If Christ is for you and interceding for you and has done all of that he’s done for you, how could you ever question his ability to save you and keep you and sustain you. It really is amazing.

We’ve seen how to us Christ redeems, justifies, and even defends. But there’s even more that he does. He goes further and he clothes us. Do you remember in Genesis when men sinned initially and was expelled from the garden that God clothed them. He didn’t send them out without a covering. All those thousands of years later when Christ came and sacrificed himself to redeem that relationship that had been broken by sinning in the garden we see that Christ once again steps into that role that God had established thousands of years before when he clothed man. Our flesh is sinful and corrupt. Our bodies are dying from the moment we’re born. But it’s not just our bodies that are corrupt it’s also our spirits. Through Christ sacrifice he offers to make us new, and to literally clothe us in his righteousness. What his father will see when he looks at us is Jesus and all of his righteousness, and not the sinful unworthy creatures that we are. Instead, he makes us like himself by literally clothing us in himself. 

For now, while we walk through this world, he’s also given us another clothing of sorts. Scripture refers to the armor that we should cover ourselves with. The breastplate of righteousness, the sword spirit, the helmet of salvation, the belt of truth, our feet shod with the readiness for the preparation of the gospel. He tells us to just stand, because he’s already won the victory. We just simply need to stand armored. So not only has he clothed us with his righteousness and in the hereafter will be transforming us.  As scripture says when we see him, we will be as he is. He’s also equipped us for our struggle and our challenges in this world with his armor. Pretty amazing how he’s made provision for us. The mind blowing thing is that by clothing us this time, remember the first time when men sinned he clothed them when they left the garden, Christ clothes us in righteousness and then brings reconciliation so we can be back with him. Interesting how that comes full circle. So many things are like that in scripture if you see it as the full story. 

Now the above are more well-known roles that we all have Christ playing on our behalf in common. For all of us Christ is our Redeemer, our justifier, our advocate and defender, and the one who clothes us reconciling us to God himself, But there’s one more way that’s not as well known that I would like to highlight. It’s not as acknowledged but I actually think it’s one of the most important. You see he’s our sustainer. The Bible declares that he who began a good work in you will be faithful to complete it. In Isaiah 46:4 it says “even to your old age in gray hairs I am he, I am he who sustains you.” In Psalms 119:113 the Psalmist asks God “to sustain me according to your promise and I will live.” 

I was actually doing a little research while writing this about God as our sustainer and saw that justification behind the idea that he can be the sustainer of our soul is his attributes. If God is all knowing, all powerful, and supremely good then he’s well equipped to be the sustainer of our soul. Recently, I watched “Thor, Love and Thunder.”  One of the scene showed Thor going to the other gods in Olympus where Zeus was the head god. Of course, there was trouble in the human world but here all these gods sat uncaring worrying more about their own pleasure. They didn’t care because the people’s troubles couldn’t touch them. When I was watching this, it was a reminder that our God is not like these fake gods that men have made. We don’t need a God of Thunder and a God of the sea and a God of the vine or whatever. We have one God who is the God of all gods. There’s no other needed, his is our all sufficiency. God is the one who does it all. He is the one who made heaven and earth, he is the one who causes the lightning or could stop it, he is the one who made the sea and everything in them, he is the one who made all of the living things that are on land including people. He is the one and there is no other. Yet even being that great, and even being one who needs nothing from us, he still chose to be involved with his creation. To love us by coming and serving us and sacrificing his one and only son for us. He is not some man made up story to help us cope and deal with difficult life. No, he is the one who is above it all, yet, because of his great love chose to reach down to bring us up when we did not have the ability to do that. It’s amazing and not only did he concern himself with our salvation, but he also concerns himself with our life. He knows everything about each one of us, the countless trillions that have existed. He knows how many hairs are on each of our heads, he knew every day of our life before we had lived even one of them, before we speak a word, he already knew what it would be. Not only does he know all of us, know all about us, but love us.  He longs to save us and promises that he will keep us. In 1 Corinthians 1:8 scripture declares that “he will keep you firm to the end so that you will be blameless on the day of our Lord Jesus Christ.”

If I think about these things that Christ is to me, that he is to you as well, It’s overwhelming. I don’t know how to wrap my mind around him being one who redeems the unworthy, who justifies the undeserving, who advocates for us even while we were still his enemies, who clothes us with holiness and righteousness and glory that’s his own, and who continues to sustain us and provide for us and concern himself with us. Those are only just some of the things he is to us. There are the things that he is to each of us individually because of our life experiences that I wrote about before. Remember for me he’s my friend, my refuge, my provider and my anchor. And that’s just some of the things he has shown to me, not all of them. I could probably write the rest of my life and keep discovering new ways that Christ is amazing in that he has provided for every single detail of my life. But he hasn’t just done that for me, he wants to do it for you, for all of us. 

Maybe you think that you know who Christ is, and what answer you would give. I challenge you to look again today and see a way that he’s working new things in your life. Maybe these things that Christ is to you don’t seem amazing to you anymore, you’ve heard them your whole life and well, they just don’t seem like a really great thing. I challenge you to look again and understand the depth of what he’s done for you and continues to do in each of his roles towards us. We will spend our lifetime discovering who Jesus is to us, probably only to get to the end of our life and find that we’ve barely scratched the surface. In our relationship with the Lord he doesn’t want us content to dip our toes into the water at the shore line, no, he wants us to step out and go into the deep waters of who he is, there’s always more to discover and find if you keep searching.