BY JAN PAULSEN

hristian fellowship revolves around a common center located outside those who enjoy it, but uniting them to it and to others in service and purpose. Such fellowship is not the result of what we bring to the table, even though what we bring is an expression of it. The center of our Christian fellowship, of that which we all have and share in common, is our Savior. It is what he has done, is doing, and will do for us that creates fellowship within the community of believers. The closer each member of the community gets to that majestic center, the stronger are the ties that unite them to one another, thus facilitating the mission of the church.

United in the Fellowship of the Cross of Christ
We are united in the fellowship of the cross of Jesus. What a wonderful thought! That is exactly what the church is, a community of believers who have found their true identity at the very heart of the cross. The cross tells us what we need to hear by revealing who we truly are and what we should and can become. First, it undresses our existence, removing its self-deception, by making us fully aware of the fact that we are sinners, thus revealing the dark side of our existence. It reveals not only our condition but also our common and inescapable future: eternal death. In a sense the cross is about sin, judgment, and death: our sin, our judgment, and our death. The Crucified One pierces through our deceitful feelings of cultural, ethnic, educational, financial, and professional superiority and painfully reveals to us that we are wretched, pitiful, poor, blind, and morally and spiritually naked (cf. Rev. 3:17). It is from that realization that the cry for help and salvation comes out of our hearts and a glorious fellowship is created with the Crucified One and with those who have found in the cross not only judgment but salvation.

Second, the cross depicts for us a new condition and the possibility of a new future. It points to the enjoyment of a new fellowship with the head of a new humanity, Jesus. It is a humanity that is no longer controlled by a sinful condition, facing a common fatal destiny. The cross speaks to us about breaking away from our solidarity in sin and death--the natural common center of fallen humanity. In fact, it creates a new solidarity of love and gratitude with Christ and with a new redeemed humanity, the church. As believers we have one fundamental thing in common, one thing that is the very ground and essence of Christian fellowship: the cross of Christ. In the crucified Messiah we are confronted with a new experience--a restored fellowship with God; with a new purpose for our lives--the fulfillment of the gospel commission; and with a glorious new future--eternal life.

The shift from sin, judgment, and death to freedom from the power of sin, to peace, and to life in Christ takes place through the surrender of our being to the Lord, through conversion. Consequently we are united in the fellowship of those who have been forgiven through the blood of Christ. Every Adventist around the world should enjoy fellowship with the risen Lord and with one another because we are united in the experience of forgiveness and acceptance by God through Christ. The cross has revealed once and for all the unfathomable love of God for us
(1 John 4:9). Through the Spirit, that love reaches us from the cross, is poured out into our hearts (Rom. 5:5), and binds us together in true fellowship (Col. 3:14).

United in the Fellowship of the Death and Resurrection of Christ
This radical change from fellowship in sin and death to fellowship in forgiveness and new life is possible through the death and resurrection of Christ. Our common future as sinners was actualized in Christ, who on the cross appropriated our eternal death in order for us to have fellowship with Him and with one another. Adventists enjoy true fellowship only and exclusively through the substitutionary death of Christ for us (Mark 10:45). Throughout the world we hold in common this most wonderful truth: Christ died for us bearing our sins on the cross.

It is through the baptismal rite that we publicly proclaim and acknowledge Christ as our substitute and by faith see ourselves dying when He died, because He died in place of us, rebellious sinners. Through baptism we are incorporated into His death and joyfully recognize that our sinful destiny--eternal death--was experienced by Christ on the cross. There is no other baptism through which we can be united with God except through baptism into Christ. He died once, and we are all baptized into that one death (Rom. 6:3). We can have fellowship with one another because we have in common one fundamental spiritual experience: we were all baptized into Christ. Adventists are united in the fellowship of the death of Christ, which liberated us from the power of sin and death and led us to a new life.

Therefore, we are united with Christ not only in his death but also in his resurrection (Rom. 6:5). Resurrection is both what will take place at the coming of the Lord and a present experience. For the believer there is a dimension of it that is a present reality, well represented in the one baptism through which we are incorporated into Christ. As we come out of the water--representing our death to sin--we are spiritually resurrected to newness of life (Rom. 6:4). The resurrected Savior is now the Lord of our lives, and sin should no longer lord over us (Rom. 6:14). It was to this that Paul was referring when he wrote "I want to know Christ and the power of his resurrection and the fellowship of sharing in his sufferings" (Phil. 3:10).* The power of the Resurrection is revealed in us through the lordship of Christ in our lives. We are describing here a life shaped by the will of our loving Savior and guided by the power of the Spirit (Rom. 8:6, 7, 13, 14). We are not to pattern our lives according to the will of the world, but to live it to the glory of the Lord, who is able to renew and transform us (Rom. 12:2). In that important task we are not left to ourselves to define the shape of our new lives. The Spirit is given to us "in order that the righteous requirements of the law might be fully met in us, who do not live according to the sinful nature but according to the Spirit" (Rom. 8:4). This is the result of the experience of the new birth.

Nicodemus was not able to grasp the significance of the mystery of the new birth (John 3:4). This creative event is the result of the work of God, through the Spirit, in our hearts. One could say that the new birth consists in having new motives, new tastes, and new tendencies through the power of the Spirit. The effects of that miracle are detectable in the lives of those who have been born again. We know that "when the people of God experience the new birth, their honesty, their uprightness, their fidelity, their steadfast principles, will unfailingly reveal it" (Counsels to Parents, Teachers, and Students, p. 251). Adventists are united in the experience of the new birth through the resurrection of Jesus.

United in the Fellowship of the Glorified Savior
Believers are united not only by the cross and the death and resurrection of Christ but also by the glory of the risen Lord. Peter tells us that God "raised him from the dead and glorified him" (1 Peter 1:21). We have a common future made possible through Christ. His glorification makes it possible for us to be glorified. At the present time the glory of Christ is already in us, but it is still our hope of glory (Col. 1:27). We by faith contemplate it through the study of the Scriptures and through prayer and meditation, and as a result of that beholding, we are being transformed into the likeness of His glory (2 Cor. 3:18). But the full revelation of that glory is still a future event. Speaking about our resurrection, Paul says, "It is sown in dishonor, it is raised in glory" (1 Cor. 15:43). Since we have a glorious future, we do not face life depressed, or fearful and uncertain. Adventists exist eagerly waiting for the moment of their glorification at the coming of Christ.

It is through our glorification that we will be permanently removed from the reach of the power of sin and death. Our glorification is an act of God through which He restores to us the fullness of the glory with which He endowed us at creation (cf. Ps. 8:5). Our glorification and the eradication of our sinful nature will occur at the same time--at the moment of the return of our Lord. The assurance, the certainty, that this unique event will take place is to be found in the fact that Christ was glorified (1 Tim. 3:16). We worship the glorified Lord and look forward to the moment when we will also be glorified through Him (Phil. 3:20, 21). This hope holds us together and provides for us as a church a common center of devotion, commitment, and mission.

My fellow pilgrims in Christ, we are one people, one remnant, united in the fellowship of Christ, entrusted with and equipped for a particular mission. The forces that tend to separate us may be strong and threatening, but the cross of Christ, the crucified and risen Lord, is powerful enough to hold us together in the fulfillment of the mission He entrusted to us. We must press together around Him in sincere commitment to His message of salvation and to His ministry of service to a perishing world. We are united in the death and resurrection of Christ, but we are also united in the expectation of our glorification in Him. Let us keep our eyes on Him, because therein lies our safety.

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*All Scripture quotations in this article are from the New International Version.