The Pre-Eminence of Jesus Christ | Christ Above All Things

1 Corinthians 1:30. For He has been made unto us sanctification, righteousness, redemption, and wisdom. Now I ask you, brother, what is wisdom? Christ. Christ is wisdom. And righteousness… I’m sorry…we all know what righteousness is. Christ is righteousness, and there’s no other. Ah, but sanctification, that’s a different matter. In sanctification, you don’t cuss, you don’t drink, you don’t chew, you don’t dance. Well, that’s for a Baptist. You don’t smoke, you don’t cuss, you don’t drink, and you don’t run around with people who do, and that is living a holy life. My dear saints, there is only one sanctification. You are sanctified because sanctification is Christ, and that’s all there is. Let Him possess you. Let Him devour you with His imminence, with His first place, with His dominance. That Christ Jesus the Lord be the center of all things.

Now that’s some Christ. I think this is enough. I will bring only one more thing to your attention. The kingdom moves in the preeminence and centrality of Jesus Christ, or it doesn’t move. Now let me make it really clear. What is the kingdom? We have no idea. Theologically, we can give you a dozen answers, but there is something I can tell you, and don’t forget it. He is the Lord. He is God. He is the chief potentate, and He is the King of that kingdom. Look therefore not only to Him, but I am saying to embrace Him until you are intoxicated on the fact that Christ Jesus is everything, and then you shall be blessed. If you can come to God’s people and say to them, here’s the centrality of all things. Here’s the preeminence of all things, and here’s how you get to know Him – an experiential knowledge. Saint of God, you come to that, you turn the world upside down, and you won’t care about anything else in this universe.

Now, we have one more passage of Scripture. There’s one last thing to add. There’s much more. We could stay here all week. I’m serious about this – the preeminence and the centrality of our Lord Jesus Christ. I’m telling you, everything else pales in the revelation of Him. There’s one last thing. There’s one thing I want to ask you to do when you go home. I want you to read 1 Corinthians 12:12. 1 Corinthians 12:12, and let it drive you stark raving mad. It goes like this. And just as the body has many members and many parts, even so is…and you say, even so is the church. But you look again, and that’s not what it says. It doesn’t say that. It says in the body there are many members and many parts, even so is Christ. And John Calvin, whom I don’t particularly care a whole lot about, said that, having read this over and over, he came to but one conclusion. Now I’m quoting John Calvin, not Gene Edwards. He said the only conclusion you can come to, on the basis of this, is that the church is Christ.

Now then, in my flesh, that may not be true, but remember I have a Lord who’s already been there. I’ve got a Lord who’s visited both ends. That in Jesus Christ we shall find that we are many parts of His body, righteous, sanctified, redeemed, wise, and everything else. We will be totally with Him, in Him, indistinguishable from the neck down. That day comes when the body and the head come together, and it is Christ, and it is Christ, and it is Christ, and it is only Christ.

This final word, and that is, listen to the word, Christ in you. Christ in you. Christ in you. What Christ is in you? Which Christ, who died on Calvary’s tree? No. The Christ who saved you from your sin? Yes, but no. Stay with me. Understand. Give me a little rope here. No. King of kings and Lord of lords? No. The Lord, who is the Creator of the universe? Too small! Christ in you. No, it is the Christ of the cosmos, the entire creation. The Christ who was, is, and forever shall be in first place. He who is free of space and time. He who has creation in Him. He who lived before there was nothing, and He was all, the Christ of redemption, sanctification, righteousness, and wisdom, the Christ of the incense, Christ of the Holy of Holies, the Christ of the ark, the Christ who lives on this earth today. It has turned out that all the fullness of all these things was pleased…Colossians 1:16-18…it is the good pleasure of all fullness to dwell in Him. The Father, the Spirit, the creation, before creation, redemption, transformation…All who is the All, who is and will become and shall be, and is the All in All – that is the Christ who lives in you, that He might come to have preeminence in all things. God bless you all. The kingdom only moves when Christ is everything. Do that again. This time for Him, would you? What a revelation. He is the Christ that’s in you. Preeminent Christ. That’s bigger than the Christ we’ve known. Much bigger. Hallelujah.