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God.  Knocking is someone wanting to come in.  Every time God
        speaks, he wants to come in.  His voice is an invitation and He
        wants to come and have us respond to His word.


                  Heavenly Father, we ask You to speak to us and enable
        us to open the door so that you can come in.  We know how
        much we need You.  Show us the  Lord Jesus in a fresh and
        living way.  Deliver us from cold academics and show us the
        Living Word.  We ask in Jesus’ name.  Amen
                  We are looking at these great foundations of our faith.
        The foundation I’d like to look at now is called “Union with
        Jesus”, “Union with Christ”.  That truth is all over the Bible and
        especially in the New Testament.  It’s so comprehensive.  We’re
        to abide in Christ as a branch abides in the vine.  We’re to relate
        to Christ as a bride relates to a husband, and like children relate
        to their parents.  What the head is to the body, that’s union.
        What the sun is to the earth, that’s union.  What the soil is to the
        plant is a picture of union.  When you read the epistles of the
        New Testament, the expression  “in Christ”  is used over and
        over and over.
                  The Bible says that we are found in Christ, preserved in
        Christ, sanctified in Christ Jesus and we are rooted in Christ
        Jesus and we’re made perfect in the Lord.  We’re called to think
        in the Lord, walk in the Lord, speak in the Lord, labor in the
        Lord, suffer in the Lord, and rejoice in the Lord.  Everything is
        in Christ Jesus.  We conquer in the Lord.  We get married only
        in  the  Lord.     Children  obey  their  parents  in  the  Lord.   We
        receive one another in Christ Jesus.  We reign in life in Christ
        Jesus.  We submit to one another in the Lord.  We die in the
        Lord.  We are asleep in Jesus.  When He returns we return with
        Him.  All of that pictures union in Christ.
                  I have a problem.  I want union with Christ.  Where do I
        begin?  There is so much in the Bible that pictures union with
        Christ, like eating and drinking.  I think the greatest picture of
        union with Christ is John 17:21, “…that they may all be one;
        even as Thou, Father, art in Me, and I in Thee, that they also
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