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Death was overcome in life, alienation in love, sin in righteousness, delusion in truth, and darkness with the light of his face.

God the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, whose life is love, created us for fellowship with himself. We chose in stead to center our existence in ourselves and stepped out of that divine love, all turning to their own ways. This separated us from our Source, the One who is light, truth, holiness, love, and life. Disintegration, corruption, and death became our inevitable fate because, when we turned from God, we turned from the source of all that is good.

We needed saving help, but we needed it where the problem was—inside of us. The Father, who is self-giving love, sent his Son to become one of us to reverse this process of destruction. A relationship, lost when we turned away, had to be reestablished with our Source. God did this in Christ, in the Incarnation—when the eternal Son of God was embodied in Jesus of Nazareth, the Jew—and with the Cross.

Jesus assumed our state, with its sin and its consequences, into himself. When the Spirit raised him in triumph over death, a grace was released that made his life a source of eternal life and holiness for us.

Thus Jesus took our judgment upon himself and provided salvation. Death was overcome in life, alienation in love, sin in righteousness, delusion in truth, and darkness with the light of his face. By this Atonement our relationship to God through the Spirit became that of child to the Father and bride to the Son. His life became ours so that we, God's people, can fulfill his purposes for us: one, to be a kingdom of priests who live not for ourselves but for others, especially for those who do not yet know him; and two, a holy people in whom God dwells and with whom the Holy One walks in eternal communion.

Dennis Kinlaw is the founder and chief executive of the Francis Asbury Society, Wilmore, Kentucky.

Next: Mighty to Save: Robert Smith Jr.

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February 7 2000, Vol. 44, No. 2