We have been called to co-labor with Christ to extend the Kingdom of God. But what does that look like? How do we enter into this co-ness with Christ? And how do we work with Him in extending His Kingdom?

We will start with the understanding of how we come into union with Christ through our reckoning with His death, burial and resurrection. We have to first understand that we have died and been raised with Christ before we can understand co-laboring with Him.

Understanding our unity with Christ is essential to understanding our co-laboring or co-working with Him. It is through and by Jesus that we can consider ourselves dead to sin and alive to God. We have been brought into this co-laboring relationship with Christ through His death and resurrection.

Working with Christ is a different view point than the historical view the church has presented of us working for Christ. Working with Christ, as He lives in us, is incredibly different than working for Christ while He maintains some guardianship over us in heaven requiring that we serve Him in order to please Him.

We work with Christ to extend the Kingdom of God as Sons and Daughters - not just as servants hired to do a job.

If you study Romans chapters 6, 7, and 8, you see three pictures. We read chapter 6 earlier. It tells of our unity in Christ’s death and resurrection. Chapter 7 tells us of the Law which was holy itself but by our participation become the law of sin and death. It also speaks of being caught in a cycle of doing. Doing what you don’t wanna do and not doing what you want to do. Meanwhile, Chapter 8 tells us of how Jesus fulfilled every part the law, and now His life-giving spirit lives in us! Now we are sons and daughters to glory!

We don’t have to live in Romans 7, when chapter 6 shows us that we have a clear access point to living in an 8 life. Without the understanding of Chapter 6 and what our union with Christ means, we can spend many years trying to deal with Chapter 7 (the law, our sin). But we can now live in Chapter 8, in victory and breakthrough. We have been given life in Christ Jesus!

We do not gain victory simply through knowledge, but through application. It is only by doing that the knowing becomes wisdom to us. This is why James encouraged us not to be hearers of the Word only but also doers. So it’s not deeper revelation we need but more consistent application. Could this possibly be the daily bearing of the cross or the walking out of what we believe?

So now, with our new identity in Christ, we co-labor with Him. It has been said that we are His hands and feet in the earth. We are sharing the same message of the Kingdom that He shared when He was among us. We release the love of God in the earth by the power of Holy Spirit at work in us. We are extending His Kingdom.

Christ in us is the hope of glory. Christ flowing through us is the hope of the world. As we find our lives in Christ and learn to let His life flow through us, the world will find hope.

In what ways are you seeking to advance the Kingdom of God?