32: The Exchanged Life (An Easter Series, Part 3) | S4E32

(00:00) Stephanie Warner: Welcome to Season 4, episode 32. Hello, Father.

(00:04) Marcus Warner: Hello, Daughter. We’re back at it here, Easter season. Lots to talk about.

(00:10) Stephanie Warner: Yes, we’ve been lingering on our Easter season. It is the most important holiday. The most important, as we’ll talk about, foundation of the Christian life. It’s a very good thing. I’m happy to be back here. Before we dive back into that topic though, the week in which this episode is releasing is in fact the Healthy Community Online Conference. So this is your last shout out from the podcast to make it there live if you want to get there live. But you can also catch the recording and it is name your own price.

And we’re very excited for Michel Hendricks, the author of The Other Half of Church to be there and Chris Coursey, author of The Joy Switch and our own Nik Harrang. And then their wives are all joining for a panel and it’s going to be great. And then you also have a bonus session from Dad. You are invited to learn more in the description and the link below.

(01:06) Marcus Warner: Yep. I’m the add-on here. Okay, we can do it.

(01:09) Stephanie Warner: Yes, we are pre-recording this because you are currently as of the release of this episode, doing some training in Europe.

(01:18) Marcus Warner: That’s correct. Yes. Looking forward to that. It’s going to be busy. I’ve got like seven days of speaking over there. So it’s going to be a busy time.

(01:28) Stephanie Warner:  Yep, we’re praying for that and blessings on that. All right, shall we dig in? You wrote a couple devotionals about the Easter season so we’re just unpacking them.  I’m gonna give you a lot of the heading here because I’m sitting at your feet for your devotional here. We mused on Palm Sunday and some Holy Week things and you talked about tough love and Jesus. We’ve also just been looking at Jesus as our King. Today we want to look at the angle of the gospel of Easter and how the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ is the foundation for everything. So take it from there Father.

(02:18) Marcus Warner: Yeah, absolutely. We often look at Easter as the foundation of Christianity in the sense of the ultimate proof that it’s true. Because the Apostle Paul says, if Christ is not risen, then your faith is futile and you’re still in your sins. And so we look at it as, the truth of Christianity rises and falls on the resurrection, but it’s more than that. It’s the practice of Christianity that actually hangs on crucifixion and Easter. The crucifixion represents that we live a crucified life and Easter resurrection is we live a resurrected new life in Christ by walking in the Spirit. And so these core foundations of living a crucified life and walking in the Spirit are anchored in what happened on Easter weekend. It is kind of interesting, I was telling you that I had a friend show up and talk to me in the very early days when I was still young at Deeper Walk. His problem was he felt that in Matthew, Mark, and Luke, that Jesus didn’t teach grace.

And that grace was an invention of the apostle Paul. And that John was the last person to write and finally adopted it in his writings. but the earliest ones didn’t have Jesus talking about grace and this was something Paul had invented. For a lot of people, this is like, what? What are you talking about? But in academic circles, there’s a lot of places you can go where it’s taken for granted that the apostle Paul changed everything that Jesus taught and invented this thing called grace.

But I tell people that first of all, Jesus did give us a lot of hints at grace. The prodigal son’s story is a story of grace. The woman pouring perfume on his feet is a story of grace. The thief on the cross is something of grace, where someone has given something that they didn’t earn that is given to them. So he hints at it, but grace, the reason Jesus didn’t camp out on grace is that grace was a product of what Jesus did when he died and rose again.

It wasn’t the focus of his teaching. When he was teaching, he was teaching on the kingdom of heaven, and he’s teaching about what it means to live a kingdom life and a kingdom-oriented life. So, it’s going to have a different point of emphasis, whereas the apostle Paul doesn’t dive into a lot of the things Jesus taught. Instead, he camps out on what Jesus accomplished through his death and resurrection. So there is a significant difference in emphasis between them, but that doesn’t mean they’re in conflict.

And what I had to help this guy understand was that no, Paul didn’t transform Christianity into something it wasn’t. He explained how the Old Testament prepared us to understand what it was that Jesus did on the cross and what the significance of his resurrection was. And so Paul didn’t invent that either. What he was doing was, he was explaining what the Old Testament said about it. And he was anchoring that in what he claimed was direct revelation from Jesus himself. I just put that out there for those people who are in the academic world enough to know, that’s a thing. That was kind of where my mind started with this and that event jumped up. But for me, Easter is the foundation of our faith in some very practical ways.

(06:03) Stephanie Warner: It’s not just the foundation of our salvation. It’s the foundation for walking out the rest of the Christian life.

(06:109) Marcus Warner: Exactly. So we look at, yeah, go ahead. You want to ask?

(06:15) Stephanie Warner: Yeah. I know a lot of people will call this, the exchange life or living a crucified life or different things like that. Would you unpack that?

(06:24) Marcus Warner: Yeah, I love the phrase the exchange life. Now it’s my understanding that it was first coined by the son of Hudson Taylor, who was trying in his biography of his famous father to explain his approach to Christianity, and he called it the exchange life. And the exchange life: I’ll explain who Hudson Taylor is in a second, but the exchange life is that Jesus takes our sin and gives us his righteousness. It’s like, let’s exchange it. You give me your sin, and I’ll give you my righteousness. That’s a pretty good trade.

And so that’s the idea. Not only then does that get us saved, but now we keep living that way the rest of our lives. We are like, I’m going to keep giving Jesus my sin. I’m going to keep giving him my doubts. I’m going to keep giving him all the things that are broken about me. I’m going to keep giving him all of those things. And he’s going to keep giving me not only his righteousness, but as Paul put it, he who freely gave his own son, how will he not also with him freely give us all things? So in the exchange everything that’s broken about me goes to Jesus and everything that creates life comes to me.

And so this idea of a great exchange is really profound. Now, as for who Hudson Taylor is…Hudson Taylor, back in the 1800s, has a remarkable story well worth reading. He took off for China and was one of the first British citizens to go to China and brought the gospel to that country. The avenue for evangelical Christianity in the nation of China really began with Hudson Taylor. And he was your grandfather’s hero in the faith. My dad, your grandfather, he loved Hudson Taylor. He was one of his spiritual heroes. And so I think that the exchange life is a good point of emphasis for this Easter.

(08:27) Stephanie Warner: Yeah. So unpack that more. What does it look like? Like what is it? It’s one thing to say I give my brokenness to Jesus and he gives me life, but what does that look like?

(08:41) Marcus Warner: Yeah, in practice, it’s called a crucified life. The crucified life starts with  that I have been crucified with Christ. It is already a done thing and I am not trying to crucify my flesh. It has already been crucified. And one of the words that Paul uses here, which is really interesting, is the word reckon. He says, so let’s reckon ourselves dead. Now that’s an accounting term and the idea is like, you’ve got two columns. Here’s a column that says. assets and here’s a column over here that says, debts.

Let’s move my self-life from the column that says, it’s alive and it’s an asset and let’s move it over here to a debt and give it to Jesus. And so the reckoning of it happens every time that we make a choice to do that. Every time we actually live that way, we are reckoning ourselves dead with Christ and alive to God. And so the crucified life to a large extent is developing the habits and the patterns of saying no to the things where we try to take control of our own lives away from God. And it’s the idea that there are areas in life where I’m fighting with God because I want what I want, and it isn’t what he wants. But I’m stubborn and I’m stuck and I’m pushing on for what I want, that needs to be surrendered.

That would be a classic example of crucifying the flesh and saying, no to that. And like with anything in life, the bigger your yes is, the easier it is to say no. So the bigger the yes is to Jesus, the more excited and passionate you are about the yes in your life. Like, I want to live for Jesus, I want him to be everything. The easier it is to say no. But the weaker your yes is, like, well, you know, I’m open to this. It’d be a nice idea. The weaker your no is going to be. And so the exchange life becomes the foundation for making that exchange in situation after situation all throughout our lives by putting that into practice.

(11:57) Stephanie Warner: It makes me think very clearly that you teach a lot about walking in the Spirit. Teaching, knowing, trusting, obeying, and the cycle of strength. One of the ways to strengthen that, yes, is that you are actually getting to know God and you are learning to trust Him on a very personal level and not just on a head level. Talk to us about walking in the Spirit.

(11:23) Marcus Warner: Well, you for example, one of the things that characterized Hudson Taylor was his prayer life. He was a disciple of George Mueller, who was famous for his prayer life. And my dad used to tell the story that Taylor didn’t want to do all of the accounting work that it took with processing a bunch of small donations. So he prayed, God, would you supply everything that I need? And would you do it with a handful of big donations so that I don’t have to waste my time with all of this accounting? I’m like, that’s a very specific prayer, right? God would you just send me a million bucks so I don’t have to deal with the 10 bucks here or 20 bucks there? And God did. He funded his trip over to China. He funded those early years of his ministry with a handful of big gifts and just made it all happen.

And that really stuck with me because that seems pretty concrete. Part of the big, yes, is that with every care I have, I cast it on Jesus. With every need that I have, I look to Him for provision first. And when I don’t have that, when I don’t have that kind of prayer life where I am casting my cares on Jesus, and I’m taking every need to Him first, what I will default to is that every care remains mine. Every problem is mine to solve and every need is mine to come up with a provision for. So that’s kind of walking in the flesh in a nutshell, as I hold on to all of those things and I make them my responsibility.

And I’m now going to come up with a way to make those things work. Whereas walking in the Spirit, it kind of begins with that I need to cast my cares on Jesus. I need to go to him for what I need. I need to play the role he’s asking me to play and not presumptuously step into things that he’s not asking me to do.

(13:25) Stephanie Warner: Yeah, rely on self-reliance and trying to keep control of things in our own hands. That’s another thing that grandfather used to always say, the consequences, if we’re in control, then the consequences are up to us. And if we let God be in control, the consequences are up to him.

(13:47) Marcus Warner: Yeah. Do things God’s way and he’ll be responsible for the results. Do things your way and you can be responsible for the results. That was something he said a lot. You know, this also reminds me that you can take exchange life teaching to an unhealthy extreme. And I do want to point this out somewhat, and one caution here. Because dying to the flesh or crucified flesh is sometimes called dying to the self life. That it can be said, you got to die to yourself.

And that means different things to different people. And so what can happen is people can begin to feel like they have to deny themselves every pleasure in life. Like if there’s something that’s actually good and happy and would make them happy, they can’t have it, because you got to die to yourself. And so that’s one extreme way this can go. It’s a perversion of what the exchange life is meant to teach. But it is something that some people have associated with this, that God would never want me to have nice things because I have to die to every desire for anything good in my life.

The other extreme that it can go to, in a similar fashion, is sometimes parents who grew up with this idea did not help their kids develop a really strong sense of self and a strong sense of identity because they were constantly getting their kids to die to themselves. And as a result, there was no self there to die to. They hadn’t developed a fully strong identity. The idea of dying to self isn’t even a scriptural phrase. It’s just sort of a shorthand for the way people are trying to describe it.

So I’ll still use that expression. I don’t think it’s a terrible expression. We just have to understand what it means and what it doesn’t mean. What it’s talking about here is there are times, yes, when I have to give up desires that I want. And there are times when I have to give up strategies that I’m employing. But it doesn’t mean that all of those are automatically bad all of the time. And there is nothing wrong with having a strong sense of identity. In fact, one of my favorite… go ahead.

(16:05) Stephanie Warner: Well, I was gonna say, I know people who have been living in a warped sense of similar things. Where their inclination is the bad stuff, but obeying God is actually, do the nice thing, right? God is like, actually I want more for you. And they’re like, wait, what? So anyway, what were you gonna say?

(16:27) Marcus Warner: No, it’s true. I lost it.

(16:32) Stephanie Warner: I’m so sorry.

(16:34) Marcus Warner: That’s all right. It’s okay. I was kind of going somewhere, but I forgot, it’s okay. If it comes back, I will let you know.

(16:42) Stephanie Warner: Awesome. One of the things that we also did was look at Romans and Isaiah. Did you want to unpack that at all?

(16:50) Marcus Warner: Romans 4:25 is the specific verse that I was pondering. And there’s a Greek word in there that’s used twice in the verse. And I think it captures the idea of great exchange pretty well. And it’s translated, “to give over”, like something to be given over.  At the crucifixion our sin was given over to Jesus and His righteousness is given over to us. And I had the thought, that’s an interesting word. Given over is not a common word in the New Testament. So I did a little research. I was like, does the Greek version of the Old Testament use that word in Isaiah 53?

That was my specific question, because Isaiah 53 is the passage that explains Jesus on the cross. And I figured if Paul was meditating on anything here it was probably Isaiah 53. It turns out, sure enough, Isaiah 53:6, that same Greek word for giving over is used there. It says, all like sheep have gone astray. We’ve each turned to his own way, but the Lord has given over to him. All of our iniquity, all of our sin. So Paul is picking up on what happened at the cross. And he’s using Isaiah’s terminology and he’s saying at the cross this was given over to Jesus and new life was given to us. And I just thought that it captured really well the exchange between Jesus takes the bad stuff, and he gives us the good stuff.

(18:37) Stephanie Warner: So the other symbols that you’ve pointed to for how the Bible shows the exchange life would be baptism and Lord’s Supper. Do you want to say anything about those?

(18:49) Marcus Warner: Yeah, baptism is the ceremony that celebrates our entrance into the community. Our entrance into the community, and that is sealed by the covenant. And so it’s a covenant ceremony. And when I’m baptized, I die, and I’m raised, and I am born again. And that’s what’s being symbolized in baptism. And so the whole FISH model of heart-focused discipleship is anchored in that I die with Christ in order to be set free from what enslaves me. And so a crucified life from that standpoint is continuing to walk in freedom from those things that enslave me and dying to them. And then I am raised with Christ. I’m raised with Christ first to eternal life, but also to a new identity and also to life in the Spirit.

There’s a covenant identity that I’m given that is true about me objectively because something legally has changed about my identity. I’ve been given a pardon, I’ve been adopted, I’ve become a citizen of heaven. I’ve been given the title Saint. Those are objective legal things that have changed about me. I’ve also been born of the Spirit and the reception of the Holy Spirit changes everything because now what I’m doing is not just living a crucified life. I’m not just saying no to the flesh. I’m saying yes to something. And that is a relational connection with God through the Holy Spirit where the Spirit is leading me into the abundant life that God has for me.

And so all of that goes together and then baptism is entering into community. Now the point of community is to be heart-focused. It is to help each of us with our freedom journeys, and remind us of our true identity. And to practice together what it looks like to walk in the Spirit and not in the flesh on a regular basis. So all of that, the whole model that we have is anchored in baptism, and baptism is anchored in what happened on Easter weekend, the crucifixion and the resurrection of Jesus.

And to make sure we didn’t forget it, that it wasn’t a one-time thing that only happened at baptism, every time we take communion we’re reminded of baptism. Because every time we take communion, it’s about the body and the blood. That’s the crucifixion. But it’s also about this hope that Jesus is coming again and that we’re going to drink of the fruit of the vine with him in the kingdom. And so resurrection and the second coming are also in communion. And so God was like, I just want to make sure that this doesn’t get lost. Let’s make sure the focus stays the focus.

And the focus of the Christian life is the death of Jesus and the resurrection of Jesus and the fact that He’s coming back again. In our lives, the same things, those three things are the anchor points. We die to the things that enslave us with Christ. We live in the Spirit by living out our new identity Christ. And we are anticipating His coming again and eternity to come because we want the rewards of eternity. Whatever we go through here in this life is nothing, Paul says, compared to the surpassing greatness that awaits.

And so all of that is anchored in Easter. And that’s why I think Easter is just a wonderful opportunity to just revisit the foundations of the Christian life and why we live this way. Like in our case, in Deeper Walk’s case, why FISH is so fundamental to the way we explain Christian life.

(22:46) Stephanie Warner: Mm-hmm. Well, as you talked about the Heart Focused Community, we’re doing it together. We’re not in isolation, we’re not meant to just be like, okay, I’m gonna go into my closet and take communion and remember. We’re walking it out together. So there is a lot there. We have allies in Christ. We have people, the strong and the weak together who can help each other learn, like, I’m really struggling in this area, can you help me? And anyway, I could be going into the weeds with that sort of talk.

(23:27) Marcus Warner: Yeah, it’s very true. I think for years my view of Christianity was that it was all about me and my walk with God. That other people weren’t there to help me so much as they were to make sure I treated them right. And so I didn’t have a very relational perspective on Christianity. It was, I get in my prayer closet, I study. I do good even if nobody’s around and watching. I try to treat people the way I would want to be treated. But it was all about me and I didn’t really have this sense of a group, that this is a ‘we’, not just a ‘me’.

And it was really relatively late in my Christian journey that I intellectually knew that, but I don’t think it became a reality until… Even when I first launched Deeper Walk Ministries in 2005, it was before we became Deeper Walk International. I did not have it on the list of obstacles that needed to be overcome for Christians to walk a victorious Christian life. It just wasn’t in my thinking. Community wasn’t on the list. It was only later that I realized, wait a second, this is actually enormously important.

That’s why Michel Hendricks and Jim Wilder wrote The Other Half of Church, because there’s a lot of people who are thinking like me that Christianity is an individual journey. It’s all about me and God. They’re like, well, no, actually, there’s this whole other thing called community, and it provides the soil in which we grow. So my thinking has really been challenged on that. And how you live that out then becomes important as well. It’s good to know that if you have no option, that God is enough for you in your isolation. But it is also good to know that there’s a reason why Hebrews says, don’t forsake the gathering of yourselves together. And it’s not another legalistic command. It’s because it’s really hard to do this all by yourself.

(25:49) Stephanie Warner: Well, we are always looking for more ways to bring people on the trail into a deeper walk with God. Before we close out and get final thoughts, if somebody’s listening to this and doesn’t know Jesus, how can they enter in?

(26:19) Marcus Warner: Yeah. And this is really what Easter is all about, that ultimately I can’t do this on my own. I have to admit that I am a person in need and that I have sin that needs to be resolved. I have a gap between me and God that I can’t close by my own efforts. And I just need what God has done for me through Jesus. And so you start with an admission of the need and say, I admit that I am in need, both in terms of my behavior, in terms of my position in life and the direction that I’m heading.

And then you say, so today I’m making a choice and that I’m going to turn around and I am going to move towards you, Jesus. And I choose today to accept the finished work on the cross and what you’ve done for me. And so it starts with a choice, but it goes beyond that as you begin to form a deeper and deeper attachment with God, as you continue to walk with him. So I tend to start there and just pray, God, I acknowledge I’m a sinner.

Today I say that I have no other hope but Jesus and I choose to receive the work that Jesus has done for me. And then I would encourage you to ask Jesus, is there anything you want to show me about my life and about how this makes you feel? Just start making it relational right from the very beginning and see what comes to mind.

(28:05) Stephanie Warner: Well, if you just prayed that prayer, welcome. And what next steps would you have for somebody? Or would you recommend that people offer people?

(28:17) Marcus Warner: Yeah, again, we said this is a community thing. You want to find people you trust and let them know about the path that you’re on and the journey that you’re in. And you’re going to look for people who can give you some guidance. And it’s one of the reasons that Deeper Walk is around to try to provide guidance for people on their journey. So you can dive in there, but in the end, we’ve got that path for people to go down by taking the self-paced courses that we have. But you don’t have to wait till you buy anything, that’s not the point.

You want to get in a community as soon as you can and you want to start talking to Jesus about everything. It’s like, God, here’s this, I want to talk to you about this care and concern that I have and I want to ask you for provision about this thing in my life. And you just start talking to him about everything and paying attention to the thoughts that come back in your head as you do. You do that and begin reading your Bible and letting God speak to you through it, that’s a good start to your journey.

(29:20) Stephanie Warner:  Awesome. I’ll try to put some more thoughts into the description here. We are so pleased to offer this podcast and related content free across the world. Thank you to everybody who partners with us to keep us on the trail, whether that’s in prayer or volunteering or sharing with a friend. And thank you especially to all of our donors. You are epic and we’re glad to be with you. Father, closing thoughts for this episode.

(29:51) Marcus Warner: So we kind of summarized that Easter is not only the ultimate statement of the truth of Christianity, but it is the foundation on which we build our lives. And it’s summarized really nicely in the exchange life, we give to Jesus what’s broken in us and he gives to us what leads to life. That’s the foundation and it leads to everything else that we do. I found that no matter how long I’ve been a Christian, it just comes back to that over and over and over again. Like, it never stops.

Every day I have to give him things that are troubling me, my cares, my brokenness, my concerns, my worries, and my sin. All of those things have to keep being given over to him. And then I need to receive from him the grace that says, I love you. I’m happy with you. I’m delighted in you. I’ve got a plan for you. I know what I’m doing. We’re going into a good place. So it just never stops. And really, in some ways, the Christian life is pretty simple. It really comes down to those two things.

(31:06) Stephanie Warner: All right, next week we are starting a Building Bounce book study all about building emotional resilience and we will look forward to seeing you there.