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life-giving union with Christ

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"For with the heart one believes and is justified..." (Romans 10:10a ESV) The heart is the chief thing in believing; for into the heart Christ is received, and in it he dwells by faith. The vital union between Christ and the believer is manifested and made  known in the heart, and there it is cemented and established. With joy can the believer say, "My Beloved is mine, and I am his!" What happiness for me -- we are but one person in the eye of the law, and our vested interests are but one. What a blessed state is this! Christ gives himself freely to the believer, who also gives himself up in faith to Christ. Christ as the believer's surety has taken his sins upon himself, and the believer takes Christ's righteousness; for Christ makes over all that he has to the believer, who by faith looks upon it and makes use of it as his own; according to that express warrant for his so doing in 1 Cor. 3: 22, 23 -- "All things are yours, because you belong to Christ
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the beginning of faith

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Before we can receive from Christ's fulness to live the Christian life, we must receive from him the salvation and righteousness that he alone provides. This we cannot attain or produce; we must receive it as a gift, for Christ alone can fulfill the Father's law for righteousness. This will become the basis of our walk of faith, Romaine says. The text below comes from his first chapter of The Life of Faith , abridged and modernized.   ==============   "For we have already charged that all, both Jews and Greeks, are under the power of sin, as it is written: 'None is righteous, no, not one; no one understands; no one seeks for God.'" (Romans 3:9-11 ESV) "So then, the law was our guardian until Christ came, in order that we might be justified by faith." (Galatians 3:24 ESV) The persons, for whom this work is written, are convinced of their own sin and of God's righteousness. Through the Holy Spirit the word of God has become real to them, teaching t
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grace upon grace

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"And from his fullness we have all received, grace upon grace." (John 1:16 ESV)  "Remember where everything relating to your walk with God is to be found. The Father’s love has laid it up all in the Son’s fulness, and it is the office of the Holy Spirit to teach you how to receive out of it, as grace upon grace. He teaches by his word. With this in your hand, and his light in your understanding, read and study what he has promised you for a safe, happy, and holy walk. Take no step without the direction of his word and  expect at every step that he will make good to you all that he has promised." (William Romaine, The Life, Walk, and Triumph of Faith , modernized) Image credit: photo above by Laura Barry on Unsplash.  
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Preface to Life of Faith

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“It is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me. And the life I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me.” (Galatians 2:20 ESV) “ His divine power has given us everything we need for life and godliness through our knowledge of him who called us by his own glory and goodness.” (2 Peter 1:3 NIV) ==========    A number of years ago I came upon a very old, leatherbound copy of William Romaine's The Walk of Faith  (New York, Williams and Whiting, 1809). I was very moved by what I read and have since found digital copies of his three major works, and a hard copy of the works combined in  The Life, Walk and Triumph of Faith,  edited by Peter Toon in 1970. William Romaine  (1714--1795)  was an  English pastor who had a great influence on the evangelical movement of his day, especially through his three works, The Life of Faith (1764), The Walk of Faith (1771), and The Triumph of Faith (1795) .  I have had a desire to update
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