As Jesus is sharing the Last Supper with his disciples he speaks to them of what is about to happen to him and to them. In Mark chapter 14, he warns them that they will all fall away and he quotes Zechariah 13:7 when he says: “I will strike the shepherd, and the sheep will be scattered.” Peter, full of faith no doubt but also pride in his own steadfastness declares, “Even if all fall away, I will not.” As I was reading this, it struck me how foolish are our declarations of “I will do this” and “I will do that” before God. We sing them a lot: “I will stand”, “I will go”, “I will trust” and so on. But if there is even just a tiny portion of pride, self-belief and self-confidence in those statements, we are as foolish as Peter in Mark 14:29. As Tim Keller says somewhere:
“Christ will do everything for you or nothing. He’s either all of your righteousness or none.”
This is why I think our new song we have just introduced ‘Yet Not I, But Through Christ In Me’ is such a powerful song and merits some reflection.
All of the glorious promises we can claim and take hold of:
- Oh how strange and divine, I can sing: all is mine;
- The night has been won and I shall overcome;
- Oh the chains are released, I can sing: I am free;
- When the race is complete, still my laps shall repeat;
are concluded with the refrain: “Yet not I, but through Christ in me”.
This is the wonder of grace; we take no credit for our redemption and we take no credit for our continuing sanctification and growing closeness and dependence on him. Even our righteous acts, our good deeds and our declarations of praise and thankfulness, ultimately stem not from ourselves, but from Christ’s work in us. Thank you Jesus!
We sang this song for the first time last week and if you haven’t listened to it properly yet by yourself I highly recommend you do that right now! It is a goldmine of incredible truth and inspiring praise.