The last issue of The Intercessor explored the first stage of God’s restoration of lost mankind: the Gospel so basic that even in our blindness we can glimpse a God in heaven, a Savior in history, the sins we’ve committed–and choose to respond by repentance and faith in Christ. This issue moves into the glorious second stage of "the totality of the Gospel." Selections from Norman Grubb’s writings explore the basis and experience of the revolutionary life-change described in Galatians 2:20: I am crucified with Christ: nevertheless I live; yet not I, but Christ liveth in me: and the life which I now live in the flesh, I live by the faith of the Son of God, who loved me, and gave himself for me. 

In the lead article, "The Total Remedy," Norman Grubb unlocks the depth of our salvation in Christ–not only release from the consequences of our sins, but also from the "compulsive cause"–the self-loving, sin nature indwelling us. This article thoroughly unfolds how "tucked away in that package of grace [when we first came to Christ] was something more revolutionary"–how we function as living sons of God. 

"The Final Stage of Restoration: The Crucified Body" unfolds exactly how God provided complete liberation from our slavery to Satan/sin through the exchange of spirit-operators at Christ’s bodily death and resurrection. Norman’s classic "Romans Six to Eight" takes us step by step through Paul’s "desperate discovery" that even as a saved "new creature in Christ," he (and we) are held in bondage to sin by Satan’s subtle lie that we can (and must) independently live the Christ life. With Paul we discover that the source of sin is "not I but the sin that dwells in me"–the sin-spirit operating me, the vessel. Focusing on our vesselhood, "The New Relationship" emphasizes the neutrality of our human vessel–contrasting the misused vessel (lusting and having not) originally seduced by Satan from its proper function and that same vessel in right use– released, cleansed and restored to its rightful Owner–"the same man in two totally different relationships, first to devils then to Jesus." In clear and concise terms, Page Prewitt’s "Crucified with Christ–What Does It Mean?" presents how Christ’s bodily death and resurrection was God’s complete solution to restore our rightful function as fully-liberated new creatures in Christ. 

Along with a solid biblical foundation, this issue offers a closer look at how to personally appropriate these truths in everyday living, There is a "Second Blessing," from Norman Grubb’s autobiography, Once Caught, No Escape, describes the personal crisis that drove him to discover that the power and love he was seeking were not qualities God could "give" him, not some change in his humanity, but qualities of God himself expressing His power and love through a human vessel. "Full Assurance of Faith" describes the pathway to a mature faith–from the early struggles in the "infancy of faith" that culminate in discerning between soul and spirit; from believing in appearances to standing by faith on fact: "They that are Christ’s have crucified the flesh with its affectations and lusts." "What the New Man has to Learn" demonstrates in the lives of Moses, Jacob, and the disciples how God brings His chosen ones through the necessary experiences in order to learn not how to eliminate the old man, but how to use the new man. "What Really is the New Man" is a masterful exposition of Galatians 2:20–Christ and I made one, Christ who is my life–the real "new I" is Christ in me–He the all, we the container. 

Finally, "Be Yourself" is an excellent examination of how we function as a fixed unity–He the Positive expressing His qualities through the negative. Normal Christian living is this "mysterious" combination of the duality in the unity. He adds a caution not to believe that our human relationship with Christ is contingent on reading the Bible, special prayer times, etc., but on a fixed faith that we are in a spirit to Spirit union with Him. So as we reflect on this second stage of the totality of the Gospel, we glimpse God’s ultimate purpose for which we were "originally created and now re-created in Christ to find our place in God and He in us."