What Does it Mean to be "Crucified with Christ?"

For I through the law am dead to the law, that I might live unto God.   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. (Galatians 2.19-20)

Being crucified with Christ, we can see from the context, has something to do with being dead to the “law” (the commands of God).

The Apostle Paul had already stated in verse 19 that he was dead to the law. This had not always been true. At one time he had been very alive to the law, for it had meant everything to him. (See Philippians 1.6; Acts 22.3; Acts 23.1; Acts 26.5) At one point he thought himself to have been blameless concerning the law of God. Then, he realized that he had fallen short, saying, “And the commandment, which was ordained to life, I found to be unto death. For sin, taking occasion by the commandment, deceived me, and by it slew me.” (Romans 7.9-10). That very thing he thought was his life ended up being the instrument of his death.

It is not that there was (or is) anything at fault with the law of God, but it is in our own sinful weakness which makes us all come short of obeying it.

So now, in the Galatians verses at the top of the page, Paul is saying, having found Christ who truly brings life, that he is now “dead to the law.”

"Crucified with Christ," I believe, is a term of legality. When Jesus went to the cross and died, we (believers) died with him. Just as sure as Jesus died with our sins upon him (2 Corinthians 5.21), he truly paid the penalty of our sins through his death. In God’s eyes, judicially, we died with him. Having died with Christ, what have believers died to? We have died to the law and its demands. We no longer look to ourselves and our own obedience to make us right with God because we look to the righteous Lord Jesus Christ. Thus, we are now dead to the law.

Though there are many things in Galatians 2.20 we may not yet comprehend, we should clearly see this. Verse 19 is talking about giving up living by the law to be right with God. Verse 21 talks about abandoning any notion of being right with God through keeping the law, and verse 20 must be along the same subject too.

As a Christian, I have been crucified with Christ, meaning that I am dead to the law. I have been raised with Christ which means I am alive in him.