In Christ Alone

Dear GCI Family and Friends,

We live in a world that champions the self-made individual. We are conditioned to look within for strength, and to build our own kingdoms on the foundation of personal achievement. The deeper we slide into this culture of self-reliance, the more exhausted and fractured we become.

But the message of the Christian gospel offers a radical, counter-cultural alternative. True peace and Kingdom Living require a complete reversal of this mindset — and Jesus has accomplished this reversal in our humanity. He has freed us from the burden of self-reliance.

By the Spirit, kingdom life means deliberately rejecting self-reliance and relying solely on Christ’s finished work on our behalf. Our reliance on Christ is not what secures our place in his kingdom; it is our response to the grace that has already secured us in him. The beloved hymn, “In Christ Alone,” beautifully reminds us:

In Christ alone my hope is found,
He is my light, my strength, my song;
this Cornerstone, this solid ground,
firm through the fiercest drought and storm.[1]

These lyrics ring loud in my heart and when we sing these words, we perform an act of surrender. We confess that our own strength is frail, our own righteousness is insufficient, and our own wisdom is blind. We are reminded of his grace, this Cornerstone, this solid ground.

Our lives are anchored in Jesus, who did not merely watch our suffering from a distance; he stepped into our human reality, taking on our flesh and bone. Jesus lived the perfect life we could never live, completely empty of self-reliance, perfectly dependent on the Father through the power of the Spirit. In him alone, we stand.

I am reminded of Jesus’ monumental cry while hanging on the cross. He uttered the definitive declaration: “It is finished” (John 19:30). This was not a cry of defeat, but a shout of absolute victory. The debt of humanity was paid in full, and the broken cosmos was reconciled to the Creator. Because of his finished work on our behalf, our spiritual striving can finally end and we can rest in Christ alone.

Living out the kingdom life, therefore, looks like a daily surrender of ourselves as our response to Christ’s finished work. It means waking up each morning and acknowledging that our standing before God is not based on how well we can perform, but on how perfectly Christ performed for us.

Our identity is unshakeable because it is grounded in Christ alone. His faithfulness, not the strength of our faith, holds us securely. Through the Holy Spirit, we are continually drawn to trust the One who has already made us his own. Earthly kingdoms rise and fall, and self-reliance will always fail us when the storms of life hit. But the finished work of Jesus is an immovable rock. As the song declares: “No pow’r of hell, no scheme of man can ever pluck me from His hand.”

Because of what Christ accomplished on the cross, we are enabled to rest in his finished work and empowered by the Spirit to live boldly, love selflessly, and mirror the beautiful reality of his kingdom. As a global GCI community, we will continue moving forward by relying entirely on Christ alone. We rest in his perfect peace and stand united as one Body to pursue a kingdom life that points directly to our living King, Jesus Christ. I invite you to pray continually with me for Grace Communion International as we move into the exciting new season God has in store for us.

In Christ alone,
Heber Ticas, Vice President

[1] “In Christ Alone” 2001. Melody composed by Keith Getty. Lyrics written by Stuart Townsend.

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