We must die.
There are various deaths we must consider.
When God told Adam and Eve if they ate of the fruit of the forbidden tree then they would die, did they breath no more upon that first bite? Did their hearts stop beating in that moment? No and no. Death was promised to be the result of their action and it was, it just was not instantaneous.
There is the first death and the second death.
Rev_2:11 He that hath an ear, let him hear what the Spirit saith unto the churches; He that overcometh shall not be hurt of the second death.
Rev_20:6 Blessed and holy is he that hath part in the first resurrection: on such the second death hath no power, but they shall be priests of God and of Christ, and shall reign with him a thousand years.
Rev_20:14 And death and hell were cast into the lake of fire. This is the second death.
Rev_21:8 But the fearful, and unbelieving, and the abominable, and murderers, and whoremongers, and sorcerers, and idolaters, and all liars, shall have their part in the lake which burneth with fire and brimstone: which is the second death.
The first death is the death millions and millions of people have experienced over the last six thousand or so years. The first death is the death that those you have known and loved and are no longer with us have experienced. This death sleep is a reality, but the resurrection promised by Christ when the last trump sounds and Christ returns is equally a reality. The dead in Christ will rise then.
1Th_4:16 For the Lord himself shall descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of the archangel, and with the trump of God: and the dead in Christ shall rise first
From Adam to the very last person that dies in Christ, with Christ as their Savior- they will all rise from their graves to meet Christ in the air.
Heb 11:39 And these all, having obtained a good report through faith, received not the promise:
Heb 11:40 God having provided some better thing for us, that they without us should not be made perfect.
Act 2:29 Men and brethren, let me freely speak unto you of the patriarch David, that he is both dead and buried, and his sepulchre is with us unto this day.
Act 2:34 For David is not ascended into the heavens
The patriarch, the second king of Israel, David died long before the Apostles were born and we know truthfully that He was NOT in heaven yet. There was the promise of heaven for him just like the promise exists for us.
There is yet another death we must consider.
1Co 15:31 I protest by your rejoicing which I have in Christ Jesus our Lord, I die daily
2Co 4:10 Always bearing about in the body the dying of the Lord Jesus, that the life also of Jesus might be made manifest in our body.
2Co 11:23 Are they ministers of Christ? (I speak as a fool) I am more; in labours more abundant, in stripes above measure, in prisons more frequent, in deaths oft.
2Co 4:11 For we which live are alway delivered unto death for Jesus' sake, that the life also of Jesus might be made manifest in our mortal flesh.
Gal 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.
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We must die to self as we choose to live for Christ. Our lives truly are forfeit because we have no power to save ourselves. There is nothing we can do to give ourselves eternal life, we have to choose Jesus Christ so HE can give eternal life to us.
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Says Paul in Galatians 3:27, "For as many of you as have been baptized into Christ have put on Christ." In Romans he says, "As many of us as were baptized into Jesus Christ were baptized into His death." But if we died with Christ we are bound and certain to live again, for Christ is alive. Here we can forcibly apply the words of Peter in Acts 2:24: "Whom God hath raised up, having loosed the pains of death, because it was not possible that he should be holden of it." It was utterly impossible that death should hold Christ.
Therefore if we died with Him and in our death are united with Him, we shall also live with Him. The great thought around which the whole Bible clusters is death and resurrection with Christ.
If we die with Him, we shall live again.
We die with Him--when? Now!
When we acknowledge our life forfeited and give up all claims to that life and everything that is connected with it, that very moment we die with Christ.
Now what is this giving up of our life? Life stands for everything that a man has. It stands for everything that pertains to life. What is it, then, that pertains to the life that we naturally have in ourselves? It is sin! It is the lust of the flesh and the lust of the eyes and the pride of life. It is envy, malice, evil speaking, evil thinking--all these things make up the natural life, because we see that every man that has the natural life has these things. They are a part of his life. They enter into the life of every man on earth.
When we come to that place where we see that we have those things and are ready to give them up and pay the forfeit, then it is that we can die with Christ and take His sinless life in their stead.
In yielding up that life of ours, we give up all these things, and when they are all given up, then we are dead with Christ.
But just as surely as we give them up and die with Christ, just so surely must we be raised again, for Christ is risen, and we then walk in newness of life.
That new life--that newness of life which we have, is the life of Christ, and it is a sinless life. Knowing this, "that our old man is crucified with Him, that the body of sin might be destroyed, that henceforth we might not serve sin."
Here is the secret of all missionary effort. When a man comes to the point where in very deed he reckons that he has no life of his own and he gives up the forfeited life which he did have in his possession and the life he lives in the flesh he lives by faith in the Son of God; then Christ is his life, and his life is "hid with Christ in God." He has been raised to newness of life by faith in the operation of God. What can that man fear of what man can do to him? What will he fear of what man will say of him? He will say to himself, It is not I, but Christ that liveth in me.
What will it matter to him if he is called to go to an unhealthful locality? His life has already been yielded up, so that death has no terrors for him. He goes willingly, "not taking his life in his hand," but leaving it in the keeping of Christ in God. If Christ, in whom his life is hid, wishes to allow him to sleep for awhile, it is all right. Moreover he is not discouraged by difficulties in the work to which Christ has assigned him, for he has practical knowledge of the power of Christ and he knows that He who cast down the high things that had exalted themselves in his own heart against Christ is able to subdue all things unto Himself. The life that he lives is the life of Christ, provided only, that every moment of his life he yields himself and is as thoroughly consecrated as he was at the time he died.
It is necessary that we die continually and that we continually know the power of God and of the resurrection of Christ. For "we are saved by his life." We must know and experience the same power that God wrought in Christ when He raised Him from the dead. We take that power--How? "Buried with him in baptism, wherein also ye are risen with him through the faith of the operation of God, who hath raised him from the dead."
It is simply a matter of making the resurrection of Christ a practical thing in our own lives. It is simply believing that what God could do for Christ, as He lay in the grave, He can do for us. That power which brought Christ from the dead can keep us alive from the dead. If we have the life of Christ and it is working in us, it must do for us all that it did for Him when he was in Galilee and Judea
More on this tomorrow by the grace of our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ! All through His love! His amazing love always!
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