DO YOU BRING LIFE OR DEATH?

Date: Mon Sep 17 23:41:18 2007

Everyone likes to be known as a bringer of life. No one wants to be known for bringing death. The Bible has a different idea. What is it?

Let's start with Romans chapter 6Ö

What shall we say, then? Shall we go on sinning so that grace may increase? By no means! We died to sin; how can we live in it any longer? Know you not, that so many of us as were baptized into Jesus Christ were baptized into his death? Therefore we are buried with him by baptism into death: that like as Christ was raised up from the dead by the glory of the Father, even so we also should walk in newness of life. For if we have been planted together in the likeness of his death, we shall be also in the likeness of his resurrection: Knowing this, that our old man is crucified with him, that the body of sin might be destroyed, that henceforth we should not serve sin. Knowing that Christ being raised from the dead dieth no more; death hath no more dominion over him. Likewise reckon you also yourselves to be dead indeed unto sin, but alive unto God through Jesus Christ our Lord. Let not sin therefore reign in your mortal body, that you should obey it in the lusts thereof.

Most calls for salvation today only present at most half the picture ñ NEW LIFE IN CHRIST! However, we have to die before we can live. The old man must be crucified and put to death in order than the new man can emerge by the Holy Spirit. The reason that so many people claim to be born again without any evidence of repentance or a changed life goes back to the fact that not as many people would respond to an altar call based upon Galations 2:20.

I have been crucified with Christ and I no longer live, but Christ lives in me. The life I live in the body, I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me.

Death is a dirty word in our culture and also in the ìpositive thinkingî church. Everyone wants a shortcut to glory, with all the bells and whistles and material blessings they can possibly accumulate to make their lives on earth and in heaven the best they can me. How many preachers have you heard say, ìI want to know Christ and the power of his resurrection and the fellowship of sharing in his sufferings, becoming like him in his death, 11and so, somehow, to attain to the resurrection from the dead.î That was preached the man entrusted to write more New Testament books than any other. (Paul to the Philippians, 3:10-11)

We need to bring life AND death. We need to identify with Christ in his death, not only in baptism and not only in communion, but also in our DAILY LIVES. Read Romans 8:13, ìFor if you live after the flesh, you shall die: but if you through the Spirit do mortify the deeds of the body, you shall live.î

How do we bring about this kind of death? First, we exemplify what it means to have died to the world and its lusts. We do not rely upon the flesh or on religious rules and practices. We rely on Christ and Christ alone.

Since you died with Christ to the basic principles of this world, why, as though you still belonged to it, do you submit to its rules: "Do not handle! Do not taste! Do not touch!"? These are all destined to perish with use, because they are based on human commands and teachings." Colossians 2:20-22

"Wherefore, my brethren, you also are become dead to the law by the body of Christ; that you should be married to another, even to him who is raised from the dead, that we should bring forth fruit unto God." Romans 7:4

This is not a one-time occurrence at the altar when we first come into Christís kingdom. No, it is an ongoing process from which we only graduate when Christ receives us into our heavenly home. Many believe that they have an onward-upward-ever-more-glorious calling. Now that is true, but the way we go to higher heights in Christ is to be in the harness of the Lord (Bill Britton has an excellent article on that). Donít think you have ever graduated. My experience is that the more territory you come into in the kingdom of our Lord, the bigger the test. There is no getting around it.

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. For we which live are always delivered unto death for Jesus' sake, that the life also of Jesus might be made manifest in our mortal flesh.

2 Corinthians 4:10

Donít you want the life of Jesus made manifest in you? If you do, follow the instructions of the Holy Spirit as written by Paul in Colossians 3:5. It all must go. Nothing impure can stand before God.

Put to death, therefore, whatever belongs to your earthly nature: sexual immorality, impurity, lust, evil desires and greed, which is idolatry.

Be sure that you live a crucified life where your desires donít matter. Only the Fatherís. Jesus had many desires I am sure. However, all he cared about and all he lived for was to do his Fatherís will. If we do that, we will enable others to put to death the carnal nature and to have real, genuine, and unadulterated NEW LIFE that WILL change the world. There are no shortcuts in God, but as surely as Christ is risen, we to shall have his pure and holy and glorious life AND power in us if in fact we allow ourselves to be crucified with him. Letís bring the messages of death AND life so that all those we minister to will in fact live not for themselves, but for our precious Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ.