Life and Death

Life and Death

You were dead in trespasses and sins....[Ephesians 2:1]

Though I am a spiritual being, my understanding is mostly of the flesh. To me, life or death is more vivid in the flesh sense than in the spiritual sense. As I look back my life before being found by the Lord, many regrets arise in me. That's the extent of my perception of death.

Life and death are as far from each other as the east is far from the west. But life and death are apart only by a few yards or meters in my mind.

I cannot understand death without understanding life, for death becomes vivid when it is contrasted to life. The more vivid life becomes, the more vivid death becomes. I am a teacher myself and a confession like "I was truly death in my trespasses and sins" must be real and vivid. But I don't have that confession in me.

Years ago, after the Lord gave me an assignment, he said, "If you do this well, you will receive life as prize." If I do anything for the Lord, it is to earn this prize of life. My understanding of life is clearer now than then. But I have yet to live a true life. A true life I can live only when I live according to the commands of my Lord Jesus. Until my heart is engulfed by the zeal to please the Lord, I am not living a true life. Until then, I will not be able to understand death as God said to Adam, "You will certainly die."
 

Eph 2:8 For by grace are ye saved through faith; and that not of yourselves: it is the gift of God:
Eph 2:9 Not of works, lest any man should boast.

2Pe 1:2
Grace and peace be multiplied unto you through the knowledge of God, and of Jesus our Lord,
2Pe 1:3 According as his divine power hath given unto us all things that pertain unto life and godliness, through the knowledge of him that hath called us to glory and virtue:
2Pe 1:4 Whereby are given unto us exceeding great and precious promises: that by these ye might be partakers of the divine nature, having escaped the corruption that is in the world through lust.
2Pe 1:5 And beside this, giving all diligence, add to your faith virtue; and to virtue knowledge;
2Pe 1:6 And to knowledge temperance; and to temperance patience; and to patience godliness;
2Pe 1:7 And to godliness brotherly kindness; and to brotherly kindness charity.
2Pe 1:8 For if these things be in you, and abound, they make you that ye shall neither be barren nor unfruitful in the knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ.

IKTCA diligence is certainly important but it is important to remember that salvation is agift- the price for this most valuable treasure is paid in full. We must die to our old ways of thinking and believe the Word of God above all else. A good study in the book of Ephesians can reveal all you are in Christ- it is this inner man that is:
Eph 4:23 And be renewed in the spirit of your mind;
Eph 4:24 And that ye put on the new man, which after God is created in righteousness and true holiness.
 
Philippians 3:13-15

http://www.biblegateway.com/bg_versions/bgclick.php?what=34 13Brethren, I count not myself to have apprehended: but this one thing I do, forgetting those things which are behind, and reaching forth unto those things which are before,


14I press toward the mark for the prize of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus. 15Let us therefore, as many as be perfect, be thus minded: and if in any thing ye be otherwise minded, God shall reveal even this unto you.
:israel::groupray:
 
Let us glory in the Lord

You were dead in trespasses and sins....[Ephesians 2:1]

Though I am a spiritual being, my understanding is mostly of the flesh. To me, life or death is more vivid in the flesh sense than in the spiritual sense. As I look back my life before being found by the Lord, many regrets arise in me. That's the extent of my perception of death.

Life and death are as far from each other as the east is far from the west. But life and death are apart only by a few yards or meters in my mind.

I cannot understand death without understanding life, for death becomes vivid when it is contrasted to life. The more vivid life becomes, the more vivid death becomes. I am a teacher myself and a confession like "I was truly death in my trespasses and sins" must be real and vivid. But I don't have that confession in me.

Years ago, after the Lord gave me an assignment, he said, "If you do this well, you will receive life as prize." If I do anything for the Lord, it is to earn this prize of life. My understanding of life is clearer now than then. But I have yet to live a true life. A true life I can live only when I live according to the commands of my Lord Jesus. Until my heart is engulfed by the zeal to please the Lord, I am not living a true life. Until then, I will not be able to understand death as God said to Adam, "You will certainly die."

As Larry has showed us through scripture one can never "earn" the prize of life. Doing "well" is simply a genuine heart response of God's love for mankind revealed at the cross (Romans 10:10). We love Him because He first loved us." 1 John 4:19.

Jesus gives us a great parable to point this out:

"... the kingdom of heaven is like a certain king [Christ Jesus] who wanted to settle accounts, one was brought to Him who owed Him ten thousand talents." [With this amount of money there is NO WAY the servant could ever pay the debt [of sin].

But the servant said, "and I will pay you all." "The master [Christ], of that servant was moved with compassion, released him, and forgave him the debt" (Matt. 18:21:35). [How did Christ forgive the servant? By paying the debt for him, you and me].

Before we do anything at all--repent, confess, or even believe, God has already done something extremely significant. He "has reconciled the world to Himself" by "not counting men's sins against them." "ALL things are of God." Every possibility of human boasting and merit is completely blotted out of the picture.

In Christ Jesus He is our "righteousness and sanctification and redemption--that, as it is written, He who glories, let him glory in the Lord" (1 Cor. 1:30:31).

blessings to you in Christ,
John

In Himself, Christ has already forgiven the whole human race. Our message is to give that message of "reconciliation."
 
Life and Death

You were dead in trespasses and sins....[Ephesians 2:1]

Though I am a spiritual being, my understanding is mostly of the flesh. To me, life or death is more vivid in the flesh sense than in the spiritual sense. As I look back my life before being found by the Lord, many regrets arise in me. That's the extent of my perception of death.

Life and death are as far from each other as the east is far from the west. But life and death are apart only by a few yards or meters in my mind.

I cannot understand death without understanding life, for death becomes vivid when it is contrasted to life. The more vivid life becomes, the more vivid death becomes. I am a teacher myself and a confession like "I was truly death in my trespasses and sins" must be real and vivid. But I don't have that confession in me.

Greetings,

You have made some very astounding and yet humbling comments. Thanks for being so very forthright and vulnerable.

I know little, but I believe the answer to the life and death question is summed up by Paul's statement. "For I determined not to know anything among you except Jesus Christ and Him crucified" (1 Cor. 2:2).

To appreciate life perhaps we need to understand what kind of death Christ died to at the cross. Was it merely a physical death as Mel Gibson gave us in his movie The Passion of the Christ?

The first death, in a sense, is not really death at all. Jesus called it sleep. The story of the young maiden, "Weep not; she is not dead, but sleepeth" (Luke 8:52). The people "laughed Him to scorn, knowing that she was dead" (vs. 53). ... Consider Lazarus. Jesus, speaking to the disciples, Our friend Lazarus sleepeth; but I go, that I may awake him" The disciples did not understand, finally Jesus said, "Lazarus is dead" (John 11:11-14).

Jesus preferred to call the physical death sleep. That's really not the ultimate death, He seems to be saying.

With this background on the physical death, what about the second death? Jesus said, "... fear Him which is able to destroy both soul and body in hell" (Matt. 10:28). The first is merely the killing of the body. But the second death is utter destruction, encompassing both body and soul. [The idea of the immortality of the soul is a Plato, Roman Catholic teaching]. Only God is immortal, according to scripture anyway.

In the end-time book of Revelation, we encounter the second death. Chapter twenty describes the destiny of the saved as well as the final demise of those who have chosen to reject the salvation of Christ. Of the saved it says, "on such the second death hath no power" (Rev. 2):6). Remember the fire from heaven is not the whole picture of the second death. The second death encompasses both body and soul.

The wages of sin is death, not merely sleep, or a physical death. Hence we can "begin" to appreciate life and God's unfailing love when we comprehend that Christ died the equivalent of the second death, the eternal death, or second death. Christ Jesus was to say goodbye to eternity for us miserable sinners. Now that's love!

The Bible does not necessarily tell us to DO something but to comprehend something. "... that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith; that you, being rooted and grounded in love, may be able to COMPREHEND with all the saints what is the width and length and depth and height--to know the love of Christ which passes knowledge; that you may be filled with all the fullness of God" (Eph. 3:17-19).

blessings in Christ,
John
 
Sometimes life becomes real when contrasted to death. Years ago one of my Sunday school students lost her father. I loved her much for I could see her heart committed to the Lord. When I saw her crying at her father's funeral, I was torn of grief. I could not hold it and walked out to the open field of the cemetery and cried to the Lord. Then understanding came: there has to be life that overcomes the death and the grief of death.

Where, O death, is your victory?
Where, O death, is your sting? [1 Corinthians]

Let the aroma of life remove the stench of death from me, now and forever. Amen.
 
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