Second Death part 5
You have to die if you want to live forever. Or, rather, you have to understand that you DID die 2,000 years ago on an old rugged cross when Jesus died. His death was our death. That's why, now, His life--His abundant, everlasting, eternal, Resurrection Life of love--is our life. We can only experience Jesus' life by letting Him live His own life in us, and through us, and as us. And we can only do that after first identifying with His death. Out of the second death--the death OF death--comes newness of life. Out of ashes comes the consuming fire of love. And the key is to see this finished work behind us instead of in front of us. Dying is not something we need to do. It's something we already did. When Hebrews 9:27 says, "...it is appointed unto men once to die, but after this the judgment," we need to understand that JESUS kept that appointment! And us IN Him. It is appointed unto men ONCE to die. When Paul said, "I die daily," he was talking about the literal danger of physical death that he was in because of his preaching of the gospel. He wasn't talking about needing to die over and over again. We are crucified with Christ. His death was our death. That's why His life can be our life. So we need to stop looking forward to something that already happened. That's why we miss it. We need to look back to what already happened so we can enjoy the fruit of Christ's labor. We need to see that our death is behind us. We need to stop thinking so much about the "afterlife" and focus on the life that we have right now. The gift of God that is His everlasting life. Did you catch that? Everlasting. What is "after" everlasting? I don't see how anything could be. If our new life never ends, there is no way anything could be "after" it. Things change, yes. Always have and always will. Only Jesus is the same yesterday, today, and tomorrow. And that's where we stand, and why we can stand, no matter what changes all around us. That's why we can be who we were created to be no matter what. I think, honestly, we are too ready, willing, and able to settle. That, to me, is one reason why something so drastic had to happen. Something to shock us out of our "comfort zone." Pink Floyd sang about being comfortably numb. And I think that, unfortunately, is where a lot of us are at. We're just going through the motions. Stuck in a rut. And we know that a rut is just a grave with the ends kicked out. We accept life as we know it even though there is so much more available to us. The Kingdom of God is at hand. It is within reach. All we need to do is grab it. Fight the good fight of faith and lay hold of the gift we've been given. Stop trying to get something we think we haven't got by being someone we're not. Embrace who we are. Let Jesus show us who we are. And the shift--from death to life--comes from the death (our second death, the death of death), burial, and resurrection of Jesus! Because when He was lifted up from the cross He drew us all into Himself. From that moment on whatever happened to Him happened to us. After death came the judgment. Death WAS NOT the judgment. God raising His Son (and, again, us in Him) back to life was the judgment! The second death, death and hell being cast into the lake of fire, was simply the mechanism God used to get us out of death and into life. Jesus said the greatest love a man could have was to lay His life down for His friends. He told us what love is, and then SHOWED us what love is. So that we can experience His love--His life--by receiving it and releasing it. So that His death could be our death and HIs life can now be our life!