You're Dead part 2
A dead man can't be punished for a crime. Once you die... that's it. Game over. Nothing that had a hold on you can continue to have a hold on you. You're free. And, as we saw in our key verse for this Rant series (Colossians 3:3), "For ye are dead, and you life is hid which Christ in God." You're dead, but that's not the end of your story. Because in order for the New Man to come forth, the old man had to make way. We needed, desperately needed, that second death so that we could experience the abundant, everlasting, eternal, Resurrection Life of God. His life of love. Because, if your life is hid in God... and God is love... that means your life is hid in love! That's where we find our life. We find it in love. In being loved by God and loving Him back by loving each other with that same love. Receving and releasing His love. That's how we experience it. We give it away. We share it with the people in our lives. But here's the thing: You can't give what you don't have, and you can only give what you do have. So if you're stuck on all that old man stuff--f you're letting all of your mistakes, and the lies of the world, drag you down--then you're not walking in newness of life. And it seems like, at best, we take this idea of a new life to mean "another try at the old life." We think we can fluff and buff the old man. Force him into shape through behavior modification. That's not God's plan. That's our plan. God's plan is for us to understand the complete transformation that occurred on the cross. See, in the beginning we were created in the image and likeness of God. But it wasn't until the cross that we were conformed to the image of God's beloved Son in whom He is well pleased. Its the idea of NOT eating from the tree of knowledge of good and evil. We think if we eat the good and not the bad we'll be ok. But that's just swinging from different branches on the same tree. What we need is an entirely different tree. The Tree of Life. Because that Tree only has one fruit--the Fruit of the Spirit, which is love. You are what you eat, right? Feasting on love is how we know and believe that love is in us. And knowing and believing that love is in us is what lets that love come out of us. We're not an old man trying to be a "better Christian." That old man died in the watery grave of baptism. We're dead. Double dead, in fact. Adam, and all of humanity that was represented in him, was the walking dead after eating the poisoned fruit from the wrong tree. Then Jesus came, wrapped us all up in Him, and died on the cross. That was the second death. The death of death. That was when everything old passed away. And something NEW came forth. That New... is you. "Therefore if any man be in Christ, he is a new creature: old things are passed away; behold, all things are become new" (2 Corinthians 5:17). In order to get to the New we had to get rid of the old. And by "we" I mean Jesus. HE got rid of the old. We're dead, but our life is hid in him. We're dead, but yet we live. In Him. As He lives in us. In us, and through us, and as us. So leave all that stuff--guilt, pain, bitterness, etc.--behind. It can't hold you back anymore. That guy who did all that is dead. And we can now walk in newness of life!