Present your Bodies (Part 3)

Present your Bodies (Part 3)

Where is the dead body going to get life from?

1Cor 15:45  And so it is written, The first man Adam was made a living soul; the last Adam was made a quickening spirit.

God breathed into the nostrils of the man, and he became a living soul. But since the fall of Adam, man is now dead in trespasses and sins. Where’s man going to get life from now? The law? Philosophy? Science?

Rom 8:10  And if Christ be in you, the body is dead because of sin; but the Spirit is life because of righteousness.

The law of sin and death is no longer the only law operating in a believer. There is now another law operating within them too; the law of life and righteousness that frees them from the law of sin and death.

Rom 8:2  For the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus hath made me free from the law of sin and death.

Rom 8:11  But if the Spirit of him that raised up Jesus from the dead dwell in you, he that raised up Christ from the dead shall also quicken your mortal bodies by his Spirit that dwelleth in you.

Now, note. This is not talking about your redeemed, glorified body! This is the body you have right now! What quickens it? The Spirit of God, the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus. How? The most important thing that we as believers can do today is to make sure we regularly have good doses of the Spirit of God. This is not the one-shot deal when you got saved. This is the continual doses of faith and edification that we get from the word of God. The Bible says, “The just shall live by faith.” Rom_1:17. Where does faith come from? “Faith cometh by hearing the word of God.” Rom_10:17. We cannot function outside of the word of God. We cannot become useful for God when we are not able to walk in the newness of the life [spirit]. Paul said,

Rom 7:5  For when we were in the flesh, the motions of sins, which were by the law, did work in our members to bring forth fruit unto death.

Did you see what Paul said? The motions of sin. That is an interesting phrase. The motions of sin worked in our flesh to bring death. Well, if there are the motions of sin, then we, as believers, who are under a new law, can now also have the motions of life. When we get the spirit of the Word operating in us, 1Cor 2:12, the motions of that Spirit, the law of that Spirit of life, becomes functional and operational inside us and it will begin to bring our dead body to functional life so that we might walk in NEWNESS of life.

Rom 6:4  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. 

Let’s just recap on the above statements. The motions of sin in our flesh are our default state. We do not have to do ANYTHING special to have this state operate within us. We can simply wake up in the morning and we will be walking according to the motions of sin and death. This is the reality of the flesh. But thank God, there is another reality that we can partake in. God’s word [spirit] can raise us up, like He did Christ, and fill us with the motions of life and righteousness, not by the letter of law, but by the liberty of the spirit.

The scripture above says that we are buried with Christ. Dead men cannot do anything. The motions of life and righteousness is not something that we can manufacture or manifest ourselves. This is God’s work. It is God’s doing, and God performs this work through the spirit of His word. The motions of righteousness, the newness of life, is breathed into us as we partake of the written Word. The Spirit of God, the life of God, the essence of His being, His will, His ways, and His thoughts, are encapsulated in the written words we partake in as we spend time in His Word.

We are informed that these motions of sin are produced in us by the knowledge of the law. Thus, to have the motions of life and righteousness produced in us, we are to partake of the Word of God. Just like a woman, who being married to a husband, when that husband dies, the woman is free to be married to another man. Similarly, we are loosed from the law through the death of Christ, but that doesn't mean that righteousness just starts working in us automatically.

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

We were freed from the law to be married to another, even to Him that is raised from the dead. It is that union to the risen Saviour that is going to bring forth fruit acceptable to God, not us doing anything. It's our submission to Christ, our commitment and obedience to the Word of God, that will quicken the motions of His life and righteousness in us and bring forth the fruit of God in our lives. We need to get into the Word of God. That is where the spirit life comes from, Jn.6.63.