“Death and taxes” – nothing is certain but these, as the famous quote by Benjamin Franklin rings.
As believers, though, we have slightly less grim prospects and we can count on another certainty – the promise of an eternal life with God after we die because of what Jesus did on the cross for us.
I am sure most of us look forward to the day that we can spend an eternity with Him in heaven.
Yet, I would like to challenge how we think about one day when we die and how we can bring heaven down to earth while we are still alive in this fallen world.
Do you perhaps picture some kind of timeline in your mind when thinking about all this? Of life here and now until you die and then a new life in heaven?
What if life to death and death to life are actually running concurrently next to each other? While we are nearing our death on earth and aging each hour, at the same time, we are coming closer to our new life in Christ. The more we die to ourselves (the fleshly human nature) each day, the closer we get to experiencing the life that God has planned for us – the life that knows no end.
2 Cor 4:16: “Though outwardly we are wasting away, yet inwardly we are being renewed day by day.”
The irony of it all is that to be renewed inwardly, we need to die to the flesh within us to make space for the One, who can renew us daily. The “death to life” part doesn’t start when we die. It starts the moment we commit our lives to Jesus. Water baptism provides a wonderful symbolism of the death of the flesh when we go down into the water. The moment we come up out of the water we are born into our new Spirit-filled life.
God has given us a gift, not only of eternal life, but life to the full – John 10:10 (NLT) – rich and satisfying. We have the amazing promise of a fulfilling, God-enriched life on earth, the moment we lay down our fleshly lives and make space for the Holy Spirit.
It’s certainly not easy to lay down our selfish desires, and it’s the last thing Satan wants, because if the flesh is no longer alive in a spiritual sense, then he no longer has any hold on you. He cannot whisper thoughts into your ear that appeals to your fleshly desires if the self is in actual fact – dead.
The way to obtain a truly victorious life on earth is by accessing the power of God that raised Christ from the dead. But Christ had to die first before He could be raised in power. Jesus had to die first for Heaven to be opened for us. In the same way, we must die to ourselves first, before we can gain this resurrection power of God in our daily lives and concurrently we gain the ability of pulling heaven closer to earth.
Romans 8:10-11: “And Christ lives within you, so even though your body will die because of sin, the Spirit gives you life because you have been made right with God. The Spirit of God, who raised Jesus from the dead, lives in you. And just as God raised Christ Jesus from the dead, he will give life to your mortal bodies by this same Spirit living within you.”
What a pity then, if we had to die in the flesh first physically, before finding the new life God wants us to have. Spiritually, it is available to us immediately, to the extent that we are willing to die to the flesh – our human nature and the desires that are attached to it.
When Jesus hung on the cross and asked God to forgive those that crucified Him, He became our ultimate example of a life lived – dead to self. There was no self-pity, no anger or sadness or revenge planned. He didn’t even say a word while they mocked Him and tortured Him. All that mattered to Jesus was that God’s will be done. The insults and the blows to self didn’t matter because the one they were injuring, the self, was already dead even though He was still physically alive.
As we look to the cross, one of the greatest gifts we can bring Him is ourselves along with all our selfish desires and needs, and nail them to the cross. His scarred hands are big enough to take all that you have to give to Him, and in return, He will give you His peace and His freedom – in this life as well as the next.
The Faithfulness of God 