What Do You Think? Wednesday
In order to live, something has to die. We see this in all of nature. Animals kill other animals so they can live. Humans kill animals to give life to humans. Even vegetarians eat fruits and vegetables that have begun to slowly lose their nutrients after they are picked. That’s a death so vegetarians can live. Death is a part of the cycle of life. Just like something has to die in the physical to give physical life, the same is true in order to give spiritual life. The physical body has to die so that the spiritual man might live. Christians are obligated to die to their physical bodies so their spirit might live and they are obligated to explain this process to nonbelievers.
Everyone needs to know that God the Father sent Jesus—God the Son—to die so that we might live. But just like taking in the food for it to be effective, we must take Jesus in. We can’t just have as a fact that Jesus died on the cross for the sins of mankind, which means each of us personally, but we must confess with our mouths and believe in our hearts that Jesus did this for us. We do this after acknowledging that we are dead (that we continuously sin when we don’t want to but are incapable of restraining ourselves) and want life and that Jesus is the only one who can give us this life according to His own testimony (Romans 10:9-10; John 14:6-7). Some say Jesus never said He was God. True. He didn’t say it literally but He spoke metaphorically and the people understood exactly what He was saying (John 6:26-58, 8:58-59 and 10:32-42). A perfect God took on a body and lived a perfect human life to die for my imperfect life that I might live through Him. What an awesome God!
In gratitude to His awesome work, we are obligated to the awesome work of dying to ourselves—our desires, actions and thoughts—that don’t bring God glory. No one wants to die but dying is the only way that we get life, a full, vibrant, peaceful and productive one all given from the Son. So if something seems not to be working in your life you just may be in the process of dying so that life can spring forth. If things aren’t working out and you haven’t made a conscious decision to die, surely God is working on your behalf to rid your life of those dead things blocking the life He wants to bring. Don’t fight the dissolution of unhealthy friendships or the removal from certain circumstances. This may be God’s strategic move to help you through the death cycle. Let God have His way. Choosing spiritual life is up to you (Deuteronomy 30:19).
What do you think needs to die so that you have the spiritual life God intends for you to have? Also, why don’t you read the posts at the following links that talk about life and death? Please, tell me what you think.