Rom 6:1-4
1 What shall we say then? Shall we continue in sin that grace may abound?
2 Certainly not! How shall we who died to sin live any longer in it?
3 Or do you not know that as many of us as were baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into His death?
4 Therefore we were buried with Him through baptism into death, that just as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, even so we also should walk in newness of life.
(NKJ)
There is no mincing words here. The Holy Spirits tells us you can either live in the old life or die to that life and live in the new life. However, you can't live in both the old life and the new life. When I was born again in 1996 I came across these verses and I couldn't help but shout in my spirit for joy. This is exacltey what I had done when I turn to Jesus. I said to my old natural man "I don't want you around, I am tired of you, and I am taking to the cross to die. After you breath your last I am going to buried you once and forever." Then my pastor at the time buried me deep in a baptismal tank full of water. Friends what was happening was no sad funeral service. It was time to celebrate! A child of God had been born and my sinful life was buried with Jesus.
What a clear picture Paul gives us of what takes place when we leave our old life and step into our new life with Christ Jesus. In fact he compares it to our own death and beginning a new life. This is interesting because all that we know on this earth is that we have been given life and someday we will experience death. Here Paul compares coming to Jesus Christ as experience death in this life and given a new life. And death and life and life and death are definative experiences because they only happen once to us in the physical world.
When we turn our lives to Christ we cross over from our lives in this world and step into God's kingdom. However, we cannot step into God's kingdom in our current natural man. The natural man is sin ridden and flesh driven. Our natural man has one master and one will. It's own alone. We cannot live in God's kingdom unless we have given our will over to the Lordship of Jesus Christ. There is no two rulers in God's kingdom. It doesn't work that way nor will it ever work that way. God's kingdom is not yours and Jesus. You have no right or authority to rule with Jesus Christ in His kingdom. And it is the natural man that wants to rule all and will not give over its own will unless it benefits itself in some way. So how are we brought over into God's kingdom? Well Jesus said we must be born again (John 3) if we are to enter into the kingdom of God. Jesus also said that we cannot be born again into God's kingdom by our own physical effort. Jesus makes it clear that we are born again by and through the power of the Spirit of God. So regardless of what any religion may falsely teach in the world the only way possible for us to cross over into the kingdom of God is by the power of God.
Now if the power of God is the determining factor in translating us from this worldly kingdom into the kingdom of God and our natural man cannot inherit the kingdom of God, then what happens to our natural man when God births us into the glorious kingdom of His Son Jesus Christ?
Simple put. It dies and is required to be buried! And this is where God speak to us so clearly in this text. When God's power brings us into His kingdom our natural man dies in the process. There is no passing from this kingdom to Christ kingdom expecting to live in the natural man. It dies just as Christ physical body died on the cross. In the same manner when we turn to God in our natural man to receive Jesus Christ as savior from our sins and the wrath to come we also yield to His Lordship. This means we are ready to relinquish or natural man's will over to Jesus. And as Jesus on the cross said unto the Father, "It is finished...into your hands I commit my spirit." we too say unto Jesus Christ "it is finished...into your hands I commit my will." Since Christ died physically for us in our place we do not need to offer ourselves physically as a sacrifice unto God for our own sins.
Now this leaves us in this world and still in our physical body. But this is the miracle and the supernatural work of the Spirit of God. And it is the greatest of all miracles. When we turn away from the world and our desire to sin and we receive Jesus Christ as our payment for our sins and relinquish our will over to Him God miraculously transforms you and I into a new creation! A new life is given to you and I and one in which God is present in you and with you. But what about that old man. The one that desired its own will. What happened to it. Well this is what is supposed to have happened to it. We took it to a tomb. In fact Jesus left one empty for us. And we put that old natural man in that tomb and buried it. At least that is what Paul is referencing in this text. How can we live in sin which can only be possible when our natural man is living if we buried that old natural man in the empty tomb Jesus left for it?
Is that to say we can never fall into sin? Heavens no! It is the living in sin that gives life to our natural man. You and I have to be ready and devoted to live out the remainder of our life in this body in the new man created by God. We have to be prepared to tell the old man that you are dead and I no longer desire you to live in me. We must be focused on living in Christ and His power which gives supernatural life to my new man. And when the old man begins to attempt to take over ownership of your will, and when the old man is drawing you into sin and separating you from Jesus Christ, and when the old man is gaining its old grip in your heart there is only one place you need to take it.
TAKE IT TO THE EMPTY TOMB JESUS LEFT OPEN AND AVAILABLE TO US...
AND BURY IT!!!
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