Resurrection life! We live in the Body of Christ.

Do you remember that before you belonged to Christ you were held in a prison called Spiritual Death?

The Bible comments clearly on this in Ephesians 2: 1 – 7:

And you were dead in your trespasses and sins, in which you formerly walked according to the course of this world, according to the prince of the power of the air, of the spirit that is now working in the sons of disobedience. We were by nature children of wrath.  But God, being rich in mercy, made us alive together with Christ and raised us up with him and seated us with him in the heavenly places, in Christ Jesus.

It is this combination of despair and faith that Paul speaks about that reveals the refreshing realism of the Bible. For what Paul does in this passage is to paint a vivid contrast between what humankind is by nature and what we become by grace in and through Jesus Christ, the risen Lord.

This contrast between the spiritual death of humankind and the deliverance of God causes us to rejoice about the privilege to live the Body Life, in other words the true life found in the Church of Christ.

We once were sons and daughters of disobedience. Spiritual death and disobedience characterised our lives before we came to live in Christ. We walked according to the directions of ungodly society before we came nearer to Christ, to live in him.

Why reflect on this? That we may rejoice with enthusiasm about the Body Life we experience in the Church of Christ,  given to us in Jesus our Lord, that we may praise God with all our heart for the resurrection life, when we understand that it delivered us from our sins and from the wrath of God - and made us a people, a community of faith,  who are alive through the Spirit: sanctified, forgiven and saved.

Praise God for the grace of knowing that we now are part of Christ’s Body and a member of his chosen people, his Church. I rejoice because I am one of those who are alive in him.

Only Jesus has the key to unlock the prison of spiritual death.

And he gave me this life because he loves me.  Praise his glorious Name!