He Has Abolished Death
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II Tim.1:10 - But is now made manifest by the appearing of our Savior Jesus Christ, who has abolished death and has brought life and immortality to light through this gospel.
Think of that, our Lord and magnificent Savior has abolished death through His gospel work. The common fear every human has is the fear of death, and yet for the believer Christ has abolished it. Jesus said, “I AM the resurrection and the life, he that believes on me though he were dead yet shall he live!”. Death is not just the cessation of breathing or heartbeats, death is this entire world.
I Jn.2:17 - And the world passeth away, and the lust thereof: but he that doeth the will of God abideth for ever.
This world is dying, sometimes slowly but many times rapidly. All who hold to this world are clinging to and enjoying a death bed stranger, a continuing corruption that indeed corrupts all those who touch it. We in this part of the world are seeing a deception and are being enticed with death. This death, the death that inhabits this world, sometimes appears as entertainment, and sometimes as love, and sometimes as money, and sometimes as success, and sometimes as religion, and many times as something to be desired. And yet, regardless of its thin veneer of attraction, it is still death. Death to the soul, death to the emotions, death to faith, and death to any productive journey in pursuing to know Christ and His glory more deeply.
But Christ has abolished death for His followers if we will walk in His life and reject this world. Yes we are in this world but we are not of this world. It is when we consider ourselves part and parcel of this carousel of death, enjoying its delicacies and participating in its deception, that we lose the power of Christ’s life. What a disaster and what a colossal loss when we trade the glory of the Risen Christ and His life for the unproductive death of this world. The Word says that:
I Jn.2:15 - Love not the world, neither the things that are in the world. If any man love the world, the love of the Father is not in him.
No man can serve two masters, he will love one and hate the other. So if we love this world we cannot love God. And the love of this passing death manifests itself in both the sins of the flesh and sins of the spirit. Oh precious saint of Jesus, do not get swept away in the tidal wave of modern Christianity that claims to have a foot in the world and one in Christ, that is death. Oh it may seem alluring and it may appear that many who live such careless lives are actually enjoying this world and all that is has to offer, and they may even testify that the world’s water is great so come on in, but they are deceived unless God is a liar. God has said this present world is death and He cannot lie!
Now some new and exciting teachings have rejected the rapture of the church, the tribulation period, and the visible second coming of the Lord Jesus. They say that this world will continue to get better and better which is in direct contradiction of God’s sure Word. This world cannot get better, it is dead. The western church has so compromised that she could no longer endure the tension between her lifestyle and the dictates of God’s Word, so the church took God’s Word and twisted it to accommodate her hedonistic lifestyle and taught the sheep that God was well pleased. God’s own church put on the serpent’s skin and told God’s people to eat of any and all forbidden fruit and indeed there is now nothing forbidden to God’s bride. God’s own bride has spoken with the forked tongue of the adder, testing the world’s air and slithering toward its fleshly delights. And preachers and teachers have signaled to the flock to follow them to the land of death.
But we have forgotten how glorious suffering can be for God’s people, and fasting from this world gives us strength and brings praise to our Father. Is it inspiring to read of modern preachers that curse and tell disgusting jokes and have multiple tens of thousands in the bank to lavish upon their hedonistic lifestyles? God has never been impressed with those who claim His voice without sacrifice. If the Fox’s Book of Martyrs was restricted to America’s Christians the book would never have been written. Peruse the Christian bookstore and see the multitude of books that teach how you can have what this world offers while any books that teach the glorious praise of suffering have long since gone out of vogue. We are in love with death and have called it life and more abundant.
Why? We have taken our eyes off the Lovely One, the Author and Sustainer of all Grace, and we have looked upon this world and its attractive offers. Have we forgotten how this world was killing us before we met the Master? Have we returned to the pigpen only this time dressed as the Christian life? The prodigal is now the faithful, the backslider is now insightful, the false teacher is now deep, and the worldly and careless believer is now free in Christ. This is not the death abolishing Jesus, this is the man made caricature who bears no resemblance to the One who calls us to leave this world and “Follow Me”. And the visible church certainly enjoys the poisons of this world but she has rejected the eternal nectar that is given to those who continually seek to lose their lives to find His and His alone.
Stories and testimonies of saints in former years seem like a dream and so alien to anything to which this generation can relate. John Wesley once began a fast because his brother Charles purchased a new couch and John thought his brother was sliding into worldliness. How archaic and legalistic, right? Maybe so but God used John Wesley to shake continents for Christ and perhaps millions of souls will be found in heaven because of this “legalist”. I believe it is easier for God to break us of legalism than apathy and worldliness. Away with it all, it is death and like the Nazarite we should not even touch it lest it keep us from our Beloved and His throne room!
Oh come my brethren, let us walk humbly and filled with awe and grace before our Mighty Master and Lord. We must find no fulfillment in this world but in our Savior alone. Learn of Him and bow to His yoke which is easy and gives us the rest our souls seek. Jesus must have the preeminence in everything we do and think. Who is this One who has the power to abolish death itself?
Jesus. The Death Abolisher and the sum total of all spiritual truths. God is a spirit and yet chose to present Himself as a man, indeed a God man. Just that thought consumes the mind with wonder and head shaking depth. The question that must be answered was asked of this God man Himself when He asked, “Who do men say that I am?’. Notice how the Lord so wisely constructed that sentence with the obvious “I AM” included within the question itself. That question has so many eternal implications and yet the disciples only recognized the very surface of Jesus’ question about other men. They replied that some said He was John the Baptist, or Jeremiah, or one of the prophets. What an easy way out and how colloquial the conversation when it should have been addressed with the infinite truth about which He spoke.
But then Jesus puts aside the verbal shotgun and now fires the rifle. It is no longer who do men say that I am but who do YOU say that I AM. That is the line of eternal demarcation that divides the living from the dead, heaven from hell. The greatest deception ever foisted upon religious people is not that Jesus doesn’t exist, it is that salvation comes through good works. Not only is that an evil teaching, it demeans the Risen Christ and mocks His sacrifice as incomplete. Any sinner who so desires salvation must believe that Jesus is the Christ, and that He has completely and thoroughly paid the price for whosoever will believe upon Him. There is no middle ground, no accommodating any debate, and certainly no room for any of the works of men regardless how they are viewed as “good”.
Notice Jesus did not say “What have you done?”, no, He asks who do you say that I am. This is what confronts us, who is Jesus? Is He the one who abolished death and has preserved our life hidden in Christ with God or is He the thrower of this party we call the “world”? Is Jesus the “toast of the town” or is He the powerful Risen Master who triumphed openly over death and made a show of his enemies and indeed abolished death??? Which, my friends, is He? Does He sit on the right hand of the Father or does he descend to accommodate the believer’s flesh? Is Jesus the Exalted and August Son of the Living God or is He the informal guest who provides a hedonistic spread to satisfy the carnal desires of His worldly church?
The world ignores His cross and seeks pleasures rather than His sufferings, and this is what His people embrace? Who, like Paul, desires to know the fellowship of His sufferings in this hour? Who bows to the less and lives without murmur in the midst of spiritual content? Who closes their eyes at night with a song of deliverance on their heart simply for the privilege of knowing Christ? And when the waves are high and the sea troubled, and when the praises of men cannot be found, and when the body groans with affliction, and when friends and foes assail you, and when fortunes disappear, who then can kneel before the Great Christ and with tears streaming down fevered cheeks say with trembling hearts and lips,
“Thank you my Beloved Savior and Lord, I will never die because You have abolished death for me. I continue to exist in this vapor as per Your will, but I feel not the sting of death and I will never see the grave’s victory. Take me, my Lord, and do what pleases Thee and use my life here to one day glorify You before the angels of God. What do I care for this world of death, I am a living soul walking through a graveyard disguised as a party but with You alone do I find life.
You, Jesus, You alone have abolished death.
You, Jesus, You alone are who I seek…
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