God Raised Us Up with Christ

Together in Christ

(Ephesians 2:5-7)

“If my circumstances later improve, then I will work on my faith life.” “Can’t you just believe before you die and when you are older?” These words seem fine, but people who trust these ideas will ruin their future. If people today escape from the former powers and entrust themselves to the Lord, they will decide their eternal future.

1. The Condition of Being Raised
When God saved Christ, we were also saved with Him, and when God seated Christ in heaven, we were also seated in heaven with Him. We are those who were raised. Of course, there is a condition to this. It is that we die together with Christ. Dying to sin and living in newness of life! This is our identity as Christians.

2. Spiritual Change
Though we were in this state of despair, God saved us. God is rich in mercy, and He loved us greatly. This does not mean He saves us in a leisurely manner because He is abundantly capable of loving us. In order to forgive us, He not only endured pain to give up His Son, but He endures pain even now. This is because He is patient with us – us who accepted His love, but refuse to change, follow the desires of our flesh and seek to behave anyway we want.

3. A New Rule
The Church has the duty of successfully demonstrating this change. Christ’s resurrection and ascension is not merely His own experience. The ruling structure of the whole universe has changed due to Him. In the time of the former powers, people thought about how to achieve their own will. This time is over, and the time of the sincere rule of Christ has come. Let’s prove with our lives that this new rule is true. As those who died to the former powers, let’s obey and submit to Christ to the end. Let’s show to the coming generations the richness of God’s grace which He gave in Christ.

Overseer Sung-Hyun Kim