Living Dead

February 24, 2023

Christians are Dead

“I have been crucified with Christ. It is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me. And the life I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me.” (Galatians 2:20)

Christians are dead. There is no other way to look at it. The moment we accept Christ as our savior and give Him our lives, we have died. That is, our fleshly selves have died. Our earthly desires, pleasures, self focused plans, dreams, and hopes are all dead. Our freedom to live for ourselves, to pursue what makes us happy, to make our own decisions is dead. We are now slaves to Christ.

The Living Dead

But how can a dead person live? That same verse that declares us dead, shows us our path to life: living by faith in the Son of God. Our new life begins in complete surrender, allowing Christ to rule and reign in our lives.

His decisions become our decisions. His desires are ours. His plans must be our plans. Of course, we are not possessed beings in the sense that this death to self is a daily choice. We die a daily death to our own flesh and choose to let Christ rule and reign. In doing so, we find the only kind of life worth living.

Living Free

In death we find freedom: freedom from sin, freedom from destructive patterns, freedom from self sabotaging indulgences, and freedom from opinions that lead only to controversy and death.

At GCM we have a vision statement that declares dead people don’t have opinions. Our opinions are His opinions. We will seek first and represent His kingdom always.

We must embrace the Christian death, and set our hearts to living only for Christ. As we pursue His plans for our lives, we will not let our opinions get in the way. Whether these opinions are criticism towards other parts of the church, uncertainties about if and how we should move forward in faith, or selfish ambition, we make a conscious effort to die to these decisions, giving Christ full reign in our lives.

Dying to our Opinions

The church around the world lives and dies by their opinions, constantly finding themselves stuck in the traps of disagreement, criticism, or an intellectually thought out plan that is really just a mask for disobedience.

It is time for us to return to the truth of Galatians 2. We are dead. Dead people have no opinions that would prevent Christ’s rule and reign. We have only obedience to the One we have sworn to live for. In our death, we find freedom to overcome our human frailty and surrender ourselves wholeheartedly to Christ.

We must each carefully examine ourselves and every area that we still cling to our entitled opinions, throw them off with violent repentance, and join the call to come and die. For in death, we find life.

Living Dead. How Christians die to self and find life in Christ.

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We believe the Scriptures, both the Old and New Testaments, are inspired by God and are the revelation of God to man, the infallible, authoritative rule of faith and conduct. (2 Timothy 3:15-17, 1 Peter 1:21)

We believe that there is one God, eternally existent who has revealed Himself as embodying the principles of relationship and association as Father, Son and Holy Spirit. (Deuteronomy 6:4, Luke 3:22)

We believe in the deity of our Lord Jesus Christ, in His virgin birth, in His sinless life, in His miracles, in His atoning death through His shed blood, in His bodily resurrection, in His ascension to the right hand of the Father where He intercedes for us, in His present rule as Head of the Church, and in His personal return in power and glory. (Matthew 1:23, Luke 1:31)

We believe in the creation of mankind in God’s image, and the fall of man, resulting in universal guilt and total depravity; and the necessity, therefore, of redemption and restoration; that all men and women are lost spiritually and face the judgment of God, that Jesus Christ is the only way of salvation, and that repentance of sin and faith in Jesus Christ is necessary for regeneration by the Holy Spirit. (Genesis 1:26-27, Genesis 2:17)

We believe salvation is received through repentance toward God and faith toward the Lord Jesus Christ. By the washing of regeneration and renewing of the Holy Spirit, being justified by grace through faith, man becomes an heir of God, according to the hope of eternal life. (Luke 24:47, John 3:3)

We believe in the resurrection of both the saved and the lost; the saved unto the resurrection of eternal life in the presence of our Lord, and the lost unto the resurrection of damnation and eternal punishment. (Matthew 25:46, Mark 9:43-48)

We believe in the spiritual unity of believers in our Lord Jesus Christ and that all true believers are members of His body, the Church, which has the duty to preach the Gospel to every person. (Ephesians 1:22-23, Ephesians 2:22)

We believe that we must dedicate ourselves to prayer, to the service of our Lord, to His authority over our lives, and to the ministry of teaching, preaching, the prophetic, the apostolic, and evangelism. (Ephesians 4:11-13)

We believe in upholding the ordinances of the church of water baptism and holy communion.

The ordinance of baptism by immersion is commanded by the Scriptures. All who repent and believe in Christ as Savior and Lord are to be baptized. Thus, they declare to the world that they have died with Christ and that they also have been raised with Him to walk in newness of life. (Matthew 28:19, Mark 16:16, Acts 10:47,48, Romans 6:4)

The Lord’s Supper, consisting of the elements—bread and the fruit of the vine—, is the symbol expressing our sharing the divine nature of our Lord Jesus Christ (2 Peter 1:4), a memorial of His suffering and death (1 Corinthians 11:26), and a prophecy of His second coming (1 Corinthians 11:26), and is enjoined on all believers “till He comes!”