Life Reigns!
“death reigned.”— Romans 5:17
Reflection:
According to the Word of God, why do people die?
“The wages of sin is death.” — Romans 6:23
Sin leads to the “payment” of death. But this begs the question, what is “sin”?
“sin is lawlessness.”
— 1 John 3:4
“Lawlessness” against what “law”?
“The LORD God commanded the man…, from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat, for in the day that you eat from it you will surely die.”
— Genesis 2:16-17
Sin then is “lawlessness” against God’s Law, NOT man’s. So then, what Law of God did mankind break - which is called sin - which led to death? I submit it was the tenth word of the Decalogue given to Moses on Mt Sinai:
“You shall not covet.”
— Romans 7:7
To covet is to illicitly desire something which belongs to another, namely the rule and power of God as King in the affairs of man. That is what the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil symbolized. God spoke the Law that mankind was NOT to eat of this tree - that is, to covet the rule of God for ourselves in order to rule over each other as if we are God. In theological lingo, this is called “deification” or “theosis”. It is a “political” DESIRE to “be like God” over against each other, yea - even over God Himself! This is the “SIN” which led to God’s proclaimed judgement (i.e. punishment) of death to mankind. Now, after this sin (rebellion), coveting ran amok in the world of men, leading to wars and revolutions, adulteries, murders, theft, etc…,
This also was God’s holy judgement. Essentially, we were given so much coveting that it started “coming out of our nostrils”! (Numbers 11:18-20) Is this not a better understanding of what REALLY drives the current economic systems in the world?
“We have formed a crass commercial culture based on coveting and self-indulgence and instant gratification.” - Dale Ahlquist (Some Light for the New Dark Ages)
Coveting is coming out of our nostrils, and it is destroying us!
I disagree with the egghead anthropologists and philosophers of our “enlightened” day. We don’t “covet” primarily because we fear “natural” death. We covet because we want God dead in order to have His power! That is, “to be like God”. This is the Bible’s description of the REAL “driving force” (and predicament) in man.
And as God’s Law of “just recompense” indicates:
“As you have done, it will be done to you.
Your dealings will return on your own head.”
— Obadiah 15
We want to “disempower” (kill) God in order to gain His political power, and so God “disempowers” (kills) us in return. “Our dealings return on our own heads”. We see this reality placarded on the public cross when God became a man and willingly became “disempowered” for us for our sins. We see mankind - represented by the Jews and Romans (“church and state”) - killing God, and if we have eyes to see, we will also see God killing man in the same act!
I submit that this is the elephant in the room that no one seems to want to talk about in the church today.
It is NOT the fear of death primarily which drives men to want power. It is “sin”, that is a hatred and rebellion of God as our ruler that drives us. And after the Fall, God condemned all mankind to die like animals, and subsequently, this “animal death” intensifies our coveting and lust for power over others, i.e. making it “come out of our nostrils.”
But there it’s Good News in the world today!
“so that, as sin reigned in death, even so grace would reign through righteousness to eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord.”
— Romans 5:21
“Life reigns”!
Jesus died our death for us. The very “disempowerment” and death which fallen mankind desires for God, and which according to the Law of just recompense God has returned to us, Jesus entered “under” - for us!
God “put the cookies on the bottom shelf!” All who simply confess Christ as Ruler and Savior have already been judged on the cross! That is, we are free! Exonerated! pardoned! Death no longer “reigns” over those who belong to Christ because as Christ lives, so too will we! He promised that He is “preparing a place for us” on the New Earth that is coming. We too will be resurrected from the dead like Jesus, and we will see our loved ones again, “eating and drinking and being merry” before the face of our loving, merciful God, the God who has a human face, and we will “reign” with Him unto all ages, forevermore…….