The Fourteenth Epistle

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To Live Is Christ.

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DATELINE: Sunday, February 4, 2001.
By Rev. James R. Bingham

Special to corndancer.com
Posted from Memphis, Tennessee

Philippians 1:20-22

20. According to my earnest expectation and my hope, that in nothing I shall be ashamed, but that with all boldness, as always, so now also Christ shall be magnified in my body, whether it be by life, or by death.
21. For to me to live is Christ, and to die is gain.
22. But if I live in the flesh, this is the fruit of my labour: yet what I shall choose I wot not.

I recall a popular song from the good ole days called "What Am I Living For?" It was a hit that traveled up the chart and maintained a position in the R&B Top Forty for some time. It talked about a man loving a woman so much he declared that his only reason for living was to live for her.

The question he posed was, "What am I living for, if not for you?"

Though fleshly in its depraved emotional outcry, the singer's question does bring attention to the foundational principle of having a purpose in one's life. The song even went on to say, "Nobody, yes, nobody, yes, but you."

To Live — and Die —
For a Person, Nation, or Idea.

Martin Luther King, Jr. said, "If a man hasn't found anything worth dying for, he isn't fit to live." What King meant is all too clear: One lives for the person, nation, or idea he values enough for which to die.

Having a purpose in life gives each of us good reason to live. If something has meaning to you, you will give your all for it.

At this point, we must envision another perspective on dying. Move your mind away from the notion of death as finality. I am not referring to any of us leaving the planet. Surely, Dr. King meant physical death, but he was dealing in part with political and social issues. For the purpose of this discussion, look at death as change, as mental and physical progression.

Do not, I repeat, do not think I am talking about getting ready for a coffin. That form of death does not serve our purpose on the earth or in it, unless you are striving to be some type of martyr — and I'm certainly not encouraging martyrdom.

Jesus died, physically, that we might live. (Do not try that at home!) Thus He lived that He might die to give us life more abundantly.

The Son of God, Truly,
Is Born Again in Heart and Soul.

Jesus gave meaning to the lives of those who received him. He helped them find a purpose for living. They came to see that the Son of God, truly, was born again inside their heart and soul.

Philippians 1:21 says, "For me to live is Christ, and to die is gain." Gain what? In I Corinthians 15:29-31, Paul explains the acceptance of change as opposed to remaining in a state of mental stagnation. As an expression of his abhorrence for satisfaction with tradition, he declares, "I die daily." He was referring to putting off the old and putting on the new. Every time you die in a spiritual sense, you gain maturity and insight. When you die to the old, you become a new creature in Christ Jesus.

How do we determine what aspect of life is worth dying?

Jesus said He came into this world to die. That was the objective to his purpose for being on earth. In a sense we all must follow the example He set. You see, we live to die, but we die to live. That is to say, every day we are growing and dying, physically as well as spiritually.

The Difference
Between 'Spiritually' and 'Spirit'

Please note a crucial distinction between the concepts "spiritually" and "spirit." You may die spiritually, you may die and be reborn in the ways you perceive life, but your spirit never dies. Your eternal spirit is adjusted, propped up, sacrificed, and rewarded, but it does not die.

Physical death is intertwined with daily life. Aspects of the physical realm die and are reborn with each passing hour. It's a fact that certain cells of the body simply die. They are washed away and the body regenerates, producing replacements. These new cells appear in just about the same form. They may be a little bigger, maybe a little tighter, maybe more numerous, but they are replaced to ensure the life of the body.

Your sweetest friends may look at you and say, "Why, girl, you haven't aged a bit," but you know that the body you're looking at in the mirror is not the same body you wore five years ago. That's right. It may look the same in most areas, but it just isn't the same body you moved across the earth in 1996.

People say, "I haven't seen you in years. You haven't changed a bit!" They need to stop telling you that. You most certainly have changed. You have changed physically, you have changed spiritually, you have changed mentally — and if you happened to have met Jesus along the way, your soul is changed beyond measure.

The Beauty and Grandeur of Change.

When I was a child I remember the saints singing an old song, "I know I've been changed." They sang it because they were able to recognize a difference in their lives. They acknowledged the beauty and grandeur of change, the ways it can be seen in how you talk the talk and walk the walk.

You, and those around you, are able to see that the things you used to do, you don't do no mo'. That's because you are walking in the spirit. Walking in the spirit makes it possible for you to walk by faith and not by sight. Why? Because you have gone from life to death and back to life again.

Let's look at bit deeper into this life-to-death-to-life situation.

Dying is a process of Hearing. In your hearing you are tuning-in to the universe, to creation, and to the reality of God.

Experience teaches that if things go one way, then it's certain that something else will happen. One event leads to another. The philosophers and theologians call it cause and effect. After a while cause and effect becomes an ingrained reality in your mind as well as and in your daily life.

Hearing, Living, Receiving,
Digesting, and Responding.

Thusly, you develop faith according to what you have heard. Faith comes by hearing and hearing by the truth. Knowing the truth makes you free. Jesus said in John 14:6, "I am the way, the truth, and the life." His way is to deny self. His truth is knowing Him. His life is having an on-going fruitful exchange with the order of the universe. That is Christ. To live is Christ.

Living is a process of Receiving. If you receive it then you can believe it, and thus you can achieve it.

Receiving is a method of Digesting. Once your body takes in food, it begins to sort through the intake. Its goal is to transform the food into vitamins and nutrients for the life and strength of the system. If the food is palatable, if it is digestible, then the body begins to pull from it and open up to the good it has to offer. If the food is not digestible, or downright disagreeable, the body finds a way to reject it. Good or bad, your body receives the substances you feed it.

Scripture (John 1:12) says, "To all who received him, he gave them power." Let me ask: What are you going to do with the power you receive?

Living is a process of Responding. When you receive the word of God and digest it, you change. You either get bigger or you get smaller. Old folks used to say all that what won't kill you will make you stronger. The word of God makes you stronger.

Stand Up! Grow Up!
Receive and Keep His Word.

Listen. He's saying, Stand up! Listen. He's saying, Grow up! Listen. He's saying, If you receive and keep my word, then everything you desire will be added unto you.

Eve and Adam couldn't handle it. They misunderstood the meaning of death in the spirit. Had they known, they would have realized they couldn't handle death. They weren't ready for the truth. When it came time to grasp the present reality of the truth, they couldn't handle it and lost their deed to Paradise.

Nimrod couldn't handle it. He didn't want to die. He wanted to live forever. He misunderstood eternal life. We are placed upon Earth to live out our lives according to the order of the universe. By doing so we can receive the many blessings that are ever available to us.

Jesus could handle death because He knew that to die spiritually is to gain favor with the Father which is in heaven.

Look up and live! Grow vertically in the spirit.

Look up and live. Reach for the sky! Reach for perfection. The sky is the limit, but there is no limit to the sky. There is no limit to what we can do when we walk in the Spirit. Look up and live!

Give God Some Praise!!!