Thursday, April 8, 2021
Living in the Power of the
Resurrection
I have been
crucified with Christ; and it is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me;
and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God,
who loved me and gave Himself up for me. Galatians 2:20
We know that we have the same
power that rose Jesus from the grave in us because we are His children. Having
that power and using that power are two different things. Ironically the only
way to experience the full power of the resurrection in our lives is to let go.
We must let go of everything
we are grasping for dear life and let God be God. As long as we have our hands
on it, He cannot do the work in our lives that He longs to do and that we need
Him to do. It is hard to take our hands off. We lay things down at the foot of
the cross only to pick them up again over and over. We struggle and grow weary trying
to do in our own power what resurrection power can do for us. But we are human,
and we tend to want to fix everything in our lives instead of letting God fix
it in His way and in His timing.
Overcoming In life
One thing that resurrection power
does for us is that it helps us overcome in life. Paul was afflicted in so many
ways. It is crazy what he endured and was able to overcome. Shipwrecked and
stuck on an island, bitten by a snake, beaten and stoned, persecuted and imprisoned,
threatened and cast out of more than one city. Yet he kept going because he was
living in the power of the resurrection. He was able to overcome his circumstances
over and over again with the help of God. He pressed on for the sake of the kingdom
and was more concerned with the churches and their spiritual health than he was
for himself. Paul truly lived for Christ. His body carried the
scars of his devotion and faithfulness. Through his sufferings he continued to serve
when it would have been much easier to turn back. It was resurrection power that helped him overcome and keep going.
Freedom From Sin – Unbound
The story of Lazarus is a
great picture of us being freed from the bondage of sin through resurrection
power. Jesus brought Lazarus back to life after he had died. He called him out
of his grave to “come forth.” When Lazarus came out of his grave, he was
still wrapped up in his grave clothes from his head to his feet. I can only
picture what seems like a mummy coming out, trying to hop with his whole body
wrapped from head to toe. He couldn’t move, he couldn’t see, and he couldn’t
even talk. Have you ever felt like this?
Sin can wrap us up just like that, completely bound up so that we cannot
see or hear God’s truth. Defeat, shame, addiction, and many other things bind
us completely, keeping us from God’s truth. But the death of Jesus paid for
that sin, the blood of Jesus covers that sin, and the power of the resurrection
rips the bondage of sin right from us.
Let go. Stop trying to do this
life in your own power and let resurrection power do for you what is it
supposed to do. Allow yourself to be unbound from all that binds you and claim
the power to overcome this life. If you are His child, that power lives in you,
but it doesn’t come from you and you can’t make it happen. It is God working
that resurrection power in our lives when we let Him.
