We know that we have passed from death to life, because we love the brethren (1 John 3:14).
I want to introduce this message as “From Death to Life,” and as a subtitle, I am calling it “The Life of the Glorified One” or “The Glorified Christ.” I want you to understand what that means. I do not want you to sit in church all your life and not understand that the life that is in you now is that of the glorified Christ. What that life brings to you is not just information. But what does that life bring to you? It brings to you all the power that it embodies. If you understand this, I do not have to teach you how to be a good husband, how to be a good wife, how to be a responsible child; I do not have to teach you how to be a good employer and a good employee. I do not have to do that if you really understand who you are in Christ Jesus.
So then, subsequently to that statement, I would like for you to understand that you have been baptized into Christ, and the baptism into Christ is not a goose-bump, wonderful feeling thing– it is a baptism into death. It is a baptism into death in that you have been crucified. All that you were has been dealt with and you must then believe that.
We are not the people who are dead while they live. We are not like that. But we who are living are dead. We are dead to ourselves. We are dead to what we were. There is a statement that is called the enigma of our death. It is a very paradoxical kind of thing. It says we live though we are dead, we die yet we live. It’s amazing how God has done that.
Now if that went right past you, you have to reread and ask the Lord to bring you clarity and understanding. When I lay down my head finally in this life, I want you to have gotten the message, whether you think I was a great pulpiteer or not. My interest is that you would see Jesus so clearly whether it is through my life or through my words. So then I want to see a powerful demonstration of the Lord in your life.
From death to life—we are talking about that. In 1 John 3:14, he says, “We know that we have passed from death to life. . .” That is an amazing statement. We know that we have passed from death to life. How is it that we know that we have passed from death? Paul is talking about a death that we died; we died to ourselves; we were in Him when He went into death. We know we have gone through the process. We have gone to life now. We know we have entered into the life of God, the Zoë. We have entered into the life of God. How is it that we know we have entered into the life of God? How is it that we know we have been changed, not temporarily but permanently? Because “. . . we love the brethren.” (1 John 3:14). That is an amazing statement. We know we have gone through this metamorphosis, this process of metamorphosis, this process of being totally changed, because we love the brethren. Beloved let us love one another.