Rising From Death’s Sleep in This Body – Putting on Immortality

Continuing today with a further exploration of the resurrection and it occurring while we are in flesh bodies. In the past we’ve seen it from the perspective best described in 1 Corinthians 15, which we know is a chapter that deal with the resurrection and our victory over death. What is often forgotten is the entire book itself details the step by step process leading to this same end. It begins by telling of and giving us an understanding come only by the wisdom of God, which is necessarily counter to what a corrupted orthodoxy (establishment) demands we conformed to. This return to diligently seeking His wisdom (that has been fallen away from) as it freely flows through the Holy Spirit into those asking and receiving, is as our having become as little children seeking the pure milk of the word. This is after our new birth out of a world having become without form (total confusion,) and void (emptied of all truth.) We are told of this being our putting on the mind of Christ and thereby being able to judge what is error and knowing (re-cognizing) truth as God knows and sees.

1 Corinthians 2
9 But as it is written, Eye has not seen, nor ear heard, neither have entered into the heart of man, the things which God has prepared for them that love him.
10 But God has revealed them unto us by his Spirit: for the Spirit searches all things, yea, the deep things of God.
11 For what man knows the things of a man, save the spirit of man which is in him? even so the things of God know no man, but the Spirit of God.
12 Now we have received, not the spirit of the world, but the spirit which is of God; that we might know the things that are freely given to us of God.
13 Which things also we speak, not in the words which man’s wisdom teaches, but which the Holy Ghost teaches; comparing spiritual things with spiritual.
14 But the natural man receives not the things of the Spirit of God: for they are foolishness unto him: neither can he know them, because they are spiritually discerned.
15 But he that is spiritual judges all things, yet he himself is judged of no man.
16 For who has known the mind of the LORD, that he may instruct him? [quoted from Isaiah 40:14] but we have the mind of Christ.

The following chapters go on to tell of our moving from consuming the milk of babes and now being ready to feed our understanding with meat. These chapters deal with our using this judgment in becoming (in a battle with the flesh/world) pure and holy, and to keep ourselves in this way. (1 Corinthians 10: 21 You cannot drink the cup of the LORD, and the cup of devils: you cannot be partakers of the LORD’s table, and of the table of devils.)

This same Idea is what Paul is telling us when He writes in chapter 15:54 of our putting off corruption and putting on the uncorrupted, and in doing the mortal (liable to death), shall have put on immortality, and then will have been brought to pass what is written in Isaiah 25 of death being swallowed up in our victory over the error that have become the orthodoxy of this now totally corrupted world thinking. (1 Corinthians 15:54 So when this corruptible shall have put on incorruption, and this mortal shall have put on immortality, then shall be brought to pass the saying that is written, Death is swallowed up in victory.)

When the above “saying” is written is Isaiah 25:8 it tells us by reference exactly what the corruption is Paul is speaking of. We see it’s the same as he had spoken of earlier in telling of the wisdom of the world that has supplanted and now opposes God’s wisdom. We are told of the LORD as the one who ends this death causing error that covers the entire world. He tells of the means of destroying the covering being by his preparing and delivering to us this great feast of understanding, and of it being in His mountain (Zion.)

This again is what is spoken of in Hebrews 12 when we are told of our having come to mount Zion and of the things heard there that shake the existing order of the world. It is telling of the same as does Peter in 2 Peter 3 using the wording of the “elements” that melt away. These “elements” are the Greek word stoicheion, literally meaning the order things are placed (prioritized,) and are the “rudiments,” the basic principles, upon which the world bases all its decisions (reasoning.) These are what we are told of as being shaken in Hebrews 12 as it ends stating, “Our God is a consuming fire,” a statement that is seemingly out of place without the Spirit giving us this further understanding. (1 Corinthians 14:33 For God is not the author of confusion, but of peace [come only from understanding and its resulting order – ordering ideas,] as in all churches of the saints.)

This is also why Hebrews 12 begins with exhorting us to run of the race set before us, looking to the author and finisher of our faith, and ends with the victory we reach by staying this course.

Hebrews 12
1 Wherefore seeing we also are compassed about with so great a cloud of witnesses, let us lay aside every weight, and the sin which doth so easily beset us, and let us run with patience the race that is set before us,
2 Looking unto Jesus the author and finisher of our faith; who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross, despising the shame, and is set down at the right hand of the throne of God.
3 For consider him that endured such contradiction of sinners against himself, lest you be wearied and faint in your minds.
4 You have not yet resisted unto blood, striving against sin.
5 And you have forgotten the exhortation which speaks unto you as unto children, My son, despise not you the discipline of the LORD, nor faint when you are rebuked of him:
6 For whom the LORD loves he corrects, and disciplines every son whom he receives.
7 If you endure correction, God deals with you as with sons; for what son is he whom the father corrects not?
8 But if you be without corrections, whereof all are partakers, then are you illegitimate, and not sons.
9 Furthermore we have had fathers of our flesh which corrected us, and we gave them reverence: shall we not much rather be in subjection unto the Father of spirits, and live?
10 For they truly for a few days disciplined us after their own pleasure; but he for our profit, that we might be partakers of his holiness.
11 Now no discipline for the present seem to be joyous, but grievous: nevertheless afterward it yields the peaceable [well-ordered] fruit of righteousness unto them which are exercised thereby [practiced it to become proficient – training to be victorious.]
12 Wherefore lift up the hands which hang down, and the feeble knees;
13 And make straight paths for your feet, lest that which is lame be turned out of the way; but let it rather be healed.
14 Follow peace with all men, and holiness, without which no man shall see the LORD:
15 Looking diligently lest any man fail of the grace of God; lest any root of bitterness springing up trouble you, and thereby many be defiled;
16 Lest there be any fornicator, or profane person, as Esau, who for one morsel of meat sold his birthright.
17 For you know how that afterward, when he would have inherited the blessing, he was rejected: for he found no place of repentance, though he sought it carefully with tears.
18 For you are not come unto the mount that might be touched, and that burned with fire, nor unto blackness, and darkness, and tempest,
19 And the sound of a trumpet, and the voice of words; which voice they that heard demanded that the word should not be spoken to them any more:
20 (For they could not endure that which was commanded, And if so much as a beast touch the mountain, it shall be stoned, or thrust through with a dart:
21 And so terrible was the sight, that Moses said, I exceedingly fear and quake:)
22 But you are come unto mount Zion, and unto the city of the living God, the heavenly Jerusalem, and to an innumerable company of angels,
23 To the general assembly and church of the firstborn, which are written in heaven, and to God the Judge of all, and to the spirits of just men made perfect,
24 And to Jesus the mediator of the new covenant, and to the blood of sprinkling, that speaks better things than that of Abel.
25 See that you refuse not him that speaks. For if they escaped not who refused him that spoke on earth, much more shall not we escape, if we turn away from him that speaks from heaven [as I speak to you now in the authority vested in me by the LORD:]
26 Whose voice then shook the earth: [what part of this aren’t you hearing of feeling?] but now he has promised, saying, Yet once more I shake not the earth only, but also heaven.
27 And this word, Yet once more, signifies the removing of those things that are shaken, as of things that are made, that those things which cannot be shaken may remain.
28 Wherefore we receiving a kingdom which cannot be moved, let us have grace, whereby we may serve God acceptably with reverence and godly fear:
29 For our God is a consuming fire.

Today we continue with seeing this as written in Romans 8, which must be premised with understanding it is inseparably connected to what is explained in the prior chapter. There Paul tells of sin being present in his flesh, meaning we are all naturally inclined toward the weakness of a human nature, not exercising to be in shape (mentally.) He tells of the Spirit delighting in the law of God that gives us the understanding of the necessity, but this also being in constant conflict with the natural bent toward inactivity – a seeming inability to overcome the flesh.

It is from this point Paul then speaks of there being no condemnation to those in Christ as they engage in this battle, their having elevated the Spirit calling above that of the flesh. From here he tells of our eventually overcoming by putting to death the demands of the flesh, and being raised up, (quickened – brought to life) in the same way (out of death) as was Christ, by the same work of the Spirit in us as it is in Him. We cannot be raised up until we have put the flesh desires to death, the things that corrupt us and oppose the Spirit. These are differing descriptions from distinctive viewpoints telling of the same exact thing using corroborating witnesses.

Romans 8
1 There is therefore now no condemnation to them which are in Christ Jesus, who walk not after the flesh, but after the Spirit.
2 For the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus has made me free from the law of sin and death.
3 For what the law could not do, in that it was weak through the flesh, God sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh, and for sin, condemned sin in the flesh:
4 That the righteousness of the law might be fulfilled in us, who walk not after the flesh, but after the Spirit.
5 For they that are after the flesh do mind the things of the flesh; but they that are after the Spirit the things of the Spirit.
6 For to be carnally minded is death; but to be spiritually minded is life and peace.
7 Because the carnal mind is enmity against God: for it is not subject to the law of God, neither indeed can be.
8 So then they that are in the flesh cannot please God.
9 But you are not in the flesh, but in the Spirit, if so be that the Spirit of God dwell in you. Now if any man have not the Spirit of Christ, he is none of his.
10 And if Christ be in you, the body is dead because of sin; but the Spirit is life because of righteousness.
11 But if the Spirit of him that raised up Jesus from the dead dwell in you, he that raised up Christ from the dead shall also quicken your mortal bodies by his Spirit that dwells in you.
12 Therefore, brethren, we are debtors, not to the flesh, to live after the flesh.
13 For if you live after the flesh, you shall die: but if you through the Spirit do mortify [put to death] the deeds of the body, you shall live.
14 For as many as are led by the Spirit of God, they are the sons of God.
15 For you have not received the spirit of bondage again to fear; but you have received the Spirit of adoption, whereby we cry, Abba, Father.
16 The Spirit itself bears witness with our spirit, that we are the children of God:
17 And if children, then heirs; heirs of God, and joint-heirs with Christ; if so be that we suffer with him, that we may be also glorified together.
18 For I reckon that the sufferings of this present time are not worthy to be compared with the glory which shall be revealed in us.
19 For the earnest expectation of the creature waits for the manifestation of the sons of God.
20 For the creature was made subject to vanity, not willingly, but by reason of him who has subjected the same in hope,
21 Because the creature [the natural body] itself also shall be delivered from the bondage of corruption into the glorious liberty of the children of God.
22 For we know that the whole creation groans and travails in pain together until now.
23 And not only they, but ourselves also, which have the first-fruits of the Spirit, even we ourselves groan within ourselves, waiting for the adoption, to wit, the redemption of our body.
24 For we are saved by hope: but hope that is seen is not hope: for what a man sees, why doth he yet hope for?
25 But if we hope for that we see not, then do we with patience wait for it.
26 Likewise the Spirit also helps our infirmities: for we know not what we should pray for as we ought: but the Spirit itself makes intercession for us with groaning which cannot be uttered.
27 And he that searches the hearts knows what is the mind of the Spirit, because he makes intercession for the saints according to the will of God.
28 And we know that all things work together for good to them that love God, to them who are the called according to his purpose.
29 For whom he did foreknow, he also did predestinate to be conformed to the image of his Son, that he might be the firstborn among many brethren.
30 Moreover whom he did predestinate, them he also called: and whom he called, them he also justified: and whom he justified, them he also glorified.
31 What shall we then say to these things? If God be for us, who can be against us?
32 He that spared not his own Son, but delivered him up for us all, how shall he not with him also freely give us all things?
33 Who shall lay any-thing to the charge of God’s elect? It is God that justifies.
34 Who is he that condemn? It is Christ that died, yea rather, that is risen again, who is even at the right hand of God, who also makes intercession for us.
35 Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? shall tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or sword?
36 As it is written, For you sake we are killed all the day long; we are accounted as sheep for the slaughter.
37 Nay, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him that loved us.
38 For I am persuaded, that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor powers, nor things present, nor things to come,
39 Nor height, nor depth, nor any other creature, shall be able to separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our LORD.

The following chapter goes on the tell of those being God’s people in the flesh, meaning they’ve not yet put off the corruption. This is speaking of any and all who think that by their adherence to some human centered (physical) practice they are entitled to salvation (demanding and forcing their way in,) instead of elevating the God centered work of the Spirit bringing them to an uncorrupted state of mind.

These men are known in the pattern seen when Paul defines the promise in Romans 9:9, which divides between those who receive it and those hardened by it. The quote is from Genesis 18:14 where Sarah is told of the child that would come. The LORD askes the question, “Is anything too hard for the LORD?”

These same men now claim it is impossible for a man to become holy and pure while in a flesh body. They act as though the word of God has taken none effect; and having a form of godliness but denying this power thereof.

Romans 9
1 I say the truth in Christ, I lie not, my conscience also bearing me witness in the Holy Ghost,
2 That I have great heaviness and continual sorrow in my heart.
3 For I could wish that myself were accursed from Christ for my brethren, my kinsmen according to the flesh:
4 Who are Israelites; to whom pertains the adoption, and the glory, and the covenants, and the giving of the law, and the service of God, and the promises;
5 Whose are the fathers, and of whom as concerning the flesh Christ came, who is over all, God blessed for ever. Amen.
6 Not as though the word of God has taken none effect. For they are not all Israel, which are of Israel:
7 Neither, because they are the seed of Abraham, are they all children: but, In Isaac shall your seed be called.
8 That is, They which are the children of the flesh, these are not the children of God: but the children of the promise are counted for the seed.
9 For this is the word of promise, At this time will I come, and Sarah shall have a son.
10 And not only this; but when Rebecca also had conceived by one, even by our father Isaac;
11 (For the children being not yet born, neither having done any good or evil, that the purpose of God according to election might stand, not of works, but of him that calls;)
12 It was said unto her, The elder shall serve the younger.
13 As it is written, Jacob have I loved, but Esau have I hated.
14 What shall we say then? Is there unrighteousness with God? God forbid.
15 For he said to Moses, I will have mercy on whom I will have mercy, and I will have compassion on whom I will have compassion.
16 So then it is not of him that wills, nor of him that runs, but of God that shows mercy.
17 For the scripture says unto Pharaoh, Even for this same purpose have I raised you up, that I might shew my power in you, and that my name might be declared throughout all the earth.
18 Therefore has he mercy on whom he will have mercy, and whom he will he hardens.
19 You will say then unto me, Why doth he yet find fault? For who has resisted his will?
20 Nay but, O man, who are you that replies against God? Shall the thing formed say to him that formed it, Why have you made me thus?
21 Has not the potter power over the clay, of the same lump to make one vessel unto honor, and another unto dishonor?
22 What if God, willing to shew his wrath, and to make his power known, endured with much longsuffering the vessels of wrath fitted to destruction:
23 And that he might make known the riches of his glory on the vessels of mercy, which he had afore prepared unto glory,
24 Even us, whom he has called, not of the Jews only, but also of the Gentiles?
25 As he said also in Osee, I will call them my people, which were not my people; and her beloved, which was not beloved.
26 And it shall come to pass, that in the place where it was said unto them, You are not my people; there shall they be called the children of the living God.
27 Isaiah also cried concerning Israel, Though the number of the children of Israel be as the sand of the sea, a remnant shall be saved:
28 For he will finish the work, and cut it short in righteousness: because a short work will the LORD make upon the earth.
29 And as Isaiah said before, Except the LORD of Sabaoth [Hosts] had left us a seed, we had been as Sodom, and been made like unto Gomorrah.
30 What shall we say then? That the Gentiles, which followed not after righteousness, have attained to righteousness, even the righteousness which is of faith.
31 But Israel, which followed after the law of righteousness, has not attained to the law of righteousness.
32 Wherefore? Because they sought it not by faith, but as it were by the works of the law. For they stumbled at that stumbling-stone;
33 As it is written, Behold, I lay in Zion a stumbling-stone and rock of offence: and whosoever believes on him shall not be ashamed.

2 Timothy 3
1 This know also, that in the last days perilous times shall come.
2 For men shall be lovers of their own selves, covetous, boasters, proud, blasphemers, disobedient to parents, unthankful, unholy,
3 Without natural affection, trucebreakers, false accusers, incontinent, fierce, despisers of those that are good,
4 Traitors, heady, high-minded, lovers of pleasures more than lovers of God;
5 Having a form of godliness, but denying the power thereof: from such turn away.
6 For of this sort are they which creep into houses, and lead captive silly women laden with sins, led away with divers lusts,
7 Ever learning, and never able to come to the knowledge of the truth.
8 Now as Jannes and Jambres withstood Moses, so do these also resist the truth: men of corrupt minds, reprobate [without proof] concerning the faith.
9 But they shall proceed no further: for their folly shall be manifest unto all men, as theirs also was.
10 But you have fully known my doctrine, manner of life, purpose, faith, longsuffering, charity, patience,
11 Persecutions, afflictions, which came unto me at Antioch, at Iconium, at Lystra; what persecutions I endured: but out of them all the LORD delivered me.
12 Yea, and all that will live godly in Christ Jesus shall suffer persecution.
13 But evil men and seducers shall wax worse and worse, deceiving, and being deceived.
14 But continue you in the things which you have learned and have been assured of, knowing of whom you have learned them;
15 And that from a child you have known the holy scriptures, which are able to make you wise unto salvation through faith which is in Christ Jesus.
16 All scripture is given by inspiration [life giving breath breathed into men] of God, and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness:
17 That the man of God may be perfect, thoroughly furnished unto all good works.