You’re Dead!
No, that’s not a bad confession. That’s what the Bible says!
“For ye are dead, and your life is hid with Christ in God” – Colossians 3:3.
“For if we be dead with him, we shall also live with him” – 2 Timothy 2:11.
“We, being dead to sins, should live unto righteousness...” – 1 Peter 2:24.
“I am crucified with Christ, nevertheless I live, yet not I, but Christ liveth in me...” – Galatians 2:20.
Your identification with the death and resurrection of Christ is one of the most important themes in the entire Bible. Surprisingly, few Christians even begin to understand this. If they did, they would not run around saying that they are sinners saved by grace. If you are saved by grace, you are no longer a sinner by nature! You were created in God’s image in righteousness and true holiness (Ephesians 4:24). You are not some unworthy little worm. Never talk about yourself that way. You’ll drain away all your boldness to approach God by wallowing in that old religious stuff. You have the same right standing with God that Jesus Christ Himself does. For some reason, this offends some people, but if you don’t understand it, you may need to get saved! As a believer, you are the righteousness of God in Christ (2 Corinthians 5:21) and are completely worthy in His eyes to receive anything you need. If you don’t understand that, you need to go back and grasp the total significance of what Jesus did for you at Calvary. Read Romans! Paul said in Romans 10:10 that you have believed unto righteousness – you are righteous right now!
I won’t include the entire book of Romans here, but a key passage is Romans 6:1-14. Think about what this says. You are dead and buried with Christ. You’re dead to sin. Sin has no power over you. You are to walk in newness of life. You don’t just live a crucified life; you live a resurrected life!
Romans 6:1-14:
What shall we say then? Shall we continue in sin, that grace may abound?
God forbid. How shall we, that are dead to sin, live any longer therein?
Know ye not, that so many of us as were baptized into Jesus Christ were baptized into his death?
Therefore we are buried with him by baptism into death: that like as Christ was raised up from the dead by the glory of the Father, even so we also should walk in newness of life.
For if we have been planted together in the likeness of his death, we shall be also in the likeness of his resurrection:
Knowing this, that our old man is crucified with him, that the body of sin might be destroyed, that henceforth we should not serve sin.
For he that is dead is freed from sin.
Now if we be dead with Christ, we believe that we shall also live with him:
Knowing that Christ being raised from the dead dieth no more; death hath no more dominion over him.
For in that he died, he died unto sin once: but in that he liveth, he liveth unto God.
Likewise reckon ye also yourselves to be dead indeed unto sin, but alive unto God through Jesus Christ our Lord.
Let not sin therefore reign in your mortal body, that ye should obey it in the lusts thereof.
Neither yield ye your members as instruments of unrighteousness unto sin: but yield yourselves unto God, as those that are alive from the dead, and your members as instruments of righteousness unto God.
For sin shall have no dominion over you: for ye are not under the law, but under grace.
Jesus took on your sins and died, but when He rose, there were no more sins on Him. That is what you are to identify with. Your old sinful nature was killed when you were born again, and your new nature is free from the stains of sin. You are a righteous and holy new creation in Christ.
It is essential that you recognize your righteousness. It is part of your armor in Ephesians 6:10-18 that you use to stop the devil’s attacks. At some point, you have probably had the thought that you deserve to be sick because you didn’t walk in love or because you sinned some other way. If you’re in sin, just repent! You already have forgiveness of sins as a believer (Ephesians 1:7 and many other passages). If you sit around condemning yourself, you are doing the devil’s work for him. It is not right for you to bear the punishment for sin because Jesus already did that for you. Now you deserve God’s best because you are blood-washed. You are right with Him. God chooses to remember your sins. God does not hold your sins against you. The blood of Jesus Christ has cleansed you from sin. Nothing that is a result of sin belongs in your life. That includes sickness.
Sin has no claim over you, and therefore Satan has no claim on you. His claims on mankind are based on sin. You are delivered from sin and from Satan’s kingdom. You are in the kingdom of God’s dear Son (Colossians 1:13). What you deserve to get in life is no longer based on what you did; it is based on what Christ did.
Jesus Christ never got sick until He willingly yielded His body to take your sicknesses and pains during His atonement. Of course, He could be tired, weak, hungry, and other things that we experience as part of life, but He was not sick. You are as righteous before God as He is, and you have every bit as much right to walk in health as He did. It doesn’t make sense to claim that although Christ’s physical body was not sick when He walked the earth, now His current physical Body on the earth (the Church) should be sick. If we are sick, we are not representing to the world the way Jesus was when He walked on the earth.
The Story of Bad Carl
To illustrate what it means to be “dead with Christ,” I offer you one of my silly stories.
Bad Carl was one of many habitual jaywalkers in his city who made the local drivers slam on the brakes to avoid an accident, practically daring them to hit him so that he could sue them, despite the fact that there were crosswalks everywhere. (You might have even encountered him.) His serious drug habit led him to break in and steal things any time that he could. He also had a habit of public drunkenness and was prone to starting fights at different bars. One night he got really drunk and angry. He killed a woman who yelled at him to stop jaywalking. A crowd rushed him and someone in that crowd killed Bad Carl before the police could break up the melee. Over came the local Crime Scene Investigators, who all wished that they could be like the ones on TV shows because their real-life jobs were so routine and unexciting and involved so much boring paperwork. (I realize that if I produced a true-to-life new show “Miami Investi-Gators DCEP (Detectives Completing Endless Paperwork)” where you watched the police fill out reports, it would probably get ratings lower than a competitive food show where chefs try to avoid being the next one cut by coming up with the best recipe for ice cubes.) The investigators found a stash of illegal drugs in Bad Carl’s coat as well as an item of jewelry stolen from a local store.
After his death, the court convened and tried to determine the punishment that would be meted out to Bad Carl. The judge decided that he would be assigned 40 hours of community service for his jaywalking, then 12 months of probation for possession of controlled substances, then 1 month in jail for public intoxication, then 1 year in jail for breaking and entering, and finally 10 years in prison without parole for murder.
Of course, it was ridiculous for the judge to hand out sentences to a dead man, and it is just as ridiculous for sentences to be handed out to you for your sins, because as a believer you’re considered a dead man, too! You can’t stick a “dead man” with sentences for crimes he committed!
You Don’t Deserve to be Sick
If you don’t believe that you are just as righteous as Jesus Christ in God’s eyes, you need to do some serious studying and find out just how righteous the blood of Jesus Christ has made you! You have received His righteousness as a gift (Romans 5:17). The “old man” who deserved sickness, poverty, destruction and death is dead. You are a new man in Christ. You are now a child of the light instead of a child of wrath. The old has passed away and all things have become new (2 Corinthians 5:17). The law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus has made you free from the law of sin and death (Romans 8:2). You should now walk in newness of life (Romans 6:4). You are right with God and you don’t deserve sickness. Nothing you have in Christ is based on what you did; it’s all based on what He did for you. See yourself as God sees you – as someone who was buried with Christ and now lives with Him in the power of His resurrection!