Honey From The Rock

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Honey From The Rock
Psalm 81:16

"Sweet Stuff From God's Word"

A daily Bible study with Victor Knowles
Copyright 2007

RAISED WITH CHRIST!

This entry was posted on 08-08-2008 and is filed under uncategorized.

"If then you were raised with Christ,..." (Col. 3:1a NKJV). "Raised with Christ!" What a powerful thought this is. Paul was writing to a people who had been raised with Christ. I am writing to a people who have been raised with Christ. If, in fact, you have been raised with Christ. The NEB reads, "Were you not raised to life with Christ?"

Before you can be raised with Christ you must be buried with Christ. I think that is what Paul was getting at in Romans 6 when he wrote, "Therefore we were buried with Him through baptism into death, that just as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, even so we also should walk in newness of life" (v. 4 NKJV). When I was in college I used to work in a funeral home. The first thing they taught us was "make sure the person is dead before you prepare them for burial." We must die to sin - the Bible calls that "repentance" - before we are buried with Christ in baptism. Then we are raised with Christ to live for Him. Conybeare's translation says: "If, then, you were partakers of Christ's resurrection." Paul also talks about this in Romans 6. "For if we have been united together in the likeness of His death, certainly we also shall be in the likeness of His resurrection" (v. 5 NKJV). Nowhere is the death, burial, and resurrection of Christ symbolized better than in Christian baptism (immersion). We have been "raised with Christ!" We're not in this alone. With the resurrected, living Christ walking by our side today we can briskly and boldly "walk in newness of life" (Rom. 6:4).

Hymn: "Buried with Christ and raised with Him too, what is there left for me to do? Simply to cease from struggling with sin and strife, simply to walk in newness of life. Risen with Christ, my glorious Head, Holiness now the pathway I tread; Beautiful thought while walking therein, He that is dead is freed from all sin. Living with Christ, my members I yield, Servants of God forevermore sealed; Not under law, I'm now under grace; sin is dethroned and Christ takes its place." (T. Ryder)