Raised With Christ

though we were dead in our trespasses and sin, he made us alive together in Christ, by grace you have been saved, and raised and seated in the heavenlies with Christ Jesus (Ephesians 2:5-6)

By the grace of God Jesus could take on sin and taste death on our behalf (Hebrews 2:9). Grace doesn't stand alone, it has many effects.* To me this is the greatest effect of God's grace, that Jesus tasted death, by grace the Son of Man was saved and raised, so that by grace we would be saved and raised. The law of sin brought condemnation and death but the Spirit brought freedom and life. Though I was dead God being rich in mercy through his great love, made me alive together in Christ. Together in Christ, Jesus having died and risen again, I am together in Christ, united in both his death and life (Romans 6:4). Dying with and Raised with Christ.

For this is the will of my Father, that everyone who looks on the Son and believes in him should have eternal life, and I will raise him up on the last day (John 6:40)

The word "last day" makes it sound as the end of times, or when Christ returns, and surely in regards to the body being raised we can look at it that way, but it refers to an age. So it could refer to the age of the kingdom of God. Jesus compared the kingdom of God to a banquet where the King had invited many people who did not come so he went out into the highways and byways and invited all. Also, the kingdom is like an owner of a vineyard who went away, and the servants he had appointed no longer served him and thought they could take it for themselves killing the owner's messengers and then his only Son.

 John writes Jesus came among his own but they received him not, but to those who received him, he gave the right to become children of God, born not of flesh but from God (John 1:10-13). Jesus said we must enter the kingdom of God through a new birth of the Spirit. So of the age of the kingdom of God we have been raised, we have eternal life, and certainly we will be raised one day in a glorified body.

I am the resurrection and the life, the one believing in me even though he dies, lives, and all the ones believing in me, not one dies, do you believe this? (John 11:25-26)

What Jesus said here would be a contradiction, if we do not account for a new spiritual life. Even though we die (the body dies) the inner man will live on. The definition of resurrected is to restore someone to life. We were dead but physically walking around, this implies something besides the soul and body was dead, and this something was made alive. 

So I am alive spiritually and I await the completion of my salvation and redemption in regard to the body, and in between is my soul which includes my mind being conformed to my new inner spiritual man. This is where the war is wage for the child of God, through the weak member against the soul.

We are a new creation in Christ, something newly created not existing before. We are born new into the kingdom of God by a new birth of the Spirit, which is a spiritual new birth. Now, we see both a resurrection of the body that will occur and a resurrection of the spirit, that has occurred. Being resurrected is both a future and present event. 

Amazingly that part of me that is new is already raised and seated with Christ in the heavenlies! Oh, what clarity this brings to my identity in Christ, and that I am being transformed into the image of Christ, in between.