The Ephesians Story (Part 6)

If you think it’s strange, try to understand there, and there, and then be sitting here, and trying to live in reality, and reality is that you’re holy and blameless, and you’re living in another reality in which you really know that’s not true, and God made a mistake. He shouldn’t have said it. If those are hard to believe, let me tell you something even harder to believe. It’s hard to believe that you were tried by a Jewish court, that you were hauled up to hell, and that you were nailed to a cross, and that you died. Having already been dead, you died. There’s a part of you that was born, let me…just say with me, in Commerce, Texas, way back when dirt was young in 1932. Born, but I was born dead and stayed dead until my 17th birthday. Oh, hey, today’s my birthday. I’ve been a Christian; what’s 17 from 61? 43 years. I’ve been a Christian most of that time. Now, honestly, I’d forgotten all about it. Not one of you said happy birthday to me today to remind me. You did because today you did. Oh, that’s right. You said at 11:30 last night.

Anyhow, I was born dead. Parts of me that don’t count were born dead, and those parts of me were hauled up to the cross. It’s hard for me to understand that that part of me actually walked up that hill and had nails driven through it, but boy, I tell you what’s really more difficult than that is to understand that which was before creation marked off in Christ, that that part of me rose from the dead. I was present at the resurrection, and not only was I present, but I was a spectator. There were others there who were spectators. I was not a spectator; I was a participant in the resurrection. And the earth shook and contorted and twisted, and angels cried in terror, and the eternal Spirit…it’s what Hebrews calls who raised Christ from the dead. Where was the Father when all this was going on? It kind of makes you wonder, but boy, here comes this cataclysmic struggle. The entire powers of an eternal God are concentrated on a dead body lying in a tomb, and the Father concentrated everything of His power against the most powerful force that could challenge Him, and that’s not the devil. This is a force more powerful. The Lord can handle this. The Lord can handle the devil and everything else. He is in a battle with His only enemy, His arch enemy, and His only enemy. He concentrates all the force and energy of His divinity. The Godness of God is at stake here. And everything that is the energy and power of God is forced there in this magnificent struggle between death and life. All of that power, all of the power of God, is now in one place in a tomb. And God wins. All of that power presence raises Him from the dead, and I got caught in that resurrection. I was in Christ, and I came up out of that tomb.

Now, give you some reassurances. Susan, can you see all that power? Can you see it all in one place? No place else in the universe. All the power of God was brought to one place to raise Jesus Christ from the dead. And I tell you, if He rises from the dead, then God has even more power than He ever had before, for He’s liquidated His enemy. Now, Susan, this is what I want you to understand, and that is, sister, that enormous concentration of power, incredible for us to understand, far greater than the power of God to create the entire culmination of all God’s power in one place, doing the most difficult thing He ever did—raising Christ out of death. That same amount of power works in you. Don’t just sit there and clap or something. Praise the Lord.

Are you looking for more power than that? Do you think I’m making this up? I am not making this up. I don’t understand this. How can I be present? You know, the bad part of me is present when going up the hill. I say the bad part of me; I don’t know how bad it is, but the negative aspects are going into the grave with Him – dead and dead and dead forever. God sees all that is dead, but I am not even born yet. For Him, history is not linear, going out this way. As far as He’s concerned, that part of you that is negative, whatever, lived and existed going up that hill, was done away with. And for Him, your history goes this way, not this way. This, which you are now, moves back to Calvary and dies, gets dragged into the grave, and does not come out. That which is you, that was in Christ before the foundation of the ages, and what I’ve got to say to you may be just possibly the most glorious thing you will ever hear. That life, that eternal life, that portion of Christ who is life, that little speck of Him that was marked off and put your name on it, that was Eternal Life. But there’s something greater than Eternal Life. There is something higher than Eternal Life. There’s something higher than the Life of God. And that Life – you’re in it. Are you with me now?

You’re in that Eternal Life. There’s a portion marked off in Christ before the foundation of the ages, and it is in Christ. That’s Eternal Life. It’s the highest life. It’s the greatest life – but there’s something greater. You’re a participant and a part of that Eternal Life – and there’s something greater than that eternal life: and that is Eternal Life that has passed through death and risen again. That is Life that cannot die, and that is Life that is in eternal resurrection. You were in Him, passing through that death, a portion of Him that is eternal and that is His highest life that now comes out of that tomb, free from the shadows of death, and there ain’t nothing that can touch it. Eternal Life does something greater than Eternal Life: Eternal Life passes through death and comes out of that grave, and you are in Him. Praise the Lord. If you’re ever going to say amen, right now is the time to open your mouth, because if this won’t help you, nothing will help.

Praise the Lord for Jesus Christ, who brought you out of the grave with Him. When He looks at this thing, I’m telling you, he looks at it backwards. Here’s the ugly part of you, and it ended up at Calvary. Here’s the great part of you: you ended up in resurrection. Perhaps God is cross-eyed, and you are inside of Him. He sees you at the end and the beginning, and He chooses you based on what He sees. Then He sees you in your fallen body and your untransformed soul, and He takes you back to Calvary and takes you up that hill, and He destroys that body forever. It’s there, saints. It’s in a grave somewhere outside Jerusalem. That’s where your body is, and it’s going to stay there forever. It’s dead. You were dead when you went up that hill, and you’ve been dead ever since you were born. And are you going to die someday? You were dead then. You’re dead when you were born. When did you die? Well, maybe I’ll die someday in California or Texas. Who knows where I might die, but I was already dead. I died first at Calvary. This thing’s running backwards. Do you understand what I’m trying to tell you? This is not difficult. This is very difficult to understand, but not to a God who is I am.

Now God is I am. I am. I am. I am. And I am. Don’t reckon yourself dead; you are dead. That which is you now is headed backward toward Calvary to die forever and is dead because God is not feathered by space and time. He can just pick you up and drag you straight back, and He did to Calvary, and there He killed you. But at the same time, that other wonderful part of you, He allowed you to go into death. Now, why would God do this? God allows His greatest enemy to come up on the stage. That’s for Susan’s sake. Well, Susan’s going to worry about whether she dropped the pencil on the floor or not. So, Susan, He doesn’t take some little sin or some big sin, and He doesn’t take the devil or the devil’s angels, but He brings the only real enemy He’s got upon the stage, and He pits His Life against its death.

Have you read the beginning? There’s a place where death emerges for the very first time. And Gabriel looks at this hideous creature and says, “It’s not alive. It’s not alive. Death exists and breathes, but it’s not alive. It’s dead. It’s the antithesis of your Lord.” And they meet upon the stage of history in space and in time. Each believes He is greater than the other, greater than all your sins. Christians are fascinated with the devil – the devil came in and stopped such and such. Stop being so immature. If you have any problems, it’s between you and God, but here are the real enemies in the only battle that ever really took place in a situation that really was outside of space and time. And they met on the earth in a tomb. Death battled for your spirit marked off in Christ before the foundation of the ages, and He was after nothing less than… (continued in Part 7)