Thursday, April 3, 2014

The Crucified Life - AW Tozer


As we contemplate Him, His death and resurrection, I was moved by this passage from Tozer.  Read, consider and lift your hands in praise of the life He has given us.  Amen.


Christ’s triumph over death, the foundation and fountain of our faith, was everything to the early enraptured believers. Christ’s rising from the dead was first an amazing thing, then it became a joyful wonder, and then a radiance of conviction supported by many infallible proofs, witnessed to by the Holy Ghost. This became to the first Christians the reason for everything. The battle cry of those early Christians was “He is risen,” and it became to them outright courage. In the first 200 years, hundreds of thousands of Christians died as martyrs. To those early Christians, Easter was not a holiday or even a holy day. It was not a day at all. It was an accomplished fact that lived with them all year long and became the reason for their daily conduct. “He lives,” they said, “and we live. He was triumphant, and in Him we are triumphant. He is with us and leads us and we follow.” They turned their faces toward an altogether new life because Christ was raised from the dead. They did not celebrate His rising from the dead and then go back to their everyday lives and wait for another year to pull them up from out of the mire . They lived by the fact that Christ had risen from the dead and they had risen with Him. “If ye then be risen with Christ . . .” That word “if” is not an “if” of uncertainty. The force of the word is “since ye are then risen with Christ.”
Tozer, A. W. (2011-09-09). The Crucified Life: How To Live Out A Deeper Christian Experience (Kindle Locations 396-407). Gospel Light. Kindle Edition.

1 comment:

Sharon, Michael, Aharon said...

Amen dear little brother,
He is risen from the dead and He is our Lord, in fact He is our very life. I appreciate what Brother Tozer has shared. We live by the fact that He is risen and we have risen with Him. What brother Tozer is showing us is that we are His extension. And, as he also said, this isn't a day to hold up which Christianity calls Easter, but a life to be lived out.
Brother Nee said in his book, the Gospel of God, vol. 2, chapt. 15, section 5: The resurretion of the Lord Jesus is God's message to us. It shows us that God has accepted the Lord's work. Thank God that the cross has satisfied God's heart. That is why there is the resurrecion. Brother Nee confirms what brother Tozer saw, the foundation of our faith is the death of Christ, but our faith is also based on the proof of resurrection. Death is His work of redeeming us. Resurrection is the proof of His having redeemed us. Thank You Lord Jesus for bringing death and resurrection into our spirit that we can live You in our daily life. Thank You Lord Jesus that You, God, became a man to make man God in life and nature but not in the Godhead. We love You Lord.