Die so you can live

I want to continue to explore this commission we've been given to be imitators of God. He has been using the passage, 2 Cor. 5:14-21, to challenge me in this area. As we saw in Eph. 5:1, God calls us to imitate Him and "walk in love, just as Christ also loved you,". This passage in 2 Cor. starts out with, "For the love of Christ controls us, having concluded this, that one died for all, therefore all died; and He died for all, that they who live should no longer live for themselves, but for Him who died and rose again on their behalf." Two things stand out to me in these verses. Namely, that being an imitator of God involves how we die and how we live. Is it just me, or do these two words seem to be opposites? Yet God puts them together often in connection with each other.

In his first letter to the Corinthian church, Paul had explained to them the importance of love, going so far as to say that if love is not a motivating factor in the things we do, they end up having no value at all. Here again he uses love as a measurement. If I am going to accurately represent God, I will need Christ's love to control me. His love motivated Him to die. This death took a few different forms. Phil. 2 tells us that He died to what was rightfully His, that is, the glory of equality with God. He also became obedient rather than being obeyed. This obedience brought Him to the point of physical pain, suffering, and death. His death also involved spiritual separation from the Father; "MY GOD, MY GOD, WHY HAST THOU FORSAKEN ME?"

So too, if we are going to be imitators of God who are controlled by the love of Christ, we are going to experience death. What is God asking me to die to? Perhaps my rights, my desire to control? Maybe this death will involve pain and suffering? But unlike Jesus, this death takes a different path in the spiritual realm. Prior to hanging on the cross, Jesus had never experienced any separation from the Father. He was sinless and perfect and well pleasing to God. We come from the other side. We were born in sin, separated from God, strangers to His covenants. But by dying, we are able to enter into fellowship with the Father.

And this is where life comes into play. He died that we might live. However, verse 15 tells us that we are not living for ourselves anymore, but rather for Him. Imitators of God live like Jesus lived. He gave Himself up for us; He came not to be served but to serve; He lived His life for the glory of the Father. What will I give up today? Who will I serve? How will God's glory be shown through my actions and words?

This is the commission I've been given, to die so I can truly live.