"Or do you not know that as many as were baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into his death? Therefore we have been buried with him through baptism into death, in order that just as Christ was raised from the dead through the glory of the Father, so we also may live a new way of life." Romans 6
My life is not my own.
Actually, i died a long time ago. i may have even been still born, i'm not sure, i don't remember life before knowing Jesus, others seem to know the exact date they were born again. The person i would have been, the one made in the image of my father the devil died and Jesus put his own life into my body. My breath was cut off and His, the Holy Spirit himself, came into me. Somehow, Jesus took the satanically corrupted, sin saturated, self worshiping Scruffy Fricken and dragged him up onto his cross with him. There God destroyed him, utterly, wholly, with divine prejudice when he destroyed his own Son. i never even felt a thing but i know it happened because the devil has not stopped trying to take me back. To rework me again into his image, has never ceased to mar and scratch and to claw at the image of my new, my adopted, my true Father God in heaven and yet he has never won, never taken back complete control (though i have sometimes given it to him), never succeeded, never not met fierce resistance. That doesn't come from me; i wouldn't have done that. i totally would have gone along with every fool notion the devil threw up for consideration. i'm dumb like that. But Jesus isn't. Jesus isn't letting him have an inch. No matter what it takes, no matter what he has to do to me to stop him, Jesus has won, is winning and will win. It is finished. i'm a battlefield where the outcome is assured, there's nothing left to do but finish the fighting and mop up the last pockets of resistance. This insurgency may set off a bomb or two, it may melt back into the mountain citadels to pop back up at what it thinks is a more favorable time but General God has already factored all of that into His plan. The enemy will only succeed in bringing about his own demise.
"And as I have watched over them to pull up, and to tear down, and to annihilate, and to destroy, and to do evil, so I will watch over them to build and to plant." Jeremiah 31
"For no one is able to lay another foundation than the one which is laid, which is Jesus Christ... Do you not know that you are God's temple and the Spirit of God dwells in you?" 1 Corinthians 3
My life is not my own.
My life is a house and i may have thought i invited Jesus in. Found him outside, thought he needed a place to stay and graciously offered my own couch with promises to build him his own room, a savior-in-law suite, out back somewhere, especially if he could chip in towards it. But he comes in and starts tearing everything down, knocking out bearing walls, exposing termites and cockroaches to the light, tears it down, bulldozes the foundation which crumbles all too easy on its sandy mud and starts laying out plans to build a completely new house, on a new foundation, on the rocky highground i didn't want to have anything to do with. Too hard to get to. Too much work. He's not even building in the same styles and motifs of the neighborhood! This life is going to stick out like a sore thumb! People will talk. The neighbors are going to report me to the association. And when i ask just what the hectare he thinks he's doing, he just shows me the deed. He bought the house. He bought the land. With his own blood. With his own priceless righteousness. Paid a fortune for it too. Much more than it was worth.
"I AM YHWH your God, who brought you out from the land of Egypt, from the house of slavery." Exodus 20
"Thus says YHWH, the redeemer of Israel, his holy one,
to the one who despises life,
to the one who abhors the nation,
to the slave of rulers:
"Kings shall see and stand up;
princes, and they shall bow down,
for the sake of YHWH, who is faithful,
the holy one of Israel, and He has chosen you." (Isaiah 49)
"Or do you not know that your body is the temple of the Holy Spirit who is in you, whom you have from God, and you are not your own? For you were bought at a price; therefore glorify God with your body." 1 Corinthians 6
My life is not my own.
The auctioneer's gavel fell. The money changed hands. A king's ransom was given for me. Yeah, for me! i was standing, naked on the auction block, the dregs of the slave market and a king, THE King bought me as a bride for his Son. i am a gift. i am being scrubbed sore. My wounds are being dressed. My malodorous pungency, acquired from years on the streets, in the pigpens, in the robber's dens, in the prison cells, years of neglect, poor hygiene, self-loathing are being washed away and replaced with the finest beauty treatments from the most exotic places i've only dreamed of, perfumes, ointments, oils, soaps. Robes and garments of spun gold and crimson silk and purple yarns and linen as white as snow that has yet to gently touch the earth (Did you know the process that forms snow actually purifies the water perfectly?) are being prepared for my wedding along with gemstones forged in the heat and pressure of the sufferings and troubles of my life to be used in the crowns, rings, necklaces being custom crafted to fit only me. i am being trained, how to walk, how to talk, how to carry myself in the presence of my King, my Husband, my Master.
"Truly, truly I say to you, unless a grain of wheat falls into the earth and dies, it remains by itself alone. But if it dies, it bears much fruit. The one who loves his life loses it, and the one who hates his life in this world preserves it for eternal life. If anyone serves me, he must follow me, and where I AM, there my servant will be also." John 12
My life is not my own. i was king of my own life and then i died. The king is dead, long live the King of Kings!
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