What does it mean to be dead in Christ?

[episkopos]

^{2 Cor. 4:10} We always carry around in our body the death of Jesus, so that the life of Jesus may also be revealed in our body.

What does it mean to be dead in Christ? We see that the pathway to life in Christ is through His death. But in what does this death consist of?

There is a natural life force and a spiritual life force in the one who is born again by the Spirit. As a rule, when our natural life force is spent...then we die. So then death has to do with a termination of the natural life in us....our strength. Unless a person has another KIND of life force that kicks in after the natural life ebbs away...we have a physical death. But one who is born again...one with another life in him...has this other kind of life...the spiritual life that is of Christ... as a "back-up." But before a spiritual life force can take over in the body, a spiritual death force must deal with the natural life strength that has sustained the body until then. These, then, go hand in hand. Death and life.

So then while we can have a spiritual life force in us even while we yet have a natural life, our own strength can't bring out the spiritual life in us. It's in the way. Even applying all our faith and every faculty we know of...these still have no effect on the outcome. No, rather, the natural life force (the old man) needs to become weak in us so that the spiritual life force in us, which is Christ in us, may be made strong. The weaker we are in the natural man, the stronger we can become in the new spiritual man. And death brings in the full measure of Christ in us.

The power of the cross.

Can we put ourselves to death? No. We are not talking about what a man can do through self-discipline as in the eastern religions. The natural man can do a lot of things...but being in Christ means a power outside (but now inside) of ourselves accomplishing the task. Grace must do it's continuing work in us. Having been given life, we must now go to God for the further grace of a deeper work of the power of the cross over our lives. God will never force this step on us. he will not impose the death of His Son on us. We must choose this way for ourselves and come to God with the willingness to "leave all" in order to be joined to Him.

New Life in Christ

The only way to bring out this power (grace) of a new life in Christ is by getting out of the way. The death of Christ is a great gift from God for those who are serious about being pleasing to God: for they who wish for Christ to live through them. So then we must go to God and offer ourselves as a living sacrifice so as to separate us from the carnal power of the natural man...and become a conduit for the life that is according to the power of God (grace).

[episkopos]

A glorious weakness?


2 Cor. 12:9 But He said to me, "My grace is sufficient for you, for My power is perfected in weakness." Therefore I will boast all the more gladly in my weaknesses, so that the power of Christ may rest on me.

Power from God comes through our weakness. It is His strength being manifested through our weakness. We provide the faith to become weak and He provides the grace to become strong. We present to God an empty vessel...emptied by faith through the operation of God...so that He may fill it with His grace through faith which is also by the operation of God.

Notice the physical effect of God's grace on Paul.

2 Cor. 10:10 For his letters, say they, are weighty and powerful; but his bodily presence is weak, and his speech contemptible.

Men look for natural strength, and despise weakness. It goes directly against the flesh to have to be weak. We don't like this idea of being weak first in order that we might be truly strengthened by God. So normally, we find that men choose to put on a show of being in Christ so that they might retain their own strength. Opinions and ideas die hard. After all, how can you enjoy the life in Christ if you must first pass through His death? We lose control of our own pursuits in this way. But this is the way that God has chosen. The way of death and life is a gift from God...so that no man can boast of his own abilities. In fact, our own abilities are in the way of a witness of life in Christ.


Phil. 3:8 Yea doubtless, and I count all things but loss for the excellency of the knowledge of Christ Jesus my Lord: for whom I have suffered the loss of all things, and do count them but dung, that I may win Christ,

That I may win Christ

How many consider this as the goal of their faith? How many believe they already have everything...including Christ..so that they are now rich and in need of nothing? How many think that the first step in a race is equivalent to winning that race?

What was Paul after? You don't see many people today in a pursuit of that which most modern believers have been led to believe they have already. But what do we have? We have for the most part a potential that has yet to be realized in any significant way. People tend to defend what they already have against all that might be entered into. We will defend the obtaining of a spiritual lamp against the need to fill it with oil. We will let the carnal mind dictate the proper way to proceed. We will seek to be perfected in a way that God has not chosen. All this because we despise (in the natural man) weakness, death and dependency on God.

Is this why most believers stay in spiritual nursery school...satisfied with being able to say a few words and distinguish colours and such? Most remain milk drinkers perpetually.... constantly needing to be changed out of soiled diapers. To continue to be spiritual babes...yet defending this state with all the powers of the carnal mind which is now become religious through an over-confidence in some bible knowledge. Truly to remain strong in the natural way of things is to remain weak in faith and weak in Christ. Better to lose all things and seem foolish so as to win Christ...thus truly becoming wise...so then to walk in the same power that resurrected Jesus from the dead. This is our heritage and calling. It is up to each one of us to take hold of eternal life in this way.

[episkopos]

Col. 3:9 Lie not one to another, seeing that ye have put off the old man with his deeds;
10 And have put on the new man, which is renewed in knowledge after the image of him that created him:

We first put off...that which is carnal or natural...and then we put on what is spiritual and eternal.


Col. 3:1 If ye then be risen with Christ, seek those things which are above, where Christ sitteth on the right hand of God.
2 Set your affection on things above, not on things on the earth.
3 For ye are dead, and your life is hid with Christ in God


For you are dead.

How often do we claim what we read in the bible as if it was simply receiving "done deals" according to our own understanding...but without the slightest indicator or proof that would show that we have indeed come into a new level of walk with the Lord? Are we truly dead to the things of this world? Are we dead to sin?

How can we set our minds on things above unless we see (or have seen) those things? Or, are we just to imagine things as we think they are?

No, being raised with Christ means that we have entered into His life in order to see what He sees and do what He does. We need grace for this. But a grace that gives us both death and life. Death to our old carnal ways...and a life that sees through what is visible and into what has been previously unseen.

[episkopos]

Does to be dead in Christ mean that we are no longer aware of what is going on in this temporal life? ...or is it about focus?

Now unless our eyes have been opened to see beyond the physical realm...we will have no choice but to see as any other human sees. We will see with our natural carnal eyes. Our natural senses will function as well as anyone else and enslave us in the same way. Our faith can help us to not go to the extremes of the world...but we can never be strong enough to keep the world out completely. The spirit is indeed willing, but the flesh is weak. But if the blindness of our spiritual eyes becomes unveiled...then our focus can proceed into the spiritual kingdom realm. What previously held us captive in the natural world will now have fallen away so that we can see through what is natural and into the spiritual realm by the light of the life in Christ. We can then walk as Jesus walked...having His faculties at our disposal. This is the mystery of the kingdom kept secret (even from most believers) in our time...although once revealed to the church in times past. Can you say "the best kept secret in the world?"


We can try to keep the natural world out of focus by faith....and succeed to some degree. But this requires a lot of effort...and we will not be able to do this with any constancy. We cannot do as Jesus by our own efforts. While any amount of faith on our part is good...it may lead us to believe we are doing something that we are really only scratching the surface of. The good gets in the way of the perfect, in any regard. That is why we need grace. With grace all becomes easy. We need the gift of spiritual sight. Then we can set our "eyes" on eternal things. And the unity of the Spirit becomes reality when all who experience this grace, see the same things. After all, if it is left to our imaginations to meditate on the things which are above, without actually seeing (or having seen) them, then we will find that we are still walking in the futility of our own minds. Not so with Christ.

So then just as a camera can focus on things that are farther away (while yet keeping the things in the foreground slightly out of focus), so we are to focus on the kingdom things that we can actually see by the Spirit while keeping the natural world in the foreground...but out of focus. To be dead then is not to be totally unaware of what's going on in this world...but that our focus has shifted to the kingdom of heaven to the extent that the things of this world are no longer desired or holding us captive. They have become out of focus due to the new gift of grace that "saves" us from the bondage of this world. Jesus came to set the captives free. The truth (the spiritual reality of the kingdom) will indeed set us free (from having to focus on what blinds us to the kingdom realm and enslaves us to the natural world).

[episkopos]

Gal. 6:14 But far be it from me to boast except in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, by which the world has been crucified to me, and I to the world.


Gal. 2:20 I have been crucified with Christ. It is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me. And the life I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me.


What does this mean "it is no longer I who live?" Would it have something to do to being dead to this world? How does that work?

[ewq1938]

What does it mean to be dead in Christ?

It means to be a Christian and then die. A dead Christian.

[Slug1]

2 Cor. 4:10 We always carry around in our body the death of Jesus, so that the life of Jesus may also be revealed in our body.

What does it mean to be dead in Christ? We see that the pathway to life in Christ is through His death. But in what does this death consist of.

Applying a context with 1 Thess 4, we also understand that while in Corinth (during his 2nd missionary trip), to be dead in Christ is a way that God utilized Paul to help those in Thessalonica be assured that when they "die," they are not missing out on Jesus' return. Why... because they are eternally alive in Christ.

[rom826]

I think the original poster was talking more about what it says in Romans 6 rather than I thess 4:16 but I will let him speak for himself.

Roman 6:7-11
For he that is dead is freed from sin.
Now if we be dead with Christ, we believe that we shall also live with him:
Knowing that Christ being raised from the dead dieth no more; death hath no more dominion over him.
For in that he died, he died unto sin once: but in that he liveth, he liveth unto God.
Likewise reckon ye also yourselves to be dead indeed unto sin, but alive unto God through Jesus Christ our Lord.

[rom826]

[B]
We provide the faith to become weak and He provides the grace to become strong.

Do we have to "provide faith to become weak? or is the flesh already weak and we have to recognize that?

[Trivalee]

It means to die to self...but alive in Christ.

[Trivalee]

Do we have to "provide faith to become weak? or is the flesh already weak and we have to recognize that?

You are right, faith doesn't make us weak but strong in Christ.

[Brother Mark]

It means to die to self...but alive in Christ.

We are already crucified with Him.

[percho]

What does the phrase, " dead in Christ," mean in the only place it is found in the word of God? νεκροὶ ἐν Χριστῷ

[ewq1938]

What does the phrase, " dead in Christ," mean in the only place it is found in the word of God? νεκροὶ ἐν Χριστῷ

1Th 4:15 For this we say unto you by the word of the Lord, that we which are alive and remain unto the coming of the Lord shall not prevent them which are asleep.

Asleep means dead here. Dead Christians.

1Th 4:16 For the Lord himself shall descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of the archangel, and with the trump of God: and the dead in Christ shall rise first:

The Christians that are dead will resurrection first, before the living Christians are changed and raptured.

It only means people who died as Christians, who are awaiting the resurrection. Any other answer is simply wrong.

[FreedMan]

1Th 4:15 For this we say unto you by the word of the Lord, that we which are alive and remain unto the coming of the Lord shall not prevent them which are asleep.

Asleep means dead here. Dead Christians.

1Th 4:16 For the Lord himself shall descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of the archangel, and with the trump of God: and the dead in Christ shall rise first:

The Christians that are dead will resurrection first, before the living Christians are changed and raptured.

It only means people who died as Christians, who are awaiting the resurrection. Any other answer is simply wrong.

I agree so much, brother. Sometimes, we try to make the Bible say so many things that is doesn't really say just because we are trying to impress others withour opinions. Thank you for the reminder that sometimes the Word means exactly what it says and nothing else!