DAILY DEVOTIONAL – July 1, 2019

“Live and Let Die” 

Prayer:  God and Father You sent Your Son Jesus to die so that we might truly live.  Grant us the strength and courage of faith to submit to the power of Your Holy Spirit who daily calls us to surrender ourselves in order that we would receive Your fullness of life.  Amen.

Scripture: Galatians 5:22-25

²² But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, forbearance, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, ²³ gentleness and self-control. Against such things there is no law. ²⁴ Those who belong to Christ Jesus have crucified the flesh with its passions and desires. ²⁵ Since we live by the Spirit, let us keep in step with the Spirit. 

Devotional – “Live and Let Die”

Susannah Keogh, a reporter with the European Sun newspaper, tells the true story of a strange law that had to be put in place in the Norwegian town of Longyearbyen.

Longyearbyen is a tranquil town in the middle of the deeply frozen wilderness of Norway.  The city is such a remote and freezing part of the country, that residents are not allowed to die there.

The law banning the death of its residents has been enforced in Longyearbyen since 1950, when it was discovered that bodies in the local cemetery were not decomposing because of the freezing temperatures.  The island’s climate is so arctic that in the early 2000’s, scientists tested corpses buried there who succumbed to the 1917 influenza virus – and to their amazement, they retrieved live samples of the virus.

Residents had been living among the deadly virus for decades, without even realizing it.

The graveyard no longer takes any new inhabitants because of fears disease will spread throughout the island, meaning that even those who have lived their whole life on the island, cannot be buried there.

Instead, terminally ill residents must be shipped to the mainland to prepare for death.

Although on the one hand, you can’t help but feel sorry for the residence of Longyearbyen not being able to mourn and bury their dead in their own homeland, the problem that they faced was a fascinating one, especially when we think about our text for today from Galatians 5 when Paul says,  “Those who belong to Christ Jesus have crucified the flesh with its passions and desires.”  The threat of disease and the threat of death that was posed to the living residents in Longyearbyen existed because the dead were not allowed to die.  Specifically, the deep freezing temperatures prevented the flesh of the dead from dying, and as a result the life of the living was at risk.  St. Paul tells us that the same thing happens to all people spiritually when we do not put to death our own flesh.

All throughout Scripture, the Bible is clear that by nature as humans we aren’t just people who make mistakes and do occasional bad things.  The Bible teaches that in our very nature, from birth, we are wicked and full of sin and rebelliousness toward God.

• 1 John 1:8 says, “If we say we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us.”
• Jeremiah 17:9 says, “The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately sick.”
• Psalm 51:5 says, “Behold, I was brought forth in iniquity, and in sin did my mother conceive me.”

This sickness of sin, and in particular the wicked desires we have and that by nature controls our thoughts, emotions and actions, the Bible often refers to as “the flesh”.  For example:

• Galatians 5:19 says, “Now the works of the flesh are evident: sexual immorality, impurity, sensuality, idolatry, sorcery, enmity, strife, jealousy, fits of anger, rivalries, dissensions, divisions, envy, drunkenness, orgies, and things like these.”

The reason we do and think and feel such awful things, the reason we sin at all, is because that is what our sinful nature, or our flesh, desires.  Galatians 5:17 puts it plainly when it says, “For the desires of the flesh are contrary to those of the Spirit [of God], and the desires of the Spirit [of God] are contrary to those of the flesh, for these are in opposition to each other.”  Much like the living residence of Longyearbyen were at risk because the flesh of their dead would not die, so to our lives, the lives of joy and peace and purpose and salvation that God has given us by grace through faith in Christ Jesus is put at risk and is under threat when our sinful nature, our flesh, is not put to death each day.  When we permit the desires of our flesh to prevail, we risk the health and well-being of the new life we have been given in Christ.

When Jesus died on the cross and was buried, He paid the price for every one of our sins.  Through His death and resurrection, Christ defeated death and has given us a new life in the Spirit; a life as Paul says in our text for today that is filled with, “love, joy, peace, forbearance, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control” because God has put His Spirit in our hearts.  Jesus and Scripture regularly call us to die to ourselves, to put to death the desires of our sinful nature and flesh, so that the desires and resulting new life of blessing that God has given us in Christ can flourish.

Paul says in Galatians 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.”

And Jesus tells His disciples in Luke 9:23, “If anyone wants to follow me, let him deny himself and take up his cross daily and follow me.”

So how is it that we put to death our flesh and its evil desires?  First and foremost, we must realize that we cannot do it on our own; the very sinful nature we want to put to death won’t let us.  But the Good News friends, is that God has not left us to ourselves.  He has given us His Word, His word that calls us into account with it’s Law.  As Hebrews 4:12 says, “For the word of God is living and active, sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing to the division of soul and of spirit, of joints and of marrow, and discerning the thoughts and intentions of the heart.”  That same Word of God then enlivens us to new life through the precious promises of God that give and strengthen faith.  As Proverbs 4:22 says, the Words of God, “are life to those who find them, and healing to all their flesh.”

In baptism, the Word of God works in and through the water to put to death our flesh and sinful nature and refresh our souls to new life.  As Paul says in Romans 6, “all of us who have been baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into his death.  We were buried therefore with him by baptism into death, in order that, just as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, we too might walk in newness of life.”

This is why Luther says that we should daily return to our baptism.  Luther doesn’t mean to be baptized every day, but rather through daily repentance in and through the Word of God and Spirit of God that gave us new life in our baptism, that same Word and Spirit give us new life today.  As we are told in 1 John 1:9, “ If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just and will forgive us our sins and purify us from all unrighteousness.”

In His amazing grace and mercy, God has not only forgiven us of our sins through the death and resurrection of His Son, but He even comes to us each and every day through His Word and Spirit to help us put to death the flesh, and make alive the new life in the Spirit He has put in our hearts.

So, my friends, much like the residents of Longyearbyen had to do, we must let the dead die.  Through daily repentance and life in the Spirit in the Word of God, we must allow God to put to death our sinful nature and the desires of the flesh so that we may fully enjoy the life of blessing He wants to work in and through us.  Because of Christ’s sufficient sacrifice, we no longer have to fear death at all…because death no longer exists for those who put their faith in Christ.  Jesus said in John 11, “I am the resurrection and the life. Whoever believes in me, though he die, yet shall he live, and everyone who lives and believes in me shall never die.”  We also no longer have to fear dying to ourselves each and every day.  Trusting in Christ we know, because He proved it in His own resurrection and ascension to glory, that when we pick up our cross and follow Him, He is faithful to give us a glorious new life that begins even today.

Thanks for joining me for another daily devotion in God’s Word, and remember that God has forgiven yesterday, is with you today and has already taken care of tomorrow.  Amen.