Question 107: Is it enough to refrain from killing our neighbors in such a way?

 

Question 107: Is it enough to refrain from killing our neighbors in such a way?

Answer: No. By condemning envy, hatred, and anger, God teaches us to love our neighbors as ourselves, to treat them with patience, peace, gentleness, kindness, and friendship, to protect them from harm as much as possible, and to do good even to our enemies.

John 6:63, "It is the Spirit who gives life; the flesh profits nothing." All people are born spiritually dead. This is why the idol of greed is hidden deep within their hearts. Only those who have died with Jesus can be free from this greed. Those who do not break free from greed become murderers. Thus, they endlessly repeat anger and murder in their hearts.

Therefore, for believers, reviving the dead spirits of their neighbors should be their top priority. The purpose of evangelism is to revive dead spirits, and this is also Jesus's Great Commission. Believers actively participate in this work and regard it as their calling.

 The spirit is dead because it is trapped in the dust. Therefore, the spirit must be resurrected and return to the kingdom of God, but to do so, the spirit cannot be naked. The spirit must wear spiritual clothing. The spirit must wear a wedding garment. Jesus spoke of the wedding garment in a parable at the king's wedding feast. In his conversation with Nicodemus, he told us to be born again of water and the Spirit. The clothing of the spirit is the spiritual body, the clothing of Christ. Everyone who is united with Christ receives a spiritual body. For the spirit to wear a spiritual body, the fleshly body (the body of sin: sarx) must die with Jesus.

For a dead spirit to be resurrected, the physical body (sarx) that imprisons it must die. A state of spiritual death is often described as imprisonment or blindness. That's why Jesus came to free the imprisoned, open the eyes of the blind, heal the demon-possessed, and guide those in darkness to light. Those who are united with Jesus Christ receive this grace. To be united with Jesus Christ, one must die with Him.

Hebrews 4:1-2 says, "Therefore let us fear, lest, while a promise remains of entering his rest, any of you should seem to have come short of it. For good news was preached to us, just as they also; but the message they heard did not profit them, not being mixed with faith in those who heard it."

These people will not enter Canaan. God made a promise to the Israelites: "None of the people who came out of Egypt, except Joshua and Caleb, will enter the promised land." This reminds us that all of our old selves must die in the wilderness.

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