When Jesus raised Lazarus from the dead He was restoring to Lazarus the life that he had lost, and when Lazarus walked out of the tomb at the command of Christ he was fully alive. In the same way, every time a human being puts their trust in Jesus as their Savior, the life that was lost in Adam is restored. Every Christian is fully alive, having been made complete in Christ. When Christian teachers tell us that we need “more,” they can’t be saying that we need more of God, for the Church (the living body of Christ) is the fullness of Him who fills all and is in all. It is true that as we grow in Christ, we will experience “more,” but we do not get more, for “Christ is all and is in all” Colossians 3:11. Even though Lazarus came forth from the tomb fully alive, he was too bound up by the grave clothes he was wrapped up in to fully experience the life that was his. He was alive but not free to enjoy the life that was now his. Again, in the same way, even though Christians are fully alive, the grave clothes of the old life can restrict the Christian from the freedom of resurrection life. I was talking about this with a fellow worker “in Christ” just yesterday, and they asked me a profound question about which part of the grave clothes would have been unwrapped first so that Lazarus could be free to live. I paused for a second before answering, and then I said, “His head.” My fellow worker knew already the answer and was asking me the question to pull that answer out of me. Of course, it had to start with the head so that Lazarus would be able to see and hear. Our transformation into Christ-likeness is a result of the renewing of our mind – learning to hear and see from the mind of Christ so that in surrender and childlike faith, we can participate in the life of Jesus that is now ours to fully enjoy. The Christ who lives in us is continually by the Holy Spirit leading us into all truth – Jesus is the truth about everything – so that we can increasingly experience the freedom of the life of the resurrected Jesus in us, consequently lived through us. Transformed daily; greater freedom daily, more Christlike daily every day for the rest of our lives. What a journey!
