We nourish and build up our real "you" by praying for the gifts and ministries of the Spirit and then using our gifts and ministries to build up the Body of Christ.

We nourish and build up our real "you" by walking in iron righteousness, fiery holiness, and stern obedience to the Father.

We nourish and build up our real "you" by sharing our material means as God directs.

We nourish and build up our real "you" by seeking first the Kingdom of God and His righteousness, knowing that God has promised to supply our needs.

We nourish and build up our real "you" by aiding the poor and the afflicted, as God directs and enables us.

We nourish and build up our real "you" by doing all the things associated with wholesome Christian living and discipleship.

We can choose to spend our life eating, sleeping, playing, working, and reproducing, satisfying all the appetites and passions of our flesh, attending church when it is convenient; or we can choose to make establishing our position with Christ at the right hand of God the most important business of our life.

When we die our soul will be sent to the location where it belongs, where it fits. If we have faithfully sown to the real "you" of our personality, our new man will remain hidden in Christ at the right hand of God while we rest in the spirit realm, waiting for the appearing of Christ.

Then, when Christ appears, our true life will appear with Him, that which has become a life-giving spirit.

But if we have largely neglected the real "you" of our personality, we will be raised at the end of the thousand-year Kingdom Age to receive from the hand of God that which our works deserve. I am speaking now of Christian people.

Why Bother With the First, Dead "You"?

For you died, and your life is now hidden with Christ in God. (Colossians 3:3—NIV)

We know our body is dead because of sin.

But if Christ is in you, your body is dead because of sin, yet your spirit is alive because of righteousness. (Romans 8:10—NIV)

We know we are to count that we have died with Christ on the cross.

For we know our old self was crucified with him so the body of sin might be done away with,  that we should no longer be slaves to sin— Because anyone who has died has been freed from sin. (Romans 6:6,7—NIV)

Our old self, that is our old nature, the first "you," was crucified with Jesus (we are by faith to regard this as a fact).

The purpose of crucifying the old nature is to do away with the body of sin. The body of sin includes all the bondages of sin we have inherited and acquired. The old nature is our first personality, the first "you." The body of sin is alien to our first personality but resident in it.

In order to get at the body of sin and destroy it the Lord has condemned our entire first personality, the good and the bad of it, to the cross.

The destroying of the body of sin releases us from slavery to sin. This is much to be desired.

To be continued.