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The Daily Word of Righteousness
To Perish or To Live, continued
Do not be deceived: God cannot be mocked. A man reaps what he sows. The one who sows to please his sinful nature, from that nature will reap destruction; the one who sows to please the Spirit, from the Spirit will reap eternal life. (Galatians 6:7,8—NIV)
Again we see that the resurrection to eternal life in the body must be attained by following the Spirit of God.
The question is, what does it mean to reap destruction and what does it mean to reap eternal life?
Since we already have eternal life in our inner personality it must mean if we choose to live in the Spirit of God instead of according to our fleshly appetites we will be given eternal life in our body when the Lord appears.
Most Christians would probably not have much of a problem with the idea that if we live in the Spirit now we will receive more eternal life in the Day of the Lord; we will have an abundant entrance into the Kingdom of God.
What really is difficult to understand is what it will mean to sow to our sinful nature and thus reap destruction from that sinful nature.
We would submit that if we kill our spiritual nature by pursuing the things of the material realm, by yielding to the passions of the flesh, and by insisting on following our own path in the present world, there will be no inner Divine Life in our personality, only the death that has accrued from our living according to the lusts and ways of the flesh. "She who lives in pleasure is dead while she lives," Paul writes.
Now, if we have killed our spiritual nature by not keeping the commandments of Christ and His Apostles, and many believers in America do just this, what will be done with us when the Lord appears? He cannot clothe with a glorious body of Divine Life a spiritual personality that is unrighteous, unholy, and disobedient—even if that personality professes belief in Christ. To raise the flesh and bones of a corrupt personality and then clothe the whole with immortality would bring chaos into the Kingdom of God. It shall not happen!
We see therefore that we will reap precisely what we sow. If we sow to our flesh we will reap corruption in the Day of Christ. If we sow to the Holy Spirit we will reap eternal life in that our body will be raised from its place of interment and swallowed up in incorruptible resurrection Life.
But what happens to our body in the day of resurrection if we reap corruption? According to the Scriptures our body is beaten or else is assigned to a place of torment where it cannot die. It cannot die after it has been raised from the dead.
That servant who knows his master's will and does not get ready or does not do what his master wants will be beaten with many blows. (Luke 12:47—NIV)
Multitudes who sleep in the dust of the earth will awake: some to everlasting life, others to shame and everlasting contempt. (Daniel 12:2—NIV)
If your right eye causes you to sin, gouge it out and throw it away. It is better for you to lose one part of your body than for your whole body to be thrown into hell. (Matthew 5:29—NIV)
To be continued.