“ OBEDIENT UNTO DEATH “ By J W Luman We will be speaking about coming from the Testimony to the Witness, and more specifically we will be speaking of coming from death unto life. We must come to this as we come to know Christ, The Resurrection. And just a footnote on that. There are two phrases in the scripture regarding this. One of these phrases is specifically with regard to Christ in His Person; it is said He is raised up from among the dead. The King James Version says “from among the dead.” The original says, “ up out from among the dead”. The other phrase is “ resurrection of the dead”, and those two phrases are distinctly different. One refers to Him in His death, burial and resurrection, and the other refers to Him as He relates to us. He answers both terms - He was raised up out from among the dead, as the first fruit of many brethren. And because of that, He Himself is The Resurrection of the dead. HE IS THE RESURRECTION OF THE DEAD. He is the only hope the dead have! He is the only answer the dead have. He Himself is the Resurrection of the dead. He does not raise the dead aside or separate from Himself, but rather becomes to the dead who hear His voice, The Resurrection and The Life. When I really began searching on Christ, The Resurrection, those two terms at first were really bothering me. I had seen the distinction - “from the dead”. God raised Him, Christ was raised - always “from the dead”, “out from among the dead”. It is as though the dead stay dead and He is raised out from among the dead. And as I began to see Christ as The Resurrection I saw why that is so - He comes forth as the first fruit. Going back to the Testimony, to the scripture, He is waved before Jehovah God! By that Eternal Spirit He is raised up out from among the dead, and waved before God as the guarantee of many to come - all in the same resurrection: The Resurrection that He is. “If that same Spirit which raised up Christ Jesus dwell in you...” “He that hath not the Spirit of the Lord is none of His own.” He’s waved before the Lord; and that’s in certainty and fulfillment then that the dead shall be raised. Because if the first fruit has come forth raised up from among the dead, the penalty has been paid and the power has been broken by His death and burial and resurrection. The penalty has been paid! Man has died, the power has been broken - He has come forth. Now by that same Spirit, He shall bring forth many brethren. Who will He bring forth? Those who hear His Voice and are obedient unto HIS DEATH. And now we’ll talk about “obedient unto death”. What does it mean - to be obedient unto His death? Jesus said, “The hour is coming, and now is that the dead shall hear the Voice of the Son of God. They that hear shall live.” So He is raised up from among the dead, He has the keys of death and hell; it is given unto Him by His same Spirit, by His own life to bring forth all who will come; answering in Himself, becoming their Resurrection, becoming The Resurrection of the dead that Israel had talked about, preached, believed in and looked for so long! IT’S HIM! So the term that He is The Resurrection of the dead does not find its full meaning in that He will raise up the dead and give the dead another life. No - it’s that He becomes their life! They are raised up by Him. It’s not that He is raising the dead aside from Himself; it’s not something that He is doing. It is Who He is in you and I being. It’s not something He’s doing to us; it is Who He is in us. “I AM THE RESURRECTION.” Those who come must come through obedience to His death. We have said that He came from being The Testimony to The Witness in obedience unto death. So let’s look now at Philippians 2:5-9, and I want to emphasize this phrase, “ LET THIS MIND BE IN YOU.” The literal translation says, “which is in Christ Jesus also, who being inherently in the form of God deems it not pillaging to be equal with God. Nevertheless, empties Himself, taking the form of a slave, coming to be in the likeness of humanity, and being found in fashion as a human, He humbled Himself, becoming obedient unto death, even the death of the cross.” OBEDIENCE - He was deemed obedient. Romans 5:19, “ For as by one man’s obedience many were made sinners, so by the obedience of one shall many be made righteous.” It’s through His obedience. Now let’s think - to what was He obedient? In The Testimony Israel was not obedient to the Jordan. They got to the Jordan and could not pass over into Canaan, or they would not pass over. Why would they not pass over? They would not pass over because they were disobedient unto death. How do I say that? How did they get out of Egypt? They got out of Egypt by the blood of the lamb upon their doorposts; they entered into the house. They were all baptized into the Sea; baptized into His death. But they would not continue; they would not live in obedience to His death. A few days after that, they wanted to go back to a place unto which they were dead! Not just once - several times! They would not live obediently, they would not live seeing themselves dead to this, but alive unto God. They would not live in the comprehension that they were alive not just because God saved them, but that they were the firstborn of God; that they virtually came out of death, and God said Israel is my firstborn - they belong to ME! Not being obedient unto death. They got right up here to what is a very strong type of The Resurrection - living in Canaan, the promise land; and because of the fears in their own hearts, because of their fear of death, fear of dying - they would not cross over! Paul mentions these in the scripture who all their lifetime are in bondage through fear of death. How are they delivered from their fear of death? By death! BY THE CROSS! Had they comprehended what happened to them, had they seen the enormity of their death when they looked at the mightiest army possibly on the face of the earth - and saw it all dead; had they seen what was the evidence, the type, the testimony of how great a death it is by which God brings us out and how all encompassing a death it is by which God brings out His firstborn, alive unto Himself! What is all this showing? It is showing The One who was the firstborn from among the dead - the One of Whom The Father said, “He is mine. In Him I am well pleased.” That’s The One who comes forth in The Resurrection - that’s a Corporate Son, but it’s no less The Son Himself, because it’s Christ in you, and in you and in you. And it’s you and I in Christ as One Son. All of this was in testimony. Why did God so demand obedience to The Testimony? Because The Testimony pointed toward this obedience of The Son; it was a Testimony of The Son. So how could Israel possibly fail? God did it, God smote the Egyptians, God parted the Red Sea, God buried the Egyptians, God fed them with manna - how could they possibly fail? Through disobedience; through failing to obey what God hath done. Now as it is with The Testimony, so it is with you and I. How can you and I fail so miserably today? Paul says, “If God be for us, who can be against us? What is able to separate us... I perceive that neither life nor death nor things present, nor things...” How is it when He has by His death, His burial, His resurrection brought us forth and He is made unto us all that He is; when He lives in us, Who is the absolute Resurrection and The Life - how is it we have such a hard time? We are disobedient to that which God hath done. See, you can’t be disobedient to anything God hasn’t done; the disobedience is to that which He has done. If He hasn’t done it, how can you be disobedient to it? How was Christ obedient, obedient unto death? Because He was obedient unto that thing unto which He was appointed of God. (Hebrews 3:2, “Who was faithful to him that appointed him...”) He was obedient unto a thing that God had done. The Cross is a settled thing in the heart and mind of God long before Golgotha, long before the first creation. IT IS THE CROSS THAT DEMANDS OBEDIENCE! And we must come to realize that the gauge, the measure, the standard of obedience is not in anything other or less than THE CROSS. If I am not obedient to The Cross, that is to His death, then it really doesn’t make any difference what else I do or do not do; because whatever else I do or do not do, I am doing it or not doing it in disobedience. If I am disobedient to The Cross, if I’m disobedient to His death, if I refuse in my heart to take His death as my death (because that’s exactly what it is) and I refuse that as did Adam, and I seek to save my own soul life, then whatever I do, whether it be good or bad, it’s done in disobedience, so it just becomes the dead works of the flesh. We try to measure our obedience in how much “we do for God”; ‘I preached six sermons last week, I did this or that!’ Yes, but did you do that in obedience or did you do that in disobedience? ‘Well’, we say, ‘I obeyed the Lord and did that.’ No, did you do that in obedience or in disobedience? Did you do that having understanding (not brain knowledge), in obedience to the comprehension - I HAVE NO LIFE OF MY OWN, CHRIST IS MY LIFE! Did you do that in obedience to The Cross? Look at all that Jesus did in 3 ½ years. But had He not gone to The Cross, had he balked in Gethsemene, had He balked in the Judgment Hall, had He balked going up the hill, had He balked and called for deliverance while hanging upon the Tree - everything He would have done, would have immediately become an act of disobedience, not obedience. And if it is for Him that way, it is certainly for you and I that way. We want to judge things so much in what we’ve done for the Lord. I’m not discrediting that, I’m simply saying if that is done in obedience to The Cross - well and good. If it’s not, then it’s just worthless works of flesh - religious flesh! And I know that’s a hard pill to swallow. That’s why I come back to Jesus as the standard. If He had not been obedient unto death, even the death of The Cross, all that He did would have been a washout; more than that, it would have been an act of disobedience. But you see, everything He did from the time He was made of a woman and made under the law was in absolute obedience to The Cross! Whenever an issue came that would say, shall you do this or shall you do that: it was THE CROSS that motivated Him. “Know ye not that I must be about My Father’s business?” At the height of His ministry, when foreigners were coming and saying, “Sirs, we would see Jesus...” At the height of His popularity and ministry He says, “Except a corn of wheat fall into the ground and die, it abides alone.” In other words, it accomplishes NOTHING! “But if it dies, it bringeth forth much fruit...And I, if I be lifted up...” Why didn’t He just continue for two thousand years? Why isn’t He still just walking around, changing only the look and mode of His garment, doing what He did? He was going about doing good, He was going about healing those who were oppressed of the devil, God was with Him. Why isn’t He still doing that? I mean, as an individual, if that’s what it’s all about? Why? Because there would still be no Resurrection, there would be none in heavenly places, there would be none born of His Spirit - there would be none of that. Except He became obedient unto death, there would be no living Witness of that which The Testimony declares. His obedience unto death is the reason you and I are seated in heavenly places now. How do we come from one comprehension to the other? How do we who are in Christ come from comprehending Him only as Testimony to comprehending Him Who is The True and Faithful Witness - the proof and the declaring of all things? How do we come? Through obedience unto His death! Let this same mind be in you which was also in Christ! Not the mind that says, I’m God. No, the mind that says “ I am obedient unto death, even the death of The Cross”. The mind that says “I am found in the form of a servant and the fashion of a man - I WAS BORN TO DIE! It’s the mind that says, when He died - I died. And now I only live, I can only live, it is only possible that I live by Him. I HAVE NO LIFE BUT HIM!” This is the mind that is obedient unto His death, obedient unto His death - in what? EVERYTHING! See, if there is an obedience in us unto His death, then whatever we do, we do in obedience. In the context of this scripture, the obedience that is called for, and talked of here is always and only worked in you by His death - by THE CROSS. It is always related; there is no other obedience. If we are obedient there, then all things are done in obedience. If we are disobedient there, it doesn’t make a lot of difference what else we do or not do, because we are judged disobedient. Look at Israel - they go around in the wilderness for forty years. Don’t tell me they didn’t do some good things - but they all died nonetheless. Why did they die? Did God really hate them? No, God didn’t hate them. He just said that in disobedience they could not enter into His rest. The New Testament writer translates that “in unbelief” - no faith, which is the same thing as disobedience. They refused to believe, they would not enter in, they were disobedient, but unto what? That’s the whole point? Unto what? Unto His death, which was their death! In their hearts they never saw themselves dead, so when they got up to where it really counts and looked at Canaan - fear struck, where faith should have ruled! Fear struck, and they said, we can not do that! Why, we’ll die if we do that! No - you died when you came out of Egypt - don’t worry about it! They are all still afraid of death; they’re all still bound up with this business of death - afraid they’re going to die. Christians are that way too; all bound up. “ Who all their lives were in bondage to fear of death.” When are you going to be delivered from that? When you die! When you come to that reality you’ll be delivered from that. We’re still trying to feel a pulse and trying to get a heartbeat, but that doesn’t have anything to do with it. That’s not where fear resides anyway. Fear is something that is deeper than that. The fear is over the loss of my life. But when we come to realize that’s what I lost at The Cross, and I have it again in Him, Who shall never die, and by Him I cannot die - there goes the fear of death! It is destroyed by obedience unto His death, taking it as our own. That’s just the gospel; that’s just the Truth as it is in Christ. Israel walked right up there and there was Canaan - that’s just the gospel; it’s yours! God prepared it - that’s the gospel. ‘Well I don’t know, maybe we’d better send some spies out.’ And they ended up not going in. And God said, “I have sworn in my wrath, they shall not enter into my rest.” You see, it didn’t make any difference how much good they did. All that time that they wandered around, everyone of them that was of a certain accountability, a certain age, who refused to go across - everyone of them died, and they died in disobedience, they died because of disobedience. Because they wouldn’t reckon themselves dead - they died in disobedience. All except two - Joshua and Caleb, that two fold testimony of the Lord Jesus that finds itself again in Revelation 11 as the two fold witness of the Lord. The point here is that obedience is the way you cross over. You don’t swim the river. We have believers today who say, ‘how do I do that?’ They think, I’m not a good swimmer, I’ll drown in the Jordan! That’s not what gets you across. When they were obedient, Jordan rolled back! When we come to see ourselves dead with Him, I promise you on the authority of the scripture, on the authority of The Testimony, by the authority of The Living Spirit of God Himself - I do guarantee you when obedience unto His death comes into our hearts, when we come to say, “Oh God, I am dead!”; I promise you, YOUR LIFE WILL APPEAR! I PROMISE YOU, You will hear the Voice of The Resurrection saying, “Look and live! Come forth!” I promise you because it isn’t something He has to become, it is Who He is! They come to the same Jordan, the same Canaan, but in obedience unto death this time, with three days preparation, which speaks of being in obedience unto His death - they crossed over! Crossing over this Jordan. See, when the Lord Jesus took that to Himself in the baptism called the baptism of John, He came there in obedience. “We must obey, we must fulfil, it must be, let it be so.” He came to John to fulfil obedience and in obedience He came and fulfilled it. John said, “No Lord, I have need to be baptized of you.” “Well, that may be true, but we must fulfil all righteousness. I must be obedient unto you, what you represent - the end of the first; the summation of all the prophets are in you. I must be obedient, for unto such a thing I was born, to such a thing I came; to be obedient unto death, even the death of The Cross. Thou hast said, ‘Behold the Lamb of God’ - I must be obedient unto you. You must baptize Me in this Jordan at this time.” Summing up The Testimony - coming up out of that Jordan, as it were from Testimony to Witness and we know all of this was foretelling, speaking of The Cross. His dealings with Lazarus pointed right to The Cross. What was He doing? Fulfilling The Testimony in obedience! John was raised up for that very purpose; he was conceived for that purpose. Lazarus got sick for that purpose that The Son would fulfil. He was obedient - obedient - obedient. He took that obedience that was foretold in those incidents to The Cross, because these let us know what He did at The Cross. He took all of that right to The Cross and there He fulfilled the baptism of John. There at The Cross He fulfilled that Resurrection that He was unto Lazarus. There at The Cross we come truly from The Testimony to The Witness. And because of what He set forth in those 3 ½ years that was totally governed and controlled absolutely by The Cross, we understand what took place on The Cross. So, obedience unto His death. In John He brought the whole Old Covenant episode into obedience to His death. John wasn’t going to baptize Him, was he? But He said, you will, we must fulfil all righteousness. And in John everything of The Testimony is summed up in obedience, by the obedience. Don’t you see, He took it into Himself right there, and became obedient. The whole of The Testimony became obedient unto His death by His obedience. How do you and I become obedient unto His death? By His obedience; by coming to comprehend, and that being a work of The Spirit, not our own academic understanding. We are obedient to His death in the comprehension that by Him we are dead. This is what it’s talking about - the mind of Christ being in you. This is what it’s talking about - being renewed in the Spirit of your mind, in the putting off and the putting on. Let this same mind be in you. And that mind is worked in us by The Spirit, but The Spirit in revealing Christ and working that mind in us, works in us the obedience of His death. And this is something that we allow, we let it be. But then that death reaches some corner that I’m not too happy it’s going to, and I have to keep that door locked - and immediately obedience ceases. We have ceased to be obedient to His death. We say there’s a little bit of obedience. No, you have ceased being obedient. And when you have ceased being obedient - what are you? Disobedient! And that doesn’t mean doing or not doing obedient thing. No - you have ceased being obedient, therefore you are disobedient. It is our heart, it is our soul, the condition of our heart. Coming from The Testimony to The Witness is a condition of our heart. And in fact the condition of our soul has to do with The Resurrection. In our soul we are either being raised into the newness of life, recognizing that, walking in that , rejoicing in that - or we are not partakers in that. We’re somehow holding back. Maybe we’re waiting for another Resurrection to come, or whatever, but we’re not walking in the light as He is in the light. And the only thing that can keep us from doing that is being disobedient unto His death, because it’s that death that releases us into The Resurrection that He is. Think about the vail in the Temple that keeps us out of the Holy of Holies; but the vail is done away. But how? In His death the vail is done away. Now - when, if the heart will turn to the Lord (see 2 Corinthians 3:14-17) the vail shall be taken away. The vail that is done away shall be taken away, and when the vail is taken away we are said to be open-faced, unveiled; that we can behold the glory, behold the glory of the Lord, behold The Resurrection. We haven’t worked The Resurrection, we are just turned to see Him in The Resurrection; being obedient unto His death. The vail that keeps us from beholding the glory is done away in His death. In us it is taken away when we are obedient to His death, when the heart turns. And in obedience to His death we come to say, Yes, when He died, I died. I didn’t lose a hand or a leg, I didn’t get a foot cut off - I DIED! I wasn’t just hurt or wounded - I DIED! O God, let me find my life now in Him. O God, let me see the life in direct proportion to the death. Let me walk in the faith of The Son of God in direct proportion to the obedience working in me to His death, because that’s the way it works. One is in direct proportion to the other. This is the essence of Philippians 2:5-9 concerning this obedience of Christ. God has always looked to the greater man in His dealings, in the full scope from Genesis to Revelation with The Cross in The center. God has always looked to the greater man, to the greater city, to the greater temple, to the greater mountain, to the greater Priest, the greater prophet, the greater King, the greater Son. In The Testimony we have a man - God has always in this man looked to The Greater Man. In the first Adam He has always looked to the second. Everything spoken of the first has always been spoken as though it were fulfilled in the second. Hebrews 2 really locks that in. Everything that God has purposed for man comes to be fulfilled in That Man Christ Jesus - “BUT WE SEE JESUS.” Everything that God spoke concerning mankind seemed to have been lost in mankind until into mankind came The Man. And all that was spoken - He obeyed, He fulfilled, and brought forth through His death, burial and resurrection A New Mankind in Whom the full thought of God is realized and accomplished, because That Man that comes forth through His death, burial and resurrection is The Corporate Man that He Himself is - it is CHRIST IN YOU! It is not after all, many men that He has brought forth, but He hath brought forth ONE MAN - many who are One Man, and The One of that is That Man in you - Christ in you. So we look at things typed in Adam. Now I’m not just taking about the individual Adam; I’m talking about Noah, Abraham, Isaac, Jacob - all are a part of this man. God dealt with them in view of The Greater Man. I’ve said the greater city - Jerusalem. God always looked at that city in view of the Greater City, the Jerusalem unto which you are come; the City which in Him you are now. But what good is a city, even a greater city if the light is not turned on? Because the greatness of The City is The Light that is in it. If the city is still in darkness, still back in the darkness looking for something to come; if you and I are not walking in the light as He is The Light - where is The Witness of The City? We’re still writing songs and preaching sermons about The One to Come. Why? Because Christ is not revealed in The City. The whole purpose of The City is that The Son be revealed, The Light come forth. John saw The City and he saw The Light of The City, he saw The Tabernacle of The City, and The Lamb is The Light. And what does that suggest to you concerning the nature of that City, the character of that City, the obedience of that City? It is a City that is dead unto sin, but alive unto God through Christ! It is a City whose nature is obedience. It is The City of The Lamb. And when God looked at the first He always saw the second. So the whole thing is just this - there must come at some point in time an end of the first so that the second may be made manifest. And until there is a death of the testator, the testimony isn’t any good. The Bible says that, because it is sealed in His blood, it is sanctified in His blood - The Testimony is. Well, the real blood has got to come, the real death has got to come, the real obedience has got to come before there can be any witness that indeed it is come. If that is so in the actuality of the thing - in Christ Jesus, it’s got to be that way in each who would be witnesses unto Him. If He has passed from death unto life, from The Testimony unto The Witness, you and I must pass in our comprehending of Him, in our own souls we must pass from The Testimony to The Witness. We must not be those who are looking for a City, but rather, living as one. And the only way we can do that is if The Light is turned on. The whole purpose of The City is that The Son be revealed in you, revealed in me - as all that He is! In Him dwelleth the fulness of the Godhead bodily! Revealed in us so that we may know, not because some scripture says it, but that in verification of what the scriptures say, we may know by the Indwelling Spirit - as He is, so are we in this earth. For you see that’s what it’s all about. It’s not just about Him being something; it’s about Him having Witness in the earth. It’s about all that He is - His whole fulness having Witness in the earth. All of this business of His death, burial and resurrection didn’t make Him anything. It was that by which you and I become in Him, through Him, what God determined to have - a Witness of Himself in man, or A Man who was in Witness of Himself, a creation, a New Creation. So when the Light is turned on in The City, then The City shines. It doesn’t try to shine - it just shines! The Light being the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ - shining in our hearts, in a people, who become that Light, that knowledge, that reality, that declaration in the earth. In all parts of the earth - little parts, big parts - every part! It determines their thinking, their values - everything about them. But it is The Lamb who is The Light, and it is The Lamb who is upon The Throne in That City, so it is obedience unto His death that is being worked in us while His Life is being made manifest through us. I used to think that He was working Life in me. He is not working Life in me: HE IS THE LIFE! He isn’t going to be more Life than He already is. He is The Life, He is The Light. What happens when light increases? Darkness decreases. You could then say that light worketh the decrease of darkness. His Life worketh death in me. Light is death to darkness - it does away with darkness. His Life is not working Life in me: He is not giving me Life - HE IN ME IS LIVING, HE IS THE LIFE! What that Life is doing in me is working in me the knowledge of death; working in me the reality of His death. Paul says that in his letter of 2 Corinthians 4:7-12. “So then death worketh in us, but life in you.” The more I see that Christ is my Life, the more I see I have no Life but Christ! That’s obedient unto His death. When you stop that by resisting what His Life is working in you, then you are disobedient. You say, well, I’m disobedient to His Life. No, you’re really disobedient to His death; you are disobedient to what His Life is working in you, to what the realization of Christ is bringing about in you - dispelling darkness and working death to me, to the flesh. Look at what Paul says in Philippians 3: “Oh, that I may know Him in the power of His resurrection...” Several times Paul has mentioned that power. One is in Colossians 1:29 where he started this narration in verse 24. “Christ in you, the hope of glory; Christ whom we preach,...that we may present every man perfect in Christ Jesus; Whereunto I also labour, striving..” How Paul? ...” according to his working, which worketh in me mightily.” Take hold of that word “mightily” and you will see that it’s the power of His resurrection. Again in Ephesians: “...who is able to do exceeding abundantly above all we can ask...” How? “...according to the power that worketh in us.” “Oh, that I may know Him, and the power of His resurrection, (now look what it works) the fellowship of his sufferings, being made conformable to his death.” We would think that I’d have to be conformed to His death before I’m ever going to know Him in the power of His resurrection. No - you’ve got to be obedient to His death. It is The Resurrection that makes you conform. It is the knowing of Him. We don’t go out and try to conform to His death. It is in our heart, it is our willingness to see ourselves dead with Him; that’s where it is. That’s where it’s got to be, because we’re all willing to go do stuff. When I’m obedient in my heart, in my soul, that I have no life but Christ - He appears! I see Him as my Life - He appears! And it is that appearing of Him, that working, that knowledge then that begins to work in me, by which I am conformed to His death - it’s not something I try to do. I’m trying to say that obedience is the key; not me doing, me not doing, me trying to be dead, me trying to conform to His death. Give it up! Paul says if you’re going to labor, labor into this rest. That’s obedience, and that’s not a labor of flesh, but that is a heart that is truly turned to God. The heart that is truly turned to God calls out, ‘Oh God, Oh God! Work this in me! This same mind which was also in Christ Jesus!’ And when we’re willing to see ourselves dead, there remains only Him as our Life. And then the working of that Life in us is the power by which we’re conformed to His death; because His death is us - it’s our death! I say it over and over because it’s so contrary to the natural mind. Philippians 3 there looks so contrary to the natural order of things. We think we ought to start out being conformed to His death, knowing Him in the fellowship of His sufferings, and now the power of His resurrection. But Paul is saying, ‘Oh God, let the power of His resurrection work in me, bringing me into the fellowship of His sufferings, that is my soul becoming obedient unto His death. That’s the fellowship of His sufferings - the Psalms are full of it! The fellowship of His sufferings is when our soul literally begins to be obedient to the reality of Christ, to the reality of His sufferings. Where did He suffer? He suffered in His soul. The Psalms tell us that over and over again. It was the laying down of His soul life. We know Him in the fellowship of His sufferings and are conformed to His death. That is, all that would live about me is brought into subjection to His death. And that doesn’t happen over night - that is the working of Christ in you and I. But I will say this again: He is not working life in me, He is The Life in me. His working in me is against everything that would try to live other than Him. It’s against things that are enemies of The Cross, seeking to have their own way, their own life. He’s not working life - HE IS LIFE! It is Life coming to The Throne - that’s The Resurrection. That’s the power of The Resurrection, and it’s released through our obedience to His death. And there’s the point - who are obedient unto His death? I’ll tell you right now: those who desire to know Him are the only ones who will be obedient unto His death. Those who want to die and go to heaven - they are not going to be obedient unto His death. Those who want to come from The Testimony to The Witness more than they want to breathe another breath shall be obedient to His death. See, this is not something we have to conjure up - death is real, The Cross is real! All it takes is obedience. It isn’t something we have to conjure up and play like it happened. The Spirit of God is there in a flash of an eye when a heart will turn to see. The Spirit of Truth is all over you, and all in you - you don’t have to conjure anything up; it’s a simple act of obedience. But you see, before we have that “simple act” - oh my, there’s got to be that willingness worked in us, that attitude of heart worked in us. It took a lot of time, the Lord working in me, until I finally in total exasperation was willing to be obedient to anything! I just cried out, ‘Oh God, there’s got to be more than this!’ Now I tell you He’ll show you, but He’ll say look at this! I saw great things in the Testimony - the city, the mount, but I wondered, how will it be? And people told me: we’ve got to die to go be with Jesus. Well you do - but it’s the death of The Cross that gets you there. I tell you, most Christians today are in worse shape than the Jews were before The Cross. At least their Testimony was certain: it depended upon the Lord doing His job. And He did it - He fulfilled The Testimony! But we’ve got Christians today who have brought The Testimony over. By that I mean they’re still looking for The City, they are still looking for the Great Day of the Lord, they are still looking for the Temple. They are worse off than the Jews were because what these Christians are looking for is already fulfilled in Christ! They won’t receive it; they are in absolute disobedience, waiting for what? Waiting for a City that is not going to come after the imagination of their heart, but rather in the Revelation of Jesus Christ is that City going to be seen because He’s The Light of it! But we’ve got most modern day Christians in worse shape than the Jews. They are still looking for that of which we should be and are meant to be The Witness of. And now we’re looking at this most specifically concerning the Resurrection. How many are still talking about a Resurrection and they are afraid to die - how many Christians? I’m not talking about sinners; they don’t know enough about it to care one way or the other. How many Christians are still looking for a Resurrection - wondering if they’re going to make it? Wondering if they’re going to come forth in it, because of their idea concerning what it is. They are afraid to die - that fear is deep down in them. You look at most so- called Christian funerals; they are the saddest things on the face of the earth. I’m just challenging us now. Are we still looking? But what brings us to it? OBEDIENCE. Not obedience saying, well then I’ll go do something for God. No, He’s already done it. It’s obedience unto what He’s done. But the problem there is we can’t determine the measure. We can’t say, well He just died this much. No - He took the thing all the way! Obedient unto His death goes all the way in there. But we don’t get short changed on the Life either, because He who says, “I am The Resurrection and The Life” is The One living in you, and would show you Himself fully. Why would He do that? That He might have a full Witness in the earth. You must admit we’ve given Him a pretty poor one. We can not declare (and I don’t mean just talk about) more of Him than is revealed in us, but it’s the revealing of Him that makes us witnesses, and that’s based upon our obedience unto His death. Why? Because His Life works death in us. We could take this so much farther. There’s so much that must be said, but it must be said in reference of scripture, in reference of The Testimony as it is in the scripture; so that it is not just inspirational speaking but that we bring The Testimony right into this thing. We could talk about the obedience of Moses, but we’d have to get into Hebrews and Joshua to do that. That will give greater dimension to what I mean by obedient unto His death. I want you, when you see The Cross to think of One Word - OBEDIENCE! It is obedience that brings us from The Testimony to The Witness. The Cross is obedience; it is not a stick of wood, it is an Obedient Son there! OBEDIENT UNTO DEATH. There follows burial and resurrection, but the obedience is unto death. And even His Life working in us depends upon our obedience unto death for the continuation of the working of His Life. When we cease being obedient unto death, immediately His Life ceases to work in us, because we have resisted His Life; not as Life - we have resisted the working of His Life - death in us. There’s something we don’t want to give up to it; that’s what it’s about. The Lord bring us to this obedience unto His death.