Now that we have the principle that the process of the Man-Savior’s resurrection began while He was dying, we need to ask when the Lord Jesus died. Did He die only on the day of the Passover? The New Testament indicates that He began to die immediately after He was born. Throughout His years on earth, He was dying to live. Every moment of every day, He was dying. This means that while He was living in the home of a poor carpenter, He was dying. The process of His resurrection began as He was dying.
It is significant that the Lord Jesus said, “I am the resurrection and the life” (John 11:25). The Lord did not say that He is the life and the resurrection; He said first that He is the resurrection and then that He is the life. Why does resurrection come first in John 11:25? Resurrection is mentioned first in this verse because throughout His life the Lord Jesus was dying and resurrecting.
When the Lord Jesus told Martha that her brother would rise again, she replied, “I know that he will rise again in the resurrection in the last day” (John 11:24). Here Martha prolonged the resurrection to the distant future, to a time just before the millennium. Therefore, the Lord Jesus said to her, “I am the resurrection and the life.” The Lord was indicating that He is the resurrection now, the resurrection in the present. He did not say, “I shall be the resurrection;” He said, “I am the resurrection.” The Lord could say this because while He was living in the human life, He was resurrecting by dying.
When did the Lord’s death begin? His death began immediately after He was born. When did His resurrection begin? His resurrection began with His dying. The Man-Savior was dying to live; He lived by dying.
The Lord’s life on earth for thirty-three and a half years was a life of dying to live, a life of living by dying. Eventually, His death was completed on the cross, and His resurrection was completed on the third day after His crucifixion. There was a beginning of His death and also a completion of it. Likewise, there was a beginning of His resurrection and a completion of resurrection. I encourage you to bring this matter to the Lord in prayer.
Praise the Lord that He was the dying-to-live Man-Savior and also the living-by-dying Man-Savior! While He was living, He was dying, and while He was dying, He was living. We may even say that while He was dying, He was resurrecting. His thirty-three and a half years on earth were a long process of death and also of resurrection. With Him resurrection and death went together.
According to our opinion, we may think that the Lord Jesus should have said to Martha, “Do you not know that I am the life? One day I will die, and then I shall be the resurrection.” However, the Lord said that He was the resurrection and the life. The fact that He was resurrection proves that He was also life. If He had not been resurrecting, He would not have been able to live.
After a person is born, does he begin to live, or does he begin to die? Actually, as soon as a human being is born, he begins to die. Death, therefore, does not come as an accident. On the contrary, death comes as a process. For some, this process is short; for others, it is very long. But whatever the case may be, all unbelievers are in the process of dying.
What is our situation as believers? Are we dying or living? Today we believers are dying to live, and we are living by dying. The unbelievers only have the process of dying, but we have both dying and living, both death and resurrection. Actually, the more we die, the more we are resurrected.
In the previous message we pointed out that through the incarnation humanity was added to God. In other words, through the process of incarnation God put humanity upon Himself. In a similar way, in the process of resurrection certain elements were put into the Spirit. In particular, these elements include the Lord’s human living and His all-inclusive death. Therefore, resurrection was a process of transfiguration in which these elements were put into the all-inclusive life-giving Spirit. This is the Spirit who has entered into the believers.