God’s Life Released Through Death
Let us read Luke 12:49 which is the deepest verse in the Gospel of Luke. The Lord is recorded there as declaring: “I came to cast fire upon the earth; and what do I desire, if it is already kindled?” He did not say, “I came to atone for sins”; rather, He said, “I came to cast fire.” That this fire was cast upon the earth shows that the fire did not come from earth but it came from heaven, even from God. Fire points to the life in the Holy Spirit. To cast fire upon the earth is to release the life of God on the earth. And our Lord continued to say as seen in verse 50, this additional word: But I have a baptism to be baptized with; and how am I straitened till it be accomplished!” Straitened” in the original Greek means “tighten” or “bound.” What the Lord meant was that He came to release God’s life, yet He was still in the flesh, God’s life could not be released. This was because the life of God was circumscribed by the flesh. Hence, He felt tightly bound up and unreleased.
The Lord mentioned that He had a baptism to be baptized with. Was He not already baptized according to the record that is noted in the third chapter of Luke (see v.21))? Why, then, did He say that He had a baptism to be baptized with? Let us notice that recorded here is ch12 of Luke our Lord did not say that He was yet to be baptized. What He said was that He had a baptism to be baptized with. So, it is clear that the baptism here points to His death on the cross (Mark 10:38). To Christ, His death was a great released. Were He not to die, the life of God in Him would forever be imprisoned and circumscribed. Once He died, though, God’s life was released, and became available to men. This was His desire.
The Bible speaks only of “in Christ,” not “in Jesus.” For we cannot be in Jesus. Jesus is a man, the only begotten Son of God. We can have no part in Him. No one can be in Jesus. Yet one day this man in the flesh, His individual person, was crucified. Although His flesh was put to death, His life was released. When this man was raised from the dead, He became Christ Jesus in whom we can dwell in. In Christ not only do we receive His life but we also have died and are resurrected together with Him. This, then, is what the resurrection of Christ has accomplished for us.
….. (this goes on and on, but because I don’t have time to write the whole thing, you can ask me.)
Wow, when I read this part of the chapter, I felt so enlighten. The Holy Spirit is opening my eyes more each day. I am coming to experience the Lord in so many different ways. He is truly amazing to me! I love the Lord so much. I am falling in love with Him each day!
