Union With Christ in Resurrection

by T. Austin-Sparks

Chapter 2 - The Effect of Union With Christ in Resurrection

Reading: Eph. 1:19-23; Rom. 8:18-24.

"That I may know Him, and the power of His resurrection, and the fellowship of His sufferings, becoming conformed unto His death" (Phil. 3:10).

Conybeare's translation of Romans 8:18-24 is:

"For I reckon that the sufferings of this present time are nothing worth, when set against the glory which shall soon be revealed unto us. For the longing of the creation looks eagerly for the time when (the glory of) the sons of God shall be revealed. For the creation was made subject to decay, not by its own will, but because of Him who subjected it thereto, in hope: for the creation itself also shall be delivered from its slavery to death, and shall gain the freedom of the sons of God when they are glorified. For we know that the whole creation is groaning together, and suffering the pangs of labour, which have not yet brought forth the birth. And not only they, but ourselves also, who have received the Spirit for the first-fruits (of our inheritance), even we ourselves are groaning inwardly, longing for the adoption which shall ransom our body from its bondage."

In chapter one [which was missing] in a more or less general way we covered ground over a wide surface, a widespread area. We introduced this contemplation of "the power of His resurrection", and we saw that the apostle Paul in this connection leads us far beyond the elementary aspects of the resurrection of the Lord Jesus so far as our salvation is concerned. He does deal with those - for instance, the fact that our justification rests upon the resurrection of the Lord Jesus - the matter of our forgiveness, our remission of sins is all bound up with that. And other, what we might call initial aspects of salvation, are vitally connected with the resurrection of the Lord Jesus. Yet he does not leave us there but carries us on and would have us know that the resurrection of the Lord Jesus reaches far, far beyond the realm of our personal salvation. It goes into that vast universal spiritual sphere where everything seen and unseen, of time and of eternity, is affected. He takes up in the resurrection of the Lord Jesus the whole matter of the foreknowledge of God, the eternal counsels before the world was, and passes on through the ages into the eternal ages yet to be and sees that the power of His resurrection links the eternities, and is the link between intention and realisation, purpose and accomplishment. But he shows how great and how wonderful was that purpose, and how great will be that accomplishment.

All is by reason of what he calls "the power" of His resurrection, showing the resurrection as both exemplifying and providing the power: the infinite energy and might of God for the realisation of all God's thought. And we especially emphasised that the need of our time, which we believe to be the end time, is for a fuller knowledge of the power of His resurrection. If there is one need greater than another in the church, the Body of Christ, at this time, and as revealed in the Scripture in the end time, it is just that - elementally, the knowledge of the power of His resurrection.

To put it quite briefly, summing it all up: the final, ultimate breaking through of the church to the throne with the consequent dispossessing of the whole force and realm of satanic activity of the heavenlies will be the expression of the power of His resurrection. It will be the triumph of that Life in its fullest development, its fullest expression. Now, that embodies a tremendous amount because it gathers every moral aspect, question, and problem which has made the Cross, the incarnation and all that Atonement work, necessary, and which has produced the whole plan of redemption. All those moral elements and factors will have been fully and finally settled as the outworking of what Christ did in His Cross when the church is finally translated.

But the outworking of the Cross is something experimental. It is the expression of a Life which has met all those moral elements and factors, a Life which cannot be tainted or corrupted by anything evil in the universe, and in that sense is morally a Life triumphant over death. Life triumphant over death is not just some spiritual energy floating about in the universe which we sometimes get hold of in part, in a sort of abstract spiritual way, and we say we have found "divine life". It is not that.

If that Life can be tainted, corrupted, and impinged upon by moral evil, then death again reigns and satan has won his day. But in so far and inasmuch as it is true that that Life - by which the Lord Jesus conquered death, the Life of His resurrection, and the Life which has placed Him where He is, "far above all principality and power and rule and dominion" - is an unconquerable Life, it is destined to bring the church through to where He is on a moral basis.

What God in Christ has done is to have smashed and broken the immoral element that came in through satan in the garden; a universal thing. I use that word immoral in a very wide sense: everything that raises a moral issue bound up with the one moral question of spiritual iniquity. Paul takes us on to that and it is just there that we come now in this simple passage in Romans. This portion of Romans 8 will throw a great deal of light upon Philippians 3. I do not know that it will go all the way, but it will carry you a long way.

Here the apostle, in this part of the revelation which has been given to him, is showing us God's work in a groaning creation. Work which, as you notice in the context, is related to God's foreknowledge, and therefore God's foreordination. God's foreknowledge and foreordination were not in connection with salvation at all, they were in connection with the issue of salvation, and that makes all the difference. And the issue of salvation is conformity to the image of God's Son. "And whom He foreknew, He foreordained (not to be saved or lost but) to be conformed to the image of His Son" (Rom. 8:29). As the apostle points out in this part, conformity to the image of His Son necessitates that the Spirit of His Son is in us. And because the Spirit of His Son, constituting us sons, is in us, and we cry "Abba Father", that is both the commencement of God's work in the groaning creation, and that is the end of God's work in the groaning creation. God's work in a groaning creation is the securing of sons in secret, with an issue.

Now, this is what we meant when we said a little while ago that Paul leads us to the vastness of the power of His resurrection. He here says that the whole creation is in a state of groaning, travailing, and it cannot get through to its end. There is an arrest, it cannot get through; this groaning and travailing for something... but it is all under arrest and God has put it under arrest, and the whole creation is in a state of disappointment. That word "vanity" means that the thing is made subject to transience rather than abiding and going on to its completeness of purpose or intention. It is deliberately put under that condition by God, and yet it groans in that condition to be delivered from vanity and transience in order to realise the purpose for which it has its being; to come to that, but it cannot. God has put it under the bondage of vanity, which the apostle calls the slavery of death.

Now the whole creation is in that condition in relation to what God is doing in the groaning creation, in relation to His getting sons. When eventually these sons whom He has been getting at least through two thousand years (I won't raise the issue as to whether the Old Testament saints came into the church) secretly getting sons, when that is completed and the last son is added, is gained in secret, and then all those secret sons are manifested in glory, that manifestation coincides with the deliverance of the whole creation from this bondage. That is the power of His resurrection in the whole creation.

You see, it is a mighty thing this power of His resurrection, because it affects the whole creation. It is only to do with this creation; we do not go on into Ephesians, principalities and powers; that comes later. The power of His resurrection is operating ultimately to the deliverance of the whole creation. The power of His resurrection is operating towards that through this way of secretly getting sons, and every child begotten of God, born of God, is one further movement towards the issue of this whole creation to come into the glory of the liberty of the children of God. But note, the creation is to take its character from the sons of God. Creation is to come into their glory, and the creation cannot come to glory until the sons receive the glory by their emancipation, that is, the ransom of their bodies.

The power of His resurrection is working towards that in you and in me as children of God, if we are such. We are linked in our very sonship with the whole creation's emancipation and being filled with glory. Now, that is looking at the thing in a vast way and you may say, 'That does not help me very much when I come up against personal difficulties.' That is the point. This thing, while linking us to the whole range of God's purpose, also comes down in practical application to all our spiritual experiences, and in all things God works good to them who love Him and are called according to that purpose. ALL things. You have got to relate all things to the purpose, and then you will discover that God has got some good in them.

Of course, if you are taking all things as just a personal matter, probably you will not find the good in them. Relate them to the issue: conformity to the image of His Son so that you can say, 'Well, that throws a new light upon my experience today! l had a good deal of provocation this morning and, well, I did not see how that could be related to the liberation of the creation at all. How was this point bound up with something that was calculated to upset me this morning?' Inasmuch as that trial, that difficulty, that perplexity, that provocation or annoyance had in it the power of developing in you the Life of the Lord Jesus, giving you an opportunity for rising up in the power of His resurrection and transcending the old man, it carried with it the ultimate issue of God: the glorifying of the whole creation, the manifestation of the sons of God.

The New Testament is very practical; the vast things of the eternities are brought down to the most intimate things of spiritual life and experience, and the two are found to be one, and "all things (our authorised translation is the favourite one) work together for good to them that love God", more literally, "God works in all things good to them that love Him and are the called according to His purpose". That is Romans 8:28. You see, all things; but they must be held in the light of the purpose, otherwise you miss God's meaning in them. Now then, that means all things, whatever they are, have within them the power of His resurrection.

"God energises in all things." This is the same word as "according to the energy of His might which He wrought in Christ when He raised Him from the dead". God is energising in the power of His resurrection, to produce an ultimate issue. That is why you get such contradictions. You ask for one thing and you get another! (A dear lady said she asked the Lord for more patience and the Lord sent her a green cook!) The Lord seems so often to deal with us just in the opposite way of what we meant when we asked Him to do a thing. We have asked Him to do things for us and our thought took a certain line, and He has done it in a way that seems to be calculated to undo just what we have asked. God gets His end. He puts us in a position where, instead of being relieved of responsibility, our responsibility is increased, to draw out moral strength by the energy of the Holy Spirit, all in relation to the ultimate thing.

The resurrection was a great moral triumph in this universe and is going to be universally displayed through the church, the Body of Christ. God is doing this thing secretly. We have said He has been doing it all these centuries. He is going to have a multitude which no man can number. This is saying a big thing when you consider the census of these days which can get pretty near the last man on the earth. This multitude which no man can number - we get a surprise! If Elijah got a surprise when he thought he was the only man left and then found 7000, we may get a surprise later on. God has a big universe to people in the new creation.

The sons of God are not known to this world. "Beloved, the world knows us not because it knew Him not", says John. And here we are, I think we can claim to be in that relationship, but in the world we do not look different from anyone else. No one would say we were sons of God to look at us. No, but there is a secret and the day is coming when that secret will be no longer a secret. It will be an open manifestation, and to the whole universe God's sons will be revealed. The thing that He has been doing in secret in a groaning creation will be openly manifested, and the creation will be delivered from its groaning at that time. But I want to point out not just the fact that being born again we are becoming children of God, but God is doing a secret work in us, sometimes deeper than our own consciousness, in constituting us not only children but sons of God, bringing us to the place where we can, as children of God, take our place as sons of God.

There will be a placing of the sons. That is what the word literally means, "Whom the Lord loves He child trains (chasteneth, ASV) and scourgeth every son whom He places" (Heb. 12:6); there is the placing of sons to come about. You know the figure, that the Greek father would never allow anyone but his own son to be adopted and that son could never wear the toga until he was adopted. When he came of age he was adopted by his own father as his son, given the toga, placed in position, and declared by a public ceremony to have come of age and taken his responsible position in his father's house. Children, yes; the time is coming when we come of age, we are placed, given, as it were, our official robe and position and displayed to all as sons of God. The Lord is secretly working towards that.

Now, this is what Paul means in Philippians 3, in part at least, when he says "that I may gain Christ", "...the prize of the upward calling of God in Christ Jesus... that I may gain Christ". What is his prize? Christ is his prize. That is Romans 8, "Conformed to the image of His Son". Christ was Paul's prize in the sense of being conformed to the image of His Son in glory. "Glorified together with Him", receiving His glory, that is the prize. The point is this, that that has got to be gained, that is the issue of salvation. That is God's intended end of salvation. We do not win salvation; we do not gain salvation; we do not have to suffer the loss of all things to be saved. We are saved by faith, then we become willing to suffer the loss of all things. We are not saved by works, but when we are saved by faith, we begin to work. It is the other way round.

Salvation is not a prize to be won, not something that we can gain by stretching forth, as Paul says, but the issue of salvation is. And the issue of salvation is conformity to the image of His Son. That is "the glory that shall soon be revealed unto us". The glory of the sons of God shall be revealed. When they are glorified that is the prize, that is the gain, and God is working in us towards that end. Suffering? Yes, leading to glory. Trial? All to the glory; everything to bring about the glorifying of the sons of God. So our smallest trials, temptations, difficulties, as well as our greatest sufferings and adversities have in them, by the Divine blessing, the Divine putting into them, that which has as its issue the manifestation of the sons of God in glory and their attainment unto the prize. So Paul says, "I count all things as loss for the excellency of the knowledge of Christ Jesus my Lord; for whom I suffered the loss of all things and do count them but refuse, that I may gain Christ, and be found in him, not having a righteousness of my own, that which is of the law, but that which is through faith in Christ, the righteousness which is of God by faith" (Phil.3:8,9).

My question is this: What effect is union with Christ in resurrection having upon us? How is it influencing us in relation to trial and to suffering? What construction is it placing for us upon these difficulties that we are meeting, the suffering through which we pass? The power of His resurrection ought to influence us towards these things in this way: that there is in that a possibility of spiritual maturity, spiritual growth and I lay hold of the Lord and the power of His resurrection that I might realise the possibility of this trial, of this suffering to bring me on the way further towards that ultimate goal. Moreover, if the power of His resurrection is really operating in us, it is going to have the effect that it had in Paul, of making us count all other things as very little worth in comparison with that end: Christ.

You compare Philippians 3 with Mark 10. You have got two young men. As you look at them, they are very similar, a rich young ruler, and young Saul of Tarsus. Both men of high standing among their own people socially, religiously, intellectually and morally. Of the one, the Master looked at him and loved him, and he said, "All these things have I observed, from my youth", and the Master did not dispute that statement. The other could say, "...touching the righteousness which is in the law, blameless". Two young men, probably both Pharisees. The one came to the Lord Jesus in respect, reverence, "Good Master, what shall I do that I may inherit eternal life?" Perfectly sincere and honest, and after a little drawing out the Master said, "... go thy way, sell whatsoever thou hast, and give to the poor, and thou shalt have treasure in heaven; and come, take up the cross, and follow Me", and he went away very sorrowful "for he had great possessions". Possessions held, rather than to gain Christ.

The other, Paul, had great possessions; read of them in Philippians 3 - a vision of Christ and the great possessions - he had nothing, less than nothing to gain Christ. And the difference was this, that Paul had seen Christ in resurrection. He had seen Christ in resurrection, and the power of that resurrection had broken upon him with such terrific force. This Jesus of Nazareth? This, that One Who hung on that cross, despised and rejected of men? His countenance marred more than any man, hardly recognisable as a man? That picture of weakness, helplessness and despair? That! This! 'There is power here altogether beyond anything that I know of.' "The exceeding greatness of His power… raised Him from the dead and set Him at His own right hand." You see, the power of Christ's resurrection had broken upon this young Pharisee, and the effect in him was to make every rich possession as mere refuse. To be found in Him and to "gain Him" - that was his prize.

What is the effect of union with Christ in resurrection? I believe that this is a fairly sound test of our union with Christ.

I cannot understand a Christian life indwelt by the resurrection Life of the Lord Jesus, that hangs onto things rather than go all the way with the Lord, that can think of sharing Christ with the world and that has a tremendous quarrel with the Lord about letting this go and that go. What is the matter? The church needs emancipating by the power of His resurrection, and that individual life needs emancipating by the power of His resurrection and made to see how utterly worthless everything else is in comparison.

The question for us is this: does our union with the Lord Jesus cause us, by reason of the royalty of it, the strength of it, to reach out to Christ unto a full realisation of Him with a willingness to let everything else go as nothing in comparison? Does it have that effect? That is the initial challenge because unless it is working like that, there is no hope of God's realisation.

The great thing that God has in view depends upon whether the power of His resurrection is making everything else of no account to us, but Christ. That should settle all queries, all disputes with the Lord, that should settle everything between us and the Lord. Is this thing calculated to bring me to that Divine end? If so, well, the means, whatever it may be, is worthwhile. It is all worthwhile and if it is a case of something going, well, it must be nothing in comparison with that. That is the operation of the power of His resurrection. Now it is Life, you see, the issue is Life. A working now in us unto an ultimate end when that Life in its fulness shall break through and be displayed. Life!

But the adversary is out all the time as the murderer, and I want in closing just to remind you, and if it is a fresh thing to you to point out to you, that the Lord Jesus links the murderer with the liar. In His statement about satan, He brings those two things together. He says, "Ye are of your father the devil… When he speaks a lie, he speaks of his own; for he is a liar, and the father of it", and right alongside with that He said, "He was a murderer from the beginning". Now I want you to see how that is linked up with what we are saying.

What did the Lord mean when He said, "from the beginning"? From the beginning of satan? Surely not. Satan was not created a murderer; he was created as one of the highest of the celestial beings. He held a very high position in heaven, "Son of the morning", "anointed cherub that covers", a place very near to the throne of God. That was not the beginning to which the Master referred. Was it the beginning of man? No, it was not the beginning of man. When was it, the beginning, because satan has already fallen when man is created, so it was not the beginning of man referred to. There must be some other beginning somewhere, when it was made known in heaven among the angelic hosts that God's purpose of the ages, the creation of all things, was related to His Son, and that He would sum up all things in Christ, and that in all things He should have the pre-eminence. Satan coveted the Son's place, the Son's position and said, "I will ascend into heaven, I will exalt my throne above the stars of God: I will ascend above the heights of the clouds." He lost his position; that was the beginning, murder was then in his heart against the Son.

How would he carry out his murder? By a lie. And a lie was born in his soul as the instrument of murder. Now you track that down through the Scriptures and you see if the satanic murder activity is not constantly related to a lie. When he started opposing God's creation which was to issue in His Son having in all things the pre-eminence (because the creation was created unto Him, for Him, the Son), how did he begin? His object was murder, not merely physical murder but to kill the soul. It was by a lie, but it was marvellously wrapped up with the truth, "Hath God said...? Ye shall not surely die" (Gen. 3:1,4, AV), but he did not finish there, "ye shall be as gods knowing good and evil" (v.5, AV). His lie was wrapped up in truth, the greater included the lesser, and he struck his death blow at the soul of man by getting a lie in, wrapped up in the truth. He brings along the truth, and it is so obviously the truth of God both in word and in practice, in expression, phraseology and conduct, but he has hidden in that thing a lie, and the issue of that thing is spiritual death. All that applies to all the great deceptive work of the devil through the ages.

The great delusions, the great false teaching systems have come as a lie wrapped up in what appears so clearly to be the truth. On the face of it, it is according to the Word of God; but there is something wrapped up there which is calculated to strike a death blow at the soul, and the only thing to counter it is the power of His resurrection.

In the resurrection of the Lord Jesus, in the mighty power of His resurrection, the lie of the devil was undone. You notice that whereas satan always comes with a lie and death, Christ always comes with Truth and Life. "I am the way, the truth and the life." You cannot have the Life without the Truth, and it is tremendously important that we should have spiritual intelligence in Life, that this should be an intelligent Life, an understanding Life.

Now you need not make any specific application of what I am going to say in any special directions, unless you feel you should; I speak in a general way. The end time is going to see the smiting of the murderer at the people of God, along the line of the lie wrapped up in the truth. Things will be to all natural appearances so obviously the truth, with a lie wrapped up therein, by which there will be a blow at spiritual Life. And the end of the deception is to land you in a state where you have, in a sense, lost your spiritual Life, and alongside all that, landed yourself in the darkness of a lie. That is happening. That will happen more and more, the enemy will do that at the end. He is out against the Life of the people of God. His way is to give them a lie wrapped up in truth, perhaps nine tenths truth, one tenth a lie, but it is enough, and the enemy will stop at nothing. He is not above preaching Christ! He will preach Christ; he will patronise Christ. For example, at Philippi, that one possessed of a demon following the apostles about, patronising them and their gospel, "These men are the servants of the Most High God which show unto us the way of salvation." What do you want more than that?!

You may be sure there is some subtle plan of the devil when he begins to patronise the gospel and make the preachers popular. Perhaps you are getting near to the heart of it when you put it that way. When you popularise people who preach the gospel faithfully, you are laying a trap somewhere and the devil will be there - you do not see the snare. The apostle knew there was something there and waited on the Lord for the dealing with that thing. But how much was bound up with that, how hell came out when that lie was exposed and when spiritual death, through that lie, was rendered impossible. He struck to have the bodies slain. Paul and Silas are in prison, but hell rages and has broken loose because this lie, wrapped up even in a patronising of the gospel and preachers is exposed, and its end of spiritual death has been frustrated.

But blessed be God, there is One on the throne, and I am interested to notice that whereas Paul was flung into prison at Philippi, from that prison the Philippian assembly was born. That was the door into Europe and a whole continent was opened. It was out of another prison he wrote his epistle to the Philippians. Both prisons meant spiritual victory, and the second prison episode from which he sends the letter to that assembly, is just what took place there ten years before, developed - the power of His resurrection. That was satan's work, this is God's answer. And he writes from that prison in Rome to the Philippians, who were born out of a Philippian jail, "I would have you know, brethren, that the things which happened unto me have fallen out rather unto the progress of the gospel." The power of His resurrection is all wonderfully bound up together, but do remember that what we need to know is the power of that resurrection, the mighty energising of that risen life of the Lord to preserve us from the lie.

The cause of the leading astray of the majority of the Lord's people is the low level of their spiritual life. If we are living in the power of His resurrection, it is a mighty fortification of power against the devil who wants to strike a blow at our spiritual life. Multitudes are carried away because there is not an adequate resistance of His Life in them. The answer back, our safety in these days, and triumph, therefore, to the end, is along this line: knowing Him and the power of His resurrection.

We must ask the Lord that we may so know Him more than we do, and that we may come into a new experience of the inward energising of that exceeding great power. We have just touched the beginning of things with the issue in view. The necessity for every believer is to have Christ as their Life more abundantly. That is where the Philippian letter begins; chapter one is, "For to me to live is Christ", and then in connection with that, "My ambition is to know Him more and more, and to know Him and the power of His resurrection life".