Quiet Talks by Samuel Dickey: Gordon, Samuel Dickey - Quiet Talks on Following the Christ: 52. Resurrection Power—A Present Experience

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Quiet Talks by Samuel Dickey: Gordon, Samuel Dickey - Quiet Talks on Following the Christ: 52. Resurrection Power—A Present Experience



TOPIC: Gordon, Samuel Dickey - Quiet Talks on Following the Christ (Other Topics in this Collection)
SUBJECT: 52. Resurrection Power—A Present Experience

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Resurrection Power—A Present Experience

There is a second experience in this group. In sharpest contrast with Jacob's tomb stands out the Resurrection Morning. Our Lord Jesus rose up out of death. The strongest bars that death could make—and surely every one of us has some sore experience of their strength in holding dear ones from us—those strongest bars were snapped, as a woman breaks the cotton thread in her sewing.

Our Lord Jesus rose up again into life, and into a new, a higher, a different sort of life. The personal identity was unchanged. His disciples recognized His voice and face and form, as they talked and ate with Him. But the limitations were gone. The control of spirit over body was complete.

And it is a bit of His gracious plan that we shall follow Him here, too. When He returns in glory there will be a resurrection for those who have followed Him. As He comes down on the clouds, the dead bodies of those who have the warm vital touch with Him, that the word "believeth" stands for, will be touched into a new life and be reunited with the spirits that had lived in them.

There will be a wondrous meeting in the air with Himself, and an equally wondrous reunion in His presence of those bound to us and to Him by ties of love. Our personal identity will be the same, loved ones instantly recognizing loved ones. But the bodies will be of a new sort, free of all the limitations and weaknesses of our earth life. And our Lord's return is peculiarly precious because it is the time of this change and reunion.

But there is yet more than this. This is something future. There is a present meaning of the resurrection-life for us, today, if we'll accept it, and live in the power of it. There may be the resurrection life and power coming into our bodies now. As the need comes, it is our privilege to look up, and ask for, and experience resurrection power coming down into our bodies, overcoming their weaknesses and diseased conditions.

The subject of healing involves much more, for a full poised understanding of the Scripture teaching, than can be satisfactorily talked over in the brief limits here. But the great fact can be thus simply stated, that there is full healing for our bodies by God's direct touch upon them. But this means on our part living a real faith life, looking up moment by moment, receiving from His hand constantly what is needed, and using it wholly for Him. It is actually a living of the dependent life as regards the bodily needs.

Paul is clearly speaking of a present experience when he says, "If the Spirit of Him who raised up Jesus from the dead dwelleth in you, He that raised up Christ Jesus from the dead shall give life also to your dying bodies by means of His Spirit that dwelleth in you." (Rom_7:11.) But this resurrection power coming in to affect our bodily conditions is frequently in the midst of most difficult trying circumstances. It is as though a subtle hindering power were tenaciously at work, and this were being offset and overcome by the resurrection power.

It was under just such circumstances that Paul writes these words: "We who live are always delivered unto death for Jesus' sake, that the life also—the resurrection life—of Jesus may be manifested in our dying bodies." (2Co_4:11 :"Dying" in these two passages does not mean being in the process of dissolution, but that the body is subject to death.) This as plainly means a present experience of power in our bodies, overcoming weakness, disease, and the tendency to death.

This is the present meaning of the resurrection for us. But it is possible only for those who will live the resurrection life of separation and of union; separation from all that separates from the closest union of life with our Lord Jesus. And it comes oftentimes through much conflict and difficulty. This bit of the road is much contested.