" What does that mean--You are dead to sin? We can not see it more
clearly than by referring to Adam. Christ was the second Adam. What
happened in the first Adam? I died, in the first Adam; I died to God; I
died in sin. When I was born, I had in me the life of Adam, which had all
the characteristics of the life of Adam after he had fallen. Adam died to
God, and Adam died in sin, and I inherit the life of Adam, and so I am dead
in sin as he was, and dead unto God. But at the very moment I begin to
believe in Jesus, I become united to Christ, the second Adam, and as really
as I am united by my birth to the first Adam, I am made partaker of the
life of Christ. What life? That life which died unto sin on Calvary, and
which rose again; therefore God by his apostle tells us: "Reckon yourselves
indeed dead unto sin and alive unto God in Christ Jesus." You are to reckon
it as true, because God says it--for your new nature is indeed, in virtue
of your vital union to Christ, actually and utterly dead to sin.
If we want to have the real Christ that God has given us, the real Christ
that died for us, in the power of His death and resurrection, we must take
our stand here.
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