To experience a glorious and victorious Christian life (the Christ-life), there needs to be death first. In other words, first death and then resurrection. The life of Christ is a crucified life, which means in our union with Christ we have surrendered our own life and will and are dead to self, alive to Him. This life is lived by the faith of the Son of God, the most holy faith. The daily denying of self and choosing the way and will of Jesus is not the easiest, but the best way to live. The abundance of the life of Jesus inside of us is proportional to our death unto self. Surrendering our idolatrous and prideful will to His, always being willing to witness about Jesus, humbling ourselves, and being convinced that serving the flesh is unprofitable and unfruitful while the opposite is true of walking in the Spirit, are all aspects of dying to self. The goal of this death and daily cross-bearing is to have fellowship with Christ. The essence of dying is typified by five things: One – humiliation through reproaches, abuse, poverty, loneliness, persecutions, distress, seeming failure, and disappointments which cause us to lose our will and let God take charge. Two – rejecting the praise and approval of men. Three – embracing simplicity and childlikeness. Four – living by pure faith. Five – seeking our nothingness and his all-ness. We could choose to live a normal happy Christian life and be with the Lord when we physically die or choose to die to self and gain the Christ-life now.
