Seeking for the help of the Lord, I direct your prayerful attention to Paul's epistle to the Colossians chapter 3 and reading for our text verses 3 and 4. Verses 3 and 4. For ye are dead, and your life is hid with Christ in God. When Christ, who is our life, shall appear, then shall ye also appear with Him in glory. pause epistle to the Colossians chapter 3 verses 3 and 4 our text comes as it were in brackets and if we leave that text out and read from the beginning or if we Just read from verse 2, set your affection on things above, not on things on the earth, mortify therefore your members which are upon the earth, and so on.

We have the chapter given to a life of mortifying sin, dealing with the old nature, dealing with that which every child of God has, and it is done not on the basis of earning salvation, not on the basis that we, in that way, are trying to bring ourselves into favour with God, But it is on the basis that we already have that work of God, already are His children.

When Paul begins this epistle, and we need to remember this, as to who the apostle is writing to, he says of them that they are to the saints and faithful brethren in Christ which are at Colossae. He says, we have heard of your faith in Christ Jesus and of the love which you have to all the saints. So he's not writing to unregenerate people, he's not writing to unbelievers, he's not writing to those that do not have any assurance is also not writing to those that are perfect and pure and without sin. They have sin and they have an all nature that rises up, that seeks to bring the soul into bondage, that seeks even to do those things of which Paul says in verse 6, for which things sake the wrath of God cometh on the children of disobedience. now he's not setting these things before them as if well if you fall in any of these ways then you're you've lost your salvation but he's reminding them these are the things that those outside of christ they do those things they walk in those things and if we walk in those things those which we also once walked in in which he also walked sometime when he lived in them very often those old ways those old sins they rise up again, they plague us to the end of our days. But we know and we walk in that which the apostles said to the Romans. Again it was written to them that are in Christ Jesus.

But he sets forth a difference of being calmly minded and spiritually minded. kindly minded is death, spiritually minded is life and peace. And the child of God will learn by painful experience that if the old nature is not mortified, is not put down, then it will bring us into darkness and loss of assurance and loss of comfort. It won't take away our salvation. Now remember that the devil will say it does and say there's no hope, you can't return, you can't recover.

But we are to remember that Christ has died for our sins. They are put away and it's in this way that our text is put forth Before the Apostle goes into the long list and the directions of how to deal with sin and the necessity of it, he gives the basis on why it is to be so. And we need to do this.

You might say, well, surely one that is unregenerate, one that is outside of Christ? Shouldn't they be exhorted to holy and upright lives? Shouldn't they be exhorted to forsake those ways of life that they've been walking in. It didn't Paul at Athens bid them to stop worshipping the idols, turn to the true and living God. Yes, he did.

And it is right that we expose that which is sinful and wrong. But the great danger is that We would direct someone to Sinai, not to the Gospel, and they would do as Paul had to address in Romans 10, that seek their own righteousness and not the righteousness of God.

It is very important that there might be two people and they are both seeking to do that which is right in the sight of God, both seeking to mortify the flesh, turn to spiritual things instead of carnal things, seek those things which are above, and they're both doing as it were the same thing. But one is doing it from a motive of trying to earn their way to heaven or earn God's favor, and the other one is doing it from the motive that God has forgiven them their sins. He has suffered upon Calvary for them, and out of love for Him and love for holiness and His ways, they are doing these things. It's a very, very different outlook, very different motive, and yet the things that they're doing are exactly the same.

A passage like this should be encouraging to us in several ways. One is that it tells the reality that God's dear children do have still this old nature and that it is a battle. Another, that the Apostle addresses it, that there is hope, there is a way. The Word does point as to how believers are to deal with these things. And it is in the spirit and not in the flesh. In turning our backs upon those things and replacing them with the things of God. That is what mortification is. It is doing the opposite to what the flesh wants to do and is very hard.

In Hebrews 12 we read, you have not yet resisted unto blood, striving against sin. We should never underestimate the power of sin even in a believer, but the Lord has given grace and he gives more grace and he gives that help. So our text is really the secret, the standing of the people of God the reminder of where they are in Christ before the Apostle launches into many directions as to how they are to live, how they are to deal with sin, how they are to walk glorifying to God. As if we want to make really sure He's not pointing them to the old covenant. He's pointing them to those works that are done out of love and that are not grieving to the Holy Spirit.

So he says in our text that he are dead and we read in Romans 8 that in verse 10, if Christ be in you, the body is dead because of sin, but the spirit is life because of righteousness. And Paul sets before us in those chapters 7 and 8 the conflict between the flesh and the spirit. So God's dear children, they are to be crucified to the world The flesh is crucified, the flesh is counted as if it were dead, but our life, our life is secure. It's a beautiful way that it's set forth here, your life is hid with Christ in God. I've sometimes felt the wonder of our Lord when He rose from the dead.

He didn't set up a kingdom on earth. He didn't choose one nation and make a palace and a kingdom and every person could look to that or make pilgrimages to that. He ascended up into heaven beyond the reach of man. and to where he will bring his people after death.

And so they walk by faith here, and there they are to be with him. And we might say then, no Herod can seek the Lord there, no Pilate, no Jews, he is beyond the reach of man. And as if he say with the souls of his people, their head, head in God, They're hid with Christ, they're with Him. They're secure, they're safe in His care and keeping. Our Lord says this in John 10, No man is able to pluck them out of mine hand. My Father that is greater than I, no man is able to pluck them out of my Father's hand.

And so we have these two verses setting forth a beautiful truth of the life of the people of God. And what is especially upon my spirit is this word, when Christ who is our life, Christ who is our life. And our text, it goes from present to the future. He says, when Christ who is our life, that is present now, when he shall appear, so this is now in the future, then shall ye also appear with him in glory. There are other scriptures like this as well.

At the end of Psalm 84, verse 11, we read, He shall give grace and glory, no good thing shall He withhold from them that walk uprightly. Those that because of the Lord's saving grace and love to them, they walk in His ways. We think of the Lord's Supper also, that reflects this same truth.

Ye do show forth the Lord's death till he come. Ye show forth, that is present, the Lord's death, that is past, till he come, that is in the future. we think of in Romans 8 and from verse 29 then we have again a chain that goes from the past whom he did foreknow then he also did predestinate to be conformed to the image of his son that he might be the firstborn among many brethren Moreover, whom he did predestinate, then you come to present, them he also called, and whom he called, them he also justified. And then he goes to future, and whom he justified, them he also glorified." A beautiful chain.

We have God's people that are chosen in Christ from the foundation of the world. in time they are brought into this world by natural birth they are then brought to be in Christ by spiritual birth the Lord exercising his own last will and testament and he knows for whom he died and whom he will quicken whom he will and then he brings them to glory and if we were to look into that book before the foundation of the world we find the same number that are with the Lord in heaven in glory in years to come, eternity to come. And in between is time, the present, and in time there is grace, there is faith, there is God's work of grace in gathering His people, in calling His people in time. And it's important for us to realize the links, if we are to have comfort and assurance then we are to see clearly what the links are between time and eternity to see how God marks out his people here, what they look like here, the conflicts they have, that which moves them to love and obedience, and the people that they desire to be with, like dear Ruth of old, thy people shall be my people, thy God my God. the cleaving being let go the disciples they went unto their own company so I want to look with the Lord's help at at three three points firstly what Christ is to a believer now these words our life And then secondly, the words, when he shall appear, what he has set forth there.

And then thirdly, the prospect of the people of God, we shall appear with him in glory. But firstly, what Christ is to a believer now, Verse four says, when Christ who is our life, Christ who is our life. Remember our Lord Jesus Christ says, because I live you shall live also. When Paul comes to those at Mars Hill, Acts 17, he says, in him we live and move and have our being.

In one sense, the Lord is the Saviour of all men, especially of them that believe, because He gives to all life and breath and every blessing, opens His hand, satisfies the desire of every living thing. There is a common grace and kindness that the Lord shows to His enemies as well as to His friends.

But for God's children, they recognize this, they see this, and they see also a need for a spiritual life, a life that they now live that once they did not live. A life that once they were complete and utter strangers to, perhaps never even realized it existed. Or if they did, they saw the people of God and thought they were a funny lot, and didn't understand them, and didn't work out why they did what they did, why they believed what they believed. It was a mystery to them, and perhaps an offense to them. But then when the Lord first begins this, and may we always remember, it is the Lord that instigates life. I pass by thee and bid thee live.

Reminds us, doesn't it, that we are spiritually dead. Though we are made in the image of God, yet through the fall we have lost that spiritual image of communion and fellowship with God, we've sided with Satan, we're at peace with hell, we have God at war, and The natural man receiveth not the things of God, neither can he know them, because they are spiritually discerned. We are dead in trespasses and sins. We have no capability of reviving ourselves or giving to ourselves life. there's no faith in us there's no latent ability to respond to anything law or gospel our wills our free wills given us are perverted they go freely to that which is evil and sinful or they may be religiously dressed like the apostle paul and as a pharisee of the pharisees Just go in our own.

We are our own God. We live to ourselves. We trust in ourselves. Our hope is in ourselves. We don't really need God. We are like the children of Israel who worship God and then turn their backs and worship idols. and saw no problem with that. And we make our own rules and our own ways and our own laws. This was very, very different when the children of Israel were brought out of Egypt and God said to them, if you are to have me as your God, then you will serve me on my terms, not on your terms.

God is a holy God, an upright God, and so is not like the many of the religious world today that have a Bible but pay little regard at all to what it teaches or the way of salvation in the Lord Jesus Christ. Many find it very offensive that the Lord has said that if you believe not that I am He, you shall perish in your sins. There is only one name given among men whereby we must be saved. The exclusivity of Christ is offensive to many.

And yet for the people of God, they are brought to know this, that the Lord has passed by them and bid them live. The Lord has said, I give unto them eternal life, they shall never perish, neither shall any man pluck them out of mine hand. It is a gift. The Lord is the author and finisher of our faith. the faith which is of Jesus Christ, it comes from Him and is given at the moment of the new birth. The new birth is an instantaneous act of God, it's not a gradually coming to a knowledge of the Lord, though to our feelings it may be, to our feelings especially coming to assurance or knowing that we are a child of God it is over a period of time it may be that is the Lord is sovereign in that But the actual gift of life, often evidenced by a realization of aching void that the world cannot fill, or of a conviction of one sin, as the Apostle Paul, he says, when the commandment came, sin revived and I died. He brought unto conviction one sin as a sinner, who so is offended in one point, guilty of all, and read that in Romans 7, as to how the Apostle was brought down. You think of on the Damascus Road. Who began that? Was it Paul? Saul? Of course it wasn't. The Lord met with him so sovereignly. And there is a beginning.

He which hath begun a good work in you will perform it unto the day of Jesus Christ. So what Christ is to a believer, our life, the very first thing is to realize He is the one that gave us life. He is the one that gave us eternal life, that breathed life into our souls, that gave us a want, a need, conviction of sin, a hearing ear, a will to want to know the things of God. That all came from the Lord. not from man that's not to be given the glory to any other but the Lord Jesus Christ and so the apostle says Christ who is our life he gave it us he began it why did he do that why did he do it to us and not to another because he has died at Calvary for our sin Because He has chosen us in Christ from the foundation of the world. Because we have been loved with an everlasting love. Yea, I have loved thee with an everlasting love. Therefore with loving kindness have I drawn thee. What a picture of that life that is first given. I have drawn thee. How many of you? How many of you this afternoon?

You dare not say you have not been drawn by or drawn to the things of God, drawn to the Word of God, drawn to seek the Lord. This is what the Lord does, and He does in loving kindness. Our Lord says, No man can come unto Me except the Father which sent Me draw him. and I'll raise him up at the last day." There's the two things joined together again, aren't they? The drawing and the raising up at the last day. What was it that moved Ruth? She was drawn. And sometimes we might not be able to recognize or know how or what we were drawn, but we felt that attraction. We felt that drawing.

And this is where the Lord begins, and He begins with life. If you can come in with that this afternoon, then you can say, Christ, who is our life? and is put as our life, is not just one believer, but every single believer. They live because Christ lives, because He died for them and rose again, because He has satisfied the justice of God. He died for our sins according to the Scriptures, rose again for our justification. Therefore, He will quicken a soul into life and make them know in time what He has done for them on Calvary's tree. Now we may say Christ is our life in that He gave us eternal life. The second thing is this, that He maintains that life in the soul.

We do read of solemn cases, the case of Simon Magus in the Word, where he was even baptised, but he was shown as a false convert because he thought he could purchase the gift of God with money. There have been those, even in our churches, our families, who have been baptised, who have appeared, have every appearance of being one of the Lord's people, and then have cast it completely away, and have then gone back, and for many years, and perhaps have married an ungodly partner, just completely cast away the things of God.

It's painful to see, it's very searching to see. And I believe these cases are that we do tremble, that we do realize that we need the Lord to keep our souls. That we don't just take it for granted. But on the other hand, that we do not feel and live in such fear that as if we have got to keep our soul. No man can keep alive his own soul. where we are able to discern it and I believe fairly early on and right through our lives we don't need to go back to when the Lord first began with us to realize that the Lord is keeping alive our souls.

He will use things, one of the things we often get very prayerless but he used trials, he uses fresh troubles to bring us back to the throne of grace. He'll use those things for good. We know that all things work together for good to them that love God, to them that are called according to His purpose. And so He maintains that life. He gives grace for grace. He gives that life in the soul. and those times of refreshing, times of really reviving that life again.

They that have no changes fear not God. We'll have those times that you might think, I'm so lifeless and cold and dead and hard, am I really a child of God? And the Lord gives us to feel what we are in ourselves. But then He comes again, and through the Word, through the preaching, using means, sometimes not means, revives us again, brings us again, tender, teachable, and in repentance and Godly sorrow for sin. And we notice in this the Lord's reviving hand. He hasn't left us. He hasn't done with us as we've deserved.

And you see the pattern through the wilderness with the children of Israel, they're typical people. They rebelled. They rebelled against Him. The Lord delivered them at the Red Sea. Three days later, they were murmuring against the Lord because there was no water. And the Lord revives them. There's a tree cast into the bitter waters. Beautiful type of Christ brought into the bitter waters of sin, of affliction, of trial. And then it's revived again. life again from the dead, to a rebellious people, to a murmuring people, and you see that pattern right the way through. And it's a blessed thing if we can see in just one or two instances, but I believe many, where the Lord has seen to it that He has kept our souls alive.

Now of course there is a means to this in a natural way, If we were to not eat, we would die. If we were to not drink, we would die. We read in the children of Israel that they drank of that spiritual rock that followed them, and that rock was Christ. Our Lord, in resisting Satan, quoted that from Deuteronomy, Man shall not live by bread only, but by every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of God. And then we have our Lord stating in John 6 that except you eat the flesh and drink the blood of the Son of Man, you have no life in you. A child of God needs spiritual food.

Forsake not the assembling of yourselves together. It is through the word of God that we feed. Thy words were found, and I did eat them. They were to the joy and rejoicing of my soul." So the Lord gives that appetite. He gives the knowledge of where that food is, where that life is. and the need to partake of it.

Some of our dear friends over here, one that has now got very severe dementia, and she went through a stage, she didn't know that she had to drink. She had to be told to. And sometimes we might pass over the thought, well, even in a natural way, our bodies tell us when we need food, we need drink. and in that way our bodies are kept alive. Well in a spiritual way as well, that we are informed, we are told and we made willing that we need the Word of God and the Lord is the heavenly shepherd to lead his people in green pastures beside the still waters. that we might feed upon the word of God, that we might grow thereby, that we might be strengthened thereby. So our life in Christ, he maintains our life in our souls and he does it through means of feeding our souls. Every word that we receive, like the Bereans, and to meditate upon, feed upon, like the clean beasts, they chew the cud.

You can go past a herd of cattle, a flock of sheep. You might see them. They're not grazing on the grass at all. They're just lying down, but they're chewing. What are they chewing? what they fed on before, they're chewing the cud, and that was unique to a clean beast. And God's children meditate on the things of God, think on the things of God. The Holy Spirit brings back to remembrance. It's the opposite to what our Lord said in the parable of the sower, where Satan came and immediately snatched the word out of the heart. The opposite is that word is buried. and it brings forth fruit.

And we might not realize the benefit that we're actually having from it. In a natural sense, you can have a meal, several meals, and you can't tell the benefit one particular meal has had upon you. But you know if you stopped eating, then you'd feel the lack. And so it is in a spiritual way. You might say I can't point to really any text or any service or any word that has been really blessed to me. Not yet, but it has been blessed. You keep coming back to hear more, and as you hear, imperceptibly you're being strengthened, you're being drawn, your appetite is wetted, you want some more. Those are good hearing times. That is the case.

Remember years ago, going to a special service, we were only going to go just for an afternoon and then go back to pick up the children where they were. But we were so favored in our souls in the afternoon, we phoned through to those looking after our children and said, please, can you look after them? We're staying for the evening service. We don't want to go home.

It's lovely when that effect is on the word of God. and you desire to go to the house of God. But the Lord keeps us as well. He keeps the people of God. We read in Peter's first epistle, chapter 1, verse 5, where he says there are people that are kept by the power of God through faith, ready to be revealed in the last day.

We might overlook that. You think the power of God, the power of God that made the heavens and the earth, that the Lord could speak and it was done, that He could still the waves of the sea, that mighty power of God is actually acting on me, on a sinner, is keeping me. How is that being worked? Well, it's through faith. And faith cometh by hearing, and hearing by the word of God. That faith that the Lord Jesus gave to his people is the means of their keeping and through the word.

Sometimes we may have been tempted to walk in a sinful or walk in a wrong way, and the Lord has brought to our remembrance a word of Scripture that has stopped us in our tracks And we remember those times. We'll put a caution upon our spirit perhaps. Thy word is a lamp unto my feet, a light unto my path. Wherewithal shall a young man cleanse his way by taking heed thereto unto thy word. And so the Lord keeps his people. Though when Paul says Christ who is our life, he keeps our life. He keeps our souls. The Lord is sovereign in that, isn't he?

You think of what the Lord prayed concerning Peter, and it was used to humble Peter, who thought he could stand in his own strength. Satan hath desired to have thee, to sift thee as wheat, but I prayed for thee that thy faith fail not. It's good for us to remember Peter's case. The Lord didn't say, I pray that you won't deny me. but that his faith did not fail.

He went through that humbling time of falling of sin, but came out the other side still a believer, still loving the Lord. Dear David as well, you might say not kept from adultery or not kept from murder, He paid for it, he suffered for it the rest of his life, the sword not departing from his house. And he lost that sweet fellowship at first, restore unto me the joy of thy salvation. He had been forgiven though, pardoned and forgiven, and still stayed as the Lord's people. Sometimes the Lord permits His people to fall, to humble them, to show what was in their heart, and that they might prove more and more they are saved by God's mercy, by His grace, and by nothing in them. It should not lead us to sin, that grace might abound, but it is a reminder that our life is not in us, but it's with God, it's in Christ Jesus. Christ who is our life. Is our life in this that He teaches us?

The whole New Testament covenant is that they shall not teach every man his neighbor, saying, Know the Lord, they shall all know me from the least unto the greatest. They shall all be taught of God. With our Lord on earth, He taught them as He was wont, He taught them again, without a parable spake He not unto them. All the time He was teaching them. line upon line here a little there a little instructing and teaching do notice this dear friends another token of the lord's care of our life being in christ is that there will be lessons in the school of christ it's a great thing don't ever despise it you know children grandchildren They might come home from school, they're only in grade one, and they say, we've just learnt, we've just learnt a simple maths sum, or we've just learnt what this word means. You don't say, well because you don't know calculus and algebra, you can't really take any comfort from that. They would say, I have been taught that in the school where I attend. And a child of God might have one, he might say a little thing that they've been taught, but have you been taught that in the school of Christ?

That's the important thing, even more important than what has been taught is where it's been taught and who has taught it you. They shall all be taught of God. Remember the man that was born blind? He says, one thing I know, whereas I was blind, now I see. Have we got a one thing? We got those things that we've been taught?

Taught through the ministry, taught through painful experience, taught and perhaps haven't realized it's been in the school of Christ. where the Lord has brought together what we've walked in and then the Word of God. The Lord does that in John 6, where on one day there was the miracle of loaves and fishes, the next there was a long sermon on the Lord himself as being the manna from heaven and the bread that was so vital. Labour not for the meat that perisheth, but for that which endureth unto eternal life. The Lord guides His people as well.

What a mess our lives would be if He didn't give us any direction. When the Lord began with the Apostle Paul, the very first thing that he said, Lord, what wilt thou have me to do? I wonder how many of you this afternoon have those situations or those times that that has been your simple prayer. Lord, what wilt thou have me to do? An effect of grace. Not, this is what I'm going to do. The first time, mindful of the Lord, of His will, and to be subject to His will, be willing to do what He directs and what He guides in. That's an amazing thing, isn't it? And then right through life, how many times to be guided, what steps to make in providence.

Sometimes we have to make a decision, sometimes we don't. Dear Joseph's life, he didn't have to make decisions. The only decision perhaps he had to make was to obey his father, to go to his brethren, and everything was taken out of his hands. They put him in the pit, they sold him, sold on the slave market, falsely accused, put into prison, left in prison, forgotten in prison, then brought up out of prison. Where is the one thing he had to make a decision? Nothing. The Lord dictated it all by providence.

But there are those times in our lives that we have a choice of ways, which way to go. Sometimes it might be as in the balance, which way. we actually go. Remember when the Lord was first working in my heart, and I'd been in the Welsh My Voice Choir at Frankston, and I'd made it clear to them at the start, I was not going to anything on the Sunday, but they just interpreted it that as long as it didn't clash with the services, then it'd be alright.

But when time after time I didn't go, and then I had to make it clear, no, because it was the Lord's Day, then one of my fellow workers who was with me in the choir, he said, he told the bandmaster or choirmaster, I think it's only his parents. That's all it is. So one rehearsal, he stood me up in front of the whole choir and said, now, is it you or is it your parents? Why you won't do anything on the Sunday?

And at that point, It could have gone either way. At that point, I was just so new in the way, so easy to be ashamed, so easy perhaps to, so was my parents. I said, no, it is me. I don't want to. I never had any trouble from them anymore. In fact, very soon I had a part from them. I couldn't walk there anymore.

But you think of those times when it seemed to be hardly in the balance. You say, was that really God's work that it seemed that it could easily have gone one way or easily gone the other? There's a Lord that constrains and draws and the end result is His work. However much we might look in our own souls and think, wow, it was such a fragile work. It was so, it might easily have gone the other way. But not when God is at work, no. Not when His hand is in it.

And He gives that grace to live to His honour and glory. We wouldn't need that. He giveth more grace, more help, more teaching. For all this path of mortification, many cries to the Lord for grace and help, our weak resistance, cries to the Lord, sensing our failure, confession before Him. So we live, we live by the faith that He gives us. Here below it is living by faith. But then there comes a time, this is the second point, just quite briefly now, when Christ who is our life shall appear.

What is really meant here, I mean the Lord has appeared, He appears in providence, He appears in grace, He appears in calling. But when the Lord appears, we'll either be at our death or the end of the world. We think of the Lord in John 14, I go to prepare a place for you. If I go and prepare a place for you, then I'll come again, receive you unto myself that where I am, there you may be also. The Lord appeared to Stephen as he was being stoned, the first Christian martyr, and he saw him standing at the right hand of God to receive him. The Lord appears to his people to bring them home to himself.

And there's been many of the Lord's people have testified on a dying bed of seeing the Lord in a sometimes a very visionary way and that anticipation the Lord coming and taking them, receiving them to himself. Light at even time, a prepared people for a prepared place.

But then we know that the Lord shall come again with power and great glory in the clouds of heaven. It shall be the end of the world. And the Lord makes a distinction with his people and those that are not. He says, when you see these things come to pass, those signs in the heavens, those things happening, men's hearts failing them with fear. Then look up, for your redemption draweth nigh. God's people are told that that time the Lord is coming, and He is coming to gather His people. He will come with his own that have died before in the clouds of heaven, and the dead in Christ shall rise first. And we which are alive and remain shall be caught up with them in the clouds, so shall we ever be with the Lord. The Lord shall appear.

We need to remember this. We walk by faith here, but there shall come a time that we know even as we are known. If in this life only we have hope in Christ, we are all men most miserable. So this is to be the encouragement and help. We have a veil between at the moment. We're in darkness. We only see by faith. We only know partially, just in part, like children. but then we shall know perfectly, the Lord shall appear. And so that should be an encouragement to us, where we say that Christ is our life here by faith, the Lord shall appear.

Well, thirdly then, what is the prospect when he appears? Then shall ye also appear with him in glory. We shall not be like the wicked, viewing the Lord and his people and we outside, but he says, appear with him in glory. What a wonderful prospect. Father, I will that they whom thou hast given me be with me where I am, that they may behold my glory.

This is the hope of the people of God, absent from the body and present with the Lord, and it is joined to this work of grace, the life of God in the soul here below. It is eternal life. And with Him in glory the body and the soul at the last day shall be raised, body joined with the soul, and then no conflict between the body and the soul, no conflict like here below between the flesh and the spirit, their perfect harmony. We can hardly understand what it shall be like. But what a prospect!

May we be able to see this afternoon that our life, is Christ. Christ who is our life. What a blessed thing if you go home to the house of God today and you're able to say Christ is my life. The spiritual life that I have, Christ gave that to me. I didn't give it to myself. He has maintained it and I hope to be with Him forever. The Lord give that assurance and that comfort and blessing. Amen.