“A Body You Have Prepared for Me.”

“A Body You Have Prepared for Me.”

This is what Jesus said when He came into the world. He had received a body like ours, a flesh like the seed of David. David had overcome all his external enemies, but he could not overcome the passions and desires that dwelt in his flesh. Yet this is what Jesus did, so that His spirit, as the Son of God, remained undefiled by sin in the flesh. His resurrection from the dead was the evidence of it. This is the gospel which Paul had been chosen to preach and of which the prophets had prophesied. Rom. 1:1-5; 1 Pet. 1:10-12. This mystery is great. 1 Tim. 3:16.

“Inasmuch then as the children have partaken of flesh and blood, He Himself likewise shared in the same, that through death He might destroy him who had the power of death, that is, the devil . . . .” Heb. 2:14.

By partaking of the flesh of David, Jesus could put to death the enemies that David could not put to death. Through these enemies the devil was able to gain power over all people and make them into sinners so that they had to die. Jesus destroyed the devil by dying to the enemies in the flesh. Thus He was able to “release those who through fear of death were all their lifetime subject to bondage.” Heb. 2:14-18. Just think what a gospel this is!

The lusts are the cause of all the corruption in the world. However, we can be freed out from this corruption through the gospel and partake of divine nature instead. 2 Pet. 1:3-4. We read how the Corinthians had sunk down into corruption. Paul mentions the worst sins when he writes, “And such were some of you. But you were washed, but you were sanctified, but you were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus and by the Spirit of our God.” 1 Cor. 6:9-11. He writes further about the hope they had received. “And God both raised up the Lord and will also raise us up by His power.” V. 14.

What a gospel this is! Paul writes further to the same Corinthians: “Always carrying about in the body the dying of the Lord Jesus, that the life of Jesus also may be manifested in our body.” Jesus’ body was the first body in which this dying to sin took place. That is why it is called “the dying of Jesus.” It worked so mightily in Jesus’ body that He never sinned; as a result the life that was with the Father was revealed on earth through His body so the apostles could see it, hear it, and touch it. 1 John 1:1-4.

If this dying of Jesus had also been working in the Corinthians’ bodies—the ones who had sunk so deep into sin—then the life of Jesus would also have been revealed in their bodies. Paul writes further: “Knowing that He who raised up the Lord Jesus will also raise us up with Jesus, and will present us with you.” 2 Cor. 4:10-11, 14. Just think what a gospel this is!

It is not at all strange that the spirit of Antichrist denies that Christ has come in the flesh. By doing so he explains away the gospel and salvation to a divine life in the days of our flesh. He has deceived the entire religious world. This deception had already begun in the apostles’ days. 1 John 4:1-3; 2 John 7-11. The exhortation is: “Little children, let no one deceive you.” “Beloved, do not believe every spirit, but test the spirits, whether they are of God . . . .”