Reigning in life

 

(Rom 5:17)  For if by one man's offence death reigned by one; much more they which receive abundance of grace and of the gift of righteousness shall reign in life by one, Jesus Christ.)

In our scripture reference, the one man’s offence by which death reigned was Adam’s sin. Death is not only physical death but also the effects, forms and the results of death such as sickness, disease, lack, poverty, etc. It is through the spiritual death that physical death resulted. Man was not going to die physically if he hadn’t died spiritually. Death means separation. Man’s spirit was separated from the life of God in the beginning.

When Jesus came, life rules in those who come to Him because now their spirits are born again and are in perfect union with the very Spirit of God. The Christian now reigns over poverty, disease, sickness, lack, because of the life of God is in Him. Something to note also in that scripture is that we received and abundance of grace and righteousness as a gift. Grace is God’s unmerited favour and ability bestowed on those who do not deserve it. While righteousness is a right relationship we possess with God because we are born again.

We cannot reign in life because of our own strength or merit. It has to be by grace. Also, we cannot have a right relationship with God if it not by grace. Whoever therefore has the consciousness that they are full of God’s grace (his ability), and are in relationship with Him, will reign in this life. But whoever is operating in his own ability (works) and is not right with God, but have a guilt conscious toward God, death reigns in them. We normally think this is true to non-believers but also to believers who don’t understand their position in Christ. Some believers are helplessly allowing sin, guilt, powerlessness, ravage their lives by bring upon them all forms or death such as stress, sickness, diseases, broken relationships etc. They do not that by grace they can reign over all these things and be victorious in their day to day life.

A believer has the power to bring life to every circumstance in his life by the ability which God gives (grace) because they are in right relationship (righteous) with God. Sickness has no legal right to reign over you, lack has not legal right over you, poverty has no legal right too to reign over you because you are not only equipped with God’s ability to command them to leave. What gives you the legal right to use that power is because you are right with God, hallelujah.

What is noteworthy is that you have a right to the good life when you apply your faith according to Rom 5:17, another person has the power over their body, you don’t. You can command life into their death experience if their faith agrees with yours. But if they don’t then your faith alone cannot remove the death experiences in their lives. You hear many people ask why some sick people we pray for don’t get healed, or why we don’t go and get all of them out of hospitals completely healed? It is because their beliefs may not be in agreement with these things and therefore it cannot work.

The abundant life of God is not automated. It works by principles. If it was automated then we would not be having any sick people in hospital. We would simply be in our churches and command all of them to depart from hospital. We do pray for sick people who are in hospital and send a word of healing to them. When such a word of healing sent by faith meets a heart which believes in divine healing, they are healed. Remember the four men who let down a sick man through the roof to where Jesus was? These men were in faith for the healing of their friend. The man too collaborated by allowing to be let down the roof. If he did not believe in the ministry of Jesus, he would have objected to them removing someone’s roof. Sick people have a will of their own. It is said by some doctors that a high percentage of sick people who have hope of getting well do get well. Those who don’t even if the medicine is the best they can land on, they cannot get well if they have lost all hopes of getting healed. But some sick people and caretakers are opposed to divine healing. So however, much you desire life and healing to reign in other people’s life, they need to accept by faith that God’s word is true to receive their healing even when they are not born again.

Jesus healed people whose faith was in agreement to His, or he did heal by the supernatural manifestation of the Holy Spirit. No wonder Jesus always said your faith has made you whole. We have no control over the supernatural intervention of the Holy Spirit to heal because it works as the Spirit wills, but we can use the Word mixed with our faith to get results every time. The healing may not be immediate but gradual.

Or prayer lives reveal whether we are reigning in life or not. People beg, plead, wail for sickness, diseases etc. to leave. Jesus was not walking around begging the sickness to leave, He commanded it to depart. Likewise command all deaths in your life to depart. Don’t beg it or beg God to take it away, command it to leave immediately.

As children of God, we have not been called to suffer, we have been called to a higher life, an abundant life which works on our behalf through grace and righteousness, hallelujah.