DEATH BEFORE LIFE
The Christian life is not built on trying harder but on dying deeper. Every true work of God in us begins at an altar. Before the life of Christ can flow through us, the self-life must be laid down. The cross is not only a symbol of suffering. It is the place of surrender. There is no resurrection without crucifixion. There is no glory without humility. There is no life without death.
Paul urges us to offer our bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and pleasing to God, for this is our true and reasonable worship (Romans 12:1). God does not force Himself upon us. He waits for a willing heart, a heart that climbs upon the altar and says, “Lord, not my will but Yours be done.” This offering is not a one-time act. It is a daily surrender. It is a continual yielding of our body, soul, and spirit to the purpose of the King.
In the natural realm, life comes before death. We are born and eventually we die. But in the spiritual realm, the order is reversed. We die first so that we may truly live. Paul said that we were once dead in our trespasses and sins (Ephesians 2:1). We were breathing but lifeless in spirit, cut off from the very source of life. Like Lazarus, we lay in the tomb until the voice of Jesus called us by name and said, “Come forth.” When Christ speaks, the dead rise. When His Word reaches the heart, the cold becomes warm and the still begin to move (John 11:43–44).
The One who raised Jesus from the dead also gives life to our mortal bodies through His Spirit that lives within us (Romans 8:11). We were like the valley of dry bones that Ezekiel saw—bleached, brittle, and hopeless—until God breathed His breath into us and said, “Live” (Ezekiel 37:5). That is the wonder of new birth. It is not the improvement of a broken life. It is the raising of a dead one.
Sin brought us to the coffin, but grace calls us out. The gospel is the great awakening of the soul. It does not polish the old nature. It creates a new one. If anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation. The old has passed away and the new has come (2 Corinthians 5:17). The God who created man in His image now recreates man in the image of His Son. The same power that formed Adam from the dust now forms Christ within us.
Yet this life begins with death. When we believe, we are united with Christ not only in His life but also in His death. We were buried with Him by baptism into death, that just as Christ was raised from the dead, we too might walk in newness of life (Romans 6:4). Faith does not only look to the cross for forgiveness. It looks through the cross for transformation. We were crucified with Christ. Our old self, with all its pride and striving, was nailed there. The life we now live is no longer ours. It is His life living in us (Galatians 2:20).
This is the mystery of grace. Death is not the end. It is the doorway. When we consider ourselves dead to sin and alive to God through Jesus Christ (Romans 6:11), we find a peace that the world cannot give. We stop trying to fix what God has already crucified. We rest in the truth that our salvation is complete and that our old nature is powerless. Our true life is hidden with Christ in God (Colossians 3:3).
Humility is the displacement of self by the life of God. That is the essence of being a living sacrifice. When self is emptied, Christ can fill. When self dies, Christ can live. The surrendered soul becomes a dwelling place for divine power. The Spirit can only fill what has first been emptied.
We must put to death whatever belongs to the old life—the desires of the flesh, the pride of life, and the stubborn will that refuses to yield (Romans 8:13; Colossians 3:5). We cannot manage sin. It must be crucified. We cannot control self. It must die. This death does not come through effort or willpower. It comes through abiding. As we draw near to Christ, His Spirit works within us what we could never accomplish on our own.
Here lies the beautiful paradox. The death God calls us to is the very path to fullness of life. He asks us to die so He can live through us. He calls us to lose our lives so we may find them in Him (Matthew 16:24–25). The altar that consumes our flesh releases our freedom.
This is why the Word speaks of a living sacrifice. It is not a dead offering that lies motionless. It is a life continually yielded to God. It is life burning with the fire of His presence and sustained by the breath of His Spirit. Every act of obedience, every prayer of surrender, every quiet “yes, Lord” becomes another spark in that flame.
The living sacrifice walks in daily death and daily resurrection. It learns to say, “I die daily” (1 Corinthians 15:31). It no longer measures life by comfort or success but by how much of Christ is seen. It finds joy in weakness because God’s strength is made perfect there (2 Corinthians 12:9). It counts all things loss that it may gain Christ (Philippians 3:8).
So what is our response to such grace? It is to come to the altar again and again, offering our bodies, our minds, our will, and our desires. We come not to add to what Christ has done, but to yield completely to it. We come to the One who died that we might live and say, “Lord, here I am. Breathe Your life through me.”
This is the way of the cross. It is the narrow path that leads to abundance. It is the only road where death gives birth to life. To die with Christ is to live with Him. To surrender all is to gain everything.
Let the heart that once resisted His will now rest in it. Let the hands that once clung to self now lift in surrender. Let the lips that once complained now praise. The life of Christ is not found in striving but in dying. And when you have died with Him, you will discover the secret joy of the living sacrifice—the life that never ends.
We were “dead” in our sins, but we come to life by choosing to “die” with Jesus. Once we are made “alive” together with Him, we serve Him by “dying” to self every day.
Bryan Dewayne Dunaway
