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In the last chapter we considered the twelve items of the old creation, the first of which was the angelic life. But here we need to point out that those angels who did not fall were not included in the old creation. Though at one time they were under the leadership of Satan, the former head of all the angels, they never followed him in his rebellion; therefore, they are separate from the old creation. Only the rebellious angels who followed Satan became a part of the old creation. Thus, the angelic life as the first of the twelve negative items of the old creation does not include those good angels. The fallen angels, after they rebelled, became the rulers, authorities, world-rulers, and spiritual forces of evil in the heavenlies (Eph. 6:12; Col. 2:15). The evil spirits, mentioned in Ephesians 6, are the fallen angels. The majority of the angels, who did not rebel, were not included in the old creation, which was brought to an end by Christ’s crucifixion.
However, among the human race there is no such exception, for all humanity fell into the rebellion of the devil. The rebellion of the human race began with the first man, Adam, and includes every descendant of his. There are two groups of angels, those who never rebelled and those who rebelled, but as far as the human race is concerned, there is only one group. The fallen human race is represented by Adam and is under the headship of Adam, so the whole human race through Adam is included in the fallen, old creation.
Indeed, Satan, the leader of the rebellious angels, is included in the old creation. Satan misused the authority given him and utilized it to form his kingdom (Matt. 12:26). According to Isaiah 14:12-14, Ezekiel 28:13-14, and Luke 4:5-7, Satan was appointed by God in the very beginning as the head of the angels, and as such, he received certain authority from God. The Lord Jesus in His temptation in the wilderness recognized the authority given to Satan. Under his rule, Satan formed a kingdom with a group of angels who also misused their power and authority.
After man was created, Satan came to induce man to sin; and with sin in man, many fruits were produced, called sins. Following the fall, Satan then utilized all the necessities for man’s existence — such as eating, clothing, marriage, housing, etc. These necessities had been created and ordained by God for man’s existence, but Satan utilized them to systematize the whole human race. This satanic system is called the world.
Due to sin, sins, and the world, death came into the human race, and by the fall, Satan injected something of his own nature into the human body to corrupt it, causing it to be transmuted into flesh. Another result of the fall is that man as a whole was changed and became the old man. In addition, man’s soul, under the threatening and influence of the flesh, became the self. The soul was originally created good, but through the fall the soul became the self.
Satan was the head of the angels, and Adam was the head of the rest of creation, but both representatives rebelled. Consequently, the whole creation was influenced and affected (Rom. 8:20-22; Col. 1:20) and needed to be reconciled by Christ’s redemption.
All these items compose the old creation, and as we have seen, fallen man became the very center of it. All the negative things of the whole universe were gathered together and concentrated in man. Satan, with his kingdom and worldly system, was in man, along with sin, sins, death, self, flesh, and the old man. Everything of the old creation, including all the negative things of the universe, was centralized in this fallen man.
Then Christ became incarnated as man. Christ put man upon Himself — not a small, simple man but a man all-inclusive of the old creation. This is why Christ was incarnated as man, and as man He was crucified on the cross in the form of a serpent. Before the cross Christ was a man, but on the cross He was a man in the form of a serpent. Moreover, Christ was made sin on the cross (2 Cor. 5:21). When He was on the cross, God not only put all our sins upon Him, but He also made Him sin. God put all the iniquities and all the sins of the human race upon Christ, and at that time He also made Christ to be sin in the form of Satan. Since all the negative things in the universe were concentrated and centralized in the fallen man, Christ came into this man and brought this man to the cross. When He brought this man to the cross, He brought every negative thing of the universe to the cross. When He put this man to an end, He also put the old creation to an end. All the twelve items of the old creation were terminated by the all-inclusive death of Christ on the cross. If we have the heavenly point of view and spiritual insight, we will jump up and say Hallelujah!
The last chapters of Ezekiel show us the building of God’s house, God’s temple. If the whole picture were drawn on paper, one would discover that the altar, a type of the cross, is located exactly in the center of the whole construction. Both the vertical and horizontal measurements of the building pinpoint the altar at the center of God’s temple. This is very interesting, for it portrays the all-inclusive death of Christ, which has brought the whole old creation to an end through the cross.
This all-inclusive death was accomplished by the eternal Spirit. We read in Hebrews 9:14: “Christ...through the eternal Spirit offered Himself without blemish to God.” The all-inclusive death of Christ occurred in the eternal Spirit. This term the eternal Spirit is mentioned only once in the Scriptures. When Christ was incarnated in man, He became the very center of the whole creation, which included all the negative things of the universe, and when Christ brought this fallen man to death upon the cross, He did it in the eternal Spirit. He ended this all-inclusive man in a Spirit who is eternal, One who has no beginning and One who can never be ended. In other words, the death of Christ ended everything but the eternal Spirit. Christ brought every negative thing with Him to the cross and ended it, but He remains the same because He is in the eternal Spirit. Though all things were ended on the cross, His Spirit could never be ended. Therefore, it is by this Spirit that Christ was resurrected. Christ as a man brought all negative things to death. All things passed into death and were ended; only the eternal Spirit passed through death and remained. It was in this Spirit and by this Spirit that Christ was resurrected.
Romans 1:4 says that Christ was “the Son of God in power according to the Spirit of holiness out of the resurrection of the dead.” What does holiness mean? And why does it speak of the Spirit of holiness instead of the Holy Spirit? Holiness simply means separation. Even though this eternal Spirit went into death, He was and still is a Spirit of separation. Death could end everything else, but death could not end the eternal Spirit; He is different and separate from all things. He is the Spirit of holiness, proved by the resurrection from the dead. I may put some books and other items in the trash can to discard them, but if I put a man in the trash can, he will jump out. He will not be willing to be put to an end; he is different from the books. By jumping out, he separates himself from the other items; he becomes a man of separation. In like manner, all things went to the cross — man, Satan, everything — and were put to an end, but only the eternal Spirit, who also went to the cross and into death with Christ, could never be put to an end. He is the Spirit of separation. Death did everything it possibly could, but death could not hold this Spirit. It is by this different Spirit, this Spirit of separation, that Christ was resurrected.
Romans 8:11 says, “If the Spirit of the One who raised Jesus from the dead dwells in you, He who raised Christ from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies through His Spirit who indwells you.” Who raised Jesus from the dead? It is the same Spirit of separation. What Spirit shall quicken our mortal bodies? It is the Spirit of resurrection, who dwells in us. This means that the reality of resurrection and the principle of resurrection dwell in us. The principle of resurrection is the separation effected by this eternal Spirit, the One who could never be terminated by death.
Seeing that the principle of resurrection is in the eternal Spirit of separation, we must ask where this Spirit is today. We must say, “Hallelujah, He is in me!” Therefore, this principle of resurrection is also in us. May the Lord open our eyes to see the principle of the cross and the principle of resurrection — that is, everything was ended by death, and the eternal Spirit now dwells in us. If we see this, we will be transcendent. We will say Hallelujah! There is no need for us to beg, to ask, or to cry. We only need to say Hallelujah all the time.
John 11:25 tells us that Christ Himself is the resurrection. Martha, the sister of dead Lazarus, complained that the Lord came too late. It seemed to her that resurrection and life were a matter of time. If the Lord had come earlier, she reasoned, her brother would not have died. On the contrary, the Lord told her, in effect, that it was not a matter of time or space but a matter of Christ. He said, “I am the resurrection.” Forget about time and space; wherever Christ is and whenever Christ is, there is always resurrection.
On the day of His resurrection, when Christ came to His disciples, He breathed on them and said, “Receive the Holy Spirit.” This very Spirit whom they received included the principle and reality of His resurrection. Without this Spirit, the disciples could have nothing to do with His resurrection. Christ’s resurrection is in this Spirit. If we have this Spirit, we have the reality of the resurrection; if we do not have this Spirit, we have nothing to do with the resurrection. The resurrection is simply Christ Himself, and the principle and reality of Christ’s resurrection are the eternal Spirit, which can never be ended. This eternal Spirit, who is without beginning and without ending, is the very principle and the very reality of the resurrection. Anything else that is put to death will be ended; only the eternal Spirit cannot be held or terminated by death. This is why, after the resurrection, Christ as resurrection came to His disciples and breathed on them, telling them to receive His breath as the eternal Spirit, the Spirit of separation. This very eternal Spirit, as the principle and reality of resurrection, came into the disciples, and this principle and this reality are now in us.
Two more verses will help us to understand this. In Philippians 1:19 Paul speaks of “the bountiful supply of the Spirit of Jesus Christ.” It seems that he was saying, “I am in prison, but I am not afraid, for within me there is the principle and the reality of resurrection. What is this resurrection within me? It is the Spirit of Jesus Christ with the bountiful, all-inclusive, all-sufficient supply.” Then in Philippians 3:10 he says, “To know Him and the power of His resurrection.” What is the power of His resurrection? It is the supply of the Spirit of Jesus Christ. The bountiful, all-inclusive, all-sufficient supply of the Spirit of Jesus Christ is the power of His resurrection. This power and this supply are nothing less than the eternal Spirit, the Spirit of separation. Yet this Spirit is within us today! Is this not enough? What more could we want? We should say Hallelujah! We have to thank Him for His cross, and we have to praise Him also for His Spirit. His cross has ended everything negative, and now His eternal Spirit is indwelling us as the power of resurrection.
To summarize, we can never have a real experience of the cross unless we are in the eternal Spirit. No matter how much we know it and how much we talk about it, if we are not in the eternal Spirit, we can never experience the power of the cross. The more we live and walk in the eternal Spirit of separation, the more we will realize the killing power of the cross. There is no further need to reckon ourselves dead; this is to commit spiritual suicide. Many Christians try to commit spiritual suicide daily, yet, praise the Lord, they can never succeed! If we just live and walk in the Spirit, the all-inclusive dose within us, we will experience the killing power of the cross. Since the principle and reality of both His resurrection and His death are in the eternal Spirit, then the resurrection also includes the effectiveness of His death. In the eternal Spirit of resurrection there is the killing factor, the killing power of the cross.
So, again we say, Praise the Lord! As long as we are in the all-inclusive Spirit, the experience of the cross is ours and the reality of the resurrection is within us. There is no need to do anything but take it by living faith. If we see this, we will say, “Hallelujah, praise the Lord!” We have the living faith, and we take it and claim it by faith. Then the principles of the cross and of the resurrection will be real to us in the indwelling Spirit. We already have Him within. There is no need for us to ask anymore; we only need to take Him and experience Him and enjoy Him. Then we will experience a real growth in life. I can assure you of this. This is a vision which we need to see and take by faith.
