The Living Dead? We must bury all Dead Things

[WAtchman Banks]

Death as you know it can be very tragic, but when concerning the things of God; death is victory. lets look at death from a natural point of view. If a person dies unsaved it's very tragic and it's victory to those that are saved, but it's even more tragic if the dead whether saved or unsaved doesn't get buried. A corpse will start to decay after death and it will emit unpleasant odors due to decomposition. Without burial the living would have to see and smell the decomposing corpse, but it is not necessarily a public health requirement. Burial, also called interment and (when applied to human burial) in-humation, is the act of placing a person or object into the ground. Everything dead must be buried, or the stink of death would cover the land. This is why God created so many pest like flies, worms and bugs to eat away at all the dead flesh of animals and humans.

Now there is a spiritual burial that is very important to the believer and without this burial there would be a great spiritual stinking in our lives. There is a spiritual stinking, a foul odor that emulates from spiritual deadness and those that are dead spiritually. Notice that in both Mark and Revelations these spirits are called “foul spirits” and in other passages “unclean spirits”…Rev. 18:2...And he cried mightily with a strong voice, saying, Babylon the great is fallen, is fallen, and is become the habitation of devils, and the hold of every foul spirit, and a cage of every unclean and hateful bird.

Mark 9:25...When Jesus saw that the people came running together, he rebuked the foul spirit, saying unto him, Thou dumb and deaf spirit, I charge thee, come out of him, and enter no more into him.

Foul - Middle English, from Old English ful; akin to Old High German ful which means rotten, Latin pus pus, put Ere means to stink, Greek pyon pus. Pus is composed of degenerating leukocytes (white blood cells), tissue debris, and living or dead microorganisms. So strictly speaking foul is the stink that comes from dead and rotten flesh. But how can a spirit be foul in that sense of the word? This is the only way the writer could explain the filthiness of these evil spirits. These unclean and hateful birds that revelations spoke of are birds that eat dead flesh. Babylon which is interpreted as the world is full of spiritually dead people and spiritual deadness is like the natural dead, but it can’t be seen, touched or smelt with our natural senses.

Lets just take a moment to imagine the world as it is today, but without burial. Lets go back hundreds of years and imagine this world without burial, the foul odors would be so great in the earth. Look at how we dispose of our dead and how we also dispose of our garbage through burial, land fills are everywhere. I tell you that there would be dead rotten flesh of humans and animals everywhere and the smell from this decomposed rotten filth would be rising up in the heat of the day that would make the earth unsafe to live. The smell of a decomposed body can travel approximately hundred feet, and some animals can smell rotten flesh a mile away. The whole earth is full of the spiritually dead, rotten people, unclean spirits, and wicked things, and is the result of sin in the flesh. These wicked people and spirits have filled the entire atmosphere with a spiritual foul odor. This is what happens to the dead if they don’t get disposed of properly and this is also why the lord plans to destroy the lost (the dead spiritually) with an eternal cremation.

We have now explored both the Natural and the spiritual need for burial, let’s now look at what the word of God say’s about this subject:

Colossians 2:11-13...In whom also ye are circumcised with the circumcision made without hands, in putting off the body of the sins of the flesh by the circumcision of Christ: 12 Buried with him in baptism, wherein also ye are risen with him through the faith of the operation of God, who hath raised him from the dead.
13 And you, being dead in your sins and the un-circumcision of your flesh, hath he quickened together with him, having forgiven you all trespasses;

Romans 6:3-4...Know ye not, that so many of us as were baptized into Jesus Christ were baptized into his death? 4 Therefore we are buried with him by baptism into death: that like as Christ was raised up from the dead by the glory of the Father, even so we also should walk in newness of life.

We were dead in our trespasses and sins, but we were crucified with him as we were baptized into Christ. Even though we were put to death in the flesh, God continued to bury us with Christ; “we are buried with him by baptism into death,” and not only this but our old man was crucified with Christ: Romans 6:6... knowing this, that our old man was crucified with him, that the body of sin might be done away, that so we should no longer be in bondage to sin. Our old sinful nature was put to death and buried with Christ. So then all these old things that we use to do as sinners need to be buried, who we were in the flesh all needs to stay buried. The old man needs to stay buried, and if you continue to think on fleshly things, the old ways will be resurrected.

We as born again believers in Christ have to be more careful not to put yourself in the wrong environment. A person delivered from pornography needs to stay well away from the stuff, just like a person that’s delivered from smoking need not to be around those that a smokers. Let’s imagine a person that has a close love one that dies and is buried, how can this person ever get on with his life if their at the grave everyday and visiting the buried body of the love one. Now a loved one is a little different because it wasn’t a sin to love them, but these old things that we’ve come out of in the world don’t need to be revisited, and we do not need a memorial. We didn’t just die with Christ we were also buried with by baptism into his death. Without burial there can be no resurrection or ascension to the right hand of God. Part of being New creatures in Christ is that old things are past away, they are not just dead but they are buried also.

Now we must recognize that we have the victory through the death and burial, because we were included in Christ’s death and burial. Jesus has given us a proper way to dispose of our own selves and old nature so that it never has to come back, and it is through the death, burial, resurrection, and ascension of Jesus Christ and our being included in this.


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