NEW AND ABUNDANT LIFE

NEW AND ABUNDANT LIFE, by Thomas M. Cooper

Printed in the U.S.A.

ISBN 0-9703888-0-2

NEW AND ABUNDANT LIFE

This small but important booklet has been prepared for your benefit so that as you accept and understand the truths it contains, you will be enabled and empowered to enjoy a quality of life far greater than you have ever experienced or perhaps even imagined. By believing in your heart that God raised Jesus from the dead and confessing with your mouth that Jesus is Lord of your life (according to Romans 10: 9 and 10), you have taken the first step on your journey toward experiencing NEW AND ABUNDANT LIFE.

In John 10:10, Jesus declared that the reason He came was to give us life and that life more abundantly. The Greek word translated “life” in the English is “zoe”. This refers to the same quality of life that God has - a life full of love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, self-control, wholeness, health, prosperity, acceptance, approval - indeed, a life full of every good thing you could possibly imagine. The Greek word translated “abundantly” means, “over and above, more than is necessary, exceeding abundantly, superior, extraordinary, all-surpassing”. So, as you can clearly see, through the life, death, burial, and resurrection of Jesus, we have been freely given the opportunity to have, experience, and enjoy the same superior, extraordinary quality of life that God enjoys. And we have been given that life to an all-surpassing and exceedingly abundant degree.

Now, we must ask and answer a tremendously important question: WHEN did God give you this gift of abundant life through the finished work of Jesus? Many people would say that God did not give you this gift until the moment you believed that God raised Jesus from the dead and confessed Him as Lord of your life. In reality, however, this gift was given to you and the rest of humanity two-thousand years ago when Jesus was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father (Romans 6:4). The moment you believed and confessed was simply the moment that you received for yourself, personally, the gift of abundant, everlasting life. This is the life that God freely gave you and the rest of the world two-thousand years ago when Jesus was crucified because of our sins and raised for our righteousness (Romans 4:25).

Now, what this means is that this marvelous gift that you recently received, say perhaps last Sunday for example, would have been available for you to receive the day before, or the week before, or the month before, or the year before. In fact, you could have received this gift at any moment in your life. All you had to do was hear that the gift of life had already been given to you and then respond by receiving that gift through faith in the finished work of the Lord Jesus.

Let’s see if the following parable that the Lord gave me several years ago will be of some help in putting all of this in perspective.

PARABLE OF THE WEALTHY BUM

Consider for a moment a man who possessed no worldly goods. He existed in this world with only the clothes on his back, surviving on the discarded scraps of food he could locate in restaurant dumpsters, and sleeping under a highway overpass in an empty appliance box. This man had nothing -- no possessions to his name. He is what we would call today a homeless person, in times gone by, a bum.

Now, this bum made his way through the city on a daily basis looking for food. Every day he would travel the same route: down Main Street, through the business district to restaurant row and into the back alleys, scavenging for the food necessary to keep body and soul together.

One day another man was walking down the other side of Main Street in the opposite direction of the bum who happened to be making his regular rounds at the same time. This man was a very rich and powerful man, a man who owned and presided over a vast financial empire, a man who possessed seemingly unlimited wealth. The rich man glanced across the street and noticed the bum passing by on the other side. He stopped and stared, unable to comprehend how someone could be as needy as the bum appeared to be. Out of a sense of both curiosity and concern he followed the bum and observed him from a distance. He watched as the bum climbed into dumpster after dumpster searching for his noonday meal. He continued to follow and observe the bum as he returned to his cardboard shelter under the overpass.

The rich man’s heart began to break as he witnessed this scene being played out before his eyes. His heart was full of sorrow for he knew that no human being should ever have to live like that. Moved with compassion, the rich man purposed in his heart to do what he could to see the bum delivered from his dismal life with its obviously difficult past, its tormented present and its bleak and hopeless future.

The rich man went directly back to his office and asked if anyone knew the identity of the bum who lived under the overpass on the outskirts of town. One of his employees indicated that she knew who he was and told the rich man all that he needed to know. The rich man immediately called the president of his bank and made arrangements to meet with him. The rich man arrived at the bank and told the bank president that he wanted to open an account in the name of the bum whom he had just seen a little while earlier.

The rich man and the bank president sat down together and drew up all of the papers necessary to create an account for the bum. Once all the paperwork had been completed, the rich man then withdrew one million dollars from his own personal account and deposited that same sum into the bum’s account. The last order of business was for the rich man to affix his signature to the documents in order to make the entire transaction legal and binding. The rich man signed his name to the documents. It was exactly two o’clock in the afternoon on Monday, September 22nd.

Now, let’s pause and take a look at the facts as they have been presented so far in our parable:

Fact #1 - The bum has nothing.

Fact #2 - The rich man has super abundance.

Fact #3 - The rich man observes the bum and recognizes that no human being should have to live the way he is living.

Fact #4 - The rich man is moved with compassion and takes the steps necessary to transfer one million dollars of his own money into an account created to benefit the bum.

Fact #5 - At precisely two o’clock in the afternoon on Monday, September 22nd, when the rich man signed the bank documents, the bum became a millionaire.

Let’s focus on Fact #5 for a moment and address some very important issues. As we have seen, at exactly two o’clock in the afternoon on Monday, September 22nd, the bum, who began this parable with absolutely nothing, became a millionaire. That’s a fact! Now, let’s say, for the sake of discussion, that the rich man calls upon one of his employees to go and locate the bum and let him know all that has been done for him. But because the messenger thinks the bum is dirty and smelly and unworthy of such a gift, he leaves the office but makes no effort to contact the bum. As a result of the messengers’ unwillingness to go and tell the bum what happened, the bum has no clue that he is now a millionaire. No one has told him what the rich man did on his behalf. In the absence of this vital information do you think the quality of the bums’ life would change as a result of having become a millionaire? Absolutely not! Even though he is now, in reality, a millionaire, because he is completely ignorant of that fact, the quality of his life will remain unchanged. He will continue to live as if he had nothing. He will continue to depend on dumpster diving for discarded food as his sole source of nourishment. And he will continue to reside in an abandoned cardboard box underneath a highway overpass on the outskirts of town. And WHY will he experience no change in the quality of his life? Because no one has told him what the rich man did on his behalf. His ignorance will keep him forever separated from the gift that could radically alter his life. If only he knew.

Now, let’s consider another option for a moment. Let’s say the rich man calls upon a more responsible employee to go to the bum and inform him of all that took place on Monday, September 22nd. So the messenger goes to find the bum and lets him know all that the rich man did for him on that Monday and that at precisely two o’clock on that afternoon the bum became, in reality, a millionaire. Now what if the bum were to look at the messenger in justified astonishment and say something like, “Why that’s the craziest thing I ever heard of. Who on earth would do something like that for the likes of a bum like me? You must be nuts!” And then off he would go, back to his cardboard haven.

Well, now the bum has heard the truth about what happened that day. He is no longer ignorant of the fact that he is, in reality, a millionaire. The only trouble is, he doesn’t choose to believe it. Now, let me ask you this. Will the quality of his life change as a result of now having heard the truth? Absolutely not! Even though he has now heard the truth he doesn’t believe the truth. As a result his life will remain just as it always has been. He will still perceive himself to be, and consequently live like, a bum, even though in fact, in reality, HE IS A MILLIONAIRE. In other words, not believing the truth has the same effect for him as not knowing the truth. Either way the quality of his life will not change one iota. He will continue to scavenge for food out of a dumpster, live in a cardboard box and not have two nickels to rub together.

There is one other option we must consider. What if, after having heard the truth from the messenger sent by the rich man, the bum decided some six months later to check out the story for himself in spite of how impossible the whole thing seemed. So he goes to the bank and timidly asks to see the bank president, almost sure that he will be thrown out as quickly as he entered. The bank president greets the bum with a smile and invites him into his office. The bum nervously relates to the bank president the story he heard more than six months prior about a wealthy man who has given him a million dollars, and he wants to know if there is any truth to this at all. To his great surprise, the bank president assures the bum that everything he was told was absolutely true. In order to prove it to him, the banker produces the documents that were drawn up on that afternoon in September and shows him the signature that makes it all legal and binding. At that moment, the truth begins to dawn on the bum - the truth that he is no longer a penniless bum, but instead he is a millionaire and has been for better than six months.

Dear saint, you who are reading this booklet right now, this parable represents an accurate picture of the present condition of the world. Two thousand years ago in and through the death, burial, and resurrection of our Lord Jesus Christ, God, our Father, gave the whole world the most wonderful gift imaginable - the gift of abundant and everlasting life. And He did this while we were all still “bums”. Romans 5:8 declares that, “God demonstrates His own love toward us, in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us”. And again in John 3:16, “For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life”.

This gift of life was given freely by God to all mankind. This gift of life was given by God out of a heart of compassion. This gift of life was given by God two thousand years ago. And remember, this gift of life includes unconditional love, acceptance, approval; it includes deliverance, protection, health, healing, prosperity; it includes all that we need in order to experience wholeness in every area of our lives; it includes every good and perfect gift necessary for experiencing fullness of life and godliness (James 1:17; 2 Peter 1:3).

Now, the Bible declares that there are only two things that will keep us from experiencing this gift of abundant life that God so freely gave us two thousand years ago, and they are the same two things that prevented the bum in our parable from experiencing the benefits of being a millionaire. Both are found in Ephesians 4:18, which states, beginning in verse 17:

. . .you should no longer walk as the rest of the Gentiles walk, in the futility of their mind, having their understanding darkened, being alienated from the life of God, because of the ignorance that is in them, because of the hardening of their heart.

Notice the two things that keep us alienated, or separated, from the abundant life of God: ignorance and hardness of heart, which is unbelief. Ignorance is, of course, simply the lack of knowledge, or not knowing. Many people in the world today do not experience abundant life because they have never heard that God, through Christ, provided it two thousand years ago. Their ignorance keeps them from being able to enjoy a quality of life far superior to the one they experience on a routine basis. And, contrary to the old saying, what they don’t know can hurt them! When they are sick and don’t know that God has provided health and healing in Jesus, it hurts. When they are broke and they don’t know that God has provided prosperity in Jesus, it hurts. When they are feeling unloved and rejected and they do not know that God has provided unconditional love and acceptance in Jesus, it hurts! Unfortunately, however, just because someone might tell them the truth it does not mean that they will believe the truth.

You see, beyond ignorance is hardness of heart, or unbelief. This occurs when someone has been told the truth and yet they reject it for any number of reasons. They have now heard the truth but they choose not to believe it. Consequently, they, like those who are ignorant, do not experience the abundant life that Jesus died to give them. Now, unbelief can be even more tormenting than ignorance because when unbelievers become sick, or broke, or feel unloved and rejected they wish their lives could improve according to the good news they have heard but they have no real hope that improvement will ever come.

It is extremely important that we understand a basic truth at this point: neither ignorance nor unbelief alter the truth. Truth is truth no matter whether or not we know it or believe it. The bum in our parable did not know initially and subsequently did not believe that he was a millionaire. But neither his ignorance nor his unbelief in any way altered the fact that he was indeed a millionaire. His ignorance and unbelief only altered his ability to experience that reality. Similarly, our NOT knowing or NOT believing that two thousand years ago God placed all of us in Christ, caused us to become His children, and made us heirs of abundant life DOES NOT IN ANY WAY ALTER THAT REALITY. Like the bum, however, only our willingness to hear the truth and believe the truth will place us in a position to experience the truth.

You have now come to a place in your life where you have heard the truth and you have made a decision to believe the truth and now you have placed yourself in a position to experience the benefits of that truth. Praise the Lord! But, in truth, all you really did was respond to and receive the gift of abundant life that God made available to you and the rest of humanity two thousand years ago when Jesus was crucified, buried, and raised from the dead.

YOU IN CHRIST AND CHRIST IN YOU

Let’s turn our attention for a moment to another very important truth that will help you to understand your relationship with God in a way that will be extremely beneficial to you not only today but all the days of your life. This truth has to do with the two-fold issue of you being in Christ and Christ being in you.

Let’s look first at the reality of you being in Christ. Two thousand years ago God placed all of humanity (which included you) in Christ in response to a decision He made before the foundation of the world (Ephesians 1:4). The Bible declares that being in Christ had nothing whatsoever to do with any decision that you or I have ever made or would ever make. The Bible declares instead in 1 Corinthians 1:30, that it was solely because of God that we are in Christ Jesus. The Word of God also declares that when Christ died, we died; that when Christ was buried, we were buried; that when Christ was raised from the dead, we were raised from the dead and seated at the right hand of the Father with Him (Romans 6:3-5; Colossians 3:1); and at that moment we became children of God, and if children, then heirs of God and joint heirs with Christ (Romans 8:17). The bottom line is that you are in Christ because of a decision that God made. That is an undeniable, irreversible fact. Believe it, don’t believe it; like it, don’t like it - it does not alter the fact that God placed us into Christ two thousand years ago at Calvary - and it was His decision to do so.

Now, Christ being in you, as opposed to you being in Christ, that only happens when you make a decision to allow that to happen. And that happens when you believe and confess according to Romans 10:9 and 10. The moment you decide to trust Christ, the Spirit of Christ takes up residence inside of you (Romans 8:9-11), and you place yourself in a position of being able to experience the abundant life that Jesus died to provide you. Once again, you being in Christ - that was GOD’S DECISION and there is nothing you can do about it (though I don’t know why you’d want to do anything but accept it and rejoice). Christ being in you - that is YOUR DECISION and you are the only one who can do anything about it.

YOUR IDENTITY IN CHRIST

Because you are in Christ, you are not who you have been told you are, or even who you think you are. YOU ARE WHO GOD SAYS YOU ARE! The Bible states so clearly in 2 Corinthians 5:17 that, “if anyone is in Christ (and you are), he is a new creation; old things have passed away; behold, all things have become new”. Before the death, burial, and resurrection of Christ all of humanity had been locked up “in Adam” and, as such, all were sinners. BUT GOD GATHERED UP ALL OF SINFUL HUMANITY – PAST, PRESENT, AND FUTURE – AND PLACED US ALL “IN CHRIST”, AND AS A RESULT, WE HAVE ALL BECOME SAINTS (Romans 5:12-21, see esp. v. 19). Jesus was the last of the old race of Adam, born under law (1 Corinthians 15:46; Galatians 4:4-7). That race of Adam, which the Bible also refers to as the old nature, the old creation, or the old man, was crucified with Christ (Romans 6:6). It no longer survives. Because we were all in Him, when He died, we died (2 Corinthians 5:14).

At the cross, Jesus was not only the LAST ADAM, He was also the SECOND MAN (1 Corinthians 15:47). In the same way that He was the last Man of the old creation, born under law, so He was also the FIRST MAN of the new creation, born under grace (Romans 6:14). In Christ, the old creation was done away with. In Christ, the new creation was ushered in. The two creations do not coexist. To put it another way: In Christ, at His death, the door to the old creation was slammed shut by God never to be opened again. In Christ, at His resurrection, God opened wide the door to a whole new creation and welcomed us all in. Prior to His death, Christ is identified as the “only begotten of the Father” (John 1:14). At His resurrection, Christ becomes identified as the “firstborn” over a brand new creation (Colossians 1:15,18). And because God included you in Him you are a member of that new creation. Now, due to the fact that you are in Christ your identity is consistent, not with who you were in Adam, BUT WITH WHO YOU ARE NOW IN CHRIST.

The Bible declares loudly that in Christ you are righteous (2 Corinthians 5:21); in Christ you are under absolutely no condemnation (Romans 8:1); in Christ you are always victorious (2 Corinthians 2:14); in Christ you are reconciled to God and completely forgiven (2 Corinthians 5:19); in Christ you are blessed with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places (Ephesians 1:3); in Christ, GOD IS AT TOTAL PEACE WITH YOU – HE IS NOT ANGRY WITH YOU,AND NEVER HAS BEEN (Isaiah 54:9-10); in Christ, God has given you His grace, or ability, to be able to live a victorious life (Ephesians 2:8).

In Christ, you are loved unconditionally. There is absolutely nothing you can do or not do to get God to love you any more than He already does. And equally, there is absolutely nothing you can do or not do to cause God to love you any less. Because God’s love for you is not based on what you do or don’t do. God’s love for you is based solely on the fact that He simply loves you FOR WHO YOU ARE, no strings attached, and He demonstrated that love in Christ (Romans 5:8); every promise of every good thing that God has ever made to anybody belongs to you because you are in Christ (2 Corinthians 1:20). And the list could go on and on. But the fact of the matter is that no matter how true these statements are, not one of these realities will be yours by experience until and unless you believe and receive Jesus into your heart and allow Him to be Lord of your life.

Remember our parable, even though the bum became in fact, in reality, a millionaire on Monday, September 22nd at 2:00 PM, the truth of that reality was of absolutely no benefit to him until he BELIEVED IT AND RECEIVED IT. Ignorance and unbelief kept him from enjoying any part of the wonderful gift that had been given him by his compassionate benefactor. In the same way, you and I will only ever be able to experience and enjoy the inheritance that our loving heavenly Father gave us two thousand years ago when we know and believe all that we have been given in Christ. Like the bum, ignorance and unbelief will forever keep us separated from the abundant life of God that is already ours (Ephesians 4:18). Unbelief is the reason that the old creation seems to have lingered on into the present - not because it is a reality, for it is not, but because the reality of the new creation in Christ in most cases is neither perceived nor believed.

Praise God your eyes have been opened to the reality that two thousand years ago God placed you in Christ and caused you to become an inheritor of the same quality of life that God Himself enjoys.

THE WORD OF GOD AND YOU

Now that you have taken the first step on your journey toward experiencing NEW AND ABUNDANT LIFE by responding in faith to the unconditional love of God as demonstrated through the finished work of Jesus (Romans 5:8), you are encouraged to start using the “road map” which will guide you the rest of the way. The “road map” that God provides each and everyone of us for the purposes of experiencing and enjoying the abundant life is, of course, THE BIBLE. You will only be able to experience the abundant life that Jesus died to give you to the degree that you are convinced that God’s Word is the Truth that will set you free from a mediocre existence, which is all that the world will ever be able to provide.

The Bible promises to be “a lamp to your feet and a light to your path” (Psalm 119:105), in order to give you life (v.50b). As you meditate on the Word of God and believe that you are who God says you are, that you have all the things that God says you have, and that you can do all the things that God says you can do, you will, like Joshua, enjoy good success in every area of life (Joshua 1:8).

Jesus said that if you abide in His word, if you accept His word in spite of what anyone or anything else says, then you will know the Truth and that Truth you know will set you free (John 8:31-32). The Truth will set you free to experience and enjoy the abundant life that Jesus died to provide you and the whole of humanity (John 10:10).

BELIEVING AND APPLYING THE WORD OF GOD WILL ABSOLUTELY CHANGE YOUR LIFE! The apostle Paul stated in Romans 12:2 that authentic change, or transformation, from experiencing mere existence in the world to experiencing abundant life in the kingdom, comes as we are willing to renew our minds. In other words, when we stop thinking according to this world’s system and start thinking according to the Truth of the Word of God, our lives will be filled with the fullness of the same quality of life that God enjoys.

You are strongly encouraged to spend time in the Word of God discovering all that you have inherited in Christ. After all, the Word of God is His Last Will and Testament, declaring you and all of mankind to be heirs of abundant and eternal life, a Testament signed by God our Father - signed with the precious blood of His Son, our Lord, Jesus Christ.

NOW WHAT?

Now that you have come to the end of this booklet you might be asking yourself, “Okay, now what?” Well, now you are strongly encouraged, if you have not already done so, to get involved in a local church where you can get yourself established in a relationship with a body of other like-minded believers. One of life’s basic success principles is that if you desire to succeed at something, then one of the best ways to do that is to hang around with others who are succeeding at what you desire to succeed at and do what they do, listen to what they say and think the way they think.

The Bible states the following in Hebrews 10:24 and 25, “Let us consider one another in order to stir up love and good works, not forsaking the assembling of ourselves together, as is the manner of some, but exhorting one another. . .” If you desire to experience a life full of love and good works and be encouraged, then find a church where you can hang around with believers who are stirred up in love and good works and encouraged and who can help to stir you up in love and good works and encourage you to be empowered and enabled to enjoy the fullness of the abundant life that Jesus died to give you.

A PRAYER OF FAITH TO RECEIVE CHRIST

You may have read through this booklet and the fact may be that you have not yet received the gift of abundant life that God alone offers you. If you would like to come to that place in your life where you know beyond a shadow of a doubt that you are saved and filled with the life of God then I invite you to pray this prayer based on Romans 10:9 and 10 which says: “If you confess with your mouth the Lord Jesus and believe in your heart that God raised Him from the dead, you will be saved. For with the heart one believes to righteousness, and with the mouth confession is made to salvation”.

PRAYER - “Heavenly Father, today I make a decision to believe that you raised Jesus from the dead for my righteousness. I believe that you have given me the gift of righteousness and I receive it right now, in Jesus name. I confess with my own mouth, not only that Jesus is Lord, but that He is Lord of my life. As You made a decision two thousand years ago to place me in Jesus, I now make a decision today to invite Jesus to come into my life and to make me whole. Thank You, Lord Jesus, that as I have been in you, so now You are in me, to bring me into an experience of the abundant life that only You can offer. Thank You, Father, for loving me. In Jesus name. Amen”.

If you prayed that prayer to receive Jesus for the first time today or if you have already asked Jesus into your life, we desire to help you feel welcomed into the family of God and to help you experience, enjoy, and express the unconditional love of God. Please contact us here.

NEW AND ABUNDANT LIFE, by Thomas M. Cooper (Click here to email the author)

Printed in the U.S.A.

ISBN 0-9703888-0-2