Born again and the Eucharist
Adrian Rogers once said if you’re born once, you’ll die twice but if you’re born twice, you’ll die once. By dying twice, he meant a physical and then a spiritual death (Revelations 21:8); and born twice means you’re physically born and then spiritually born, and if so, you’ll die only a physical death and at that point, you’ll receive eternal life.
“Blessed be God the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who in his great mercy has given us new birth into the living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead and into a heritage that can never be spoilt or soiled and never fade away.” (1 Peter 3-5).
John 10:10 says, “I have come that they may have life and may have it abundantly.”
John 4:14 says, “But whoever drinks of the water that I will give him shall by no means thirst forever; but the water that I will give him will become in him a fountain of water gushing up into eternal life”!
“Man was made to be thirsty! The more we drink of Christ, the more we become thirsty,” says Sister Dominika P. from Spring 2011 College Age Conference in Wales. “We can drink and eat Him in such a simple and easy way by calling on His name, reading His word, and by prayer. We have to enlarge our capacity, and we need to be full of Christ!”
Sister Dominika continues, “He is such a Wonderful Person – and He lives inside of us! In John 14:6 it says, ‘Jesus said to him, I am the way and the reality and the life; no one comes to the Father except through Me.’ Oh what a Christ have we!
“We can come to the Father only through Christ – He is the connection between God and man. The most amazing fact to me is that Jesus has come into us through such a process – through death and resurrection – so that we may contain Him in our spirit, and we may enjoy His riches everyday! Oh, He is sweeter than the wine! May the Lord give us more light every day so we can come to Him with open hearts to receive His grace.”
As enunciated so well by Sister Dominika, Christ enlivens us and lives in us through the Word in our hearts and the light in our souls! “Anyone who loves me will keep my word, and my Father will love him, and we shall come to him and make a home in him.” (John 14:23).
The Eucharist is the life within us that will never die! The Eucharist gives us life, Christ’s life. And that life is eternal. That part in us will never die! “Whoever eats my flesh and drinks my blood lives in me and I live in that person …. Anyone who eats this bread will live forever.” (John 6:56, 58).
The Eucharist is the culmination of the life of Jesus Christ as he moved from his birth to the cross. It is Christ’s plan to be with us, to be food for our journey as we go on our pilgrim way toward heaven.
When we awake on the other side, we will have with us the life of the Spirit as it has grown in us. We will take love with us, our good works, and the joy of our birth into life. That is what makes joy in this life a choice we can make.
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