Major Ian Thomas emphasizes the concept of living the impossible life through the indwelling of Christ, explaining that true life comes from being spiritually alive in Him. He discusses the significance of Christ's death and resurrection, highlighting that believers are not only forgiven but also empowered to live a life that reflects God's nature. Thomas illustrates that salvation is not merely about forgiveness but about sharing in the life of Christ, which transforms the believer's existence. He encourages Christians to recognize their own bankruptcy and to allow Christ to live through them, thus experiencing the fullness of life intended by God. The sermon concludes with a call to surrender to Christ, who is the source of true strength and victory.

Here's a familiar verse, Romans chapter 5 and verse 12 and death by sin, in particular we're going to measure upon the how of it this particular verse that there are two connotations of the word death a state of death passed upon all men where a state of death exists, that's another glimpse of the obvious where a state of death exists it is in a state of death, what I mean by that is it is lifeless it is lifeless, it is in a state of death it doesn't breathe, it doesn't feed it doesn't bleed, it doesn't breed it's in a state of death, it's lifeless and it was only three days ago it died then you'd say don't be stupid I'll agree with you when you tell me that it's in a state of death, it's lifeless but please don't tell me that it died simply because death cannot occur where a state of death exists and those are the two connotations that you find there in the 5th chapter of the epistle to the Romans in the 12th verse forfeiture of pre-existent life but the moment the forfeiture of pre-existent life has taken place there's a state of lifelessness and you see from the moment that Adam fell and God withdrew from his human spirit the Holy Spirit and he remained only physically alive, soulishly active but spiritually dead every child ever born into this world since then has been born not in the likeness of Adam in Adam all died alienated from the life of God dead in all human history and will never ever occur again to forego the exercise of those attributes of deity that would have been incompatible with his humanity and he knew that without faith and whatsoever sin but he was sinless body, soul and spirit totality of his being he presented himself to the quality of my life the things that I do, the things that I say Nicodemus as it would be impossible to me as one who though the creator has deliberately chosen to fulfill the role of creature though God who made man came into this world to fulfill that office for which man was made you're right Nicodemus not because I am God, though God I am as I as God Nicodemus created man to be alive chapter 5, verse 14 2 Corinthians that if one died for all who is the one who died for the all well the answer is very simple the Lord Jesus he's the one who died for the all but then it goes on to tell us why he, the one died for the all he says if one died for all then were all the all for whom the one died dead the one died for the all because the all for whom he died were dead and you see as we have already discussed there's one thing that you can be absolutely certain about so far as the dead are concerned the dead can't die the dead couldn't die capable of dying being already dead to be alive and you see the Lord Jesus miraculously conceived of the Holy Spirit was fashioned in the borrowed womb of that virgin girl to be both physically and spiritually alive who could turn to his disciples and say the prince of this world is come Satan he has nothing in me his being indwelt and monopolized by his father as God one who alone could die for the all who being dead couldn't die now that of course is the significance of the cross speak or hear of the blood of the Lord Jesus immediately think of death blood doesn't speak of death but maketh an atonement for the soul concerning the office of the priest end of verse 13 he shall even pour out the blood thereof for verse 14 it is the life of all flesh end of that verse the life of all flesh is the blood thereof now neaten turn to it but make a note in the margin of your bible Genesis 9 verse 4 9,4 but flesh with the life thereof which is the blood thereof shall ye not eat make another note in the margin Deuteronomy 12 verse 23 Deuteronomy 12,23 only be sure that thou eat not the blood for the blood is the life and thou mayest not eat the life with the flesh so in the bible what is it that which is represented by blood death no life accident and is danger of bleeding to death you apply tourniquet because you know the life is in the blood and at all cost the blood must be saved it's not the blood that speaks of death nothing of blood that speaks of death and you see the significance of the cross was not the physical agony that the Lord Jesus a man suffered by Roman crucifixion he laid down that life that no other man, woman, boy or girl could incurred in his person deliberately of his own free volition what had already occurred in Adam he died the only other man who ever died for sin of man's fall he survived and if the Lord Jesus only suffered physical martyrdom then that's simply a sentimental gesture on God's part to show how far he would condescend to win our approval that isn't what happened on the cross the agony of the cross was far deeper than physical suffering the martyrdom of a noble idealist who was too progressive for his age he was made sin for us and incurred in his person all that was inevitable in a dying that he alone of all mankind since Adam fell possessed I don't understand it it baffles human imagination how by agreement as between themselves these three persons of the triune oneness of the Godhead should agree somehow to be separated my God why hast thou forsaken me not a question simply citing a prophetic foreshadowing of his messianic office from the first verse of the 22nd Psalm that way you to continue to read it would tell you the story of one whose hands and feet they pierced they looked and stared upon him they cast lots upon his vesture written one thousand and eighty seven years before he was born he died in whom the beloved the Lord Jesus we have redemption through his blood shed life laid down the forgiveness of sins according to the riches of his grace there's the redemptive act to take the regenerated purpose in whom the beloved verse 13 you also trusted addressing himself to these Christians in Ephesus in whom you also trusted after that you heard the word of truth the gospel, the good news of your salvation in whom after that you believed you were sealed camped bearing the hallmark of validity as a forgiven sinner reconciled to God and share his life with man on earth on the way to heaven sealed with that Holy Spirit of promise who is the earnest of our inheritance until the redemption of the of his glory, the only evidence that any boy, girl, man who shed blood of Christ is the gracious presence of God the Holy Spirit through whom in life death has been abolished and through whom you and I now on earth may share as man shared the life of his father it's not their inheritance in him, it's his inheritance in them the exceeding greatness of usward who believe and this exceeding greatness of God's power to usward who believe is according to the working of his and chapter 2 Hattie Quicken Christian in Ephesus is that mighty power that he wrought in Christ when he raised him from the dead and you Hattie Quicken who were dead in trespasses and sins no, they've never died physically so they could never have physical life restored, but resurrection you see, demands the restoration of that life forfeited in death and you Hattie Quicken God verse 4 of chapter 2 who is rich in mercy for his great love wherewith he loved us even when we were dead in sins half past tense, an accomplished fact, half quickened us together with Christ and then in parenthesis, in brackets he says that's what it means to be saved not just to know that your sins are forgiven, that's gloriously true, and you will be eternally thankful that for his dear sake who paid the debt, you've been acquitted, that your sins have been blotted out like a thick cloud, buried in the depths of the sea as far as the east is from the west, to be remembered no more, but the apostle says that is to be saved he hath raised us up together and made us sit together with Christ in heavenly places, salvation you see involves not just the forgiveness of our sins, changing our destination from hell to heaven salvation involves the restoration of that life by the Holy Spirit restored to the human spirit who is the creature was designed to be inhabited by his creator that allows of no possible explanation but Christ in the Christian putting God back into the man, to the Corinthians and chapter 5, 2 Corinthians and chapter 5 verse 14 because we thus judge that if one died for all then we're all dead to what end? he died for all, verse 15 they which live who are they which live? well those who exercise the option born dead to come alive forgiven, acquitted the risen life of their once crucified but now exalted Lord that they which live an alien agency called the carnal mind hostile to God, not subject to his law, egocentric praying God, king in my own kingdom that they who live might not now live unto them, but presenting body, soul, spirit, mind, emotion and will in the totality of their being to the Lord Jesus indwelling them in the person of the Holy Spirit they might live alone to him who died for them and rose again from the dead to share his life with them that's the gospel before we make the application in the 2nd of Peter's epistles 2nd epistle, like precious faith like precious faith he didn't want the cross, he didn't believe in the resurrection when the women came and said the tomb was empty and they'd met the Lord Jesus on the way he said idle tale, forget it, he's dead, we buried him but something's happened to Peter prepared to let God do it verse 3, that chapter have it given unto us not earned, not merited, not deserved given unto us all that pertain to being alive and being alive all that pertain to God likeness that's what he says according as his divine power has given unto us all that pertain to life or being alive and God likeness what is it that pertains to being alive if you wanted to give those who were dead that which pertains to being alive what would you give them pertains to being physically alive what did he need to give them, he needed to give him 4 days later the physical life that he had forfeited 4 days before life that which to the dead pertains to being alive is life that's why the Lord Jesus said I'm come that you might have life, I've come to raise the dead, but you see the life that pertains to being alive is that life that pertains to God likeness that you might share he by the Holy Spirit from within your human spirit gains access to your human soul that he as Christ in the Christian God in the man might once more teach your mind so that he within might govern your behavior in directing your wills and become the origin in you of his own image, the source in you of his own activity, the dynamic in you of his own demands a hidden factor present in the divine logic absent in human reason restored to the regenerate sinner of Peter chapter 1 and verse 3 blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ who by his boundless mercy to an ever living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead you are redeemed by his death you are born again 1 Peter 1 3 by his resurrection from the dead so you see the Lord Jesus was the first man to be raised from the dead from the dead first to be raised physically from the dead he raised Lazarus from the dead he raised Jairus' daughter from the dead the Lord Jesus wasn't the first but in the 26th chapter of the book of the Acts it's all over remember me, remember thee when you come into your kingdom said he to him this day shalt thou be with me in paradise where I'm going because it's all over I have only now to add physical death to that spiritual death that I have already suffered that I might taste death in all its forms for every man and be the first forgotten in the coming of my Father's spirit back into my human spirit that I having suffered a death like yours being now risen from the dead coming to indwell you by the Holy Spirit you might share a resurrection like mine Christianity, a style of living it isn't so many rules and regulations it isn't an evangelical pattern to which we conform magnificently put do you remember in the fifth, the last chapter God hasn't appointed us to judgment but to obtain salvation and unless there should be any ambiguity in your mind as to what it is who died for us, we might live that salvation, that whether we wake or sleep we should live to the absenteeist, he said I'm off now that we won't even know we've arrived we'll just look around and say don't think I've been here before because the fantastic thing is this, that that life that is going to be yours forever in heaven is that life that became yours at the moment of your new birth when you were raised from the dead than was going for him then with Christ as God in you than was going for him with the Father as God in him why the difference then in the end product, he never once allowed there to be any explanation we're too self-opinionated we're still too eager to perpetuate the Adam creed of human self-sufficiency, we want to elbow our way to the top and tell God just how to keep him in business in other words we've never repented why don't we live in the fullness of his divine indwelling sharing his life every moment learning that every problem placed at his feet is his divine opportunity letting God loose in terms of our humanity Christ himself, why don't we do it because we've never been totally convinced of our own bankruptcy in the person of God's Son you'll find it in the 116th Psalm Psalm 116 this is what he says I love the Lord because I have a God who engineered the death of a man so that he could steal his wife compass me I found trouble and horror but he helped me my bankruptcy and invoked his divine activity he moved into my case to let God do it that's the moment of truth as we were lunching together how speaking in the chapel hour in not known as School of the Bible in Portland Oregon on the west coast of the United States a young student came to me in great great despair two years I came here ablaze for God I wanted to become an evangelist I wanted to go out into the world and win men and women and inwardly empty I'm fit to quit I'm fit to revolutionize their lives because until they're prepared to quit God's out of business I shared with him some of the things that I've already shared with you how as a young man 7 year old Jesus with the utmost sincerity came to the point of despair and allowed him at last to live through me the life that I've tried so hard to live for him the moment you bow did you ever do that? we prayed together in very simple language he told the Lord Jesus from then on he was in business that he was now going to appropriate the life of the Lord Jesus in him as years before he had already appropriated the death of Christ for him 14 years I didn't even know his name but when I flew in from New Zealand to Portland Oregon to have another week of meetings in a different church he called me he said would you come to lunch he left a few days later to go to South America to lead an all South America crusade where with television satellite, radio the ministry reached over 100 million people and they received just under 200,000 letters seeking further help in finding Christ he spoke at Lausanne he was at Christival in Germany a couple of weeks ago 5,000 youth leaders in Germany for all youth leaders of the whole South American continent so that together we can introduce them to the fact that the Lord Jesus not only dies that we might be forgiven but rose again from the dead to invade our humanity the impossible life the life of Jesus Christ we could have lunch together we'd be delighted to see but when he got to Japan he was utterly depressed right on his back the bottom had fallen out of life in the providence of God he bumped into a Christian United States service man and this young Christian gave him some very good advice he said go to the mission book shop and see if you can find a little paperback I know it will help you and he recommended this particular little book, it's a very good book I know that because I wrote it it's the saving life of Christ not that it's particularly clever or smart it took me 12 chapters to explain what God explains in one verse so it couldn't be pretty smart the verse is this Romans 5, 10 if when we were enemies we were reconciled to God by the death of his son much more being reconciled by his death we shall be saved by his life salvation is the life of Christ shared with the sinner who has been reconciled by his death he went back with that book in his hand to his hotel in Japan and he read right through the book from cover to cover that night and the Holy Spirit graciously ministered to that man's need showed him that the Lord Jesus who died from then, a death like this did so that he might share a resurrection like Christ and have the Lord Jesus living in him could ever be less than big enough well he got quite excited and during that week of meetings I had as I usually do a young man to assist me in secretarial work and taping the recordings and preparing masters it was a young fellow called Ronnie Weller, he came from Florida I led him to Christ when he was a kid of 11 he was then about 18 you see minds broken and I'll need one you know so that I don't overshoot the tape not that that ever makes all that much difference but at least I was willing well he said alright I'll lend you mine but he said only on one condition that you don't wear it because he said there's a lint loose in the armband and you get excited when you speak and you start waving your arms around I know exactly what's going to happen to my watch I promised that I wouldn't wear it but I'm sorry to say that I forgot and at one of the morning meetings I wore it and I got excited and I waved my arms around and sure enough that watch went into orbit now we neither had a watch that I'm wearing tonight he said my wife has asked me to offer to you this watch if you would be kind enough to receive it as a gift well I said hey that's most gracious in that it meets a very real need and I'd be delighted to have it and I did, I took it that afternoon he drove me to San Francisco to get a ticket from British Airlines and one of the things that had to be revamped he said you see my marriage was singularly unhappy and finally my wife died in a mental institution and we were childless but I married a widow with three sons my step sons her marriage was singularly unfortunate she married a man who was terribly violent he'd come back sometimes with blood on his wrists and his knuckles from the fights in which he'd been engaged but he died but he said eight years ago as it was then while in Japan I bought this watch for my youngest boy step son he was a gentle child a little self conscious a little nervous but he was finally drafted into the United States services and sent to Germany his company commander didn't really understand the boy and gave him a very very rough time an easy prey for those evil wretches who pushed drugs on the street lead a boy into marijuana until finally he'd get hooked on acid and he shot his mind he was discharged from the services on medical grounds and when he came back to the United States he could hardly find his way home and one night my wife disarmed him she took the gun out of his hand but during the night he went out of the house broke into his older brother's home took a gun out of his gun case and in the morning we found his body in the woods murdered by drug pushers he killed himself he said my older boy inherited the violent traits of his father he too would come back with blood on his knuckles but during his university training as an architect he overcame this disability but one day sitting in a restaurant that he had designed talking to the owner about one or two things that needed attention a long haired scurvy hippie type came in and was vulgar to a girl and my older boy rebuked him to protect the girl and this creature went out got a gun waited outside and when my son appeared shot him dead on the doorstep and within months I lost two boys one destroyed by drugs and one murdered I'm only happy to tell you he said that my middle boy a fine Christian is in Bible school but he said it was then that I went to Japan I'd lost two boys and life had seemed to come to an end it was then that I picked up your book it was then that I discovered that the Lord Jesus my creator redeemer who died for me living within me was big enough even for that and I found total relief that my wife never did for four years the room in which my boy who killed himself slept has remained as it was to this very day nothing has been changed this is what has been in her handbag she never took it out it was a symbol to her of darkness and despair but last night the truth penetrated that the Christ who died for her was the one who rose again to live within her to share his life with her and to communicate that life through her and she too in embracing him not just as the one who died for her then but lived in her now found that relief that was mine when I read that book and when she came with this watch in her hand and said please give it to Major Thomas or throw it in the river I knew at last the spell had been broken and the sun had begun to shine yes that's it you see it's in the moment of despair that you finally quit and so Lord Jesus thanks not just for what you did then but for all that you are now whether it's a budding creature or a broken hearted mum or dad the marvellous thing is this the good news of the gospel embraces the fantastic provision that God has made for every boy, girl, man or woman in their self-confessed bankruptcy to share the illimitable resources of supply that are ours by virtue of the fact that he is who he is, God living where he dies the Lord preserves it as simple I was brought low, he helped me return unto my rest, fill my soul get back where you belong at last there's a soundness, I will at peace with God his maker return unto thy rest, get back thou hast delivered my soul from death mine eyes from tears and my feet from falling listen to this I will walk before the Lord in the land of the living that could come straight out of a Pauline epistle to know the power that flows out from his resurrection that I might enjoy that spiritual and moral resurrection that lifts me out from among the dead even while still in the body I walk before the Lord in the land of the living what shall I render unto the Lord for all his benefits toward me, how can I requite his goodness and the psalmist finds himself in somewhat of a dilemma because he realizes that he's too poor and God is too rich for he I will take there's nothing I can gain I will take the cup of salvation I'll drink it deep and call upon the name of the Lord for I've learned that he's a God who cares enough to listen and I've learned that he's a God who's good enough to do something about it so the only way, the only way that I can say thank you the only way I can requite his goodness and satisfy his compassion towards me is to take take what he provides and offer to him the sacrifice of thanksgiving I can say thank you that's how you became a Christian how do you know tonight that your sins are forgiven if it wasn't that one day convicted of the Holy Spirit of the fact that you were lost you saw in the person of the Lord Jesus, the one who died a death like yours, that he might pay the price of your redemption and though you never ever deserved it you held out the open empty hand of faith like a child you took what you never deserved and ever since then you've been saying thank you, you've received Christ Jesus the Lord so walk in him for it's no less true tonight that the Lord Jesus lives in you than that then two thousand years ago he died for you why do you thank him for one and not thank him for the other all that he is, is God you can't have more and you need never enjoy less I will take the cup of salvation and I will offer to thee verse 17 the sacrifice of thanksgiving I'll take take and say thank you that's how the Lord Jesus shared the life of his father on earth five loaves, two fishes his father, thank you a man four days dead and stinking, he lifted up his eyes to heaven, John 11 and said father, thank you I know you've heard me, you know that I know you've heard me but I say it aloud for you so that these who are around may know that you sent me that I am in you and that you are in me and that without you father I can do nothing, that you father who dwell in me are the one who does the work thank you you see we've made the Christian life so complicated we've substituted for the Lord Jesus every kind of recipe, every kind of procedure every kind of gimmick every kind of new procedure rule or regulation when what God has offered is not somebody other than his son no personality, no movement no churchmanship there's nothing, nothing so sacred, nothing so biblical that we may not place it in the place of Christ and the moment you do noble as it may be in itself or legitimate, it becomes the object of your idolatry it's of him to him, to him all things to whom alone be glory I beseech you therefore brethren present your body now to the Lord Jesus as he presented his to the father so that he now may be to you all that he let the father be to him the only one who can live the impossible life, did you ever get to the end of your rope have you felt at times that your fits are quick not in resignation not in despair but in the hilarious expectation that if you tonight bow yourself out and bow him in clothed with your humanity he'll vindicate his deity and for every new day that dawns you can step out into the hilarious glorious adventure of sharing his life on earth on the way to heaven it'll be different, cathedral the artist who had been painting the murals stood back to gaze at his own handiwork it was maddening, he was intoxicated by his sheer beauty and that he might the better see it to advantage he stepped back and still again and still again and yet again till one more step would have sent him planting to his death upon the flagstones beneath him and at that moment grasping the situation in a moment and an amazing presence and in a rage the artist left said he your picture or your life your own preconceived notion of a christian life which would you rather have your picture or his life but now divinely imparted a partaker of the divine nature to paint again but the hand that holds the brush your future within my heart in his kingdom how genuinely i have tried how noble have been my ambition, my own impotence battle you're the only one, you are my strength you don't give me victory you are my victory thank you for the new day that will dawn as you may know that you're in business my lord my god would you turn trees in your hymn books take my lips and let them be filled with messages from thee, how self-opinionated how almost unwittingly wherever i go i project myself and draw attention to me instead of to you and i'm sorry, i want to apologize take my will and make it thine it shall be no longer mine it shall be thine own at thy feet it's treasure still take myself into a new future life for you never ever to be the same again you recognize who he is living where he does christ and the christians and you stand what you please