The Debt That All Men Pay

In watching, again, National Treasure 2 with my daughters, there is a scene where Thomas Gates whispers to his son as he takes his last breath, “The debt that all men pay”. If you have seen the movie, you know that it is the clue that leads Ben Gates and his father on mind bending adventure to find Cibola also known as the City of Gold. Though this is only a movie, the clue given is true of all men. We will all “pay the debt” of death. We cannot escape it and we cannot hide from it. It is certain, permanent and inescapable. To the natural man, death is the end of their existence and there is no hope beyond that and the very thought brings certain fear. The natural man contemplates death only to find fear and despair is all he is left with.

I want you to know that the Bible speaks of death in a threefold way: physical, spiritual and eternal. The natural man whether he realizes it or not is only concerned with the physical and the eternal. He understands that it is permanent and that his body (physical) will never rise again. That is where he is sorely mistaken. He rarely thinks about his soul and spirit therefore, he lives this life as if it is the only life he’s got. It does not matter if you are a Christian or not, eternality is a reality. For the Christian, eternity is life with Christ in His Kingdom and to the rest, eternity is death separated from Christ and His Kingdom. This separation is what we Christians call Spiritual Death.

Ephesians 4:18 says, “They are darkened in their understanding, alienated from the life of God because of the ignorance that is in them, due to their hardness of heart.” In this passage, we catch a glimpse of what Spiritual Death really is. “They are darkened in their understanding” means that the understanding of the mind in respects to their feelings and desires is covered with darkness. Obviously, darkness is the opposite of light; light being the true God (1 John 1:5). “Being alienated from the life of God” means to be completely shut out from fellowship, intimacy, vitality and absolute fullness of life with God. It is a complete action; the separation is permanent and lasting with no hope of ever changing. “Through the ignorance that is in them” means that their moral blindness is the channel through which their alienation is realized. Their inability to, not only understand, but comprehend anything that is moral and good in the eyes of God. Any good that they do or say is tainted with sin and is a moral standard that is less than perfectly conformed to God’s moral standard. Finally, “Because of the blindness of their hearts”; this is the main issue at hand. The hardness of their thoughts, passions, desires, appetites, affections, purposes and endeavors towards God completely separates them from God. This is Spiritual Death and we are all born in this condition.

I write this not with the concern of the physical death, but with concern for the Spiritual Death. Unlike physical death, not all men will pay the debt of Spiritual Death. How can that be? To answer that question, let’s back up in Ephesians to the second chapter. Ephesians 2:4-5 says, “But God, being rich in mercy, because of the great love with which he loved us, even when we were dead in our trespasses, made us alive together with Christ—by grace you have been saved” Though we were spiritually dead, God made us alive together with Christ. The phrase “alive together with Christ” is actually “hath quickened us together with Christ” and is a statement of fact concerning an action that was fully completed by God. This phrase is one word in the original Greek and is only used twice, here and in Colossians 2:13. Both verses teach about the deadness of all men in their sin and the fact that God makes them alive. Both verses make it clear, that this “quickening” is a sole act of God and nothing of ourselves. In fact, if there is any “work” mentioned, it is the “work” of Jesus Christ and Him alone that makes us alive. The analogy of a dead man being made alive works perfectly to describe how God “saves” us.

Let’s read on in Ephesians – “and raised us up with him and seated us with him in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus, so that in the coming ages he might show the immeasurable riches of his grace in kindness toward us in Christ Jesus. For by grace you have been saved through faith. And this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God, not a result of works, so that no one may boast. For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them (Ephesians 2:6-10 ESV).” The Greek word “works” is Ergon as in Ergonomics. Ergon is an act, deed or thing done either by hand, art, industry or mind. This means that our salvation does not, cannot or will not come by anything other than God Himself. To think that “we” did something, thought something, said something, made something or used something resulting in our salvation is, by definition, our own works. This passage makes it clear that it is solely God who performs the work of making the Spiritually Dead come Alive. For that, I am forever grateful.