John writes that “In [Jesus] was life…” The Bible often references two kinds of life: physical life and death, and spiritual life and death. John says that the life Jesus brings is “the light of all mankind.”
Q: Describe the difference between the spiritual life Jesus brings and the physical life we are born into.
The spiritual life is something that is bigger than the physical life. The body dies but the spirit lives on. If we are in Christ then we are spiritually alive. If not we are apart from God and spiritually dead.
In my life I have heard the phrase “bigger than myself” said by a lot of people in regards to finding purpose, serving something, and holding aspirations. I believe God put in us a need to find Him, a spiritual homing beacon as it were. We live our physical lives; sleep, eat, move our muscles, breath. But we can see just from watching nature that physical life will end. We look for more than just being alive, we want to be alive! That desire to live a life bigger than just physical functioning is that need for spirituality, a thirst people mistakenly try and quench with their physical form. Working hard, studying, building, physical pleasures; all these die with the physical form. Jesus spoke to our spiritual need when He said in John 10:10b “I am come that they might have life, and that they might have it more abundantly.” He also spoke of our thirst in John 4:10 “If you knew the gift of God and who it is that asks you for a drink, you would have asked him and he would have given you living water.”
Chris,
You remind me of a passage I read recently:
“Everyone’s toil is for their mouth, yet their appetite is never satisfied.” (Ecclesiastes 6:7)
Discerning the difference between ‘toiling for our mouth’ and true living is one of the great blessings that comes with knowing the Lord.