The Power Of The Risen Life

Daily Devotional for April 4, 2025

I want to know Christ – yes, to know the power of His resurrection and participation in His sufferings, becoming like Him in His death. (Philippians 3:10 NIV)

Do recognize that the Cross is the end of the risen life, and not only the beginning. If you forget everything else, remember that. The Cross is the end of the risen life, as well as the beginning: "That I may know Him, and the power of His resurrection, and the fellowship of His sufferings, becoming conformed unto His death." People have been to me with Philippians 3 and have asked: "Why did Paul put death at the end? Surely it ought to be right the other way round – 'That I may be conformed to His death, and know Him in the power of His resurrection, and the fellowship of His sufferings.'" No, there is no mistake. The order is of the Holy Spirit. The power of His resurrection presupposes that there has been a death, but the very resurrection-life leads to the Cross. The Holy Spirit in the power of the risen life is always leading you back to the Cross, to conformity to His death. It is the very property of Life to rule out all that belongs to death. It is the very power of resurrection to bring us back to the place where death is constantly overcome.

That place is none other than the Cross of our Lord Jesus Christ where the natural life is put aside. So Paul says: "...becoming conformed unto His death," which means: to have the ground of death continuously and progressively removed; and that, again, as we have said, is the fruit of living union with Him. It would be a poor look-out for you and for me were we to be conformed to His death in entirety apart from the power of resurrection in us, apart from our already knowing the Life of the Lord. Where would be our hope? What is it that is the power of our survival when the Cross is made more real in our experience? There would be no survival were it not that His risen Life is in us. So Paul prays: "That I may know Him, and the power of His resurrection..." and that means conformity to His death without utter destruction. The end of the risen life is the Cross. The Holy Spirit is always working in relation to the Cross, in order that the power of His resurrection may be increasingly manifested in us.

Bible Verses: Philippians 3:10

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Open Windows messages have been selected and compiled by Austin-Sparks.Net from the works of T. Austin-Sparks. In some cases they appear in abridged form. The introductory verse and its associated Bible version have been selected by the editor and did not always appear within the original message. In keeping with T. Austin-Sparks' wishes that what was freely received should be freely given and not sold for profit, and that his messages be reproduced word for word, we ask if you choose to share these messages with others, to please respect his wishes and offer them freely - free of any changes, free of any charge (except necessary distribution costs) and with this statement included.

Editor's Note

Through the years of our publishing books and articles on Austin-Sparks.Net, we have talked of wanting to compile a series of excerpts similar to Watchman Nee's "A Table in the Wilderness," published by Mr Sparks' son-in-law, Angus Kinnear. We felt that not only would shorter daily excerpts be easy to digest, but they might also inspire readers to read a complete message or book that they may not have read before. This project began in January 2010 when we began to send out daily messages to the Daily Open Windows email list. These continue to be sent daily in email form from Austin-Sparks.Net.

As many of you will be aware, Mr Sparks was from Scotland. He, therefore, used British spelling in his writings; however, many transcripts of his spoken messages have since been published using American English. The website reflects a mixture of both British and American spelling, but for the sake of consistency, all excerpts in this book conform to American spelling and punctuation.

Due to these daily messages being excerpts, they are abbreviated and some have had unnecessary words removed, such as "here this evening...." Also, some daily messages are a compilation of several excerpts from one original message. This is usually indicated with a pause in the text: .... and a reference to the complete source document is always provided. You will also notice that different versions of the Bible have been selected for verses that precede each daily message. Sometimes these Scripture references appeared within the context of the original message, but mostly these have been chosen by the editor with, we trust, the guidance of the Holy Spirit.

As you look through these "open windows" we pray that you will not only look out and see Christ, but you will also hear Him and open the door of your heart so that He can "eat with you daily" (Rev. 3:20). Our desire is that these messages will not simply be "inspiring," as daily devotional messages often set out to achieve, but also challenge you; lifting your vision, opening your eyes, revealing Truth, bringing Life and Light, and enabling you to let go of misconceptions. Light is not always welcome when it first shines into the darkness that our eyes are accustomed to. However, Light is absolutely necessary in order to see. And so we pray that through these messages your eyes will be opened (Eph. 1:18) and we will together "see one thing – how superior is Jesus Christ to all else!"

Austin-Sparks.Net
Wellington, NZ

Open Windows by T. Austin-Sparks

This devotional contains short daily portions from a selection of Mr. Austin-Sparks' messages. In his own words, “Perhaps this is just like a window opened into heaven. If you get the right window you can see quite a lot. You can see great things and you can see far things. But the best that I can hope is that this has just opened a window, and that as you look through it you are seeing one thing - how superior is Jesus Christ to all else, and how superior is the dispensation into which we have come, and how superior are all the resources at our disposal to all that ever was before!”

Theodore Austin-Sparks (1888–1971), often known as "Mr. Sparks" or "TAS", was a British Christian evangelist and author.

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