The difference, for Paul, is the difference between being dead and being alive. A more dramatic contrast is hardly possible. Before this new life was a possibility for him, he tells us, the old life had to be killed. Just as Christ was killed and rose again, so Paul has to undergo his own kind of crucifixion and resurrection. "I have been crucified with Christ," he tells us; "it is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me" ( Gal. 2: 20). Paul's former self has gone, and a "new" Paul has come, a Paul whose life is directed by the Christ who dwells in him. He is starting out all over again.
The contrast can, if possible, be made even more dramatic. In a symbolic way, Paul tells us, we must share Christ's death and resurrection. Here is how he interprets baptism:
To be submerged = your death = Christ being placed in the grave. To emerge = a new life = Christ's resurrection from the grave.
No death, no resurrection. But as you identify yourself with Christ's death, so you share in his resurrection.
Do you not know that all of us who have been baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into his death? We were buried therefore with him by baptism into death, so that as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, we too might walk in newness of life ( Rom. 6: 3, 4).
Newness of life! That's what happens. There we have it in three words.
What difference does this newness of life make to the way you live? Listen to Paul describe how life looks now, even in the face of swords, stones, shipwrecks, and soldiers:
Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or sword? . . . No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us. For I am sure that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers, nor height, nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord ( Rom. 8: 35, 37-39).
It is because he believes this, that Paul is willing to "stick his neck out." He is one with God in Christ. Who needs to fear the sword when such a thing is true? How can a little thing like death destroy such a relationship?
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