It is a faithful saying: For if we be dead with him, we shall also live with him:
Read Chapter 2
Ambrose of Milan
AD 397
The apostle says that even we shall reign together with Christ in the kingdom of Christ. “If we are dead with him, we shall also live with him; if we endure, we shall also reign with him.” But we by adoption, he by power; we live by grace, he by nature. .
Let us honor the spirit of Christ, that we may receive grace from him. Let us be strangers to the world, even as Christ was not of it. Let us be humble and mild, that we may inherit the land of life. Let us be unflagging in his service, that he may cause us to serve in the abode of the saints. Let us pray his prayer in purity, that it may have access to the Lord of majesty. Let us be partakers in his suffering, so that we may also rise up in his resurrection. Let us bear his sign upon our bodies, that we may be delivered from the wrath to come.
We ought to be humble of heart out of the sincerest devotion during the whole time of this wandering exile, in which we are living in the midst of trials and temptations. If so, how much more should we be so during these days, when as well as spending this time of humility by living it, we are also signifying it by our liturgical celebration of it. The lowliness of Christ has taught us to be lowly, because by dying he yielded to the godless. Christ’s highness makes us exalted, because by rising again he has led the way for the godly…. We celebrate one of these things now, when his passion is, so to say, drawing near. We celebrate the other after Easter with appropriate devotion, when his resurrection, so to say, has been accomplished.
Having been planted with him in the likeness of his death, we will assuredly be raised up together with Christ (for the planting implies this eventuality). But in the present life, we are formed in the inner man according to the measure of the incarnation in newness of life and obedience unto death, fully persuaded of the truth of his words, so that we may become worthy to say with truth, “And I live, now not I, but Christ lives in me.” That this obtains also for the future life. The same apostle has strongly affirmed this in these words: “For if we be dead with him, we shall also live with him. If we suffer, we shall also reign with him.” ...
The Apostle Paul also says: "For if we die with Him, we shall also live with Him; if we suffer, we shall also reign with Him; if we deny Him, He also will deny us."
If we be dead with him, to sin, or as others expound it, by martyrdom, we shall live also, and reign with him in heaven. But if we deny him, by renouncing our faith, or by a wicked life, he also will deny us, and disown us hereafter. See Matthew x. 33. He continues always faithful and true to his promises. He is truth, and cannot deny himself. (Witham)
So also you are yourself made king and priest and prophet in the washing of baptism. You are a king by having dashed to earth all the deeds of wickedness and slain your sins. You are a priest in that you offer yourself to God, having sacrificed your body and being yourself slain also, “for if we died with him,” says he, “we shall also live with him.” You are a prophet, knowing what shall be, being inspired of God and sealed.
Many of the weaker sort of men give up the effort of faith, and do not endure the deferring of their hope. They seek things present, and form from these their judgment of the future. When therefore their lot here was death, torments, and chains, and yet he says, they shall come to eternal life, they would not have believed, but would have said, What do you say? When I live, I die; and when I die, I live? You promise nothing on earth, and do you give it in heaven? Little things you do not bestow; and do you offer great things? That none therefore may argue thus, he places beyond doubt the proof of these things, laying it down beforehand already, and giving certain signs. For, remember, he says, that Jesus Christ was raised from the dead; that is, rose again after death. And now showing the same thing he says, It is a faithful saying, that he who has attained a heavenly life, will attain eternal life also. Whence is it faithful? Because, he says, If we be dead with Him, we shall also liv...
We must believe both his passion according to the flesh and his impassibility inasmuch as he was God…. Let us confess our oneness with Christ, lest we be separated from him. In the words of the apostle, “If we have died with him, we shall also live with him.”
