Why Are We Still Practicing Necromancy?

"Who will deliver me from this body of death?"

Jul 25, 2025

(Image by Freepic)

OK. Let me first throw this dead cat on the table: “Denominations are Demonic.” There. I said it. The whole ambition of the spirit of anti-Christ is to deny Christ; to divide Christ; to contradict Christ: WHO. IS. ONE.

Our foundational holding position is found in the Shema:

Hear O Israel, the Lord is our God, the Lord is One. Blessed is His name, whose glorious kingdom is forever and ever. Love the Lord your God with all your heart, and all your soul, and all your might. These words that I command you today shall be upon your heart. Repeat them to your children and talk about them when you sit in your home, and when you walk in the street; when you lie down, and when you rise up. Hold fast to them as a sign upon your hand and let them be as reminders before your eyes. Write them on the doorposts of your home and at your gates. Deuteronomy 6: 4-9

Nothing has changed! This is the Law and the Prophets – Jesus said so! What’s more, Jesus said he did not come to abolish the Law, but to fulfil it. Of course, as always, Jesus took things further by adding, “…and you shall love your neighbour as yourself.” (Matt.22: 37-39) The truth of the matter is that we are ONE in Christ, in God. Jesus’ prayer for our unity was answered through the cross and the resurrection. We can’t achieve unity; we ARE unity! The Good News (“Gospel”) as proclaimed by Jesus, and then by the disciple/apostles and the growing church was:

“All this [anyone who is in Christ is a new creation: the old things passed away [died]; behold new things have come] was from God, who reconciled us to Himself through Christ and gave us the ministry of reconciliation: that God was reconciling the world to Himself in Christ, not counting people’s trespasses against them. And He has committed to us this message of reconciliation. Therefore, we are ambassadors for Christ, as though God were making His appeal through us…”(2 Cor. 5:18-20a Berean Standard Bible ).

How was this reconciliation achieved? Consider:

Colossians 1:20
and through Him to reconcile to Himself all things, whether things on earth or things in heaven, by making peace through the blood of His cross.

Romans 5:10-11
For if, when we were enemies of God, we were reconciled to Him through the death of His Son, how much more, having been reconciled, shall we be saved through His life! / Not only that, but we also rejoice in God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom we have now received reconciliation.

Ephesians 2:16-18
and reconciling both of them to God in one body through the cross, by which He put to death their hostility. / He came and preached peace to you who were far away and peace to those who were near. / For through Him we both have access to the Father by one Spirit.

God didn’t send Jesus to save us from our sin and fix us up for heaven! Jesus came to die, and in dying take us down with him. He came to kill us (with himself) and make us alive anew with and in him, and so fully reconciled to God our Father. “For you died, and your life is now hidden with Christ in God. / When Christ, who is your life, appears, then you also will appear with Him in glory.” (Col.2:3-4) “And you are Christ’s, and Christ is God’s.” (1. Cor. 3:23 NKJV)

Jesus didn’t die to placate a ‘wrathful’ father-figure. God, our Father, is Love. And Jesus confirmed to the disciples how everything was going to be changed after his death: “In that day [when the Spirit is poured out on all flesh] you will know that I am in My Father, and you in Me, and I in you. (John 14:20.)

If you are like me, you have probably struggled to unpack Paul’s letter to the church in Rome and in particular, what we know as “chapter 7”. You know the arguments, so I’m not ging to rehearse them here. Suffice it to say that Paul is not describing his actual walk with God. He was describing the dichotomy of trying to fulfil the Law as a devout Jew and empathising with his people’s struggle for righteousness. He cries out, “Wretched man that I am! Who will deliver me from this body of death?” His victorious response is “Thanks be to God through Jesus Christ our Lord!”

When Christ died, you died; when Christ ascended to the throne of God, so did you!

Paul had already stated the true case as far as we all are concerned:

“Now if we have died with Christ, we believe that we shall also live with Him, knowing that Christ, having been raised from the dead, is never to die again; death no longer is master over Him. For the death that He died, He died to sin once for all; but the life that He lives, He lives to God. Even so consider yourselves to be dead to sin, but alive to God in Christ Jesus.” (Romans 6:8-11)

So, let’s stop trying to raise the dead again! Let’s abandon this “body of death” once, for all. Let us stop being Sin-conscious and instead, be Son-conscious.

In his refreshingly candid and profoundly uplifting book, Unveiled – Removing veils and scales from God, man, and the gospel, Tommy Miller writes:

“Far too many Christians waste their lives committing a spiritual form of necromancy – raising what Christ already killed. Modern expressions of “dying to self, daily” are misunderstandings of what Paul actually meant. If you interact with what’s already dead, that is not spiritual discipline. It is necromancy.”

Stop flogging a dead horse! Wake up! “God became human so that humans could become God!” (Athanasius)

A Prayer

Lord,

if I could ask for one thing,

as I sit alone by the shore,

it’s the courage to do

what you ask in this life,

and the wisdom to

listen more.

(Jay Hulme – from The Vanishing Song.)

Wayfarer

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