Ephesians 2:1-3

As for you, you were dead in your transgressions and sins, in which you used to live when you followed the ways of this world and of the ruler of the kingdom of the air, the spirit who is now at work in those who are disobedient. All of us also lived among them at one time, gratifying the cravings of our flesh and following its desires and thoughts. Like the rest, we were by nature deserving of wrath.

The them and us of this passage is stark and uncomfortable. Yet it is a division that only serves to remind us of our shared helplessness. There is no self-help remedy that can rescue us from the morgue. The dead cannot undead themselves. Trip Lee puts in thus:

Hey I was born less than human
I know it sounds crazy
But I was really born a robot as a baby
No real life in me, I just played my role
No self control, I just did what I was told
I got my first order, I was just a day old
But I didn't have a chance, cause my heart was way cold
My heart took the order, I couldn't break the mold
Sold under bondage and I couldn't take control
So I was just chilling in my robot clothes
With my robot friends, and my robot flows
Living robot ways, cause that's all I know
Till I heard I could be freed from my robot soul

It is too easy to jump to the glory of grace without dwelling first on being dead, too easy to jump from the darkness of Friday to the resurrection of Sunday. Paul's reminder is brutal: we were dead. Lifeless. And we didn't even know it. Bound by sin. Trapped in wrong thinking. Following all that we knew. Blind to the reality of glorious substance because air seemed substantial enough. And so, let us reserve judgement. Let us be oh so careful what we condemn in others. What we blame. Because those in the morgue need resurrection not rebuke. Re-birth. To be born again. And that is what we cannot do. We cannot un-dead. But God can. And he did. Romans 4:17. We used to be dead. But now we live. We are X-robots freed from our robot souls. Why then do we still live as the dead do? Why copy the world's wisdom? Why crave what the world says we need and tells us will satisfy? Why chase after the wind?