I am not ashamed of the gospel, because it is the power of God for the salvation of everyone who believes: first for the Jew, then for the Gentile.
Romans 1 : 16
Easter has come and gone again, and so soon this year!
The resurrection of Jesus is far too amazing and it’s consequences too far reaching to confine it to a once yearly remembrance service.
Here in the developed world we are in real danger of sanitising this astonishing historical fact. In many cases even the church has sought to make this central, vital, structural element of Christianity more palatable. It does this essentially by denying that it ever happened, happy instead to generalise with talk of ‘the risen-ness if Jesus’ or even further to dismiss the whole matter, content instead to talk about rabbits and chicks.
Here’s the thing… If Jesus didn’t physically rise form the dead he is
A) A liar – he prophesied many times that he would rise
B) Unable to conquer death and therefore unable to save me
C) A sinner paying the price for his own sin
D) Dead, with his bones rotting somewhere outside Jerusalem
If churches are going to take on this stance they must consider where it leads. It leads no-where, we would be left with no message and as the apostle Paul points out
12But if it is preached that Christ has been raised from the dead, how can some of you say that there is no resurrection of the dead? 13If there is no resurrection of the dead, then not even Christ has been raised. 14And if Christ has not been raised, our preaching is useless and so is your faith. 15More than that, we are then found to be false witnesses about God, for we have testified about God that he raised Christ from the dead. But he did not raise him if in fact the dead are not raised. 16For if the dead are not raised, then Christ has not been raised either. 17And if Christ has not been raised, your faith is futile; you are still in your sins. 18Then those also who have fallen asleep in Christ are lost. 19If only for this life we have hope in Christ, we are to be pitied more than all men.
1 Cor 15 :12-19
BUT HE IS….and we can live in the light of his resurrection. We must live and RECON on him being raised, our whole lives rooted and shaped by this man who was dead and is now alive. It means death holds no fear, it means I have an astonishingly powerful friend, it means I can trust all his other promises, it gives meaning and purpose, it is an unshakable anchor for the soul.
We can boast, with Paul, about Jesus raised from death to life and share dayly it that life.