We Have Risen!
“He is not here; he has risen, just as he said.” (Matthew 28:6)
The joyous annual cry “He is risen!” quickly faded into another year as a Christian for me in the past. I knew in my spirit that Christ’s resurrection should fuel a lasting fire within me, but it just never seemed to happen. Then one season my curiosity, prodded by an annual sense that something was lacking in my rather robotic response to Easter, produced a refreshing and long pined for awakening. I finally realized that Jesus’ resurrection is not the only reason to celebrate. After all, rising from the dead was never simply a hope for Jesus. He prepared his disciples for his certain death and resurrection. He, soon after, was crucified, buried, and did, as predicted, rise again to be seen by over 500 believers.
Suddenly the full extent of Jesus’ urging to “Follow me” was amazingly clear; We follow him into The Kingdom of God, which he declared is here now, and in doing so we cross “over from death to life” (John 5:24) behind Our Shepherd. As Jesus overcame death, we too have have overcome it through faith in his completed work. This was a monumental and long pined for break-through. Easter then should be a celebration of not only Christ’s resurrection, but of ours. The joy from this reality should drive us daily. It is the basis of what makes us a vessel full of light in a dark world.
It is helpful to fully comprehend and embrace how inescapable our pending physical and spiritual death by sin was. Jesus made it clear in the sermon on the mount that keeping the law was impossible. As Paul so eloquently put it, “The letter (law) kills.” (II Cor. 3:6) If Paul (Saul), as a Pharisee, became fully convinced that he could not earn salvation, through his obsessive career that centered around attempting to fully keep the law, who are we to ever think that we could? A return to attempting to earn God’s favor through good works is based upon a subconscious fear that the sacrifice of Jesus was not enough and does not last.
If God loved us enough to sacrifice His only beloved son to redeem us, we can fully embrace and rest in the work of his dear son as our redeemer. “For by grace are we saved, not works so no man can boast.” (Ephesians 2: 8,9) We must completely let go and let Jesus the son of God and our Redeemer set us free. (John 8:36) Our sin is forever washed away and our faith in Jesus is accounted as righteousness.
The gospel is the realization that we have been forever set free from the guilt, shame, and feelings of separation from God Our Father that resulted from futile attempts to please Him through striving to avoid sin. Our Father designed us to now do good works for an entirely different reason – because He has pardoned us through the lasting final sacrifice of his son and Our Savior, Jesus. We naturally want to do what Jesus taught us to do throughout His life – love God Our Father and our fellow man.
Easter then is a celebration of Jesus as the first man to overcome both the world and death through his resurrection. It is further a celebration of the endless river of faith filled believers who have already followed Jesus, as their Shepherd and Redeemer, beyond the grave. And it is finally a celebration of our having already “crossed over from death to life” (John 5:24) through our faith in Jesus as the Savior of The World. We live to praise, honor and glorify God Our Father and Jesus Our Redeemer and share the good news to everyone.
The true and lasting joy of Easter began over two thousand years ago with the realization and cry, “He is risen!” It is perfected through our full acceptance that his death should have been ours and that as Jesus overcame death, so have we. Love, freedom and eternal life are all realized in the discovery long ago that
“He is not here; he has risen, just as he said.”