Article 29

April 18, 2019          It Was a Magnificent Day – The Day of the Resurrection

For those of us in the Christian community, the Easter Sunday time has been upon us and passed shortly ago. It’s a meaningful time for a lot of us. In 1 Timothy 2:13, we are told: “Who [ meaning God] will have all men to be saved, and to come unto the knowledge of the truth.” The “will have” is in the sense that God would like to have all men to be saved. Unfortunately, it’s not quite like that in our world, nor will it ever be. In John 3:16, we read: “For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life.” A wonderful truth about this verse is that although so much of our present world hates God and the things of God, God still loved and continues to so love that He gave His only begotten Son, to get us out of the mess caused by Adam’s disobedience to God mentioned in Genesis 3. That is a whole topic of teaching in and of itself. On top of that, the entire world gets to benefit from the blessings that God gives to his children. The laws of nature are to produce beauty and give us the necessities of life, and they work for everybody, saint and sinner alike.

Genesis 1:1 tells us that “…God created the heaven and the earth.” Within the earth, we have all the necessities for life. We have food, shelter and clothing. We produce medicines from the elements of the earth and that which grows on it, so that we can get healed of many things when we get sick. Every element and plant that makes up your cell phones, clothes, cars and let’s not forget make-up are all from the earth, which God originally created and according to Genesis, had to put back together again. Sometimes I think we just forget a lot of what God has done for us. And we’ve just talked about the physical in this section. What about the spiritual? The greatest of all is spiritual, because God is spirit!

If God had not made plans for His Son, Jesus Christ to do what he did, we would have a major problem. But God so loved, as we read, and because of that love, He gave us His Son, Jesus Christ and Jesus Christ made a major decision in his life and he made it early on. In Luke 2:49, he told his parents, “…wist ye not that I must be about my Father’s business.” That was a great one to lay on his parents, and he was not referring to Joseph. He was referring to his Heavenly Father, God. His Father’s business was for him to do what he had to do in his short life to redeem mankind. I will wager that he knew a lot about it at that point in his life. One of the great examples that Jesus Christ left to us was his absolute willingness to believe and obey God’s Word. We see in John 8:29 “…for I do always those things that please him.” What a tremendous statement to make, and he wouldn’t have said it if it wasn’t true! What an example! The irony is that in spite of the great works of healing and his wonderful words of God, the political and religious community of his day and time hated him then as much as the political and religious community of our day and time do. And I’m not talking about just our country, but world wide. 2 Corinthians 2:11 tells us: “Lest Satan should get an advantage of us: for we are not ignorant of his devices.” One of Satan’s greatest devices is religion and the perverting of God’s wonderful, matchless Word, so that Christians cannot live with the power God intended for them. The Devil does not want us to benefit from the blessings of the resurrection, because he knows what a big deal it was and still is!

Without the resurrection, there would have been no ascension, and no Day of Pentecost which brought us the new birth, and thus, Christians would be “roaming aimlessly” all their lives. There would be no power of God and no abundant life. Not only have we seen that God is love, but we also see that God is light. 1 John 1:5, “…God is light, and in him is no darkness at all.” Because God is light and love and the originator of both of those qualities, He has put together a plan for life for us, His children. Because it is so magnificent and wonderful, it is hard to describe it other than by figures of speech. Keep in mind that the two requirements for being born again of God’s spirit are told in Romans 10:9, “That is thou shalt confess with thy mouth the Lord Jesus, and shalt believe in thine heart that God hath raised him from the dead, thou shalt be saved.” This is the greatest promise in God’s Word and it includes the resurrection. So is Resurrection Sunday (Easter to many) pretty significant? I would think so. What a day to rejoice in and to be thankful for all that God has given to us and made available.

Thanks for reading funglimpses! Respectfully submitted, Will Grove