First Reading: Gospel of Mark, chapter 15, verse 37 – chapter 16, verse 14
Second Reading: Gospel of John, chapter 20, verses 1-29
Focus Text: Gospel of John, chapter 10, verses 17-18

“The reason the Father loves Me is that I lay down My life in order to take it up again. No one takes it from Me, but I lay it down of My own accord. I have authority to lay it down and authority to take it up again”.

INTRODUCTION

The resurrection is as vital a part of the Gospel of Christ as the crucifixion. “We preach Christ crucified… whom God raised from the dead” (First Letter to the Corinthians, chapter 1, verse 22a with Book of Acts, chapter 4, verse 10e). The apostle Paul places it squarely as part of the warp and woof of the Gospel:

“Now, brothers, I want to remind you of the gospel I preached to you, which you received, and in which you stand firm. By this gospel you are saved, if you hold firmly to the word I preached to you. Otherwise, you have believed in vain. For what I received I passed on to you as of first importance: that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures, that He was buried, that He was raised on the third day according to the Scriptures…”.

First Letter to the Corinthians, chapter 15, verses 1-4

That is the importance that Paul ascribes to the teaching of the resurrection of the Lord Jesus Christ. In fact, he emphasises that “If Christ is not risen, then our preaching is empty and your faith is also empty” (First Letter to the Corinthians, chapter 15, verse 14). The resurrection of Christ does not mean that Jesus became a ghost; neither does it mean that the disciples had some kind of collective hallucination or vision (as a well-known Anglican bishop has claimed). The Lord Jesus was raised from the dead bodily, in His flesh. The resurrection is as vital a part of the Christian Gospel as the crucifixion. The cross and the resurrection, as the basis of the Gospel, stand or fall together, as these verses show: “He was delivered over to death for our trespasses and was raised to life for our justification” (Letter to the Romans, chapter 4, verse 25). “…that I may know Him and the power of His resurrection” (Letter to the Philippians, chapter 3, verse 10). “…if you confess with your mouth, ‘Jesus is Lord’, and believe in your heart that God raised Him from the dead, you will be saved” (Letter to the Romans, chapter 10, verse 9).

Moreover, our focus text records Christ as saying that “The reason the Father loves Me is that I lay down My life in order to take it up again”. This is an extraordinary thing to say. It seems that the Father held a special love for Jesus in His human nature because of His fervent obedience to the will of God. For to lay down His life was a command from His Father (Gospel of John, chapter 10, verse 18) and He willingly obeyed. There is real mystery in here, which I am hoping one day to understand fully.

No doubt you have often thought about the resurrection of the Lord Jesus Christ, and no doubt you understand a great deal about it. But on the off-chance that you have not considered them before, I want to bring six main points and a number of pertinent sub-points before you concerning the message of the resurrection. The first point to note about the resurrection of Jesus Christ is that:

I.  IT WAS REVEALING HIM AS THE ‘FIRSTBORN FROM THE DEAD’

“… and from Jesus Christ, the faithful witness, the firstborn from the dead, and the ruler of the kings of the earth” (Book of Revelation, chapter 1, verse 5).

Christ was the first to rise from the dead in such a way that He would not have to die again. I put it like this because others were raised from the dead (e.g. Lazarus). But Christ was the first who rose from the dead to the state of immortality. Lazarus had to die again physically, but “we know that since Christ was raised from the dead, He cannot die again; death no longer has dominion over Him” (Letter to the Romans, chapter 6, verse 9). He is thus, “the beginning and firstborn from among the dead, so that in all things He may have pre-eminence” (Letter to the Colossians, chapter 1, verse 18).

In this way, as “firstborn from the dead”, Christ became “the forerunner” (Letter to the Hebrews, chapter 6, verse 20), the holy harbinger, the trailblazer, for all those who are bonded in union with Him through their life-changing metanoia (repentance) — the unique spiritual transformation which restores us into relationship with Christ. To those who become His disciples, eternal life and the cleansing of unrighteousness are credited as the result of that victory over Satan and his darkness. Here is the bottom line: “This is a trustworthy saying: If we died with Him, we will also live with Him” (Second Letter to Timothy, chapter 2, verse 11), and we will then be in a sacred union with Him: “For if we have been united with Him like this in His death [His atonement], we will certainly also be united with Him in His resurrection” (Letter to the Romans, chapter 6, verse 5).

So Christ was “the firstborn from the dead” in order that all His disciples would be able to follow suit. That is revealed to us as an emphasis of His trailblazing work of salvation.

The second major thing I want to bring before you about the resurrection of Jesus Christ is that:

II.  IT WAS BY HIS OWN POWER THAT HE WAS RAISED FROM THE DEAD

“I lay down My life in order to take it up again. No one takes it from Me, but I lay it down of My own accord. I have authority to lay it down and authority to take it up again. This command I have received from My Father”.

Gospel of John, chapter 10, verses 17-18

What do we learn from the fact that by His own power He was raised from the dead?

1. It Proves His Divinity

When the body is dead it cannot make itself alive again and join itself to the soul; neither can a soul join itself to the body. Mere human nature cannot perform such a thing. Therefore there was some other nature in Christ which reunited soul and body together and thereby gave Him life. And that must surely have been His Godhead — His Divinity. From where else could such power come?

Another thing we learn from the fact that by His own power He was raised from the dead is that:

2. It Magnifies His Power in our Lives too

Consider this: If Christ gave life to Himself, even though He was utterly dead in the grave, then how much more can He give life to others now that He is alive and glorified in heaven? Think about it. Such is the tremendous significance of His being raised from the dead by His own power.

The third major thing I want to bring before you about the resurrection of Jesus Christ is that:

III.  HE LOST NOTHING OF HIS POWER IN DEATH

Even when we can speak of Christ as being dead, His power was not in the least bit diminished! Three things show this to be so. The first thing which shows that the Lord Jesus Christ lost none of His power even in death is that:

1. He Rose Again with an Earthquake

Even in death He still remained the absolute Lord and King of heaven and earth. It is as if the very earth trembled to pay homage to Him. But how did this earthquake come about? The answer is in the text:

“Suddenly there was a great earthquake, for an angel of the Lord descended from heaven, rolled away the stone, and sat on it. His appearance was like lightning, and his clothes were white as snow. The guards trembled in fear of him and became like dead men”.

Gospel of Matthew, chapter 28, verses 2-4

This shows that the power of angels under Christ is very great indeed, in that they can move and shake up the earth with a quake. Elsewhere in Scripture, we can read how three angels destroyed Sodom and Gomorrah (Book of Genesis, chapter 18, verses 1-2,16,22). A single angel destroyed all the firstborn of Egypt in one night (Book of Exodus, chapter 12, verse 23). Among the army of Sennacherib, one angel killed 185,000 men in one night (Book of Isaish, chapter 37, verse 36).

Now, just think about this. The devil is an angel of similar or even greater power to these other angels. He also has the power to shake the earth and destroy. Do you know why he has not been able to do so? Because God restrains him at His will, as is His manner throughout the whole of history (cf. Second Letter to the Thessalonians, chapter 2, verse 6; Book of Revelation, chapter 20, verses 2-3). Think about this also: If one angel can shake the earth in this way, what on earth will the Lord Jesus Christ do when He comes for judgement with many millions of angels at the end of the Age? It doesn’t bear thinking about! No wonder those who have resisted His call will cry out to the mountains to fall upon them and cover them from the sight of the great and terrible day of the Lord (Book of Revelation, chapter 6, verses 15-17), from which even death itself will provide no escape.

So we see here that even in death the Lord Jesus Christ lost nothing of His power. He could still be the cause of earthquakes through His angels!

The second thing which shows that the Lord Jesus Christ lost nothing of His power even in death was in the fact that:

2. The Angels Ministered to Him

“An angel of the Lord descended from heaven, rolled away the stone, and sat on it” (Gospel of Matthew, chapter 28, verse 2).

Even though He was dead and buried, angels came and ministered to Him. Thus, they acknowledged that His power, majesty, and authority is not curtailed by being buried in the earth but extends even to the heavens and the angels. Wicked men enclosed Him in the earth as the lowest of all creatures, but the angels of heaven readily accept Him as their Sovereign Lord — just as they did in His temptation in the wilderness (Gospel of Mark, chapter 1, verse 13) and in the Garden of Gethsemane (Gospel of Luke, chapter 22, verse 43).

The third thing which shows that the Lord Jesus Christ lost nothing of His power even in death was in the fact that:

3. Nothing Could Stand in His Way

We read that “The guards trembled in fear of him and became like dead men”. This teaches us that whatever God wills to come to pass can never be hindered, even if the whole world should attempt to do so. So, although the Jews had closed up the grave with a stone, and put a band of soldiers there, yet it all came to nothing — for nothing could stand in His way, such was His great power even in death!

The fourth major thing I want to bring before you about the resurrection of Jesus Christ is that:

IV.  HE IS NOT ALONE IN HIS RESURRECTION

 The resurrection of Jesus Christ is not something which has happened to our Lord alone. He underwent the whole experience FOR US rather than Himself. He had no need to come into incarnation, die, and be resurrected for Himself. It was all totally for us, from start to finish! On the cross, He was there in our place; in the grave, He was there in our place; and being raised from the dead, He became the “forerunner” (Letter to the Hebrews, chapter 6, verse 20), the “firstborn among many brothers and sisters” (Letter to the Romans, chapter 8, verse 29), the one who paved the way for us to enter heaven in His wake. As a result of the death of the Lord Jesus, we read of a triple-occurrence of gargantuan proportions:

“When Jesus had cried out again in a loud voice, He yielded up His spirit. At that moment the veil of the temple was torn in two from top to bottom. The earth quaked and the rocks were split. The tombs broke open, and the bodies of many saints who had fallen asleep were raised. After Jesus’ resurrection, when they had come out of the tombs, they entered the holy city and appeared to many people”.

Gospel of Matthew, chapter 27, verses 51-53

Why did these extraordinary things happen? It was one of three mighty events for which Christ’s death was the catalyst. Let us just look at these here. The first mighty event caused by Christ’s death was that:

1. The Curtain which Hid the Inner Sanctuary of the Temple was Torn in Two from Top to Bottom

“At that moment the veil of the temple was torn in two from top to bottom”.

That was an act of God (note that it was torn from the top of the curtain to the bottom rather than the bottom to the top!). Only one man could enter the heart of the tabernacle or temple once a year, the High Priest. No one else could have access to it. This event of the curtain being torn happened in order to demonstrate with a graphic show of power that the way of access into the presence of God was now available for everyone through the Great High Priest and dissolver of the priesthood, the Lord Jesus Christ. The barrier had now been removed.

The second mighty event caused by Christ’s death was that:

2. There was a Massive Earthquake

“The earth quaked and the rocks were split. The tombs broke open”.

The earth trembled violently as if the whole universe was shaking with indignation at the hideous nature of the act that had been carried out on Calvary. The Lord Jesus had said that even the stones would cry out if the people should stop declaring His Kingship (Gospel of Luke, chapter 19, verses 39-40). And so they did here! The very stones of the earth were crying out through the quake.

The third mighty event caused by Christ’s death was that:

3. Many Old Testament Believers who had Died and were Buried in Jerusalem were Raised from the Dead

“The tombs broke open, and the bodies of many saints who had fallen asleep were raised. After Jesus’ resurrection, when they had come out of the tombs, they entered the holy city and appeared to many people”.

What was this all about? This happened so that people would realise that there is a life-giving power in the resurrection of Christ. It was not only for Himself that he was resurrected, but for others — for all who believe in Him and become His disciples. It was like a first-fruits testimony of the power of Christ’s resurrection. If we believe with all our hearts, then He will give us this new life.

Take note of the fact that these saints came out of their graves after His resurrection and not at the time of the crucifixion — “After Jesus’ resurrection, when they had come out of the tombs, they entered the holy city and appeared to many people” (Gospel of Matthew, chapter 27, verse 53). And so it should be that way; after all, Christ is the firstfruits and afterwards come those who are His (First Letter to the Corinthians, chapter 15, verses 22-23). “He is the beginning and firstborn from among the dead, so that in all things He may have pre-eminence” (Letter to the Colossians, chapter 1, verse 18). Christ is the firstborn from the dead and those who believe follow. “If the Spirit of Him who raised Jesus from the dead is living in you, He who raised Christ Jesus from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies through His Spirit, who lives in you” (Letter to the Romans, chapter 8, verse 11). That is the clear logic.

The death on the cross and the mighty power of it first just opened the graves, then His resurrection led to the bodies of the saints coming out of them. The cross and the resurrection of Christ are intimately related as the twin-pillars of the Gospel.

Well you may wonder what happened to those Old Testament believers who were raised from the dead that day. The Bible does not feed much to our curiosity on that one; but it is generally assumed that they went with Him in His triumphant train to glory to be with Him forever. They were — like Enoch and Elijah — forerunners of the resurrection which is to come and tokens of assurance that there really is a new life beyond death for those who have faith.

The fifth point to note about the resurrection of Jesus Christ is that:

V.  IT SHOWS THAT HE IS READY TO RECEIVE ANYONE WHO COMES TO HIM

Who was the first person to whom the Lord appeared in His resurrected body? Mary Magdalene. Why do you think that He chose her? Well the answer is in the text: “Early on the first day of the week, after Jesus had risen, He appeared first to Mary Magdalene, from whom He had driven out seven demons” (Gospel of Mark, chapter 16, verse 9). She was a woman who had been possessed by seven demons, which the Lord Jesus cast out. Why do you think that the Holy Spirit makes a special point of saying this? Why mention the demons at all? Surely it is to show that even the most afflicted, far-out, ostracised, demon-possessed, worst-behaved person in the world can still come to Him and ask Him for forgiveness and deliverance, and be received! He does that with everyone who comes to Him (Gospel of John, chapter 6, verse 37).

The Bible makes a similar point in the list of names of Jesus’s ancestors given at the beginning of the Gospel of Matthew. There, amongst the list of men, we find special mention of the names of Tamar, Rahab, and Ruth. Tamar made herself into a prostitute and slept with her father-in-law, Judah (Book of Genesis, chapter 38, verses 12-26); Rahab was a prostitute by profession (Book of Joshua, chapter 2, verse 1); Ruth was of the Moabite people rather than of Israel (Book of Ruth, chapter 1, verse 4). Three outcasts — and women as well! Why do they appear there? These people get a special mention — along with Mary Magdalene, the first witness of Christ’s resurrection — to show that being able to come to Christ is open to all people, no matter how bad they have been, no matter what kind of background they’ve had, no matter what nationality they are, no matter which of the two genders they are, no matter what social class to which they belong, or to what intellectual level they attain. Salvation is freely given. The greatest mystery of all is that anyone would want to refuse it!

No matter who you are, if you ask Jesus Christ to forgive you for all your foolishness and pride, and you mean it with all your heart, He will hear you if you ask Him to save you. It is the death and the resurrection of Jesus Christ that has made all this possible. The two are indelibly bound together.

The final point to note about the resurrection of Jesus Christ in that:

VI.  IT HAS ACTUALLY RESULTED IN TWO RESURRECTIONS

This is not as weird or controversial as it sounds. In the Book of Revelation, John exclaims: “Blessed and holy are those who share in the first resurrection! The second death has no power over them…” (Book of Revelation, chapter 20, verse 6). This is a most interesting statement. Just as John implies in his book that there are two deaths, the first and the second, so there are also implied two resurrections, and they are parallel to each other. In order to understand the meaning of the first and second resurrections, one must have a grasp of the meanings of the first and second deaths. The first death must surely be the separation from God which humans experience through their moral failure, sin, by flouting Divine law. To put it crudely, as Paul says: “The payoff of sin is death” (Letter to the Romans, chapter 6, verse 23). That is the first death, which is the state in which we are all born, the state of spiritual death before the grave which, if not rectified by regeneration while one is alive, leads to the “second death” (popularly called ‘hell’) after the grave. Furthermore, the very fact that the decay and death of the body occur is as a direct result of the moral failure which is “built-in” to the human psyche and DNA as a result of the Fall of humanity at the beginning of human history. We are all born in a state of spiritual death. This is the “first death”.

The “second death” (Book of Revelation, chapter 2, verse 11; chapter 20, verses 6 and 14; chapter 21, verse 8) is the complete separation from the Divine after death of all those who have chosen darkness over Light, and followed the whims of their egos instead of the will of God, leading to spiritual death beyond the grave. Therefore, if the first death is spiritual deadness during one’s life, the first resurrection from that state of deadness in life involves the act of becoming a disciple of the Christ so that one is then back in relationship with the Divine. Such regeneration and renewal is like a resurrection from the dead — being raised up by God from being spiritually dead to being spiritually alive. As it has been well-put by the apostle Paul:

“You were dead in your transgressions and sins, in which you used to walk when you conformed to the ways of this world and of the ruler of the power of the air, the spirit who is now at work in the ‘children of disobedience’… But because of His great love for us, God, who is rich in mercy, made us alive with Christ even when we were dead in our transgressions”.

Letter to the Ephesians, chapter 2, verses 1-2, 4-5

Paul is saying there, “In your former way of life, you were spiritually dead [the first death], but God made you spiritually alive [the first resurrection]!” Surely, that must be the meaning of the ‘first resurrection’ — the spiritual rebirth which occurs in the lives of all those who become disciples of Christ. To become a disciple is like a rebirth — being made alive out of death. Christ specifically said as much: “Truly, truly, I tell you, whoever hears My word and believes Him who sent Me has eternal life and will not come under judgment. Indeed, he has crossed over from death to life” (Gospel of John, chapter 5, verse 24). He has already “crossed over from death to life” even before physical death itself! This is surely the ‘first resurrection’. One is completely renewed already in this life if one has devoted one’s life to Christ and become one of His disciples. Paul calls it being a new human creation: “Therefore if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation. The old things have passed away; behold, the new has come into being” (Second Letter to the Corinthians, chapter 5, verse 17). So, this being a new creation is a kind of resurrection from the dead, the ‘first resurrection’ — by which one has ‘crossed over from death to life’ and, as the text says above, the “second death has no power over them”.

If the ‘first resurrection’ refers to what happens when we become disciples of Christ — “made alive with Christ”, then the ‘second resurrection’ is plainly that which happens at the end of this age when the Christ returns, and the guarantee of it gives great comfort to the disciples of the Christ. If you have undergone the “first resurrection” (spiritual) by obeying the gospel (yes, it is to be obeyed, First Letter to the Thessalonians, chapter 1, verse 8), you will also later undergo the ‘second resurrection’ (physical) to glory at Christ’s return. It is like a two-stage resurrection process — the first stage being spiritual; the second stage being physical, all equipping us for life in the new creation to come, in which there will be ‘no more death or mourning or crying or pain, for the former things will have passed away’ (cf. Book of Revelation, chapter 21, verse 4).

So, the comfort for the disciples of the Christ lies in the fact that their discipleship, renewal, re-creation, and rebirth (their first resurrection — the regeneration of the soul) and their eventual raising from the dead to life after death (their second resurrection — the regeneration of the body) renders what John calls ‘the second death’ (eternal separation from God) to have no significance whatsoever in their afterlife experience. All this human resurrection —spiritual and physical — comes about as a direct result of the resurrection of Christ, our forerunner. Is this not a thing of amazement?!?

CONCLUSION

One day, there will come the Great Day when those “who sleep in the dust of the earth will awake, some to everlasting life, but others to shame and everlasting contempt” (Book of Daniel, chapter 12, verse 2). This is a clear reference, even in Old Testament times, to the general resurrection of the dead. For all will be resurrected, but not all will be resurrected to paradise but to the “second death” — separation from God forever. “Do not be amazed at this, for the hour is coming when all who are in their graves will hear His voice and come out—those who have done good to the resurrection of life, and those who have done evil to the resurrection of judgment” (Gospel of John, chapter 5, verses 28-29).

Whatever has happened to your body, all its ingredients — the essential ‘energy quotient’ of your physical being — no matter how it has died or been killed; even if it has been eaten by wild animals and defecated across a wide area of the earth; even if it has been blown to smithereens in an explosion; even if it has been lost at sea and dissolved into dust and dispersed by ocean currents for hundreds of miles; even if it is frozen into the summit of Mount Everest; even if it has been dissolved to seemingly ‘nothing’ in a bath of nitric acid — it will all be gathered once more into a new body in transformation — the great metamorphosis (First Letter to the Corinthians, chapter 15, verses 13,15-16,19,22). Don’t you find that amazing? In fact, it is an easy miracle to perform for the Divine One who has come into incarnation, died, and been raised from the dead and ascended to heaven! After all, He created the entire cosmos too (Letter to the Colossians, chapter 1, verses 16-17)!

What is more, the resurrection of the saints will not be a secret affair but will be witnessed, to the astonishment of the rest of the world. In the same way that Jesus’s ascension did not involve Him instantly dematerializing before the eyes of the disciples who needed to witness it, so the resurrection of the saints to heaven will not be an instant dematerialization but briefly gradual, in order to be witnessed by those who remain (cf. Book of Revelation, chapter 11, verse 12).

The saints in Old Testament times knew this secret. The Sons of Korah knew it: “God will redeem my life from Sheol, for He will surely take me to Himself” (Book of Psalms, 49, verse 15). So did King David: “As for me, I will behold Your face in righteousness; when I awake, I will be satisfied in Your presence” (Book of Psalms, 17, verse 15). David was buried in Jerusalem. Is it possible that he was one of the saints who were raised from the dead in Jerusalem after Jesus’ resurrection? That is an interesting thought. Did Isaiah foresee the resurrection of the saints: “Your dead will live; their bodies will rise. Awake and sing, you who dwell in the dust! For your dew is like the dew of the morning, and the earth will bring forth her dead” (Book of Isaiah, chapter 26, verse 19)? Did Ezekiel foresee not only a spiritual awakening but also physical resurrection?

“This is what the Lord GOD says to these bones: ‘I will cause breath to enter you, and you will come to life. I will attach tendons to you and make flesh grow upon you and cover you with skin. I will put breath within you so that you will come to life. Then you will know that I am the LORD’”.

Book of Ezekiel, chapter 37, verses 5-6

Even Job knew that the resurrection was coming, and the Book of Job was probably written before any other book in the Bible. Job said:

“I know that my Redeemer lives, and in the end He will stand upon the earth. Even after my skin has been destroyed, yet in my flesh I will see God. I will see Him for myself; my eyes will behold Him, and not as a stranger. How my heart yearns within me!”

Book of Job, chapter 19, verses 25-27

Does your heart yearn within you to see, with your own eyes, Christ as a resurrected being? The message of the resurrection of Jesus Christ is that He has paved the way for us to follow. He was the firstborn from the dead; It was by His own power that He was raised from the dead; He lost nothing of His power in death; He is not alone in His resurrection; He is ready and willing to receive anyone who comes to Him; and His own resurrection will effect a two-stage resurrection in all those who follow Him. This is the message and power of the resurrection.

In his first major sermon, the Apostle Peter said of the Lord Jesus Christ: “God raised Him from the dead, releasing Him from the agony of death, because it was impossible for Him to be held in its clutches” (Book of Acts, chapter 2, verse 24). It was simply not possible, in so many ways, that the Lord Jesus could remain in a state of death: 1) It was physically impossible (for He is the Creator and Giver of Life, God manifested in the flesh). 2) It was prophetically impossible (for there are so many prophesies of His resurrection in the Old Testament). 3) It was morally impossible (because He was without sin). In fact, the raising of Christ from the dead is an enormous comfort to us, because it proves that the Lord Jesus Christ really DID atone for our sins. Death could not hold Him because the wages of sin is death and our sin no longer clung to Him, for it had been fully atoned for on the Cross when He was utterly agonized and oppressed by the massed forces of darkness.

As in His suffering, so also in His resurrection, He stood in our place. Because He really is God, He was without sin, but He took the sins of others on Himself. Because He really is God, He was beyond death, yet He took on human flesh and on the cross He bore in His body and soul the penalty for our breaking of God’s law.

The great fact of the matter is that “if you confess with your mouth the Lord Jesus and believe in your heart that God has raised Him from the dead, you will be saved” (Letter to the Romans, chapter 10, verse 9). The Lord Jesus said to His friend Martha, and He continues to say to all of us: “I am the resurrection and the life. He who believes in Me, though he may die, he shall live. And whoever lives and believes in Me shall never die. Do you believe this?” (Gospel of John, chapter 11, verses 25-26).

Well? Do you?!?

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© 2021, Alan Morrison / The Diakrisis Project. All Rights Reserved. 
[The copyright on my works is merely to protect them from any wanton plagiarism which could result in undesirable changes (as has actually happened!). Readers are free to reproduce my work, so long as it is in the same format and with the exact same content and its origin is acknowledged]