“Then
certain of the scribes and of the Pharisees answered, saying, Master,
we would see a sign from thee. But he answered and said unto them, An
evil and adulterous generation seeketh after a sign; and there shall
no sign be given to it, but the sign of the prophet Jonas:
For
as Jonas was three days and three nights in the whale's belly; so
shall the Son of man be three days and three nights in the heart of
the earth.”
(Matthew 12:38-40)
It
is not possible to overstate the importance of the Resurrection. It
is the lynchpin of Christianity. Without the Resurrection, there is
no Christian faith. The Apostle Paul said, “And
if Christ be not risen, then is our preaching vain, and your faith is
also vain”
(1 Cor 15:14).
The significance of the Resurrection is two-fold. First,
the Resurrection secures our hope for eternal life. Christ promised
that those who believe in Him will never perish (John 3:16). Yet
what good is His promise if Jesus Himself is dead in the ground? If
Jesus died and did not rise, then His promise for our eternal life
died with Him.
But
the real significance of the Resurrection goes far beyond our hope in
the afterlife. When the Pharisees and scribes questioned the
authority of Jesus, they asked for a sign so that Jesus could prove
He spoke in the name of God. Jesus promised them only one sign –
the
Resurrection!
Everything that Jesus said and did is validated by His Resurrection:
Every promise He made, every commandment He gave, and every doctrine
that He taught us were all proven true on that first Easter Sunday.
Some
people say that Jesus was a great teacher. Yet if He did not rise,
everything He taught would be a lie.
Some
people say that Jesus was a prophet. Yet if He did not rise from the
dead, then His prophecies were all false.
Some
people say that He is the Son of God. Yet if He did not rise from
the dead, then He was just a man like every other.
Jesus
was a teacher, and a prophet, and the Son of God only because He rose
from the dead. To believe in Jesus, you must believe He rose from
the dead for there is no salvation in a dead Jesus. The Bible tells
us that a belief in the Resurrection prerequisite to salvation.
“That
if 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” (Romans 10:9).
The
Apostle Thomas said that unless he saw the risen Jesus himself, he
would not believe in His Resurrection. When Jesus appeared to
Thomas, He said, “Reach
hither thy finger, and behold my hands; and reach hither thy hand,
and thrust it into my side: and be not faithless, but believing”
(John 20:27).
The
words of Jesus are my prayer this Easter. Consider the Risen Savior.
Know that everything He said was proven true by His Resurrection.
Be not faithless, but believing!
Happy
Easter
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