Monday: “He is Risen”
The victory of Christ over Satan and his evil powers was secured on the cross and confirmed by the empty tomb. “When Jesus was laid in the grave, Satan triumphed. He dared to hope that the Saviour would not take up His life again. He claimed the Lord’s body, and set his guard about the tomb, seeking to hold Christ a prisoner. He was bitterly angry when his angels fled at the approach of the heavenly messenger. When he saw Christ come forth in triumph, he knew that his kingdom would have an end, and that he must finally die.” — Ellen G. White, The Desire of Ages, p. 782. And though Christ’s humanity died, His divinity did not die. In His divinity, Christ possessed the power to break the bonds of death.
Read Matthew 28:1-6; John 10:17-18; and Romans 8:11. Who was directly involved in the resurrection of Jesus?
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During His ministry in Samaria-Peraea, Jesus stated that He Himself had power to lay down His life and to take it again (John 10:17-18). To Martha He said, “I am the resurrection, and the life” (John 11:25). Other passages speak of His resurrection as an act of God (Acts 2:24, Romans 8:11, Galatians 1:1, Hebrews 13:20). Even a mighty angel of the Lord was involved in that glorious event (Matthew 28:1-2).
Meanwhile, Matthew 28:11-15 reveals the futile and foolish efforts of the leaders to continue fighting against Jesus. The Roman guard told the leaders “all the things that had happened” (Matthew 28:11, NKJV). Implicit in this account is the idea that the guards saw the resurrection. If not, what would their words mean? An angel came down from heaven, moved the stone, sat on it, and the guards fainted? The next thing that they know the tomb is empty? Maybe, while the Romans were unconscious, the angel took away the body of Jesus? Maybe the disciples did? Or someone else stole it? Whatever happened, the body of Jesus was, obviously, gone.
An angel from heaven coming down, the men fainting from fear, and the tomb being empty would have been disconcerting enough to the religious leaders. But that they “gave a large sum of money to the soldiers” (Matthew 28:12, NKJV) to keep these men quiet implied that whatever the soldiers told them disturbed them deeply. And what they told of, of course, was the resurrection of Jesus.
| Some scoff at the idea that the first people to see Christ resurrected were Romans. Why? In what ways is this truth symbolic of what was to come: the gospel going to the Gentiles, as well? |
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Sometimes things happen so fast that it is hard to get your head around what happened. In my youth I worked in a chemistry laboratory making biochemicals for research One of the tasks was to purify a particular compound by recrystallization using a mixture of very pure solvents. The big problem was that because the chemicals were so pure, they had a tendency to superheat. The liquid would heat to well above its boiling point and then something would trigger the vaporization and it would explode violently without any warning. We tried to avoid that for two reasons. One, it was dangerous and you could get burned, and two, it made a big mess that I would have to clean up. We had a name for it, "Lightning distillation". I remember that I was working on the chemicals one night when I had a lightning distillation and I could scarcely believe what happened. The chemicals were sitting quietly in their container being heated with a heating mantle and within a fraction of a second, they were dripping from the ceiling. I cannot recall the moment that it happened all that well, but I do remember the aftermath clearly. And ten years later the evidence of the event was still on the ceiling as a sort of Maurice/Michelangelo Cistine artwork.
The resurrection was explosive, It knocked out the Roman guards. One moment the tomb was closed and sealed and then they were picking themselves up and the tomb was empty. How could they explain that?
Even more important than the event itself is that the resurrection of Jesus is still having an effect today.
Paul describes what was left on the ceiling after the event so well:
Amen! And as a lightning, the return of the Lord will also happen, from one end of the sky to the other! May we all be happily standing when this happens!
That was such a nice example! With a very good sense of humor... I'm definitely sure that Jesus had a very keen personality!
God can use anyone's talent in His service! And transform whatever people may think is out of code in something spontaneously genuine!
“Let the little children come to me, and do not hinder them, for the kingdom of God belongs to such as these."
“And the guards shook for fear of him, and became like dead men.”
Do we believe that they fainted or did they just froze in place as if they were dead? Your thoughts.
I understand it as frozen in place. The soldiers saw the entire thing they saw the angel rolling away the stone and sitting on it and just could not move. This I believe was the reason they were able to tell the religious leaders exactly what happened so much so that they had to pay them off.
I wonder if this phrase is related to this event “you look like you have seen a ghost”! We do not believe in ghosts. It’s hard to explain the angels in white appearing and then disappearing. What would the soldiers have said? 🤔 my thoughts out loud.
He has risen. John and Peter could not believe it. They did not know the Scripture that Christ will rise. They saw the evidence and believed, and later on preached using David's word. The Bible is detailed enough that we can see the evidence even though we were not there, and thus believe. Because He Lives I can face tomorrow because He lives all fear is gone. That is what the disciples experienced, and what we experience as we became born again.
John 20:3-10.
Psalms 16:10.
Acts 2:25-28
What's important too, is that Christ obtained victory over Satan by dying on the Cross, and His resurection confirmed this victory. Also important is the fact that He died for us. His resurection allows us who see Him and believe, to live with Him by the power of God.
1Peter 2:24.
Galatians 1:1.
2Corinthians 13:4.
Am having a problem with the question, ''who was directly involved'. Who exactly was involved? This wakes the wolf within me: understanding the Trinity.
Maybe you'll want to send that wolf back to his lair, based on the declaration in Deuteronomy 29:29: "The secret things belong unto the Lord our God: but those things which are revealed belong unto us and to our children for ever, that we may do all the words of this law."
So what is revealed in the Bible regarding the resurrection?
And what did Jesus reveal about a) who He is b) His relationship with the Father c) His relationship with the Spirit?
Paul speaks a number of time of "mystery" revealed. But there is much mystery not revealed - questions to which the answers are not found in Scripture. And that is probably because we a) do not need to know the answers and b) we couldn't understand the answers if we were told. After all, our finite minds cannot comprehend an infinite God.
Did the chief priests believe that soldiers could keep what they had seen secret?Certainly these soldiers would tell those closest to them what they had seen and heard.Maurice could not keep what happened forever secret neither could the soldiers. The “ secret” leaked out . The authorities had a problem on their hands .Solution ; get rid of the leaders who were then spreading the news of a resurrected man who was indeed GOD. The story of this risen soon-coming king continues to threaten the evil one and his followers. This event , resurrection of Jesus guarantees our salvation.
Matthew 28:1-7 and John 20:1-10 seem to be giving contradicting account of the experience of Mary Magdalene on that Sunday resurrection morning? Any clarification?
Good question, Benard. The best I can do is share pertinent parts of the narrative as related in the chapter, "Why Weepest Thou?" in the book, The Desire of Ages.
An angel tells the other women that Jesus has risen from the dead, and the angel instructs them to go and tell His disciples. So, they start out.
Then Mary encounters, first the angels, and then Jesus Himself.
It seems like a plausible explanation to me.
I think it is a simple case of different witnesses see different things. If there is a traffic accident, and you ask for statements from the drivers and from nearby pedestrians you will get quite different accounts.
The fact that different points of view are recorded about the resurrection is one indicator that it is not a fabrication where everyone has got together to give a consistent picture. Different observers saw different things.
The fact we have varying accounts proves that the writers did not get together in collusion in the writing of the events. Rather as with different news writers and journalists we get it from different angles, it precludes collusion. We also need to remember that in that culture back then - as now in many cultures - people would report first what to them were the most important events, and not necessarily in a chronological order.
Gardeners in northern climates are planting bulbs right now. This past season's flowers have bloomed brightly and then all too soon, faded away into paper nothingness, like an elder's papery skin. The gardener eventually cut back the old dead stalks and withered petals. Some bulbs and tubers, like the dahlias, are dug up to overwinter in cool basements. Others, like tulips and daffodils, irises and lilies, stay in the ground all winter, resting under the snow and sod.
Jesus said to "consider the lilies" to renew our faith in His providence. He was referring to daily cares we might have, however I was just realizing that we can also look to the lilies for an object lesson about the truth of His resurrection. Paul reminds us of a prophecy in Ps. 16:10, when in Acts 13:37,we read that Jesus "saw no corruption" after His death. Just like the lily flowers and its green matter dies and is cut back, Jesus died and was cut down off the cross. And just like the dead-looking lily bulb springs to full colorful exuberance again in the Spring, after a season of rest, Jesus sprung to life again after a Sabbath day of rest in the grave.
Paul notes that for King David of the OT, it was different, he DID see corruption in death (Acts 13:36). So why did Jesus not decay (Acts 2:27)? Could we say that we all are like the types of plants that die completely after flowering. Sin made us annuals. We bloom and while our seed may continue on, we as the parent plant die and never resurrect in a green season. Whereas Jesus is like a perennial plant bulb wherein the life is stored through a dormant "dead" season. His human form died under the weight of our sin penalty (and perhaps some rigor mortis set in, maybe the myrrh and aloes helped to dehydrate His corpse), but His physical body never returned to dust because He IS Life, the Source of all life, and His sinless divine Self could not be kept down. The song "Lord of the Dance" says it well: "They cut me down and I leapt up high; I am the Life that'll never, never die." He paid the death wage for sin, but He reminds us in John 10:18 that sin did not take Him down.... Jesus willingly laid His life down and had the power, all on His own, to take it back up again.
Just like the lily bulb holds life dormant in its sleeping form in the ground for a season, anchored by the ever-deeper root system it laid down earlier in time, as soon as the above-ground part of the plant had died,...just so those who died to self in this life, dedicating their energy to rooting ever-deeper in God, and are cocooning underground, will burst forth with Jesus's life force in the Springtime of His coming.
One more gardening connection...this time with compost...
Many people without faith in Jesus are feeling their spiritual darkness now, they are exhausted and frustrated, maybe also angry and scared. The effects of sin are so deep that it can even be below the level of conscious awareness. Without Jesus as our Head we are dying. Jesus can and does use this rot of sin to show us the truth about Himself. Sometimes He waits longer than we'd like to transform the situation, as He did with Lazarus, waits for things to start stinking. He feels the nasty too - even Jesus wept - but in His love He always seeks to turn the darkness into nourishment for a rich harvest of souls.
Scripture says that many of the bodies of saints that had been asleep arose and appeared to many and also, the veil of the temple was torn then too. This happened at Jesus' dying while He was still at the cross, not when He Himself arose after His three days in the tomb.
True. It says they went into the cjty after the resurrection, but the rest happened when He died.
Yes, this truth promises us that the gospel message is for every nation, kindreds, people, and tongues (Revelation 7:9). Meaning the promises are not only exclusive for the Nation of Israel, because if we accept Jesus as Lord and Savior then we are adopted into the family of God (the House of Israel). Therefore, all the promises and blessings given to Israel (the chosen people of God) are also ours to claim. And, we become grafted (adopted) into the family line of Abraham (Romans 11:21-27). Thus, we become spiritual Israel. In other words, we become citizens of the Kingdom of heaven.