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Over the past centuries, we have had magicians come up with several paranormal tricks and miracles. Even Buddhists and monks have diverse means of channeling healing and certain supernatural provisions to people.
With these in place, what makes the ministry of Jesus so unique. What makes Him the Lord and savior over all, and what makes Christianity the true religion.
It is His death and resurrection. No man has ever died and resurrected three days later, in His own power. It is unheard of. But Jesus died two thousand years ago, and on the third day He arose.
What significance does this have for believers?
1. His death and resurrection was the testament or attestation that Him alone holds the keys of life and death.
2. It was the declaration of His victory over the forces of Hell.
Colossians 2:15: “In this way, God disarmed the evil rulers and authorities. He shamed them publicly by his victory over them on the cross of Christ.”
When He died, Jesus ascended into the depths of hell and conquered its forces. We are told in the aforementioned scripture that He disarmed those evil spiritual rulers.
This means He stripped them of their authority and the weapons with which they continually tormented man. He stripped them of the keys of death!
His Resurrection was the proof that indeed, He had risen. Therefore, we rejoice this day, because in Christ’s victory, we have our victory. Satan has no authority over us anymore. He has no right over us anymore.
Your sins are forgiven. The Blood was shed for the remission of our sins. We have been purchased and now we belong to Christ.
Therefore, Satan has no right over us.
Hallelujah!
3. His Resurrection marked the birth of the Church
Colossians 2:12: “For you were buried with Christ when you were baptized. And with him you were raised to a new life because you trusted the mighty power of God, who raised Christ from the dead.”
In Christ’s death, we died. The Old Man died with and in Him. But if it had ended there, we’d have been hopeless. Jesus resurrected, and we resurrected in and with Him unto a New Life.
This Life is called New Life because it is the kind of life that has never been seen before. No one in the old testament had this new life.
No one before Jesus’s resurrection had this New Life. But Jesus’s resurrection secured this New Life for us. It is Divine Life – the very resurrected Life and Nature of Christ.
Therefore, this day should not be a day of mere celebration and festivity, it should be a day of sobriety and sober reflection.
We must ask ourselves if we are truly living in this New Life which we have in Christ.
We must ask ourselves if we are living as the resurrected Church, or as dead sinners.
Are we truly living the divine life? Or are we making vain his Resurrection.
We must decide that this life of Christ in us, which is the light of the world, will be expressed through us everyday, in our speech, actions and conduct. The New Life must not be a mere theory or Doctrine, it must be a tangible reality.
People around us must experience it daily. They should experience Christ through us. Our conduct and output must be unique, distinct and permeated with heavenly fragrance, such that folks are compelled to ask for the source of our divine distinction.
4. Hope of Resurrection
1Co 15:22: “For as in Adam all die, even so in Christ shall all be made alive.”
Christianity is the only religion whose founder is not in the grave. This makes it the true and eternal religion.
The resurrection of Christ even makes Christianity more than a religion, as it provides a hope for believers – a hope which cannot be found in any religion; the hope of a future resurrection unto immortality.
Jesus resurrected to become the firstfruit of a tribe of humans with the divine life, known as Christians, who will all someday rise to full immortality where they’ll never know death again.
Though our bodies perish today, we have the hope, that the same power that raised Jesus from the dead, will quicken our mortal bodies unto eternal life in the presence of God.
KOINONIA ART 