Yes, Christmas is the other major religious holiday. And it
does fall into the same category at Easter. Without the miraculous and birth of Christ in
the manger so long ago there would simply be no resurrection. And without the
Savior’s death on Good Friday, and His
subsequent resurrection, the entire human race would remain spiritually lost
and doomed to suffer eternal wrath. The ramifications of this reality are
literally to awful for the human mind to even begin to fathom.
But a loving God provided the escape plan through the events
on that first Easter weekend. First, there was the crucifixion. There, Christ
became the sacrificial substitute to atone for the sins of an entire race. That was achieved at
the moment He cried out on the cross, ‘It is finished’. The price for all sin
had been fully paid for once and for all – something only the sinless Son of
God could accomplish. But there was more to come including a significant question.
If sin was fully paid for on the cross, and it was, then how
crucial was the resurrection a few days later?
Apparently there were some in the days of the early church who believed
that none would ever be bodily resurrected from the
dead. For that reason, the Apostle Paul penned some stunning and instructive words to those in the church at Corinth. He declared that
this error in belief would take the entire heart out of the Gospel message and leave
the effects crucifixion’s basically empty or in doubt.
In 1 Corinthians 15:16-19 Paul wrote, “For if the dead do
not rise, then Christ is not raised. And
if Christ is not risen, your faith is futile; you are still in your sins! Then also those who have fallen asleep in
Christ have perished. If in this life
only we have hope in Christ, we are of all men the most pitiable.” In other words, the resurrection of Christ
from the dead on that miraculous morning was the validation that the redemption
paid on the cross was accepted and real. Without it, there could be no true
certainty that the atonement had actually occurred. Christ’s return from the
grave was beyond essential!
His rising from that sealed tomb literally sealed the deal of God's redemptive plan!
The crucifixion and the resurrection are a complete
salvation package. They cannot be separated without nullifying the
final results. Together
they are the very core of Christianity and provide the only way for lost
sinners to be fully forgiven and forever reunited to their Creator.
Today, the celebration of the resurrection does not typically even
warrant a day off from work much less the kinds of things mentioned at the
outset. But its value makes all other
days pale in comparison. That is because man’s response to the events on that
sacred weekend long ago will determine his or her eternal destination when this
brief life someday ends. And in order to have that destiny be the one of eternal blessing and joy
in God’s presence, there is but one way. That solitary way is perhaps shared best in one of the best known verses in the Bible.
The writer John put it like this: "For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that
whoever believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life." (John 3:16) In that one verse is found the pathway to Heaven. It reveals why God did what He did, how He did what He did, what we need to do in light of what He did and what we will gain when and if we do. Nothing in this life, and especially the next, is more important than our personal response to the cross and the resurrection. Nothing!
"For the message of the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God." (1 Cor. 1:18)
Bill Breckenridge
No comments:
Post a Comment