The Resurrection and The Life

SCOTT BLAKEY

But on the first day of the week, at early dawn, they came to the tomb bringing the spices which they had prepared. And they found the stone rolled away from the tomb, but when they entered, they did not find the body of the Lord Jesus. While they were perplexed about this, behold, two men suddenly stood near them in dazzling clothing; and as the women were terrified and bowed their faces to the ground, the men said to them, “Why do you seek the living One among the dead? He is not here, but He has risen.” Lk. 24:1-6a

“Why do you seek the living One among the dead?” This is the question on which Christian faith hangs. This is the question that separates Jesus from all others, that does not allow us to see Him as merely a great leader or wise teacher. Many great and wise men had come before Christ—men like Abraham, Moses, and David—but when death closed their eyes, they were proven to be mere men. Others (such as Lazarus) would be raised from the dead, but they would also eventually return to the grave. Only Jesus would prove to be the risen One, the “living One,” whom death could not claim or hold. Scripture is clear that if there had been no resurrection, there would be no gospel; the resurrection is the act that affirms Christ’s deity and His power to truly save us from sin and raise us to eternal life with Him. This great historical truth not only provides us with the assurance of heaven, but helps transform us in this life as well, giving us, as the great old hymn says, “strength for today and bright hope for tomorrow.”

Oddly, this most significant event was met by Jesus’ followers and loved ones with confusion, fear, and doubt. The women who came to the tomb to tend to Jesus’ (presumed dead) body were perplexed to find it empty. When they took the angels’ message back to the apostles, their “words appeared to them as nonsense” (Lk. 24:11). The disciples on the road to Emmaus, broken-hearted because their hope that Jesus truly was the Messiah had died with Him on the cross, did not realize it was Christ himself who walked with them that day, recognizing Him only when He broke bread at the evening meal, at which point He vanished (Lk. 24:13-31). Jesus actually rebuked this doubt as He talked with the disciples on the road, scolding them for not recognizing the teaching of Scripture:

And He said to them, “O foolish men and slow of heart to believe in all that the prophets have spoken! Was it not necessary for the Christ to suffer these things and to enter into His glory?” Then beginning with Moses and with all the prophets, He explained to them the things concerning Himself in all the Scriptures (Lk. 24:25-27).

Indeed, Jesus himself had several times explained to the disciples that He would be crucified and raised from the dead (e.g., Matt. 16:21; 17:22-23), a fact of which the angels reminded the women at the empty tomb (Lk. 24:6-7). It is interesting to note, moreover, that the chief priests and Pharisees, of all people, seemed to grasp the significance of His teaching about the resurrection, which led them to request having the tomb sealed and a guard posted, lest the disciples steal the body and deceive people into thinking He had risen (Matt. 27:62-66), and—following the actual resurrection—to bribe the guards to lie about what they had seen (Matt. 28:11-15).

Once the apostles grasped the profound reality of the resurrection, it transformed their lives, their ministry, and all of human history. “Had the crucifixion of Jesus ended his disciples’ experience of Him, it is hard to see how the Christian Church could have come into existence. That Church was founded on faith in the Messiahship of Jesus. A crucified Messiah was no Messiah at all….It was the Resurrection of Jesus, as St. Paul declares in Romans 1:4, which proclaimed Him to be the Son of God with power.”¹ Let us then consider the great, transforming victory of the empty tomb, of the risen Lord and Savior.

 

“As of First Importance”

The longest, most in-depth teaching on the resurrection in Scripture is found in 1 Corinthians 15. Paul here summarizes the gospel message in this way: “For I delivered to you as of first importance what I also received, that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures, and that He was buried, and that He was raised on the third day according to the Scriptures” (1 Cor. 15:3-4). The apostle (as did Jesus on the road to Emmaus) shows that this should not be a new or surprising teaching, as Scripture had foretold it. He also offers the empirical evidence of over 500 eyewitnesses, most of whom are still alive and will confirm this teaching. This last point stands as evidence against those who would attempt to “spiritualize” the resurrection, making Christ’s raising from the dead more allegorical than physical. Scripture is quite clear that the risen Christ was a physical being whom the disciples touched and with whom they shared meals (Lk. 24:36-42: Jn. 20:11-29), not a phantom.

Paul sees the resurrection of Christ as part of the “irreducible minimum” of the gospel message, a truth we see in the teaching of Jesus (Mk. 8:31; Jn. 11:25-26) and the apostles following Pentecost (Acts 2:14-36; 3:12-26). In fact, he goes so far as to say that apart from the resurrection, preaching and faith are vain and worthless things, and we are still in our sin (1 Cor. 15:13-19). Paul states that if we follow Christ only in and for this life—a life marked by cross-bearing and self-sacrifice (Lk. 9:23-24)—we are utterly pitiful, a statement that stands as sharp rebuke to those who would have Jesus only as a good teacher or example. The concept that religion in and of itself is good for the soul is seen to be nonsense; there is no power in anything but the true, full gospel.

Because of the resurrection, believers possess not just a better life, but a new nature. Paul illustrates this in a parallel between Adam and Jesus: “For since by a man came death, by a man also came the resurrection of the dead. For as in Adam all die, so also in Christ all will be made alive” (1 Cor. 15:21-22). Through Adam’s transgression, all of humanity since has inherited a sin nature (Rom. 5:18-19) and is separated from God and His holiness (Rom. 3:10, 23); furthermore, “through one man sin entered into the world, and death through sin, and death spread to all men, because all sinned” (Rom. 5:12). If Jesus were to remain dead, then sin has defeated even Him; because of His saving power evidenced in the resurrection, we can share in eternal life (Rom. 6:23), inheriting a new nature by being “born again,” or “born from above” (Jn. 3:3, 7).

As new creatures (2 Cor. 5:17), we are not meant for this world alone and are not meant to live for it. History’s greatest saints, those who had such great impact on this earth, had that impact because they had learned to look beyond this life. The great heroes of faith spoken of in Hebrews 11 left their mark because they chose to live as “strangers and exiles on the earth” (Heb. 11:13), desiring “a better country, that is, a heavenly one” (Heb. 11:16) and “a better resurrection” (Heb. 11:35). Our desire is to be for that heavenly place prepared for us and promised to us by Christ Himself (Jn. 14:1-3). Which is not to say that we disregard this world; we are called to lives of service and witness. Indeed, the hope we have because of the resurrection helps us to hold loosely to worldly concerns such as our own reputations or status and better serve others (Phil. 2:1-11). We see this mindset displayed by Jesus as He washes the disciples’ feet, taking the form of the lowest slave, secure in the knowledge that “He had come forth from God and was going back to God” (Jn. 13:3).

 

A call to sacrifice

The Christian life is not a call to ease but to sacrifice, not to the couch but to the cross; why suffer if this earthly life is the only one we have? Such a life of service and sacrifice, of course, is foolish apart from the promise, hope, and assurance provided by the resurrection. Our good deeds do us no good if this life is all there is. Paul, in fact, argues that we would be wiser to embrace hedonism if there is no life beyond this one, if death erases us completely. “If the dead are not raised, let us eat and drink, for tomorrow we die” (1 Cor. 15:32). This is the life lived “under the sun” (meaning purely on the earthly plane) that Solomon writes about so eloquently and heartbreakingly in Ecclesiastes, the life in which he “did not withhold [his] heart from any pleasure” (Ecc. 2:10). This is the life that is summed up by the repeated phrase, “Vanity of vanities! All is vanity” (Ecc. 1:2; 12:8); all is eventually futile, or meaningless (or, as one of my professors put it, all is soap bubbles, things that are shiny and beautiful, and impossible to hold).

Examples of such self-centered hedonism abound—are, in fact, encouraged by such agents as media and social-networking—in today’s society. It is almost impossible to avoid them or to resist them. Paul addressed the need for wisdom in this area; “Do not be deceived: ‘Bad company corrupts good morals.’ Become sober-minded as you ought, and stop sinning; for some have no knowledge of God. I speak this to your shame” (1 Cor. 15:33-34). Rather than join in the dark pleasures of the world, Christ-followers are to be a light in the darkness (Matt. 5:14-16; Rom. 13:12-14).

“Now I say this, brethren, that flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God; nor does the perishable inherit the imperishable” (1 Cor. 15:50). In our “earthiness,” we cannot make any claim for entrance into God’s kingdom; therefore, in the resurrection of believers, we must be transformed. “For the perishable must put on the imperishable, and this mortal must put on immortality” (1 Cor. 15:53). This transformation of our corrupted, earthly bodies to our immortal, heavenly bodies is the fulfillment of the work begun in salvation when our fallen, Adamic nature was replaced by the new, godly nature which came with being born again; the work begun by our justification by Christ will find completion in our glorification with Him. It is then that death will suffer ultimate defeat, and we can rejoice with Paul as he says; “Death is swallowed up in victory. O Death, where is your victory? O Death, where is your sting?” (1 Cor. 15:54b-55).

Death has perplexed and terrified man for millennia. In his most famous soliloquy, Hamlet’s “To be or not to be” speech, William Shakespeare called death “the undiscovered country,” and the fear of what he might find beyond this earthly realm is what kept Hamlet from taking his own life. More modern, therapeutic teaching has tried to soften our picture of death, wanting us to understand it as a “natural” part of life. That, however, is not the picture the Bible presents; Scripture clearly depicts death as the enemy, and that enemy is permanently vanquished by the resurrection. Therefore, we can echo Paul’s words in Philippians 1:21, “For to me, to live is Christ and to die is gain.” To borrow once more from English literature, Christians can quote John Donne’s Holy Sonnet X (where he uses language very similar to Paul’s in 1 Corinthians):

Death, be not proud, though some have called thee
Mighty and dreadful, for thou art not so;
For those whom thou think’st thou dost overthrow
Die not, poor Death, nor yet canst thou kill me….
One short sleep past, we wake eternally
And death shall be no more; Death, thou shalt die.

The life won at the cross and proclaimed by the resurrection is entirely a work of grace. “The sting of death is sin, and the power of sin is the law; but thanks be to God, who gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ” (1 Cor. 15:56-57). The clear teaching of the New Testament is that we are saved by grace through faith (Eph. 2:8-9). The equally clear teaching is that the law has no such power to save. There is a certain illogic that leads us to believe we can be saved through the law, through our own good works and character, but because none of us has such works or character; “all our righteous deeds are like a filthy garment” (Isa. 64:6). If the law could in any way save us, then it would; instead, it convicts us of our sin (Gal. 3:21-22). To pridefully believe we can save ourselves, in fact, merely adds to our sin and does not move us one inch closer to God. The purpose of the law was not for us to save ourselves, “lest any man should boast,” but to point toward Christ; “Therefore the Law has become our tutor to lead us to Christ, so that we may be justified by faith” (Gal. 3:24). To try to add our good works to faith actually negates that faith, demonstrating that we believe Christ’s completed work to be insufficient (Heb. 7:26-27; 9:12, 28; 10:10). Paul warned the Colossians that holding on to the old things of the law such as festivals, Sabbaths, and dietary laws was holding on to “a mere shadow of what is to come,” rather than laying hold of Christ, the “substance” (Col. 2:8-25).

While we are not saved by our good works, we are called to bear fruit as evidence of our salvation and new life in Christ. It is with this point that Paul concludes his discussion of the resurrection: “Therefore, my beloved brethren, be steadfast, immovable, always abounding in the work of the Lord, knowing that your toil is not in vain in the Lord” (1 Cor. 15:58). Paul’s writings follow a consistent pattern of laying out indicatives (theological truths) followed by imperatives (commands based on those truths), connecting them with the word, “therefore.” Knowing these great truths must have a profound, transforming impact on our present, earth-bound lives. The resurrection is not just a great truth we cherish for death but for this life as well.

 

“Walk in Newness of Life”

“This spiritual renovation of nature in regeneration will infallibly produce a moral reformation of life…. In regeneration, the purposes, designs, and inclinations of the mind are changed. This new creation does not consist in just a new course of action, but in renewed faculties. It is thus called the ‘divine nature’ 2 Pet. 1:4.”² New life in Christ, secured for us at the cross (justification), and brought to perfect completion in heaven (glorification), is also evident in this life, as we grow in Christlikeness (sanctification). To be a Christian is to be a new being, complete with new desires and attitudes. “I have been crucified with Christ; and it is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me; and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave Himself for me” (Gal. 2:20). To be born again, to take on the new nature, is to be identified with Christ’s death and resurrection in our lives. We must die to our old, sinful lives that we might be made new through Him:

As Christ was raised from the dead through the glory of the Father, so we too might walk in newness of life. For if we have become united with Him in the likeness of His death, certainly we shall also be in the likeness of His resurrection, knowing this, that our old self was crucified with Him, in order that our body of sin might be done away with, so that we would no longer be slaves to sin; for he who has died is freed from sin. Now if we have died with Christ, we believe that we shall also live with Him, knowing that Christ, having been raised from the dead, is never to die again; death no longer is master over Him. For the death that He died, He died to sin once for all; but the life that He lives, He lives to God. Even so consider yourselves to be dead to sin, but alive to God in Christ Jesus (Rom. 6:4b-11).

It is inconceivable that, having been born again, one would continue in old, sinful ways; “How shall we who died to sin still live in it?” (Rom. 6:2).

In the same way that believers must “put on” the imperishable and immortal at death in order to enter heaven, we are instructed to put on “the new self” (Eph. 4:24; Col. 3:10) in this life. In order to do that, of course, we must “lay aside the old self, which is being corrupted in accordance with the lusts of deceit” (Eph. 4:22). That “old self,” utterly sinful and with no ability or resources with which to become holy, must die and be cast off in order for us to walk in newness of life. We see here some of the tension in the Christian walk between the work of the Holy Spirit in a believer’s life and the work of the believer himself. Just as we cannot put on immortality in our own strength, neither can we make ourselves holy in this life. In fact, the directives to “lay aside” the old self and “put on” the new are not so much imperative commands as they are “infinitives of result,” meaning that—as we belong to Christ—these are things that are already accomplished for us. Of course, we are also commanded to live lives of obedience, to play our part in following Christ, to “work out [our] salvation with fear and trembling; for it is God who is at work in you, both to will and to work for His good pleasure” (Phil. 2:12-13).

There is great courage and boldness that comes with this newness of life and this hope of the resurrection. The gospel is a great victory cry: “If God is for us, who is against us?… Who will separate us from the love of Christ?… But in all these things we overwhelmingly conquer through Him who loved us” (Rom. 8:31, 35, 37). Tragically, many do not walk in this confidence and newness because they fail to understand the truth of Christ’s victory over sin and death. The worldly standards of appearance and accomplishment still rule in their lives, rather than submission, surrender, and obedience. Impressed by their good work, they head not toward the blessed resurrection spoken of in Scripture but toward the most terrifying words one could hear from the Lord; “I never knew you; depart from Me” (Matt. 7:23).

In Augustus Toplady’s wonderful old hymn, “Rock of Ages,” he wrote, “Be of sin the double cure; save from wrath and make me pure.” This “double cure” is the essence of the blessed gospel promise; we are saved from both the penalty of sin in hell, as well as sin’s dominion, its rule over our lives now. We are not just the recipients of something taken away, but of something given as well. When Jesus said, “I am the resurrection and the life” (Jn. 11:15), He made a promise only He could make, a promise that came with the terrible cost of the cross where He took our sin in order to give His righteousness. We acquire this gift through no merit of our own—only by grace and faith; we add nothing to Christ’s completed work. As Toplady says, so must we say, “Nothing in my hand I bring; simply to Thy cross I cling.” May we be like Peter, hearing the risen Christ say, “Follow Me!” (Jn. 21:19), knowing that is a call to a new life now and a blessed homecoming beyond.

Surely goodness and lovingkindness will follow me all the days of my life, and I will dwell in the house of the Lord forever (Ps. 23:6). †

 

Endnotes

1. H.D.A. Major, The Mission and Message of Jesus (New York: Dutton, 1946), p. 213.
2. John Owen, The Works of John Owen, Vol. 3: The Holy Spirit (Carlisle, PA: Banner of Truth Trust, 1966), pp. 219-221.

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Scott Blakey is a Bible teacher at Arrowhead Christian Academy in Redlands, California, where he has ministered for 23 years. He holds a Master’s degree in Biblical Counseling and is a member of the Association of Certified Biblical Counselors. He and his wife, Sheri, have been married for 25 years and have two sons, Samuel and Aaron. They worship and serve at Trinity Church in Redlands. He seeks to be a man like Ezra, first studying and living out the Word before teaching it, and he is constantly amazed by God’s grace and goodness.