Easter Sunday 2018
RESURRECTION
Tribe Recap of Easter Sunday, April 1, 2018 | Lk 24:1-9, I Tim 2:5-6, Mat 12:40, Acts 3:19
As Jesus died the heavy veil in the temple separating the people from the Holy of Holies was torn from top to bottom. All people became free to be in the presence of God.
Now we pass through the veil of Jesus’ blood, which makes us able to enter God’s presence with confidence; we can enter straight into the thick and wonderful presence of the Lord - justified. This is a miracle. No longer do we need a priest, holy man, animal sacrifice or rigorous religious efforts to made acceptable to God. Jesus’ death invites us all to spend time with God in his presence. It is the Lord Jesus who is now our mediator, his body broken to break every barrier between you and him.
And the Lord has also fought the battle with death so that you wouldn’t have to. After Jesus died he descended into the heart of the earth (Mat 12:40). He entered into the portion of Hades called Abraham’s Bosom. This is a place with gates, such as a city might have where the souls of the righteous dead waited for redemption. Abraham, Moses, Elijah and many others waited there. It was the place John the Baptist went after he died to prepare the way once again for the Lord.
The gates of hell, Hades, and (Is 18:10) Sheol certainly did not prevail against him. He destroyed death and its power forever, wiping every tear from his people’s faces (Is 25:8). Death was swallowed up and killed – another miracle.
Because of Jesus death and resurrection, human death is not the end for those in Jesus - it is the beginning of a life more wonderful than you could ever imagine.
Jesus was resurrected and those belonging to him will be resurrected too. Christ led the way into a new resurrected existence with a glorified body becoming the first (Rev 1:5, Col 1:18-22) of a new race and family. The Father wants to adopt us all as we become alive and made new in his family – unified forever under the blood of Jesus. Wow. It will take all eternity for those belonging to Jesus to catch the gravity of what he did on the cross.
On earth, death becomes a fork in the road. Those who did not give their life to Jesus will experience forever-death and those belonging to the Lord will forever live. If you have not made a decision about Christ and want to know what it means to belong to him, I offer the following for your prayerful consideration:
First, one must settle the question of who is king, ruler, leader, or decider of what happens in your life. Jesus came as King. When we say that Jesus is Lord we mean that we give Jesus authority over the entirety of our lives. So the first question is, who is it that has the final say? If this person is Jesus, you belong to him.
From here you experience repentance. Repentance is where you change how you think to reflect how Jesus thinks. For example, if you bent the truth and told lies before you begin telling the truth because your thinking and values have changed. If you led an immoral life before or a life that didn’t believe in God you voluntarily surrender your values to the values of King Jesus, which glorify God, live righteously, and have faith. This is repentance.
If you have done these things you belong to Jesus, but there is something else. When we belong to Jesus, our destiny is open wide and the great work he gives us to do is an assignment we are to engage in. We become practitioners of the Kingdom of Heaven as Jesus was, causing the will of the Father to be done on earth as it is done in heaven.
Access to the Father, Jesus, and the Holy Spirit is a result of the resurrection, and with this access we begin to think like they do (repentance). Once we think like they do we begin to partner with our Father doing all we see him do.
Do you belong to Jesus? If not, you belong to death and hell. If so, you belong to a resurrected and eternal life brimming with joy and purpose. It’s that simple.
Link to a great article on where Jesus went when he died: