Death Has Died To Rise No More

Because the tomb is empty
His light shines forth,
and death no longer controls the day

Because  the Light-bringer is risen
His light will never fade
and death has died to rise no more.

Easter Truths

Some things to meditate on this Easter Season - 9 Things You Need to Know About the Resurrection by Joe Carter

This week news broke that a quarter of self-proclaiming Christians in Great Britain do not believe in the Resurrection according to a study by the BBC. For those of you who will celebrate the Resurrection this Easter Sunday, that figure may be shocking. For every reader of this blog, there are 9 things you need to know about the Resurrection.

1. Belief in the Resurrection is the core doctrine of the Christians faith. If you do not believe in the Resurrection, then you do not have a relationship with God in and through Jesus Christ.

“…If you confess with your mouth the Lord Jesus and believe in your heart that God has raised Him from the dead, you will be saved (Rom 10:9).
“And if Christ is not risen, your faith is futile, you are still in your sins!” (1 Cor 15:17).

2. The Resurrection gives everyone else who dies hope for eternal life. The Bible teaches that since Jesus lives as a result of the Resurrection, all those who have a relationship with Him have hope that they too will live with Him in eternity.

“But now Christ is risen from the dead, and has become the firstfruits of those who have fallen asleep. For since by man came death, by Man also came the resurrection of the dead. For as in Adam all die, even so in Christ all shall be made alive” 1 Cor 15:20-22).
Jesus said, “…I go to prepare a place for you. And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again and receive you to Myself: that where I am, there you may be also” (John 14:2-3).

3. The disciples who became apostles did not understand it initially. As followers of Jesus on earth, Jesus taught the disciples about the Resurrection but they did not understand him until after the actual Resurrection.

“Now as they came down from the mountain, He commanded them that they should tell no one the things they had seen, till the Son of man had risen from the dead. So they kept this word to themselves, questioning what the rising from the dead meant” (Mark 9:9-10).
“Then some of His disciples said among themselves, ‘What is this that He says to us…’” (John 16:17).

4. The religious leaders of the Jews were afraid of the Resurrection. The religious leaders did not appreciate Jesus’ message that threatened their power and upset their system of religion. They were afraid of a risen Messiah or Savior.

“…So they went and made the tomb secure, sealing the stone and setting the guard” (Matthew 27:62-66).

5. The Resurrection provided the disciples joy and a foundation for belief. When teaching the disciples about the Resurrection, Jesus said that their sorrow of His death would be turned into joy – joy that no one can take from you. John recalled these words as He encouraged people to believe in Jesus.

Jesus said, “Most assuredly I say to you that you will weep and lament, but the world will rejoice; and you will be sorrowful, but your sorrow will be turned into joy. … Therefore you now have sorrow, but I will see you again and your heart will rejoice, and your joy no one will take from you” (John 16:20-22).

6. The Resurrection was attested by eyewitnesses. Paul lists many of those who saw the resurrected Jesus.

“Moreover, brethren, I declare to you the gospel which I preached to you, which also you received and in which you stand, by which also you are saved, if you hold fast that word which I preached to you—unless you believed in vain. For I delivered to you first of all that which I also received: that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures, and that He was buried, and that He rose again the third day according to the Scriptures, and that He was seen by Cephas, then by the twelve. After that He was seen by over five hundred brethren at once, of whom the greater part remain to the present, but some have fallen asleep. After that He was seen by James, then by all the apostles. Then last of all He was seen by me also, as by one born out of due time” (1 Cor 15:1-8).

7. The Resurrection demonstrated Jesus is the Son of God. Paul saw the Resurrection as proof-positive that Jesus was the Son of God.

“…concerning His Son Jesus Christ our Lord, who was born of the seed of David according to the flesh, and declared to be the Son of God with power according to the Spirit of holiness, by the resurrection from the dead” (Rom 1:3-4).

8. The Resurrection provides the basis for our salvation. Jesus went to the cross because of our sins and a wrath-bearing sacrifice was necessary. He was raised from the dead to provide for our justification or salvation.

“…It will be counted to us who believe in Him who raised from the dead Jesus our Lord, who was delivered up for our trespasses and raised for our justification” (Rom 4:24-25, ESV).

9. The Resurrection provides you the power to live a God-honoring life. The power of the Spirit that raised Jesus from the dead as demonstrated by the Resurrection is the same power that abides in you and gives you hope for true life change, which is living a life that honors God.

“But if the Spirit of Him who raised Jesus from the dead dwells in you, He who raised Christ from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies through His Spirit who dwells in you” (Rom 8:11).
“…and what is the exceeding greatness of His power toward us who believe, according to the working of His mighty power which He worked in Christ when He raised Him from the dead and seated Him at His right hand in the heavenly place…” (Eph 1:19-23; cf. Eph 3:20-21)).
“…that I may know Him and the power of His resurrection…” (Phil 3:10).

Change of Status

If Easter Happened Today....

...which is why He came "in the fullness of time" and not now.

Holy Week

9 Things You Should Know About Holy Week from Joe Carter

Holy Week is the week before Easter, a period which includes the religious holidays of Palm Sunday, Maundy Thursday, Good Friday, and Holy Saturday. Here's what you should know about the days that commemorate the Passion of Christ:

1. Holy Week observances likely began in Jerusalem in the earliest days of the church, though the term first appears in the writings of fourth century bishops, Athanasius, bishop of Alexandria, and Epiphanius, bishop of Constantia. Holy week does not include Easter Sunday.

2. The first recording of a Holy Week observance was made by Egeria, a Gallic woman who made a pilgrimage to the Holy Land about 381-384. In an account of her travels she wrote for a group of women back in Spain, Egeria describes the Palm Sunday she observed in Jerusalem:

. . . all the children who are [gathered at the top of the Mount of Olives], including those who are not yet able to walk because they are too young and therefore are carried on their parents' shoulders, all of them bear branches, some carrying palms, others, olive branches. And the bishop is led in the same manner as the Lord once was led.

3. Because of the difficulty in some parts of the world of procuring palms for Palm Sunday, leaves from yew, willow, olive, or other native trees are frequently used. The Sunday was often designated by the names of these trees, as Yew Sunday, or by the general term Branch Sunday.

4. An archaic and infrequently used name for the Wednesday before Easter is “Spy Wednesday”, named for Judas' becoming a spy for the Sanhedrin.

5. Maundy Thursday is the day before Good Friday. The term “Maundy” is derived from the Latin word mandatum (commandment). The term refers to the commandment given by Jesus at the Last Supper: “A new commandment I give to you, that you love one another: just as I have loved you, you also are to love one another.” (John 13:34)

6. The historical origins of the “Good” in Good Friday remain unclear, though some entomologists believe the term “good” is an archaic form of “holy.”

7. In Catholic and Eastern Orthodox traditions, Holy Saturday commemorates the “harrowing of hell,” the time between his Crucifixion and his Resurrection when Christ is believed to have descended into hell. Some Protestants, however, don't believe that Scripture warrants believing the claim, found in the Apostle's creed, that “[Christ] descended into hell.” As John Piper says, “there is no textual basis for believing that Christ descended into hell.”

8. In Medieval Europe, Christians would abstain from eating eggs and meat during Lent. Eggs laid during that time were often boiled to preserve them and were given as Easter gifts to children and servants. Some traditions claim the Easter egg is symbolic of the resurrection of Jesus, with the shell of the egg representing the sealed Tomb and cracking the shell representing the Resurrection. Christians in the Middle East and in Greece painted eggs bright red to symbolize the blood of Christ.

9. The Christian scholar Bede (673-735 AD, aka, the Venerable Bede) claimed in his book De Ratione Temporum that Easter was named after Eostre, a pagan goddess of the Saxon people in Northern Europe. Later scholars, however, claim that the term derives from the Anglo-Saxon word “oster”, meaning “to rise” or for their term for the Spring equinox, “Eostre.”

50 Shades of Easter

On February 20th I visited our local branch of the Books-A-Million book store chain, and saw this display (pictured to the right) just inside the front door. My immediate thought was "50 Shades of Grey to celebrate Easter? Really?' Within minutes I tweeted the picture to the Books-A-Million twitter account with the comment "Really, @BooksaMillion? Really? Your recommendation for Easter is 50 Shades of Grey? #50Shades For Easter? Really?"

Within 30 minutes they responded: "Thanks for bringing this to our attention! It appears there was a misunderstanding. Could you tell us which location this was?" When I informed them of the store location they responded again "Thank you, I'll pass this along to my team so that we can get this resolved." I was hopeful that the offensive display was a local choice, and that the corporate office would reverse it.

Six days later (yesterday) I stopped by to see if the display was still there. It was. I tweeted @BooksAMillion again: "A week later this display is still up. Will anything be done? Does Books-A-Million support associating Easter with 50 Shades?" So far I have not received any response. If I do, I will update this post to include that response.

I also posted the picture yesterday to the Facebook page of the local store in question, with the comment "Based on this display in your Jackson MS store, should we assume it is consistent with your company values to associate the Holy Day of Easter with porn? Please take this down." Their response to me as posted on Facebook was as follows:

"As I personally am inclined to agree with your view, I would happily take down this display. However, Books a Million corporate does not view E. L. James work as porn, nor does a vast percentage of Americans whom purchased the book and/or viewed the movie. It is BAM policy to display seasonal titles at the top of our ranks and top selling items beneath. We do apologize for any discomfort this pairing may have caused and invite you to make a complaint with our corporate offices at your earliest convenience"

Notice that I was not trying to get them to stop selling the books. I know every book store is selling the books. I only asked them to remove the display associating it with Easter. Whether or not the book is considered pornography (and I do so consider it), we should all be able to agree that promotion of the book is is not appropriate for celebrating the Resurrection of Christ .I appreciate the store representative saying that he/she agrees with me, but can only conclude from the comment that the chain management considers Easter to be only a "season," not a holy day, and that the company has no problem associating Easter with the 50 Shades books and movie.

If this matters to you, please keep this in mind when making book purchase decisions. I do not think I will not be purchasing any more books or other items at Books-A-Million,

Easter Greetings From Iranian Prison

From his prison hospital bed in Iran, American Pastor Saeed Abedini sent Easter greetings and prayers through a letter smuggled out by his wife:

Crucifying the resurrected “self” with Christ and resurrects our dead faith with Christ.

Happy Resurrection Day.

On the Eve of Good Friday and Easter I was praying from my hospital room for my fellow Christians in the world.  What the Holy Spirit revealed to me in prayer was that there are many dead faiths in the midst of Christians today. That Christians all over the world are not able to fully reach their spiritual potential that has been given to them as a gift by God so that in reaching that potential, the curtain can be removed and the Glory of God would be revealed.

Some times we want to experience the Glory and Resurrection with Jesus without experiencing death with Him.  We do not realize that unless we pass through the path of death with Christ, we are not able to experience resurrection with Christ.We want to have a good and successful marriage, career, education and family life (which is also God’s desire and plan for our life). But we forget that in order to experience the Resurrection and Glory of Christ we first have to experience death with Christ and to die to ourselves and selfish desires.

Jesus said to His Disciples:  “Whoever wants to be my disciple must deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me. (Matthew 16:24)

Let us continue to pray for our brother and his family, and for all persecuted Christians everywhere.

HT: Thinking Out loud

Everything Sad Comes Untrue

From @DailyKeller

Colony of Heaven

Some great N. T. Wright quotes for Easter:

“Jesus's resurrection is the beginning of God's new project not to snatch people away from earth to heaven but to colonize earth with the life of heaven. That, after all, is what the Lord's Prayer is about.”

― N. T. Wright, Surprised by Hope: Rethinking Heaven, the Resurrection, and the Mission of the Church


“Easter was when Hope in person surprised the whole world by coming forward from the future into the present.” 

― N. T. Wright, Surprised by Hope: Rethinking Heaven, the Resurrection, and the Mission of the Church

First Day of the New Creation

One of the Best Easter Quotes Ever! 

On the third day the friends of Christ coming at daybreak to the place found the grave empty and the stone rolled away. In varying ways they realized the new wonder; but even they hardly realized that the world had died in the night. What they were looking at was the first day of a new creation, with a new heaven and a new earth; and in a semblance of the gardener God walked again in the garden, in the cool not of the evening but the dawn.

- G. K. Chesterton,  The Everlasting Man

HT:  Randy, Vitamin Z

Where to Park

Celebrating Ascension Day

Are you celebrating "Ascension Day"? Maybe we all should celebrate today. From Jared Wilson:

Today is Ascension Day, traditionally marked on the 40th day after Easter Sunday. The doctrine of Christ’s ascension has many implications. Here are just five.

1. Jesus is really alive.

The reality of Christ’s ascension, inextricable from the resurrection event, tells us that he did not raise from the dead only later to die again like Lazarus, Jairus’ daughter, the widow of Nain’s son, Eutychus, or Tabitha. Jesus’ body will not be found because he took its glorified tangibility to heaven.

2. Heaven is thicker than earth.

We tend to think of heaven as the ethereal place of disembodied spirits. And in a way it is. But Elijah is there. And Enoch. And so is the risen, glorified, incarnate Christ. Jesus is there, taking up material space. He is touchable, present. Clearly, heaven is not less real than earth but more. It is a thicker reality than our four-dimensional space, more vibrant, more colorful, more real.

3. God’s plan for human dominion of earth is being realized.

The first Adam and his helper Eve were charged with filling the earth and subduing it. They screwed it up. But God’s plans cannot be thwarted. Man will reflect God’s glory in dominion over creation. In the Incarnation, then, God sends his only Son to right the course, reverse the curse, and begin the restoration of all things. The second Adam does the job, and even in his glorification, the incarnational “miracle of addition” (see below) persists, fulfilling God’s plan for man to reflect divine glory in dominion over creation. The God-Man, who is the radiance of the glory of God, rules over the earth and is even now subduing his enemies. “The ascension means that a human being rules the universe” (Tim Keller). Just as God planned.

Risen!

Our World Prison is Split

The Third Day
The immovable stone tossed aside,
The collapsed linens,
The blinding angel and the chalky guards:All today like an old wood-cut.
The earthquake on the third day,
The awakened sleeper,
The ubiquitous stranger, gardener, fisherman:
Faded frescoes from a buried world.
Retell, renew the event
In these planetary years,
For we were there and he is here:
It is always the third day.
Our world-prison is split;
An elder charity
Breaks through these modern fates.
Publish it by Telstar,
Diffuse it by mundovision.
He passes through the shattered concrete slabs,
The vaporized vanadium vaults,
The twisted barbed-wire trestles.
A charity coeval with the suns
Dispels the deep obsessions of the age
And opens heart-room in our sterile dream:
A new space within space to celebrate
With mobiles and new choreographies,
A new time within time to set to music.
— Amos Niven Wilder
(NT Scholar and brother of Thornton Wilder)

Hat Tip: The Anchoress

From Good Friday to Easter Sunday

From my Easter weekend Twitter feed:

 A Good Lord went through a Bad thing on Good Friday for Bad people in order to make us Bad people Good. #GoodFriday @bg_simmons

Remember that what appears to be Hope dashed is actually Love poured out. Redemption is sneaky like that. #GoodFriday RT @JamieTheVWM

If you're God's child, you don't have to fear never measuring up. Jesus perfectly measured up on your behalf. RT @idshift

The solution to sins slavery is not to sin less; the solution to sins slavery is the cross of Christ that kills the sinner. RT @pastortullian

"The resurrection was God’s way of stamping PAID IN FULL right across history so that nobody could miss it." RT @DailyKeller

For Christians, funerals are not goodbye - just "so long, see you in the morning." #resurrection @bg_simmons

"The resurrection was God’s way of stamping PAID IN FULL right across history so that nobody could miss it." RT @DailyKeller

Every other religion says "just do it." Jesus says "It is done." @bg_simmons

Easter - The ultimate reboot: CTRL-ALT-DEL for the universe. #Easter @bg_simmons

The Promise of Our Future

The promise of our future is found in an empty tomb.  He is not there. He is Risen....He is Risen Indeed!

Therefore, we will rise also. Death is defeated,; it no longer has its sting.

Wishing you a blessed and joyous Easter Sunday.

Hat Tip for Picture: Cross-Eyed

Hear the Bells Ringing....!

Easter Song by "Second Chapter of Acts" - One of my favorite songs from the "Jesus Music" era of the 1970's

Enjoy!

Dance Your Shoes Off...Again

This was big on the internet last year at Easter. Hey, I think it is wonderful enough to bring back this year.

Enjoy. Celebrate. And DANCE!

Redemption Video

Good little video from a church's (South Hills Evangelical Church, Missoula, Montana) Easter 2011 celebration, entitled "He Has Sent Redemption."  Well done!

Hat Tip: Challies Dot Com

Cast Off Clothes Left Behind

This is the poem engraved on the tomb of C.S. Lewis' wife, Joy Davidman Lewis.

"Here the whole world (stars, water, air
And field, and forest as they were
Reflected in a single mind)
Like cast off clothes was left behind
In ashes, yet with hope that she,
Re-born from holy poverty,
In lenten lands, hereafter may
Resume them on her Easter Day."

Because of the first Easter, all who are in Christ can look forward to our own future Easter resurrection. He is Risen - He is Risen Indeed!

Hat Tip: The Gospel-Driven Church: The Easter Day to Come