He is not here—he has risen, just as he said.
by Loren Seibold, AT Executive Editor
He is not here—he has risen, just as he said.
I believe that the above words are the most consequential words ever spoken.
“He is not here—he has risen” was said of a dead man. A man who was totally, thoroughly dead—whose heart had ceased beating, whose brain cells had died, whose every bodily function had ceased—was fully restored to life again!
Resurrection was contemplated by a few in the Old Testament—think of Job’s astonishing assertion:
“I know that my Redeemer lives, And at the last He will take His stand on the earth. Even after my skin is destroyed, Yet from my flesh I shall see God; Whom I myself shall behold, And whom my eyes will see and not another (19:25-27).
Or the prophet Daniel’s expectation:
“And many of those who sleep in the dust of the earth shall awake, some to everlasting life…” (12:2).
But it is Jesus who makes this hope into reality. He died—died completely—and was, by the power of God, made alive again.
There is no teaching that so perfectly captures the joyful hope of Christianity. Not our various theologies of salvation or the incarnation, not the Ten Commandments, not even the second coming of Jesus.
Because this is the teaching that beats back our greatest fear: the fear of ceasing to be in death. Here, the angel says, it actually happened: a completely dead man came alive. And if one dead man came alive, then it can happen again—and again and again. In Paul’s words, “the dead in Christ shall rise” and “we which are alive and remain shall be caught up together with them in the clouds, to meet the Lord in the air: and so shall we ever be with the Lord.”
The mission of Adventist Today is to bring you hope: to assure you that for all the problems in the church and in the world, the power of God can defeat all of them, including death itself.
Of course there is more to death than physical death. Some, while fully alive in the body, suffer the death of relationships, the death of happiness, the death of hope, the death of identity.
Easter is the time to remember that the living Lord can enter into all the places in our lives where there is death, and bring hope back to life.
Adventist Today is here to share this resurrection hope with readers. We invite you to support AT’s Spring Fundraiser, ensuring this vital work continues.
