Preparing Our Hearts for Easter: Day 35 – the Resurrection

An article by Frank    No Comments

In the lead up to (and during) Easter we have been putting up a new lent devotion each week day. These devotions are also available in the discussions section of our Facebook page and have been played on New Zealand’s Rhema.

The Lord is risen. He is risen indeed!

The resurrection of Jesus was an amazing new beginning. Evil had been defeated through the cross and death no longer held its sting. In the resurrection of Jesus, a whole new world became visible – here was the first fruit of a new creation where evil, death, sin and suffering have no place.

It is the resurrection of Jesus that informs our efforts for a better world. It is the resurrection of Jesus that gives reason to the sacrifice and service we pursue because it tells us that we’re not simply trying to make things temporarily better, but that we’re feeding a new world with better values – a world where the oppressed find freedom, where tears are not shed, where no-one goes hungry or thirsty and where everyone is valued – a world that God will ultimately bring into full reality.

It is the promise of a new world inherent in the risen Christ that compels us to not be complacent, to not just accept that this is how it is. It is the resurrection that stops us from sticking our heads in the sand.

It is the resurrection that confronts the false promises of utopia in the world around us and says that real hope lies in the promises of God, in the reality of that death conquering event. The resurrection tells us there is no reason to fear evil when we are faced with it and that while we may feel naturally apprehensive, evil has been overcome. We have been shown a way to live a new reality.

While this may sound a little vague and somewhat lofty, it is the magnitude of the new reality present in the resurrection that is entirely worth spending our lives considering. The good news of the gospel did not stop at the cross, but find’s its culmination in the resurrection and the promises of that new world. Let’s live the way of that new reality.

Pray

Jesus – we recognize you as the risen Lord and we thank you that the promises you have given are not empty. Give us the vision to live in those promises.

Amen