The Meaning of the Resurrection (Part 16)

After the 40 days of Easter were over, the apostles were new men: indeed, utterly transformed, and on-fire with the new faith that nothing — not even death itself — could ever separate them from the love of Jesus Christ (Rom 8:38-39). God had clearly shown the greatness of His merciful love for humanity by conquering death itself, in the person of His Son. As the apostle St. Peter wrote (I Pet 1:3-4):

Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ! By His great mercy we have been born anew to a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead, and to an inheritance which is imperishable, undefiled, and unfading, kept in heaven for you.

Similarly, the apostle St. Paul taught the early Christians that because Jesus was risen on Easter morning we have an eternal hope beyond compare (Rom 8:17): “I consider that the sufferings of this present time are not worth comparing with the glory that is to be revealed in us.” And in II Corinthians 4:17-18 he promised: “For this slight momentary affliction is preparing for us an eternal weight of glory beyond all comparison.” This is far more than just a reasonable hope for some kind of immortality of the soul after death (that many of the ancient Greek and Roman philosophers believed in). It is a promise of new life beyond imagining for those who live in union with the risen Son.

The teachings of the apostles on the great miracle of the Resurrection of Jesus Christ can be quickly summarized in five points: one day (1) we shall be with Him, (2) we shall be like Him, and (3) we shall have “glory;” (4) If Jesus is risen then His death was not a tragedy, but part and parcel of God’s triumphant strategy for winning the ultimate victory over sin and guilt, suffering and death, and (5) Christ’s resurrection vindicates His claim that the Kingdom of God is dawning on the world through Him.

As I wrote for another series on this website, God and Human Suffering :

First, on the basis of Easter we can know that if we entrust our hearts and lives to His care, in repentance and faith, then we shall always be with Him, just as Jesus Himself promised to his disciples in John 14:

In my Father’s house are many rooms; if it were not so, would I have told you that I go and prepare a place for you? And when I go and prepare a place for you I will come again and receive you to myself, that where I am you may be also. (Jn 14:2-3)

The resurrection confirms that these promises from Jesus are true (presumably, one can trust the promises of someone whom God raises from the dead!).

Second, because of Easter, we can know that everyone who lives in union with Christ Jesus will become like Him forever. In other words, just as Jesus was not raised as a disembodied spirit — a mere ghost (see Lk 24:37-43) — but in the fullness of His humanity, body and soul, so we now have the assurance that we too will be raised to heavenly life in the fullness of our humanity. As St. Paul wrote in Philippians 3:20-21: “Our commonwealth is in heaven, and from it we await a Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ, who will change our lowly body to be like his glorious body, by the power which enables him to subject all things to himself.”

Third, because of Easter, the New Testament promises that those who live in union with Christ Jesus will one day share His “glory.” Without a doubt, glory is an awesome word, for it means, on the one hand, “rightful honor”— in other words, that one day Christ will turn to His disciples and honor us by saying “Well done, good and faithful servants” (Mt 25:21, 23). Of course, He will say it “with a twinkle in His eye,” because He knows (as we do, in our heart of hearts) that any and all the good we could ever do could only come from His grace prompting, assisting, and guiding us every step of the way.

And then “glory” has a further, more wonderful and mysterious meaning. To share His glory means to be so immersed in the loving radiance of God that, just as the risen Son was, so we too, one day, can become by his Spirit: “strong, radiant, wise, beautiful, and drenched in joy” (C.S. Lewis).

We begin to experience that joy of sharing in Christ’s glory whenever our hearts become fully surrendered to Him in complete trust. Although that joy has its fullness only in heaven, it begins even now, whenever we turn to our merciful Lord and say from our hearts the simple words found at the bottom of the image of the risen Savior (called, in the Catholic world, the Image of the Divine Mercy): “Jesus, I trust in You.”

Furthermore, the Resurrection of Jesus shines a light back upon all that Jesus said and did — and especially on his death on the Cross. If Jesus is risen, then the Cross was not a tragic defeat, but an important and vital part of God’s plan for the salvation of the world. The risen Lord guided his apostles to search the Scriptures for the true meaning of his death and resurrection: “Was it not necessary that the Christ should suffer these things, and enter into his glory?” (Lk 24:26). On the one hand, the Cross shows us that the Son of God was willing to walk with us through all the sorrows and sufferings that we must endure in this fallen world. As the prophet Isaiah had said:

He was despised and rejected by men,

A man of sorrows and acquainted with grief….

Surely he has borne our griefs,

And carried our sorrows. (Is 53:4)

But The divine Son of God came not only to identify with our sufferings, and share our pains and sorrows. He also went to the Cross to lift our burden of guilt, to take away our moral debt to God’s justice because of our sins. He came to pay the penalty on our behalf, and thereby free us from that ball-and-chain of guilt that weighs down our conscience. That’s why the prophet Isaiah also wrote (53:5-6):

He was wounded for our transgressions,

he was bruised for our iniquities;

upon him was the chastisement that made us whole,

and by his stripes we healed.

All we like sheep have gone astray;

We have turned every one to his own way,

And the Lord has laid on him the iniquity of us all.

Finally, if Jesus is risen, then His Kingdom is truly breaking into the world through His own ministry, as he promised, and cannot be defeated by evil and death. The Resurrection therefore validates the central message of Jesus’ preaching: the dawning of the Kingdom has begun in Him.

How can we join with Him in bringing this Kingdom to fruition, “on earth as it is in heaven” (Mt 6:10)? In her book Understanding the Christian Faith, Protestant author Georgia Harkness gives us some clues to this mystery:

The best analogy for our relation to the Kingdom is not that of a builder, but the sower of whom Jesus spoke in one of his greatest parables. It is our job to sow the seed, and if possible, to remove the rocks and thorns that choke it; it is God who brings forth the fruit from the ground, some thirty, some sixty, and some a hundredfold.

We can sow the seed by spreading the gospel of grace and everlasting life through Jesus Christ, and living it together in love, day by day, making the community of Christ’s followers a light to the nations (Is 49:6). We can remove the rocks and thorns that choke the growth of God’s Kingdom on earth by working to eradicate those social injustices that cripple, hamper, and warp human lives, and darken the human spirit.

The sun and the spring rains, however, come only from the grace of God. He is the one who causes the seeds we have sown to grow: “Fear not little flock,” Jesus said, “for it is the Father’s good pleasure to give you the kingdom (Lk 12:32). Saint Paul wrote: “Thanks be to God, who gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ” (I Cor 15:57). In other words, by the Holy Spirit He works in, through, over, and above our best efforts, in a world that springs from Him, is sustained by Him, and belongs to Him.

Moreover, He will speak the final word of the human story at the end of time, sending His Son Jesus again to claim this world as his own domain. This too is an absolutely free gift of God’s grace (see Mk 13:1-37). Thus, just as the story of Jesus began with the free gift from above of God’s Son, our Savior, born of a Virgin in Bethlehem, so the consummation of God’s Kingdom will be freely given to all the world, and especially to those who open their hearts in faith, hope and love to receive it.

Next Time: The End of the World and the Final Coming of God’s Kingdom

Robert Stackpole, STD

© 2020, Mere Christian Fellowship