The Resurrection

I. “His sepulchre shall be glorious” (Isa. xi. 10). The extremity of Christ’s abasement is the first beginning of His glory. Everything had appeared to be at an end. The shepherd was stricken and the flock dispersed (Zach. xiii. 7). One more was added to the multitude of lost causes. Evil had again triumphed over good. Satan and his instruments on earth were jubilant. Pilate was uneasy, but relieved that all was over. The chief priests felt that Judaism had escaped from the greatest peril that as yet had threatened it, and that it had taken a new lease of existence. The believers in Jesus had lost all heart; His name was to them no more than a memory of a disappointment, an illusion perhaps. There was only one who kept the faith in the silence of her heart, the Mother of Jesus. The tension of men’s minds was relaxing; when suddenly the rumour ran that the Dead had risen, and evidence accumulated that He had been seen alive. Dread and awe and despair invaded the minds of Herod and Pilate, Pharisees and Chief Priests. Satan perceived that he was conquered at the moment of his greatest success. Never had there been so sudden and complete a revulsion, such a victory for the cause of God. That cause is yours. That history repeats itself continually in each man’s life, and in the Church. To all the followers of Jesus will come similar disappointments and similar triumphs. Give glory to your Lord.

II. “Thou wilt not leave My soul in hell; nor wilt Thou give Thy Holy One to see corruption” (Ps. xv. 10). The Resurrection was the necessary termination of Our Lord’s Passion. Death could not hold dominion over the Son of God. The Sacred Body, elevated by its union with the Divinity, could not pass through corruption into dust. These things are necessary stages in our evolution, in order that all which is of sin in us may be eradicated, and our bodies re-formed afresh, adapted to the conditions of heavenly life. In Our Lord’s case, it would have been a retrogression, an undoing of the work of God, a recalling of His gift, if, after matter and human nature had completed their cycle by being united with the Divinity, this union had been broken by the return of the Sacred Body to original dust. Further, as being our true Life, and as being Lord of life and death, Jesus necessarily triumphed over death; and His triumph was more manifest in His submitting to death and rising from it by His own power, than if He had not undergone it. Again, it was the fitting reward merited by Our Lord’s unparalleled sufferings. “According to the multitude of My sorrows in My heart, Thy comforts have given joy to My soul” (Ps. xciii. 19). Congratulate with Our Lord on His supremacy over the universal domination of death. Thank Him that He will make its domination over you only temporary, and that He will grant you one day to rise superior to it.

III. Our Lord’s Resurrection was necessary on our account as well. 

1. It established the faith of the Apostles, and through them of all mankind in His Divinity; and it gave them the energy to propagate His religion. “…Predestinated Son of God in power, according to the Spirit of sanctification, by the resurrection of Our Lord Jesus Christ from the dead” (Rom. i. 4). 

2. It confirms our confidence, by showing that no obstacles of violence or fraud, no sophisms of incredulity, can cause one iota of His words to fail. He, and His Church, and His elect will in like manner triumph over the world, the flesh, and the devil. 

3. It is the assurance of our resurrection and glory. “Christ is risen from the dead, the first-fruits of them that sleep. … And as in Adam all die, so also in Christ all shall be made alive” (1 Cor. xv. 20, 22). You can hardly calculate the immense influence that the Resurrection of Christ has on your life and your happiness. It gives you a definite certainty as to the hereafter, it is the solution of the most urgent problems of humanity, it is your comfort and strength in life and death.