Consider This: The Power of the Resurrection

Thirty years after Peter looked into the empty tomb, he thought about the blessings that the resurrection brings to us. Inspired by the Spirit, here is what he wrote.

“Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ! In his great mercy, he has given us new birth into a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead, and into an inheritance that can never perish, spoil or fade. This inheritance is kept in heaven for you” (1 Peter 1:3-4)

The resurrection deals with our past by giving us “new birth” into a new life. In other words, we can start again. We can bury our past sins, mistakes, and regrets and be born again. That pattern is what baptism represents. “Don’t you know that all of us who were baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into his death? We were therefore buried with him through baptism into death in order that, just as Christ was raised from the dead through the glory of the Father, we too may live a new life” (Romans 6:3-4). Because of the death, burial and resurrection of Jesus, we can be in a position where God “remembers our sins no more” (Hebrews 10:17).

The resurrection also deals with our future by giving us access to an “inheritance that can never perish, spoil, or fade… kept in heaven for you”. Jesus said he would go and prepare a place for us (John 14:1-4). In this new home, “There will be no more death or mourning or crying or pain, for the old order of things has passed away” (Revelation 21:4).

Lastly, because of the resurrection, our present days can be filled with a “living (or unending) hope”. If Jesus defeated death, what else can harm or threaten us? “If God is for us, who can be against us?” (Romans 8:31). We can face anything because the same power that raised Jesus from the dead lives in us by his Spirit (Romans 8:11).

These gifts, Peter says, are because of “His (God’s) great mercy… and the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead”. Jesus paid our debt at the cross, but he secured our hope at the resurrection.

The women who went to the tomb that morning thought they found nothing. In fact, they found everything we need.

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