Easter is a day of celebration for Christians all over the World.  They greet one another that day by calling out, “He is risen!” and the joyful answer comes back, “He is risen indeed!”

Jesus’ excruciating death would have been in vain if He had not come back from the dead.  Without the resurrection, Jesus would have taken His place among the tragic martyrs of history who suffered and died at the hands of cruel tyrants.  But the resurrection changed all of that.

And it really happened.  Jesus came back in a new body – a spiritual body able to materialize in the middle of a closed room and then disappear from sight; to eat a meal and have real flesh-and-blood wounds examined by skeptical disciples, yet be transported into heaven in an instant; a new body that was immortal, one that would never grow old or die again.

What is crucial to understand is that if Christ had not been raised from the dead, then our faith would be worthless.  Christianity is the only religion where the founder/leader isn’t in his tomb.  Christ really did come alive after His death!

Proof?  For one thing, all the disciples were in hiding, scared to death that they would be marched off and killed too.  Something had to change them from being terrified and fearful men to being men on fire, preaching Christ everywhere even when thrown in jail, beaten and whipped.  What changed them was seeing Christ resurrected!

Also, many people saw Jesus crucified, dead and buried and then alive again:  the women who came to the tomb early that morning to anoint His body; the disciples when Jesus came in their room and when they ate fish with Him on the beach.  And historical notes showed that Jesus was seen by over 500 people throughout the 40 days he was on earth before His ascension!

So what happens when we die?  We will also be resurrected!  Resurrection by the power of God is the greatest miracle and the future for every Christian believer.  The perishable changed into imperishable.  We will then be like Jesus, for we shall see Him as He Is (I John 3:2).

This is our hope!  He is risen indeed!

Manna from Heaven

“I declare to you, brothers, that flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God, nor does the perishable inherit the imperishable.  Listen, I tell you a mystery:  We will not all sleep, but we will all be changed – in a flash, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trumpet.  For the trumpet will sound, the dead will be raised imperishable, and we will be changed” (I Corinthians 15:50-52 NIV)

Action Plan

Are you for sure going to heaven?  If you have any doubt whether or not you will go to heaven with Jesus, then pray right now to Him:

1. Ask Jesus to forgive you of all your sins.
2. Ask Him to come into your life and be your Lord and      Savior.
3. Believe in your heart, by faith, that God has saved      you!

“That if you confess with your mouth, ‘Jesus is Lord,’ and believe in your heart that God raised Him from the dead, you will be saved.”  Romans 10:9