God chose Jesus Christ to be the One who would die for the sins of the world. He enabled Christ through the power of His Holy Spirit to do all that He did. He gave Him the authority to do all that He did. He traveled around doing good and healing all the people that the devil was oppressing, because God was with Him.
Christ, the Son of God, who was chosen, empowered, and authorized by God, loved us enough to die for us on the cross for our sins in fulfillment of what God had promised centuries ago would happen. On the cross, the soldiers came to break His legs, but did not do so because He was already dead. After that, one of the soldiers put a spear through His side and blood and water came out; this outpouring was certain proof that He really was dead.
Someone else removed His dead body from the cross and prepared His body for burial by wrapping it with 75 pounds of linen cloth and spices. He was then buried in a tomb. At the mouth of the tomb, they rolled a huge boulder. The tomb was then sealed with a seal all the way around it. Finally, Roman guards, who on penalty of death were commanded to guard the tomb, were stationed around the tomb.
On the third day, the Father through His Spirit raised His Son from the dead. Jesus Christ of the seed of David was raised from the dead in fulfillment of what God had predicted and promised centuries ago would take place.
Many different people at different times over a 40-day period saw the One who was the Son of God with power. He appeared to those people whom God had specifically chosen beforehand that they would see His Son after He had raised Him from the dead.
That risen Christ appeared to people whose lives were forever changed after they saw Him alive from the dead. He appeared to Peter who just a few days before had denied three times that he knew Him. Yet, shortly after He appeared to Peter, Peter was boldly preaching His resurrection.
Christ then appeared to the Twelve, and soon after that appearance, they all were witnessing to His resurrection from the dead. After that, over 500 people saw that risen Christ at the same time. Most of them were still alive when the Apostles were preaching that God had raised Him from the dead. Had they wanted to do so, people could have consulted them to see if they really had seen Christ alive from the dead.
Jesus appeared last of all to Paul the Apostle. He was not seeking Christ before that point. After God was pleased to reveal His Son to Paul one day, he gave his whole life to tell people the good news that Jesus Christ has been raised from the dead. Paul went from being a persecutor of Christians to being a preacher of Christ because of the fact that Christ appeared to Paul after God had raised Him from the dead.
All the Jewish and Roman authorities would have had to do to stop Christianity from spreading would have been to provide the body. They would have destroyed that infant movement had they been able to produce the body. They, however, could not do it because His body was not there. He had risen from the dead, just as He promised He would!
God demands all people everywhere not to think any longer that He is like the numerous objects of worship that men through their imagination and art have made out of gold, silver, stone, and other things. He now commands everyone everywhere to repent and believe His Gospel concerning His Son, the One whom He has made both Lord and Christ.
God commands this repentance and faith in the risen Christ because He has appointed a day in which He is going to judge all the living and the dead through that Man whom He has appointed, His Son, the Christ of God. God has appointed that Christ to be the Judge of the living and the dead, and He has furnished proof to all men that He is going to judge all people through that Man by raising Him from the dead.
Because God has done all this, He commands people to completely change their thinking about Him and do works fitting for repentance. He wants them to repent and to be baptized in the name of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of sins. He is the Lord of all.
The Father sent His Son, Jesus Christ, to be the Savior of the world. He made Jesus who was sinless to be sin for us so that we might be made the righteousness of God in Him. Through Him, God wants you to be reconciled to Himself.
Jesus is alive today and wants to save you. As Judge and Savior, He will save you if you will repent, believe the gospel, and confess Him as Lord. Anyone who calls on the name of the Lord Jesus Christ will be saved.
Call on Him as Lord, believing that God has raised Him from the dead, and ask Him for the forgiveness of all of your sins!
Copyright © 2011-2024 by Rajesh Gandhi. All rights reserved.
