Sermon Excerpt from Rob Fields
What is the importance of the resurrection of Christ? Does it make all the difference in the world between other religions? Does it have any bearings on the point of looking for the Messiah still?
There are several reasons why the resurrection was necessary, and we shall consider some of them.
1 Paul, a servant of Christ Jesus, called to be an apostle and set apart for the gospel of God–
2 the gospel he promised beforehand through his prophets in the Holy Scriptures
3 regarding his Son, who as to his human nature was a descendant of David,
4 and who through the Spirit of holiness was declared with power to be the Son of God by his resurrection from the dead: Jesus Christ our Lord. – Romans 1:1-4
The resurrection of Christ was necessary to prove that Jesus Christ was who He claimed to be.
Our Lord had clearly claimed to be the Son of God, which was the reason why the religious leaders conspired to kill Him (cf. John 19:7). The resurrection was God’s proof that the Lord Jesus was Who He claimed to be: the Son of God: Who was declared with power to be the Son of God by the resurrection from the dead, according to the Spirit of holiness, Jesus Christ our Lord. I don’t need to look for another because the verification came from God that Jesus Christ was the One who would give mankind hope.
The resurrection of Christ was necessary to prove that Jesus Christ had accomplished what He had promised.
The death of our Lord alone would not have sufficed, since it is by our identification with Him in His death, burial, and resurrection that we are saved. In 1 Corinthians chapter 15, that great resurrection chapter of the New Testament, Paul argues that apart from Christ’s resurrection, we would have no hope: In his message at Pentecost, Peter taught that the resurrection of Christ by the Father (through the Holy Spirit) was God’s vindication of His Son, His message, and His work:
“This Man, delivered up by the predetermined plan and foreknowledge of God, you nailed to a cross by the hands of godless men and put Him to death. And God raised Him up again, putting an end to the agony of death, since it was impossible for Him to be held in its powers. . . .
This Jesus God raised up again, to which we are all witnesses. Therefore having been exalted to the right hand of God, and having received from the Father the promise of the Holy Spirit, He has poured forth this which you both see and hear. . . . Therefore let all the house of Israel know for certain that God has made Him both Lord and Christ–this Jesus whom you crucified” (Acts 2:23-24, 32-33, 36).
The resurrection was a necessary in order to fulfill biblical prophecy.
In Acts chapter 2 Peter argued that the resurrection was biblically necessary, citing David’s words in Psalm 16:10: “Because Thou wilt not abandon my soul to Hades, Nor allow Thy Holy One to undergo decay” (Acts 2:27; cf. 13:33). Peter argued from Psalm 16 that David could not have referred to himself, but rather to his Son, Messiah, whom God would raise from the dead. The Old Testament Scriptures were understood by the apostles to foretell the resurrection of Christ. The resurrection of Christ was thus a biblical necessity.
The resurrection of Christ was also a logical necessity.
In his message in the second chapter of Acts, Peter also contended that the resurrection of Christ, the Messiah, was a logical as well as a biblical necessity. “And God raised Him up again, putting an end to the agony of death, since it was impossible for Him to be held in its power” (Acts 2:24). Peter argued here that it is impossible for God to remain in the grave and to decay, as men do. By virtue of being God, Christ could not have been left in that tomb, dead.
The resurrection of Christ is vital because it is a necessary element of a saving faith.
In both the Old and the New Testaments, a saving faith was a faith in a God’s who could and would raise men from the dead. A careful study of the 11th chapter of Hebrews will indicate that the faith of Old Testament saints was a resurrection faith. Jesus said, “I am the resurrection and the life; he who believes in Me shall live even if he dies, and everyone who lives and believes in Me shall never die. Do you believe this?” (John 11:25-26) The apostle Paul wrote: . . . if you confess with your mouth Jesus as Lord, and believe in your heart that God raised Him from the dead, you shall be saved (Rom. 10:9). Personal faith in the resurrection of Christ is therefore necessary because it is a vital element in a faith that leads to salvation.
The resurrection of Jesus has robbed the last enemy of its fangs.
56 The sting of death is sin, and the power of sin is the law.
57 But thanks be to God! He gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ.
1 Cor 15:56-57 (NIV)
The unpleasantness of dying remains, but the fear of what lies beyond death’s wall is gone.
Christ shared in our “humanity so that by his death he might destroy him who holds the power of death–that is, the devil–15 and free those who all their lives were held in slavery by their fear of death. Heb 2:15 (NIV)
The resurrection of Christ allows man to rise as a new man to live a new life.
The old self and old man died with Christ on the cross. His resurrection allows us to rise as a new creation, new man, new self in Christ.
Read Romans 6:1-14