By Call of Love Ministries On April 06, 2023
Reflecting on Jesus’ sacrifice should not end as the “Easter season” ends. In fact, the time to celebrate Jesus’ resurrection is not supposed to be contained to one month or season, because the implications of those world-altering three days affect us and our relationship with God forever!
Yes, it is easy for us to lose the excitement or awe of Jesus’s resurrection in the business and repetitiveness of our lives, especially if we grew up hearing the story. It is important to remind ourselves what Jesus’ resurrection means, so that we don’t lose sight of what our faith is based on.
Not only does reflecting on this help our relationship with Jesus, but it allows us to keep the Great Commission in its top priority place in our lives as we meet new people, Muslims and non-Muslims who may have never heard the greatest story of all, how God loved us so much that He died and rose again!
Jesus lives
1 Peter 1:3: "Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who according to His great mercy has caused us to be born again to a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead…”
Jesus is risen from the dead! After willingly going to the cross and dying at the hands of the Roman Empire through one of the most torturous and horrible deaths in history, He rose again and lived on Earth for another 40 days. We know that we get to spend the rest of eternity with Him too, the Jesus who died and rose again.
Jesus reigns
Colossians 1:13-14: "For He rescued us from the domain of darkness, and transferred us to the kingdom of His beloved Son, in whom we have redemption, the forgiveness of sins."
Romans 6:8-12: "Now if we have died with Christ, we believe that we shall also live with Him, knowing that Christ, having been raised from the dead, is never to die again; death no longer is master over Him. For the death that He died, He died to sin once for all; but the life that He lives, He lives to God. Even so consider yourselves to be dead to sin, but alive to God in Christ Jesus.”
Jesus is our Lord and Savior! Quite literally, He is the Lord of the earth who has dominion over sin and darkness and death. Sometimes we forget the amazing glory of Jesus when we focus on His humanity too much, but that’s the amazing part– He is fully God and He became fully human like us but without sin.
Jesus is working in our lives
Luke 9:23: "And He was saying to them all, ‘If anyone wishes to come after Me, he must deny himself, and take up his cross daily and follow Me.’"
When we begin to live our new life in Christ, we go through a death to our old self and a resurrection of our new spirit– but because we are still on this side of heaven, we have to deliberately and daily die to our old flesh, just like Peter writes in 2 Peter 2:24:
“... and He Himself bore our sins in His body on the cross, so that we might die to sin and live to righteousness; for by His wounds you were healed.”
Living a resurrected life is both permanent and ongoing. Permanent because there is nothing that can come between us and God once we are under the blood of Jesus. Ongoing because we still live in this world so we must continually choose to live sacrificially to glorify Him in our lives until we reach our final home with our Lord.
Jesus wants a relationship with us
Revelation 3:20: “Behold, I stand at the door and knock; if anyone hears My voice and opens the door, I will come in to him and will dine with him, and he with Me.”
Ephesians 3:11-12 “...in Christ Jesus our Lord, in whom we have boldness and confident access through faith in Him.”
The verse from Revelation gives us an intimate image, sitting and eating with our Lord. The imagery of eating food with someone has always been used to signify relationships and closeness. He died so that all of humanity would no longer be separated from God by their sins but have close fellowship that will last for eternity, if we accept the invitation He gives to each of us.
Don’t let the awe of Jesus’ resurrection leave your heart even though Easter has passed us. Now that we’ve reminded our hearts of the significance of Jesus’ resurrection, here are some resources to help you share it!
Prayer
Dear Lord, thank you for sending your Son to die on a cross and rise again. Give me the wisdom to see an opportunity to share this with my Muslim friend. Please open up their hearts to hear the truth and receive it. Thank you for your everlasting love. Amen.
