God's resurrection power is immensely happy because death is so very tragic. You can't truly celebrate the resurrection until you think for a moment about the reality of sin and the inevitability of death.
Scripture Focus: John 11:17-26; John 5:28-29
"Truly, truly, I say to you, an hour is coming in which all who are in the tombs will hear His voice and will come forth; those who did the good deeds to a resurrection of life, those who committed the evil deeds to a resurrection of judgment."
Here's something you need to understand: According to Scripture, biological death is not the end of existence for anyone. It is not the end. Every man knows they're going to live forever. That's why every religion, at its base, you find immortality—their thoughts, their beliefs, their convictions about the afterlife.
Ecclesiastes 3:11 says "God has put eternity into the heart of men." There's something that God has hardwired within you so that when I say, you were made for eternity, there's part of you inside that goes, "Yeah, that checks out. I believe that." Even those of you who try to deny that and suppress that truth find that no matter how hard you try to suppress that reality, it keeps coming back up. It's like a coiled spring.
The Bible says every man will spend eternity in one of two places. For those who believe in the Lord Jesus Christ—that He died and that He rose from the grave—they will go immediately to the presence of the Lord. And for such people, Revelation says, "Blessed are those who die in the Lord." The moment they die, their faith becomes sight, death becomes gain, and to be absent from the body is to be present with the Lord.
And for those who do not believe in the Lord Jesus Christ, they go, the Bible says, immediately to hell.
I know that's not culturally palatable. But it doesn't matter what's more or less palatable to our human ears. What matters is what Jesus, who rose from the grave, declares. And this is part of the reason why He begs and pleads with people in John 8:24, "Unless you believe that I am He, you will die in your sins."
Jesus is not saying, "It doesn't matter to me. Ball's in your court. See if I care." No. He says, "Do not die in your sin!" There's a reason why Paul says we are ambassadors and we plead and we implore people on behalf of God to be reconciled to God (2 Cor. 5:15-21)—because every single person in your life and in this world is going to spend eternity in one of two places: heaven with the Lord or hell, separated from the presence of God, separated from His goodness.
There is no such thing as purgatory.
Death is man's greatest enemy. And the story of Lazarus' resurrection is the foretaste of Jesus' own resurrection in which Jesus is demonstrating in action that He has come to conquer death.
Listen—you live in a world crippled and paranoid by the fear of death. And honestly, if your sins aren't forgiven, you should be terrified of death. But if you believe in the Lord Jesus Christ, death ain't no threat.
Paul says in 2 Corinthians 5 that these bodies are like tents. We don't belong in a tent. You know where you belong? In a home. He's drawing our attention to the reality that we are just passing through. And if you believe in the Lord Jesus Christ, He's going to bring you home. He's going to wipe away all your sin. Not only that, He's going to wipe away every tear. He's going to undo the sorrow of this world. He's going to make everything new. He's going to give you a new body.
Death is not the end. It's a doorway. Do you believe that?
1. Do you live with the confidence that death is not the end, or do you fear it? What does your fear (or lack thereof) reveal about what you truly believe?
2. If you really believed you were made for eternity, how would that change the way you live today?
3. Have you been reconciled to God through faith in Christ, or are you still trying to suppress the truth that you know deep down—that eternity is real and you need a Savior?
Stay dialed in