Guarantees Our Own Resurrection (1 Cor. 15:20)
No matter how clear the New Testament is on the literal bodily resurrection of Jesus, some liberal theologians, trapped in a purely scientific and rationalist world-view, argue against the Resurrection being real. Instead, they say that the Resurrection should be seen as a myth, a metaphor of a new resurrected life we can have here and now if and when we accept, as a community, the moral teaching of Jesus.
However nice that might sound, it is a view based on human thinking, and not on the clear teaching of God's Word, which is exceedingly clear, and unequivocal, in the literalness of Christ's resurrection.
For us, there is no danger accepting the Resurrection as a metaphor, not if we take the Word of God for what it says; and it is explicit about the literal bodily resurrection of Jesus. And once we are settled in our acceptance of the Resurrection, then we can for ourselves garner the hope it offers us in the face of death. Regardless of what happens to us in this life, we have the hope that, as Jesus rose from the dead, so will we. The promise of the Resurrection help us to keep everything in its proper perspective.
Read the following passages. What hope do they hold out for our own resurrection?
The resurrection of Jesus established three certainties: (1) that our destiny is secure in Jesus (1 Pet. 1:3-5); (2) that death is a vanquished foe (1 Cor. 15:20-22); and (3) that power is available to share this fantastic news with others (John 14:12, Acts 1:8).
How should the hope and promise of our resurrection from the dead help us to keep our life here, and the things that happen in it, in the proper perspective? Imagine what life would be like if you did not have this hope?
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