10 Results of the Resurrection

If Christ has not been raised, your faith is futile and you are still in your sins. (1 Corinthians 15:17)

Here are ten amazing things we owe to the resurrection of Jesus:

1) A Savior who can never die again. “We know that Christ, being raised from the dead, will never die again” (Romans 6:9).

2) Repentance. “The God of our fathers raised Jesus, whom you killed by hanging him on a tree. God exalted him at his right hand as Leader and Savior, to give repentance to Israel” (Acts 5:30–31).

3) New birth. “According to his great mercy, he has caused us to be born again to a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead” (1 Peter 1:3).

4) Forgiveness of sin. “If Christ has not been raised, your faith is futile and you are still in your sins” (1 Corinthians 15:17).

5) The Holy Spirit. “This Jesus God raised up, and of that we all are witnesses. Being therefore exalted at the right hand of God, and having received from the Father the promise of the Holy Spirit, he has poured out this that you yourselves are seeing and hearing” (Acts 2:32–33).

6) No condemnation for the elect. “Who is to condemn? Christ Jesus is the one who died — more than that, who was raised — who is at the right hand of God, who indeed is interceding for us” (Romans 8:34).

7) Jesus’s personal fellowship and protection. “I am with you always, to the end of the age” (Matthew 28:20).

8) Proof of coming judgment. “[God] has fixed a day on which he will judge the world in righteousness by a man whom he has appointed; and of this he has given assurance to all by raising him from the dead” (Acts 17:31).

9) Salvation from the future wrath of God. “[We] wait for his Son from heaven, whom he raised from the dead, Jesus who delivers us from the wrath to come” (1 Thessalonians 1:10; Romans 5:9).

10) Our own resurrection from the dead. “[We know] that he who raised the Lord Jesus will raise us also with Jesus and bring us with you into his presence” (2 Corinthians 4:14; Romans 6:4; 8:11; 1 Corinthians 6:14; 15:20).

John Piper 

Bible Study

Romans 4:22-25

[22] That is why his faith was “counted to him as righteousness.” [23] But the words “it was counted to him” were not written for his sake alone, [24] but for ours also. It will be counted to us who believe in him who raised from the dead Jesus our Lord, [25] who was delivered up for our trespasses and raised for our justification.

Galatians 1:3-5

[3] Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ, [4] who gave himself for our sins to deliver us from the present evil age, according to the will of our God and Father, [5] to whom be the glory forever and ever. Amen.

1 Thessalonians 3:11-13

[11] Now may our God and Father himself, and our Lord Jesus, direct our way to you, [12] and may the Lord make you increase and abound in love for one another and for all, as we do for you, [13] so that he may establish your hearts blameless in holiness before our God and Father, at the coming of our Lord Jesus with all his saints.

1 Thessalonians 2:19-20

[19] For what is our hope or joy or crown of boasting before our Lord Jesus at his coming? Is it not you? [20] For you are our glory and joy.

Do You Need a Spiritual Awakening?

PRAY OVER THIS

“Then Isaac called Jacob and blessed him, and charged him, and said to him: ‘You shall not take a wife from the daughters of Canaan. Arise, go to Padan Aram, to the house of Bethuel your mother’s father; and take yourself a wife from there of the daughters of Laban your mother’s brother. May God Almighty bless you, and make you fruitful and multiply you, that you may be an assembly of peoples; and give you the blessing of Abraham, to you and your descendants with you, that you may inherit the land in which you are a stranger, which God gave to Abraham.’”

Genesis 28:1-4

 

PONDER THIS

Isaac was a man who was shaken. He was a man who came to his senses. He was a man who came back to the Word of God. God had brought great conviction to his heart, and he was shaken to the core.

Today, there are some of us who need a similar awakening. We should assess where we are and look at our families. We should ask where the path we are headed on will eventually take us. Ask, if your family is going to change, who’s going to change it? Where does God want to wake you up to be part of the solution? God knows how to discipline you, and He will for your good. First Corinthians 11:31-32 reminds us, “if we would judge ourselves, we would not be judged. But when we are judged, we are chastened by the Lord, that we may not be condemned with the world.” God wants to wake you up, for your sake and the sake of those around you. Will you respond?

Where might God want to wake you from your spiritual slumber?

How might you best position yourself to receive this awakening?

PRACTICE THIS

Dedicate time today to sitting in silence and asking God to reveal the areas in which you have been spiritually asleep. Ask Him for next steps in response.

LWF Dr. Adrian Rogers 

How to Delight in God’s Word

How sweet are your words to my taste, sweeter than honey to my mouth! (Psalm 119:103)

Never reduce Christianity to a matter of demands and resolutions and willpower. It is a matter of what we love, what we delight in, what tastes good to us.

When Jesus came into the world, humanity was split according to what they loved. “The light has come into the world, and people loved the darkness rather than the light” (John 3:19). The righteous and the wicked are separated by what they delight in — the revelation of God in Jesus, or the way of the world.

So someone may ask: How can I come to delight in the word of God? My answer is twofold:

1) pray for new taste buds on the tongue of your heart;

2) meditate on the staggering promises of God to his people.

The same psalmist who said, “How sweet are your words to my taste” (Psalm 119:103), said earlier, “Open my eyes, that I may behold wondrous things out of your law” (Psalm 119:18). He prayed this, because to have spiritual eyes to see glory, or to have holy taste buds on the tongue of the heart, is a gift of God. No one naturally hungers for, and delights in, God and his wisdom.

But when you have prayed, indeed while you pray, meditate on the benefits God promises to his people and on the joy of having Almighty God as your helper now and forever. Psalm 1:3–4 says that the person who meditates on God’s word “is like a tree planted by streams of water that yields its fruit in its season, and its leaf does not wither. In all that he does, he prospers. The wicked are not so, but are like chaff that the wind drives away.”

Who would not delight to read a book, the reading of which would change one from useless chaff to a mighty cedar of Lebanon, from a Texas dust bowl to a Hawaiian orchard? Nobody deep down wants to be chaff — rootless, weightless, useless. All of us want to draw strength from some deep river of reality and become fruitful, useful people.

That river of reality is the word of God, and all the great saints have been made great by it.

John Piper 

Bible Study

Psalm 19:10

    [10] More to be desired are they than gold,

        even much fine gold;

    sweeter also than honey

        and drippings of the honeycomb.

Job 28:17

    [17] Gold and glass cannot equal it,

        nor can it be exchanged for jewels of fine gold.

Proverbs 8:19

    [19] My fruit is better than gold, even fine gold,

        and my yield than choice silver.

Proverbs 16:24

    [24] 

    Gracious words are like a honeycomb,

        sweetness to the soul and health to the body.

Are You Pursuing God?

PRAY OVER THIS

“And He [the Angel of the Lord] said, ‘Let Me go, for the day breaks.’ But he [Jacob] said, ‘I will not let You go unless You bless me!’” Genesis 32:26

 

PONDER THIS

Have you ever watched wrestlers? My eldest son was a wrestler. I have two grandsons who are wrestlers. Do you know what muscle is most important to a wrestler? His thighs. His legs. That’s where his strength is. If you take away his leg, he can’t begin to wrestle. The Angel of the Lord took away Jacob’s strength (v. 25). How was he going to wrestle anymore? And the Angel (the preincarnate Christ) said: “Let Me go.” But Jacob replied: “I will not let you go, not until you bless me.” Now if this was the Lord, why did He say: “Let Me go?” It was because the Lord didn’t want him to let go. You may be thinking, “That doesn’t make sense.” Oh, yes, it does.

When studying the Bible, you find out that many times God will act as if He wants to get away from us when He wants us to pursue Him with all our hearts. Do you remember on the Road to Emmaus when two disciples were going there after the resurrection, and Jesus appeared in His resurrected body? He walked with them, and their hearts were burning within them. Luke said Jesus made as if He would go further, and they said, “Oh no, don’t. Spend the night with us here,” and He did. (Read Luke 24:28-29.) In our moments of greatest uncertainty or difficulty, God calls us to pursue Him with all our hearts.

When was a time you felt like you were pursuing God?

How do times of struggle or difficulty lead you to pursue Him further?

PRACTICE THIS

Consider one thing you need to do to pursue God. Take action today.

LWF Dr. Adrian Rogers 

Forever Satisfied

“I am the bread of life; whoever comes to me shall not hunger, and whoever believes in me shall never thirst.” (John 6:35)

This text points to the fact that believing in Jesus is a feeding and drinking from all that Jesus is. It goes so far as to say that our soul-thirst is satisfied with Jesus, so that we don’t thirst anymore.

He is the end of our quest for satisfaction. There is nothing beyond, and nothing better.

When we trust Jesus the way John intends for us to, the presence and promise of Jesus is so satisfying that we are not dominated by the alluring pleasures of sin (see Romans 6:14). This accounts for why such faith in Jesus nullifies the power of sin and enables obedience.

John 4:14 points in the same direction: “Whoever drinks of the water that I will give him will never be thirsty again. The water that I will give him will become in him a spring of water welling up to eternal life.” In accord with John 6:35, saving faith is spoken of here as a drinking of water that satisfies the deepest longings of the soul. And the satisfaction becomes productive, like a well overflowing.

It’s the same in John 7:37–38: “Jesus stood up and cried out, ‘If anyone thirsts, let him come to me and drink. Whoever believes in me, as the Scripture has said, “Out of his heart will flow rivers of living water.”’”

Through faith, Christ becomes in us an inexhaustible fountain of satisfying life that lasts forever and leads us to heaven, and on the way sets us free from the sinful illusions of other satisfactions. This he does by sending us his Spirit (John 7:38–39).

John Piper