It was June 18, 1815, the Battle of Waterloo. The French under the command of Napoleon were fighting the allied forces of the British, Dutch, and Germans under the command of Wellington. The people of England depended on a system of signals to find out how the battle was going. One of these signals was on the tower of Winchester Cathedral.
Late in the day it flashed the signal: “WELLINGTON DEFEATED.” Just at that moment a fog cloud made it impossible to read the message. The news of defeat quickly spread throughout the city. The whole countryside was sad and gloomy when they heard the news that their country had lost the war. Suddenly, the fog lifted, and the remainder of the message could be read. The message had four words, not two. The complete message was: “WELLINGTON DEFEATED THE ENEMY!” It took only a few minutes for the good news to spread. Sorrow was turned into joy, defeat was turned into victory!
Such is the nature of the victory Jesus won through His resurrection. After His crucifixion, the fog of disappointment and misunderstanding had crept in on His disciples. “Christ defeated” was all they knew. But on the third day the fog of disappointment and misunderstanding lifted, and the world received the complete message: “Christ defeated death!” Defeat was turned into victory!
As we reflect today on the victory that was won over sin, Satan, death, and Hell by our Savior’s crucifixion and resurrection, I want us to see how the victory of the resurrection provides what we need to live victoriously.
1. Through the resurrection, we are provided with help - v. 17
A. The help we need to be right with God.
Paul rightly observes that if Christ has not been raised from the dead, we are still in our sins, and are thus, kept from being right with God.
Sin keeps us from being right with God for two reasons:
1) Because of our sin, we are unacceptable.
“For everyone has sinned; we all fall short of God’s glorious standard.” - Romans 3:23 (NLT)
“The glory of God” refers to way God lives. Hamartia, sin, refers to falling short of the ideal, to missing the mark in the way we live.
Note that Paul tells us that sin is not like a disease that some contract and others escape. Some may self-righteously think they are better than others because of outward appearance - but we have all been soiled by sin. Sin is universal, and perhaps this is one reason why so many people live in denial. So many are sinning so frequently that it is a way of life! It has become acceptable because everybody is doing it!
But it is not acceptable to God; and because mankind is so associated with sin, we are unacceptable to God.
2) Because of our sin, God is unapproachable.
Because God is holy, sinful man can have nothing to do with Him. We can never be good enough to enter into His presence. We are cut off from a relationship with God, the source of all life. Consequently, all that is left for mankind to know is death.
This is what God warned Adam and Eve about if they chose to go their own way rather than God’s way.
“And the LORD God commanded the man, ‘You are free to eat from any tree in the garden; but you must not eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, for when you eat of it you will surely die.’” - Genesis 2:16-17 (NIV)
Literally, God said, “dying, you will die.” In other words, through
making this choice to go his own way as opposed to God’s way, man would immediately experience spiritual death, in that his relationship would be broken with God, the source of all life, and eventually he would experience physical death.
Death is the only logical result when one walks away from life! Not only did Adam and Eve experience this penalty for sin, but it has been passed along to the entire human race.
“Through one man sin entered into the world, and death through sin, and so death spread to all men, because all sinned.” - Romans 5:12 (NASB)
Consequently, the human race, left on their own are under the
condemnation of sin, which is death! We are all “dead men walking.”
“That’s what Christ did definitively: suffered because of others’ sins, the Righteous One for the unrighteous ones. He went through it all - was put to death and then made alive - to bring us to God.” - 1 Peter 3:18 (The Message)
Our Savior’s resurrection demonstrated that He had fully paid the
penalty for our sin - death - so we wouldn’t have to.
During World War II, a young paratrooper wrote his mother, “Stop worrying about me. I joined the parachutists to fight. I
intend to fight. If necessary, I shall die fighting, but don’t worry about this because no war can be won without young men dying. Those things which are precious are saved only by sacrifice.” What a profound statement! And how much more true that is when it comes to our salvation. If we are going to experience eternal joy and peace with the holy God, then somebody has to sacrifice. And that someone is Jesus. Jesus didn’t ignore our sin, brush it off or hide in a cosmic footlocker. The holy God never would have settled for that. Instead, Jesus assumed your sin and let God crush him. It was on his cross that the kindness of God and the justice of God came together.
Because of the resurrection, we know that through faith in Him we are saved from the penalty of sin; and through the power of the resurrection, we are born again.
“Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ! In his great mercy he has given us new birth into a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead.” - 1 Peter 1:3 (NIV)
B. The help we need to do right for God.
Paul insists that if Christ is not a living Savior, then our faith is futile, weak, powerless when it comes to overcoming sin’s power.
Because of the resurrection, we don’t have a faith that depends on the strength of our will to live a life pleasing to God. But by the power of the One who resides within us, we can be enabled to do right for God.
“Work hard to show the results of your salvation, obeying God
with deep reverence and fear. For God is working in you, giving you the desire and the power to do what pleases him.” - Philippians 2:12-13 (NLT)
God not only calls us to live differently now that we know Him, but He has placed within our hearts the desire to live differently and given us the power to live differently. And what is that power?
It’s the power by which Christ was raised from the dead.
“I also pray that you will understand the incredible greatness of God’s power for us who believe him. This is the same mighty power that raised Christ from the dead and seated him in the place of honor at God’s right hand in the heavenly realms.” - Ephesians 1:19-20 (NLT)
In fact, when I place my faith in Christ, by His Holy Spirit, the risen Christ comes to dwell within me.
“I will ask the Father to send you the Holy Spirit who will help you and always be with you. The Spirit will show you what is true . . .
You know the Spirit, who is with you and will keep on living in you.
I won't leave you like orphans. I will come back to you.” - John 14:16-18 (CEV)
Now, as I learn how to allow Christ’s Spirit to fill my life, I can see removed from my life things that are displeasing to God and do things in my life that are pleasing to Him.
Just like water displaces the air in a glass as it is allowed to fill the glass, so sin can be overcome in our lives as it is displaced by the presence and power of the risen Christ.
Jesus described living by the power of the risen Christ in John 7:38 to being like a well spring of water flowing from within.
Adrian Rogers used to tell as story about how one year at the New York World’s Fair, there was a display which featured a man dressed in a gaudy, loudly colored Chinese kimono, who was furiously pumping water from an old-fashioned picture pump. Upon closer investigation, however, you found that the man wasn’t a man at all. He was a dummy, with a hinge in his elbow and his hand strapped to the handle of the pump; which wasn’t a pump at all, it was an artesian well. The man wasn’t pumping the water, the water was pumping the man!
By the power of the resurrected Christ, we can live the different life we were saved to live; and do right for God as we learn to walk in the victory we have over the power of sin.
2. Through the resurrection, we are provided with hope - vs. 18-19
Through faith in our risen Savior, we can know that we will not only one day be with Jesus, but that we will one day, be eternally like Jesus.
In verse 23 of this same chapter of 1 Corinthians, Paul tells us that Christ is the first-fruits; then when He comes, those who belong to Him.
“But our citizenship is in heaven. And we eagerly await a Savior from there, the Lord Jesus Christ, who, by the power that enables him to bring everything under his control, will transform our lowly bodies so that they will be like his glorious body.” - Philippians 3:20-21 (NIV)
“God is the one who began this good work in you, and I am certain that he won't stop before it is complete on the day that Christ Jesus returns.” - Philippians 1:6 (CEV)
By the power of His resurrection, Christ makes us new within when we place our faith in Him; and by the power of His resurrection, Christ teaches us how to live in the reality of this newness of life as we grow in Him; and finally, one day we will be completely made new not only in spirit, but in soul and in body.
What we assume about heaven vs. What the Bible says about Heaven.
We assume it’s unearthly; the Bible says it’s on a new earth. We assume it’s ghostly; the Bible says it’s physical. We assume it’s static; the Bible says it’s dynamic.
“Our graves are merely doorways cut in sod.” - Calvin Miller
“The tomb is not a blind alley; it is a thoroughfare. It closes upon the twilight, but opens upon the dawn.” - Victor Hugo
Conclusion: Christ came to save us “from the guttermost to the
uttermost.” And the power by which He brings about this
wonderful salvation is the power of His resurrection.
By His resurrection power, we can be born again and delivered from the penalty of sin.
By His resurrection power, we can grow in our faith and
experience deliverance from the power of sin at work in our lives.
By His resurrection power, we will one day receive a glorified body as we are forever delivered from the very presence of sin.
