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As the shepherds gazed on
the babe in the manger, they saw a Savior who would redeem all of humankind.
When the wise men beheld him, they saw a King who would conquer death. When the
prophets looked down to his time, they saw an Emancipator who would open prison
doors, unlock chains and set captives free. They all had their vision of who
Jesus was and why he came. He was born to live
and die and rise from the dead — and to raise us to eternal life with him. He
came to bring us home to himself for all eternity! Christ is the bridge between
earth and heaven, crossing over the abyss of death that separates temporal life
and the eternal. One day we’re going to cross that bridge, and it will take
place in the twinkling of an eye
David Wilkerson
We cannot
separate Christmas from Christ’s resurrection.
You may
think of the resurrection as an Easter message, but the birth of the child in
the manger can’t be separated from the man on the cross.
God’s
message to us through both events is one and the same.
As the
shepherds gazed on the babe in the manger, they saw a Savior who would redeem
all of humankind.
When the
wise men beheld him, they saw a King who would conquer death.
When the
prophets looked down to his time, they saw an Emancipator who would open prison
doors, unlock chains and set captives free.
They all
had their vision of who Jesus was and why he came.
Christ
was born into a world of darkness and unbelief, when God’s people lived under
the terrifying grip of the Roman Empire.
Israel’s
religious leaders didn’t offer much hope.
The
Pharisees believed salvation was achievable through works; they convoluted
God’s laws into a rigid system of impossible performance.
The
Sadducees didn’t even believe in resurrection.
Very few
people had any vision of an eternal existence. This was the darkness Jesus was
born into.
When I
look into the manger in Bethlehem, I see resurrection coming. I see King Jesus
ushering in a flood tide of eternal life.
Christ
was fully human at birth — it was Mary’s blood that nourished him in the womb
and her milk that fed him through infancy — but his birth was also a breaking
forth of the eternal.
The Bible
says, “The people which sat in darkness saw great light; and to them which
sat in the region and shadow of death light is sprung up” - (Matthew
4:16, KJV).
This
light was eternal life — the possibility of resurrection from death.
Hosea
prophesied of the coming Messiah, “I will ransom them from the power of the
grave; I will redeem them from death: O death, I will be thy plagues; O grave,
I will be thy destruction” - (Hosea 13:14).
When
Jesus came, he fulfilled this prophecy, saying, “I am the resurrection, and
the life: he that believeth in me, though he were dead, yet shall he live: And
whosoever liveth and believeth in me shall never die” - (John
11:25-26).
Jesus
himself connects his birth to the resurrection: “For I came down from
heaven, not to do mine own will, but the will of him that sent me. And this is
the Father’s will which hath sent me, that of all which he hath given me I
should lose nothing, but should raise it up again at the last day. And
this is the will of him that sent me, that everyone which seeth the Son, and
believeth on him, may have everlasting life: and I will raise him up at
the last day” - (John 6:38-40, my emphasis).
Christ
said, in essence, “Do you know why I’m here? Do you know why I was born into
poverty, why the shepherds adored me, why the wise men brought gifts, why the
angels sang that night? It is so you would have everlasting life.”
Christ’s
confession points directly to resurrection: graves opening, the dead restored
to life, and the ultimate fulfillment of God’s everlasting covenant.
Resurrection is the emphasis throughout the
New Testament.
The first
church leaders accepted Christ’s incarnation as a reality. Yet their preaching
centered not on that event but on the resurrection.
As early as the Upper Room gathering at Pentecost, Peter said, “Him,
being delivered by the determinate counsel and foreknowledge of God, ye have
taken, and by wicked hands have crucified and slain: Whom God hath raised
up, having loosed the pains of death: because it was not possible that he
should be holden of it” - (Acts 2:23-24, my
emphasis).
Everywhere
Paul and the other apostles traveled, their preaching went beyond Christ’s
incarnation and miracles to proceed to the resurrection:
“They
came to Thessalonica, where was a synagogue of the Jews: and Paul, as his
manner was, went in unto them, and three sabbath days reasoned with them out of
the scriptures, opening and alleging, that Christ must needs have suffered, and
risen again from the dead; and that this Jesus, whom I preach unto you, is
Christ” - (Acts 17:1-3).
At Mars
Hill in Athens, Paul preached, “He hath appointed a day, in the which he
will judge the world in righteousness by that man whom he hath ordained;
whereof he hath given assurance unto all men, in that he hath raised him from
the dead” - (Acts 17:31).
Paul also
preached on resurrection when he appeared before the Roman governor Felix and
before King Agrippa.
Indeed,
without the resurrection, Paul says, all our preaching of Christ’s gospel is in
vain. He explains why: “If Christ be not raised, your faith is vain; ye are
yet in your sins” - (1 Corinthians 15:17).
Paul is
telling us, in effect, “If this is not all about the resurrection, you can
forget about the Christmas message. Why preach the birth of Christ? Why be
holy? Why pursue spiritual matters at all? Without the resurrection, we remain
dead in our sins. Everything we do is in vain.”
This
isn’t just some abstract theological truth.
Here is
the point of all our resurrection preaching: JESUS CAME TO GET YOU AND ME.
He was
born to live and die and rise from the dead — and to raise us to eternal life
with him. He came to bring us home to himself for all eternity!
This was
the message of the New Testament church. “Now is Christ risen from the dead,
and become the firstfruits of them that slept” - (Acts
15:20).
In other
words, just as surely as the Spirit raised Christ from the dead, he will raise
us up too: “Knowing that he which raised up the Lord Jesus shall raise up us
also by Jesus, and shall present us with you” - (2
Corinthians 4:14).
As I look
into the manger, I see a bridge.
Christ is
the bridge between earth and heaven, crossing over the abyss of death that
separates temporal life and the eternal.
One day
we’re going to cross that bridge, and it will take place in the twinkling of an
eye: “In a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trump: for the
trumpet shall sound, and the dead shall be raised incorruptible, and we shall
be changed” - (1 Corinthians 15:52).
Many Christians
wonder, “Who will I see first when I’m raised into eternity?”
I’m
convinced that when this moment comes, we will all want to see Jesus first. He
is Love incarnate — our Savior, Healer and King.
Yet I
once saw something that made me wonder about others. I walked into our living
room to find my wife, Gwen, quietly weeping.
She was
watching the last home video of our granddaughter, Tiffany, who died of cancer
at age 13. She was longing to see Tiffany again.
Make no
mistake, Gwen and I will recognize Tiffany when we get to heaven.
The Bible
says there is no marriage in heaven, but there is love because he is love. All
will be one in Christ’s body, and we’ll recognize each other with a spiritual
intuition.
Scripture
says in that moment we will know even as we are known.
Maybe you
didn’t grow up with a loving father or mother. Maybe no one in your home knew
Jesus or ever showed you his precious love.
You
wonder, “Who’ll be there waiting for me?”
I tell
you, you have another family — the family of God.
I’m
convinced there is no one in Christ’s body who wasn’t prayed for by someone who
came before them — an older man or woman, a pastor, a distant relative.
You’ll be
recognized and embraced with the family love that God has prepared for you in
eternity.
I believe God has made worlds as yet
unconquered.
We’re not
going to sit idle when we’re resurrected.
Astronomers
have discovered galaxies beyond what we can imagine and planets profoundly
larger than the earth. It’s nothing for the Creator of this vast universe to
resurrect his creatures from death.
Paul
Harvey tells the story of an atheist scientist who traveled to college campuses
for decades to lecture on how God couldn’t possibly exist.
Years
later this man became a Christian. Whenever he was asked why he converted, he
answered with one simple word: “DNA.”
Inside
every human being is this amazing discovery called DNA.
It’s a
unique identifier so accurate that someone can be proven guilty of a crime if
his DNA is found at the scene.
DNA is
complex, yet it can be taken from something as simple as a strand of hair.
In it,
scientists have discovered a “genetic code” with billions of bits of
information that, linked together, are unique to that person.
Who
created this incredible phenomenon that boggles the mind?
Who has
known the unique genetic code of every human being since Adam and Eve? Only
God.
He not
only numbers every hair on our heads but has impressed our unique DNA into each
strand. That’s what humbled the atheist scientist: the magnificence of a
Creator and his ever-impressive creation.
God knows
the DNA of every person who has ever lived — and he knows how to reconstruct it
when he raises us up on the last day.
This
should put to rest all the strange doctrines that have arisen over the years
about the resurrection.
Some say
there can’t be a bodily resurrection for people who’ve been cremated or died
gory deaths; they can’t conceive of how God would do this.
The truth
is our imaginations simply can’t fathom the glory of God. Our brains are too
finite.
We do
know that the bodies God brings out of the grave will be changed bodies.
Some
think we’ll be spirits, but the Bible makes clear we will be resurrected bodily.
Everything
damaged, severed or obliterated will be restored in the twinkling of an eye.
Hunched
over people will walk straight. The blind will see. Those infirm from birth or
killed in wars will be whole. Their DNA will be perfected by their Creator!
I think of the resurrection also when I see
sad, lonely people at Christmas.
Whenever
I’ve walked down the street in New York to buy milk or a newspaper, what I’ve
seen breaks my heart.
Alcoholic
men in their 60’s and 70’s lay on the sidewalk nodding off. They’ve spent
decades in a hell of their own making, not knowing where they are most days.
I see
desperate young drug addicts racing to their pusher as he appears. They’re
sleepwalking through life with no hope, no future, just looking to make their
next fix happen.
On the
corner, I see prostitutes no more than 18 years old, dabbing their eyes as they
cry over what has become of their lives.
I want to
tell them all: “There is a new world coming — a world without sin, poverty
or disease. That’s why he came — to bring us to the new world he has created.
It’s beyond anything we can comprehend. Your King is coming to get you!”
Meanwhile,
resurrection life is already available to us — in this life. We have been
promised, “As Christ was raised up from the dead by the glory of the Father,
even so we also should walk in newness of life” - (Romans
6:4).
This
Christmas season, let us keep a resurrection frame of mind.
As Paul
exhorts, “I would not have you to be ignorant, brethren, concerning them
which are asleep, that ye sorrow not, even as others which have no hope. For if
we believe that Jesus died and rose again, even so them also which sleep in
Jesus will God bring with him… Wherefore comfort one another with these words” - (1
Thessalonians 4:13-14, 18).
I know on
that day I’ll meet a half million converted drug addicts from around the whole
earth… scores of addicts and prostitutes who called on Jesus to save and
deliver them… and my own family members who have gone before. What a joy it
will be. Resurrection — it is why he came!
“So when
this corruptible shall have put on incorruption, and this mortal shall have put
on immortality, then shall be brought to pass the saying that is written, Death
is swallowed up in victory. O death, where is thy sting? O grave, where is thy
victory?... Thanks be to God, which giveth us the victory through our Lord
Jesus Christ” - (1 Corinthians 15:54-57).
David
Wilkerson
was called to New York City in 1958 to minister to gang members and drug
addicts, as told in the best-selling book The Cross and the Switchblade. He
went on to create Teen Challenge and World Challenge, Inc. to minister to
people’s spiritual and physical needs.
In
1987, he established Times Square Church. As its founding pastor, he faithfully
led this congregation, delivering powerful biblical messages that encourage
righteous living and complete reliance on God.
David
Wilkerson also had a strong burden to encourage his fellow pastors. He founded
the Summit International School of Ministry; and from 1999 to 2008, he held
international conferences to strengthen church leaders.
His
passion to support believers, build up leaders and care for the poor is still
at the heart of World Challenge’s ministries to this day.
https://worldchallenge.org/newsletter/2016/christmas-resurrection
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