FROM DEATH TO GLORY

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In Christ, Mark

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The scriptures. May God bless the reading of His holy word.

But we do see Jesus, who was made lower than the angels for a little while, now crowned with glory and honor because He suffered death, so that by the grace of God He might taste death for everyone. In bringing many sons and daughters to glory, it was fitting that God, for whom and through whom everything exists, should make the pioneer of their salvation perfect through what He suffered.

Hebrews 2:9-10

This ends this reading from God's holy word. Thanks be to God.

If you ask a person of the world about their feelings about death, I believe most of them would look at it with a sense of dread. I say this because without Christ, they have no true sense of a future beyond their time on earth. The end is the end and this promotes a deep sense of sadness for they will lose all the things they love, cherish, and enjoy. As they say, the party will be over.

Christians on the other hand have (or should have) a completely different perspective and attitude regarding death. For through Jesus, the end of this worldly life only serves to usher them into their best life ever, a life forever in glory with the God who made them and the Savior who rescued and redeemed them.

The latter, Jesus, knows the human condition and struggle. For after being conceived in His mother Mary by the Holy Spirit, He was born on earth and walked it for 33 years, living a life that was “lower than the angels” before facing death Himself, a death that was a part of His destiny story. It was a death no one would have looked forward to, a suffering grounded in judgment as God placed the penalty for the sin of all mankind on His Son, the perfect Lamb of God who paid the price all sinners deserved. Indeed, He tasted “death for everyone” He came to save.

Now this would have been the ultimate tragedy had it not been for the reward Jesus gained after being uncompromisingly obedient to His Father all the way to Calvary’s cross. For on the third day after His crucifixion, God raised His Son from death to life before crowing Him “with glory and honor”, bringing Him back to Heaven and sitting Him at His right hand where He rules and reigns in all supremacy and sovereignty over all things in Heaven and on earth.

Because of what Jesus did, willfully carrying out His Father’s desire to save all people who would believe in His Son, Christian believers need never fear death. Paul puts it this way as he wrote to the Corinthian church:

When the perishable has been clothed with the imperishable, and the mortal with immortality, then the saying that is written will come true: “Death has been swallowed up in victory.”

“Where, O death, is your victory? Where, O death, is your sting?”

The sting of death is sin, and the power of sin is the law. But thanks be to God! He gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ. 1 Corinthians 15:54-57

Those who have rejected Jesus see death as the ultimate loss. Life is over and defeated, and if it was a movie, the credits would run, finishing with the words “The End”.

Christians humbly see death as a win, a magnificent, unmerited victory over death and the grave. As co-heirs with Jesus (Romans 8:17), they are assured a great and holy inheritance, a place in the very Kingdom of God where they will abide forever, free from all the things of this world that afflict them.

No more sickness or pain.

No more heartache.

No more worry or fear.

No more darkness, sin, or evil.

Only glory and light and love...forever.  

Friends, today and every day, let us echo the words of the Apostle Paul:

“Thanks be to God! He gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ.”

Amen.

In Christ,

Mark

PS: Feel free to leave a comment and please share this with anyone you feel might be blessed by it. Send any prayer requests to TheChristianWalkPrayers@gmail.com.