Sunday, April 5, 2015

Let the Good Times Roll!

Today Christians around the world celebrate the resurrection. Jesus is no longer in the tomb! Death could not hold him in its bitter grasp. The rejected Messiah is robed in glory and lives. He has the name above all names and every knee will bow and every tongue confess that Jesus is Lord of all. And all those who place their faith in his atoning sacrifice will be resurrected, too. We will no longer be clothed in the body of shame. The promises made by God will come to pass and all the machinations of the evil one cannot prevent it. It’s been sealed by the broken body and shed blood of our Redeemer who lives and reigns for eternity.

I have been locked in a fierce battle for my mind for a long time. The end of which is still unknown. But today is a day of unrelenting joy and peace. The burdens I bear and the weight of my sin have been lifted from my weak shoulders and borne away by my blessed Savior. It is a day of celebration and we can party hardy! No holds barred. The Lord delights in our unabashed expressions of praise. David danced before the Ark of the Covenant as it was brought to the tabernacle. His wife despised him for it, but God was enjoying every minute of it. Shouldn’t we?

There are holy days in which we take on somber countenances and rightly so. Our God is awesome God and we do well to bow down in his presence. The Creator of all seen and unseen, the vast universe that seems endless and the myriads of angels who do his bidding on earth and in heavenly realms. And yet the Omnipotent One stooped down to fashion us by hand from the dust of the earth he created and breathed the breath of life into us. He made us in his image and blessed us. Then he rested from his creative works saying it was all good.

Never once has God been surprised by our actions and words. He foresaw our fall from perfection into a sinful existence. His glory in us sullied. And yet, there remains in each human a divinely ordained hunger to be more than we are. In the heart of all who live is an urge to worship something. The need is overpowering and humans have sought to fulfill it with anything but the One who placed it within the heart and mind. Driven by carnal instincts men and women have turned to a vast array of false gods and our fallen natures have deceived us into believing the next great thing will take away the emptiness we long to fill. But our desires are never sated.

Enter the promise God first made to Adam and Eve, that a sacrifice greater than the blood of animals would be provided to pay the ransom for us from the demand of justice that required the shedding of blood and death. The Law was given to reveal our hopeless condition. No one, not even one is righteous before God. All are subject to sin and death. We deceive ourselves if we deny the truth that the wages of sin are death and try as we might to pay our way into heaven it’s not good enough to see the face of a holy God.

The good news is God made a way to redeem our fallen race and the broken body and shed blood of an unblemished sacrificial Lamb paid the penalty once and for all time. The redemption of the created ones was declared finished from the cross and the promise of the ages was fulfilled by the resurrection we celebrate today. The path to the presence of the Almighty One is made possible through our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.

So let’s party!



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