LS-37-He Lives!

He Lives!

I am He that liveth, and was dead, and behold I am alive for evermore.--Revelation 1:18.

It is recorded of Martin Luther that on one occasion when he was in a situation of extreme danger, and his spirits were cast down because of the circumstances in which he was placed, he was found tracing on a table with his finger the words "Vivit! Vivit!"--"He lives--He lives!" His human nature was particularly in need of power above its own, and he was finding comfort and strength in reminding himself of the fact of Christ, his risen Lord and glorified Redeemer.

Jesus lives! That is the fact beyond all others in importance to us. We remember His death, and though that event is so far away in time, it affects us more profoundly than does the death of those we knew in the flesh. Alexander Maclaren said: "Christ’s death has a present and a perpetual power. He ’has offered one sacrifice for sins forever;’ and no time can diminish the efficacy of His cross, nor our need of it, nor the full tide of blessings which flow from it to the believing soul. Therefore do men cling to Him as if it were but yesterday that He died for them. When all other names carved on the world’s records have become unreadable, like forgotten inscriptions on decaying grave-stones, His shall endure forever, deep graven on the fleshy tables of the heart."

Yet that death alone would not account for His hold on the affections and His power in the lives of men. His death would avail us nothing, did He not live. He died; He is alive. He is the Prince of Life; it was not possible that He should be holden of death. In Him all things consist. He is the source of that Divine energy which is the dynamic of the spiritual life of the world. We believe He is in our midst today. We believe that. We may realise Him, that we may reach out spiritual hands and touch Him, and touching Him become the recipients of His inflowing power and blessing.
No fable old, nor mystic lore,
Nor dream of bards and seers;
No dead fact stranded on the shore
Of the oblivious years;

But warm, sweet, tender, even yet
A present help is He,
And faith has still its Olivet,
And love its Galilee.

--Whittier.