April 12

April 12.

"I have the same hope in God as these men-that there will be a resurrection of both the righteous and the wicked!" Acts 24:15

A hope of resurrection to a believer in Christ-ought to be a wonderful inspiration in the earthly life. The grave is not the end; we shall come again from it in new beauty, and shall live on forever. Not only did Christ teach that the dead shall rise again-but he himself went down into the grave and then came out again, after three days, alive! Thus he showed the reality of resurrection; one man died and rose again, and may not all? But his resurrection meant more than that. He was the head of his people, and as such-his victory was for them. He met and conquered death for them.

Now death is a vanquished foe. Paul puts it very strongly, and says that Christ abolished death. Jesus himself put it no less strongly when he said, "I am the resurrection and the life . . . whoever lives and believes in me-shall never die!" There is no break, no interruption, in a Christian’s life, in what we call dying. The spirit lives more really, fully, gloriously, a moment after death-than ever it lived before. Then the body which goes down into the grave, ’sleeps’-that is the Christian word-sleeps in Jesus, until the resurrection, when Christ will come and call it up; not the old earthly, worn-out, sin-corrupted, mortal flesh and blood-but a new, strong, glorious, incorruptible, immortal, spiritual body, to live with Christ forever!