Paul: a risen life

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by Helen Parry (Word for the Week 14-04-08)

‘Paul was preaching the good news about Jesus and the resurrection’, Acts 17:18

Why is it, I wonder, that some evangelical Christians seem to emphasise the cross, and Christ’s atoning death, to such an extent that the resurrection becomes almost an irrelevance? Witness small booklets on how to become a Christian, and certain types of evangelistic preaching.

Paul’s preaching recorded in Acts focussed on the resurrection, as the proof that Jesus was indeed the promised Messiah, that sin could be forgiven through him, and that he was the one appointed by God to judge the world. The risen Christ was also the ‘firstfruits’ of those who have died in faith – the guarantee of eternal life (1 Cor.15:20-23).

But to Paul – and to us – the resurrection is far more than a proof, far more than ‘pie in the sky when I die’. It isn’t just a passport to eternal life, but the key to everyday life, to new life, to abundant life – to whole-life discipleship. ‘Because of his great love for us,’ he wrote to the Ephesians (2:5), ‘God, who is rich in mercy, made us alive with Christ even when we were dead in sins’. That phrase ‘with Christ’ reminds us that the impossible has now become possible. ‘Since, then, you have been raised with Christ, set your hearts on things above…set your minds on things above, not on earthly things…you have taken off the old self with its practices and have put on the new self’ (Col.3:1-2, 9-10). So ‘just as Christ was raised from the dead…we too may live a new life…Count yourselves dead to sin but alive to God in Christ Jesus’ (Rom.6:4, 11).

The impossible becomes possible. It is possible for us to be content with our salaries, to have confidence about the future, to love our neighbours, to forgive our enemies, to resist temptation. On one side – the world, the flesh and the devil; on the other the radiant risen Christ, so that ‘I can do everything through him who gives me strength’ (Phil.4:13). I long that God will change the world, will change the behaviour of a loved relation – but first, Lord, by the power that raised Jesus from the dead, change ME.

May we today ‘know Christ and the power of his resurrection’ (Phil.3:20).