Resurrection Life

The celebration of Easter (see footnote) is behind us by a couple of days now. Once more we've lived through what many Christians call Holy Week -- the time from Palm Sunday, remembering Jesus' entry into Jerusalem with the crowds waving palm fronds, through the events of Thursday night, commemorated by footwashing and partaking of the bread and wine, to Good Friday and its solemn remembrance of the Lord's death on the cross; all the way to the victorious excitement of the resurrection on Sunday morning.

Now what? Back to the same old drudgery of working and paying taxes? Is that all? Nope -- Paul said we are "raised with Christ" (Colossians 3:1) and we have a whole new life with him (Romans 6:4). Paul says we are "in Christ" over 80 times in his epistles, not counting other phrases like "alive with Christ" or "raised with him". That means it was important to him, and it has a lot of meaning for us as Christ-followers.

Being "in Christ" basically means:
--Our sins are now wiped away because of his death on the cross
--Our old lives no longer matter to God, because the Father accepts us through Jesus
--Since he was resurrected, we too are as good as resurrected also
--We live in two worlds -- the current physical existence we see, and the spiritual life we experience through Jesus (this is the hardest one to understand)

How do we experience being "in Christ"? The best analogy I can come up with so far is being "in marriage." My old single life is gone, my wife accepts and loves me, and I get to spend the rest of my days exploring my relationship with her. I get to know her better, love her more, be loved by her, and learn to please her. By following that process, she and I are bound together in love more and more. We are secure in each other's love, and participate in each other's lives in multiple ways. We don't have any desire to go back to being single, and we live together more fully and intimately because we know and love each other so well.

In our new life "in Jesus Christ," we have at least one advantage that marriage doesn't give: at the end of physical life, we get transported into an eternity of ever-growing closeness with God. So, being "in Christ" is truly something wonderful and blessed. Even if we can't completely understand it, we can enjoy it. My life "in Christ" is a lot richer and deeper than it was ten years ago, and I hope yours continues to grow too.

*Contrary to popular myth, the name Easter is not linked to any pagan goddess. The best historical information gives a different story. For more, follow this link, or ask me about it:
http://www.christianitytoday.com/ch/bytopic/holidays/easterborrowedholiday.html