Victory Over Death
Steve Elliott
Godly and Godless Man 2 • Sermon • Submitted • Presented • 38:31
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But now is Christ risen from the dead, and become the firstfruits of them that slept. For since by man came death, by man came also the resurrection of the dead. For as in Adam all die, even so in Christ shall all be made alive. But every man in his own order: Christ the firstfruits; afterward they that are Christ’s at his coming. Then cometh the end, when he shall have delivered up the kingdom to God, even the Father; when he shall have put down all rule and all authority and power. For he must reign, till he hath put all enemies under his feet. The last enemy that shall be destroyed is death. For he hath put all things under his feet. But when he saith, all things are put under him, it is manifest that he is excepted, which did put all things under him. And when all things shall be subdued unto him, then shall the Son also himself be subject unto him that put all things under him, that God may be all in all.
Jesus is our Example
Watch and learn from He did and does
Watch and learn through His pure motives
Watch and learn by the Spirit He acts upon
He is also our Reason
He is the reason we have a relationship with the Father
He is the reason we have access to God in prayer
He is the reason we see God’s grace in our lives
He is the reason we have eternal life
He is the reason we will be resurrected!
The Principle Taught
The Principle Taught
But now is Christ risen from the dead, and become the firstfruits of them that slept.
The feast of firstfruits was the third of seven annual feasts celebrated by the Jews. It was associated with the Passover and the feast of unleavened bread. It was kept on the morrow after the Sabbath. In other words, it was associated with the first day of the week. The Lord Jesus was in the tomb on the Sabbath after Passover. He rose from the dead the next day, the day the priest took a sheaf of corn from the field and waved it over the whole field as a token that the whole harvest would eventually be reaped. Thus this feast pointed forward to the very day of the resurrection of the Lord Jesus.
Reaping of the harvest - 3 stages (Lev 23):
Firstfruits - sheaf of corn and wave it before the Lord
Great harvest - main harvest time
Gleanings - this would be for those poor, widows, and fatherless
This correlates to what the Bible calls the first resurrection:
Blessed and holy is he that hath part in the first resurrection: on such the second death hath no power, but they shall be priests of God and of Christ, and shall reign with him a thousand years.
3 Parts:
Lord’s resurrection
Rapture - 1 Thess 4:13-18
Resurrection of those saved during the Tribulation
God gave the Levites instruction to take a sheaf of corn!
And the graves were opened; and many bodies of the saints which slept arose, And came out of the graves after his resurrection, and went into the holy city, and appeared unto many.
This was the firstfruit sheaf!
But every man in his own order: Christ the firstfruits; afterward they that are Christ’s at his coming.
This is us in rapture!
Why is this necessary?
For since by man came death, by man came also the resurrection of the dead.
Paul links here 2 events:
Adam’s sin
Rom 5:12
Wherefore, as by one man sin entered into the world, and death by sin; and so death passed upon all men, for that all have sinned:
Jesus’ resurrection
This is why Jesus had to be fully man AND fully God
This is why Jesus was conceived in a virgin’s womb
He became truly man without ceasing to be God. Had He not been truly man, in every sense of the word, He could not have died, been buried, and been raised again. Had He not been God, in every sense of the word, the life He laid down on the cross of Calvary would have been but a finite life and inadequate to atone for the sins of the entire human race. Paul clearly saw the connection between the ruin introduced into human history by Adam and the Resurrection assured for all the redeemed by another man, Jesus.
There is a process that is explained in the law for this to appropriately be done
Kinsman-redeemer
Told in the story of Boaz regarding Ruth
Ruth 2:20
And Naomi said unto her daughter in law, Blessed be he of the Lord, who hath not left off his kindness to the living and to the dead. And Naomi said unto her, The man is near of kin unto us, one of our next kinsmen.
This role was to purchase, propagate, and protect. In order to enter into this role he needed 3 things:
Resources to redeem
Ruth 2:1
And Naomi had a kinsman of her husband’s, a mighty man of wealth, of the family of Elimelech; and his name was Boaz.
Resolve to redeem
Ruth 3:18-4:6
Then said she, Sit still, my daughter, until thou know how the matter will fall: for the man will not be in rest, until he have finished the thing this day. Then went Boaz up to the gate, and sat him down there: and, behold, the kinsman of whom Boaz spake came by; unto whom he said, Ho, such a one! turn aside, sit down here. And he turned aside, and sat down. And he took ten men of the elders of the city, and said, Sit ye down here. And they sat down. And he said unto the kinsman, Naomi, that is come again out of the country of Moab, selleth a parcel of land, which was our brother Elimelech’s: And I thought to advertise thee, saying, Buy it before the inhabitants, and before the elders of my people. If thou wilt redeem it, redeem it: but if thou wilt not redeem it, then tell me, that I may know: for there is none to redeem it beside thee; and I am after thee. And he said, I will redeem it. Then said Boaz, What day thou buyest the field of the hand of Naomi, thou must buy it also of Ruth the Moabitess, the wife of the dead, to raise up the name of the dead upon his inheritance. And the kinsman said, I cannot redeem it for myself, lest I mar mine own inheritance: redeem thou my right to thyself; for I cannot redeem it.
Right to redeem
Ruth 2:1
And Naomi had a kinsman of her husband’s, a mighty man of wealth, of the family of Elimelech; and his name was Boaz.
Boaz, as a picture or type of Christ, is our Kinsman-Redeemer
Right to redeem
This is why Jesus needed to born physically as man
We can all trace our ancestry back to Adam
When we get saved, God puts us “in Christ”. So, by natural birth we are born subject to the curse, by new birth we are born again, born from above, born of the Spirit, born of God, born subject to new life in Christ.
Resolve to redeem
Is 50:7
For the Lord God will help me; Therefore shall I not be confounded: Therefore have I set my face like a flint, And I know that I shall not be ashamed.
Resources to redeem
Our Kinsman-Redeemer redeemed us by purchase, on the cross of Calvary, and by power, when He arose from the dead having smitten the enemy with His deathblow. We were redeemed by purchase at His first coming; we shall be redeemed by power at His second coming. There would be small satisfaction in His having effected our purchase if He did not have the power to expel the enemy from our property, now His purchased possession. That is one reason why the millennial reign is essential. The Lord fully intends to take over the property He has purchased as well as the people He has purchased.
The Prophecy Foretold
The Prophecy Foretold
Then cometh the end, when he shall have delivered up the kingdom to God, even the Father; when he shall have put down all rule and all authority and power.
Then speaks of “then, after an interval”
Tribulation
Rev and Matthew 24
Jesus will reign from Jerusalem for an an entire millenium
Satan, the Beast, and the False Prophet will put down by might and power of Jesus Christ
Satan will be defeated once again at the end of the millenial rule and reign of Jesus
10 Centuries of peace
Jesus will be the Prince of Peace ruling with a rod iron
The Sermon on the Mount will be fulfilled completely and fully as normal life in these years
The Bible will be the core of every curriculum
Fruitfulness that has never been experienced since the fall of Adam
Pilgrimages to Jerusalem will include a tour of the dread Valley of Hinnom as people will see the terrible end of those who defy the Lord
The desert will blossom. The harvests will be bountiful.
Spirit-filled and anointed men and women will teach the arts and sciences.
It will be an age of peace, prosperity, and progress unlike anything mankind has experienced before.
It seems incredible people will grow tired of it. But, in the end, there will be a widespread revolt. Satan will be released and men by the million will flock to his standard. For as time goes on, more and more millions of people will be born who do not get born again. They grow up unregenerate. As children, who grow up in Christian homes sometimes become “gospel hardened,” so people growing up in the millennial earth will become “glory hardened.” In ever increasing numbers the unregenerate will begin to murmur against the inflexible laws of the kingdom. Memory of what the world was like when “sin reigned and death by sin” will fade. Millions, born during the Golden Age, will have no more memory of the miseries and horrors of premillennial times than children born today have of the First World War. People born, but not born again, will find themselves with passions they cannot express, with sin natures they cannot indulge. Increasingly a spirit of rebellion will smolder. The malcontents, afraid to express their lusts and longings openly, will begin to congregate at the far reaches of the planet, as far from the central Glory as possible. There they will nurse their growing hatred for holiness and godliness.
Then, Satan will be released from his prison (Rev. 20:7–10). The rebels will hail him as a savior, one who can emancipate them from the hated reign of righteousness. They will flock to his banners. They will mobilize and march on Jerusalem. Their swelling hordes are contemptuously labeled “Gog and Magog” by the Holy Spirit, perhaps to remind them of the most famous of all former anti-Semitic campaigns and its disastrous results (Ezekiel 38–39). Deluded by Satan, drunk with the wine of rebellion, determined to return the world to its former state, they will approach the Holy City. But their rebellion will come to a swift and inglorious end.
For he must reign, till he hath put all enemies under his feet.
Satan will be destroyed!
Wherefore God also hath highly exalted him, and given him a name which is above every name: That at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, of things in heaven, and things in earth, and things under the earth; And that every tongue should confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.
The last enemy that shall be destroyed is death.
I am he that liveth, and was dead; and, behold, I am alive for evermore, Amen; and have the keys of hell and of death.
And death and hell were cast into the lake of fire. This is the second death.
For he hath put all things under his feet. But when he saith, all things are put under him, it is manifest that he is excepted, which did put all things under him. And when all things shall be subdued unto him, then shall the Son also himself be subject unto him that put all things under him, that God may be all in all.
Spirit honours the Son, the Son honours the Father
We will raise our hosannas and hallelujahs with all the heavenly hosts forever and ever
SBC - I know of no better hope or blessed assurance to relay to you today, but the Saviour we serve will be victorious! He is separating us physically for a moment in time, but we shall see each other in the air at any moment.