What If the Crucified Christ Had Not Risen?

In Commemoration of Good Friday

Khen Lim




Image source: brendansaltvick.wordpress.com

The Apostle Paul taught that just as we Christians share in Jesus’ death in baptism, so we should also share in His rising from the dead for He was designated the Son of God by His resurrection. Paul says in 1 Cor 15:20, “But Christ really has been risen from the dead.” But what if Jesus had not been raised? What would happen to all of us then? A few verses back, Paul says, “And if Christ has not been raised, then your faith is useless and you are still guilty of your sins. In that case, all who have died believing in Christ are lost!” (vv.17-18)

Scripture, in other words, tells us that our faith will have been utterly null and void. And meaningless. Without Christ’s resurrection, all of us dead and alive will continue to face our death penalties with no respite, no hope for change and no chance at redemption. The shadow of the wages of sin will hang over our heads for the rest of our lives no matter what we do. There is no point in turning over a new leaf because nothing would have changed for us. Those who had long died believing in Christ would be in hell, waiting for us to join them.

That, of course, is a frightening parallel world to try to grasp. And no matter how hard we try, it is impossible to truly gauge the very importance of the resurrection of Jesus as our Saviour in our lives. For all of time past, man has taken His death and resurrection for granted, mainly because we do not spend enough quality time, sitting down and deeply reflecting on how our lives would have been impacted without Christ. We persistently fail to stop and think that if Christ had not arisen from the dead, none of us would enjoy having a personal and intimate love relationship with God the Father, much less that our daily devotions would have amounted to a useless nothingness. An utter waste of time, in other words.

Without a resurrected Christ, we won’t be able to shrug off our darkness. In our weakness, we will be consumed by evil and be a slave to our sinfulness. Try as we might, we know our own strength is not enough but we will also be unable to count on Christ anymore. If He could not conquer death, what gives us the right to think that we can? And without Him, we have no avenue to learn to love unconditionally or to forgive others. Our sense of love would be solely based on how others treat us and for all our days, we will count how others wrong us so that we may dish back what we received!

People need to know about Christ, the risen Saviour. People need to be introduced to the One who died for all so that they, too, may experience His peace, His unconditional love and acceptance. As Christians, we should be greatly encouraged by Christ and amplify our dedication to reach lost people away from the comforts of our own ground (Mt 20:28).

In the Gospel of Luke, we don’t just have an account of a tax collector called Levi who surrendered his life to Christ but that he proceeded to use his personal influence that same night to invite other tax collectors to a grand meal at his home so that they, too, may experience Jesus first-hand. Levi (Matthew) used his influence so that, like him, others can be saved.

In exactly the same way, God has given each and every one of us that same trust with the people in our own worlds. As He has entrusted Matthew, He has quietly done the same to us thousands of years later. And He will continue to plant His seed in many others tomorrow and into the future. In His divine will, He has made us His hands and feet and His heart in order that we can influence others in ways that perhaps even your own pastor might not be able to.

So what are you doing with the people who are within your sphere of influence, those who are in your close group of friends, those whom you know will listen to your advice? What exactly are you doing with the gift of influence that God has gifted you in your life?