HE is risen!
He IS risen!
He is RISEN!
It is true that we are familiar with these words, particularly as the culmination of the Passover season. There is power in this truth that encompasses but also surpasses mortal understanding. Nevertheless they are proposed here as three distinct declarations.
HE is Jesus Christ, the Son of God, Jehovah, the God of the Old Testament - the Creator of heaven and earth, and is the sacrificial Lamb of the Passover - the Savior of the world. HE is He who has paid the ultimate price of freedom, blood, so that every inhabitant of the earth who has ever lived, lives now and will yet live can be free of chains that cannot be undone by mortal means - the chains of sin and death. HE is He of whom every prophet of scripture has foreseen and testified of, and as if that were not enough, in every instance where God the Father Himself has spoken to man, He has also testified of Jesus Christ, His Only Begotten Son. HE is risen!
He IS - that He is! When Moses asked God for His name, that he may answer the children of Israel when they asked for it, "And God said unto Moses, I AM THAT I AM: and he said, Thus shalt thou say unto the children of Israel, I AM hath sent me unto you." [Exodus 3:14] In another forum, the Jews asked Christ if he has seen Abraham, and he responded, "Before Abraham was, I am." [John 8:58 - emphasis added]. Abraham was past tense, I AM, is present tense. He is Present yesterday, present today, present tomorrow! He IS risen!
He is RISEN! And in doing so, he accomplished his mission - and the law. Our existence is fragile, our time here is temporary. We are indeed, travelers out of time and place. That we hold to be significant today may be of little value tomorrow. We grow out of old things and into new, and in turn, those new things again become old. The very seasons testify to us that everything we see and experience will one day waste away. The tender green leaves of Spring eventually fall and shrivel before the onset of winter. It is all temporary and all of it is left behind on our individual trips to the grave. But, we shall rise again, because He is RISEN!
