It was not an easy transformation;
it was necessary for Him, tho not to see corruption, yet to have the
shadow of death pass over Him; and friends and enemies vied with each
other in trying to retain Him in the power of the grave; the friends
rolling a stone before it, to keep the beloved corpse in safety, the
enemies setting a watch lest it should be taken away. But when the
hour came which the Father had reserved in His own power, the angel
of the Lord appeared and rolled away the stone from the tomb, and the
watch fled, and at the summons of omnipotence life came back into the
dead form.
Thus, my friends, we know what is the new life that is to be like the
resurrection life of the Lord. A previous life must die; the apostle
calls it the body of sin, the law of sin in our members, and this
needs no lengthened discussion. We all know and feel that this life,
which Scripture calls a being dead in sins, pleasant and splendid as
may be the form it often assumes, is yet nothing but what the mortal
body of the Savior also was, an expression and evidence of the power
of death, because even the fairest and strongest presentation of this
kind lacks the element of being imperishable.
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