The Lord of Life

MEMORY VERSE: “The life which I now live in the flesh I live by the faith of the Son of God, who loved me, and gave himself for me.” —Galatians 2:20

JOHN 11:17-27

IN OUR selected text Martha expresses the world’s only hope for life. In verse 24 “Martha saith unto him, I know that he shall rise again in the resurrection at the last day,” and in verse 25, “Jesus said unto her, I am the resurrection, and the life: he that believeth in me, though he were dead, yet shall he live.”

The Bible teaches that Adam and Eve, as perfect human beings in the perfect surroundings of the Garden of Eden, could have followed God’s direction and multiplied and filled the earth with a perfect race of human beings. Adam, as endowed by God, would have been the life-giver, passing to his children a life that would have been dependent only upon obedience. (Gen. 1:27,28) But Adam was disobedient and the death sentence was passed upon him and all of his progeny. Instead of inheriting life, they inherited imperfection and death.—Gen. 3:19

But God does not create only to destroy. So in his design for the ages he provided that Jesus would take Adam’s place in death. The Apostle Paul expresses the thought thus in Romans 3:25,26, “Whom God hath set forth to be a propitiation through faith in his blood, to declare his righteousness for the remission of sins that are past, through the forbearance of God; to declare, I say, at this time his righteousness: that he might be just, and the Justifier of him which believeth in Jesus.” The point of the text is that it was necessary that Jesus take Adam’s place in death—a perfect man for a perfect man—so that the just sentence meted out to Adam would not be mitigated, and God could still be just and yet accept sinners justified by the applied merit of Christ.

Jesus’ death on the cross was the great offering for sin. It provided the means of lifting Adam’s condemnation from Adam and his race, and with the lifting of the death sentence—in God’s own due time and way—the means will be available again to give life to a dead and dying world through the resurrection of the dead.

The Apostle Paul expresses the thought in I Corinthians 15:21,22, “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.” And again in verse 45, “Thus it is written, the first man Adam became a living being, the last Adam became a life-giving spirit.”—Revised Standard Version

The word “father” has the significance of life-giver. Accordingly, God was Adam’s Father, or Life-giver, and the earth was his mother. The spirit of life, or power of life, was given to Adam by God, and he was privileged to keep it as long as he was obedient. When he disobeyed he forfeited this power, and it reverted to God who gave it.—Eccles. 12:7

By God’s grace this forfeited power of life has been purchased with the precious blood of Christ, and the purchaser, the Lord Jesus, is the new Life-giver (regenerator or father) for the race, who will give life, and that more abundantly, to all who will ultimately receive him.

The hope of life finally attained in the resurrection is expressed by the Prophet Job, chapter 14, verses 13, 14, 15, “O that Thou wouldest hide me in the grave, that Thou wouldest keep me secret, until Thy wrath be past, that Thou wouldest appoint me a set time, and remember me! If a man die, shall he live again? All the days of my appointed time will I wait, till my change come. Thou shalt call, and I will answer Thee: Thou wilt have a desire to the work of Thine hands.” Jesus said, “Marvel not at this: for the hour is coming, in which all that are in the graves shall hear his voice, and shall come forth.”—John 5:28,29

The Revelator tells us of the wonderful fountain of life that will be available to all in the kingdom, “And he showed me a pure river of water of life, clear as crystal, proceeding out of the throne of God and of the Lamb. In the midst of the street of it, and on either side of the river, was there the tree of life, which bare twelve manner of fruits, and yielded her fruit every month. “—Rev. 22:1-3

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