3 For what I received I passed on to you as of first importance: that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures,

4 that He was buried, that He was raised on the third day according to the Scriptures,

— 1 Corinthians 15:3-4

And now He has revealed this grace through the appearing of our Savior, Christ Jesus, who has abolished death and illuminated the way to life and immortality through the gospel,

— 2 Timothy 1:10

17 And if Christ has not been raised, your faith is futile; you are still in your sins.

18 Then those also who have fallen asleep in Christ have perished.

19 If our hope in Christ is for this life alone, we are to be pitied more than all men.

— 1 Corinthians 15:17-19

He has made everything beautiful in its time. He has also set eternity in the hearts of men, yet they cannot fathom the work that God has done from beginning to end.

— Ecclesiastes 3:11

Thoughts on Today’s Reading

Grace, salvation and joy from Jesus Christ to you.

Apart from Jesus’s resurrection, death wins. What hope do we have if we struggle through life with no hope beyond the grave? If this life with its toil and struggle is all there is, all we can do is grab as much fleeting happiness as life on earth offers. Surely every human heart longs for more!

There is more! All people are created in God’s image, with an inborn sense of their eternity. Jesus’s resurrection promises that all believes will be raised again to eternal life. Their lives on earth may end, but life in God’s presence will not. Because Jesus died but now lives, His children will regain all that sin stole from humanity. Jesus’s defeat of our greatest enemies—sin and death—offers us our greatest hope.