1 PET. i. 3. “Blessed be the God and Father of our
Lord Jesus Christ, which according to His abundant mercy
hath begotten us again unto a lively hope by the resurrection
of Jesus Christ from the dead.”
ST. PETER addresses his Epistle to scattered Christians, but
with all their manifold divergence from each other they
had one thing in common: they were “sanctified by the
Spirit unto obedience and sprinkling of the blood of Jesus
Christ.”
What has the resurrection of Jesus done for us Christians?
I. By His resurrection Jesus proved that He had a right
to speak about God, about the old religion of His country-
men, about the religious conduct of His influential country-
men, and about Himself, as He had spoken.
II. The resurrection has endowed Christians with the
great grace of hope.
It is a truism which will bear repeating, that we cannot
get on without hope. It is the very sinew of man’s life:
it is essential to man as an individual, in his education
and work in life, and as a member of society.
III. Man needs a hope resting on something which is
beyond the sphere of sense and time; and this God has
given in the resurrection.
Our Lord taught in the plainest language the reality
of the future life. When He rose He broke the spell of
the law of death. “Because I live, ye shall live also,” this
was the motto which henceforth faith descried as the legend
which was traced over the doorway of Christ’s empty
sepulchre.
There are three forms of interest which might be ac-
corded to the resurrection.
1. Interest of curiosity.
2. Interest of active reason.
3. Interest that is practical, moral, and spiritual; which
asks, What does Christ’s resurrection say to me? Have I
this living hope? If so, then earthly things will sit easily
on us, and we shall have inward peace and its accompani-
ment, habitual outward cheerfulness.
Henry Parry Liddon, D.C.L.