Resurrection From the Dead, Part 1
Reprinted March 3, 2023
Resurrection from the dead is
a topic we’ve discussed from time to time, but never really explored with full
revelation. Resurrection is a topic we
associate strictly with physical death, but it goes way beyond just the
physical aspects. In the coming weeks,
I’d like to dig into this with you.
Don’t know where this will all lead yet, but Holy Spirit has been
downloading revelation in the past couple of weeks, so we will see where this
takes us.
Let’s begin today with some statements that
Jesus made.
John 6:38-40, KJV: For
I came down from heaven, not to do mine own will, but the will of him that sent
me. And this is the Father’s will which hath sent me, that of all which he hath
given me I should lose nothing, but should raise it up again at the last day.
And this is the will of him that sent me, that every one which seeth the Son, and believeth on him, may have everlasting
life: and I will raise him up at the last day.
John 5:24, KJV: Verily,
verily, I say unto you, He that heareth my word, and believeth on him that sent
me, hath everlasting life, and shall not come into condemnation; but is passed
from death unto life.
This is the first and most basic element of
resurrection.
Jesus is making it abundantly clear that
everyone who sees Him — the Greek word here is theoreo, which means: to
discern, to see and know, to perceive and ascertain — and believes on
Him (and here the word in the Greek text is pisteuo, which is the word for faith, the exercise
of faith meaning: to put full faith and credit in, to entrust and to commit
without reservation) will have zoe life (the
God-breathed life) aionios: existing throughout the eternity of the eternities.
Then Jesus says this: And
I will raise him up at the last day. This is perhaps one of the most unique and
revelatory things Jesus says in this passage.
The Greek word used for the phrase “raise
him up” is
the word, anistemi, a contraction of two Greek words, ana (up) and histemi,
a prolonged version of stao, which has some meanings and applications
which give real understanding to what Jesus is saying.
This word, “passed” comes from the Greek metabaino
which is an instant transition from one place to another.
Again, we have the picture of hearing
(hearing and understand-ing) and exercising faith and
absolute confidence and trust in the reality of who Jesus is, and the price
that Jesus paid on our be-half.
When Jesus said, I
will raise him up at the last day, He was applying the truth of resurrection
in a phenomenal way.
The term, anistemi, literally means: to
stand up again, to fix and establish, to uphold and sustain the authority, to
restore and sustain covenant.
Resurrection, therefore, is much more than
being raised frm the dead, it is being moved from
death — where we have been laid flat by sin — to the very life that is God’s
life. It is the restoration of our relationship with Father, Son & Holy
Spirit throughout the eternity of the eternities!
Death, in this sense, is nothing more than
separation from the relationship we were created for and in with Father, Son
& Holy Spirit. Resurrection, again
in this sense, is being raised back to that life we were created and designed
for.
But that’s only one phase of resurrection.
What Jesus paid for, and what Father did when He raised Jesus from physical
death in the tomb, is literally the cancellation of the sentence of death upon
us.
We’ve quoted this passage again and again
in times past but it deserves revisiting in this context:
Hebrews 9:25-26, KJV: Nor
yet that he should offer him-self often, as the high priest entereth into the
holy place every year with blood of others; For then must he often have
suffered since the foundation of the world: but now once in the end of the
world hath he appeared to put away sin by the sacrifice of himself.
Hebrews 9:27-28, Amp Bible: And
just as it is appointed for [all] men once to die, and after that the [certain]
judgment, Even so it is that Christ, having been offered to take upon Himself
and bear as a burden the sins of many once and once for all, will appear a
second time, not to carry any burden of sin nor to deal with sin, but to bring
to full salvation those who are [eagerly, constantly, and patiently] waiting
for and expecting Him.
When
Adam and Eve ate of the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil, they brought
sin and death into the human genome. Under the Law of Moses, it was necessary
for the priests to enter into the Holy Place once each year with a blood
sacrifice for the atonement (or covering over) of the sins of the people. That
act of offering a blood sacrifice did not eradicate the sin, nor did it do away
with the sentence of death in human DNA.
Thus, it became necessary for Jesus Christ
to become the once and for all time blood sacrifice in order to completely
eradicate both the sin and do away with the sentence of death. What the priests
could not do under the Law of Moses, Jesus accomplished with four distinct
acts:
(1) He laid the axe to the root of the Tree
of the Knowledge of Good and Evil. (see Matthew 3:10)
(2) He was hung and died on that Tree — the
same Tree that brought death to Adam and Eve. (see Acts 13:29 and I Peter
2:24)
(3) He took all of our sins, our sicknesses
and diseases, our infirmities, and Satan’s power over us to that Tree and put
it all to death, then laid it at Satan’s feet once and for all.
(4) Having put an end to the power of sin
and sickness, disease and infirmity, He also put an end to death when Father
raised Him from the dead. (Acts 10:39-40 and 13:30, & Galatians
3:13-14)
This last quote from Paul’s letter to the
Galatians makes it about as unambiguous as anything can be when he writes that “Christ
hath redeemed us from the curse of the Law, being made a curse for us.”
So what was the curse? It was the sentence
of death for sin. That was the sentence that had passed upon all man-kind from the moment that Adam ate of the fruit of
the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil.
There was a fundamental under-standing
among the Jews that there would come a Resurrection Day for all at some point
in the future when all would stand before the Great Judgment Seat.
Consider Martha’s statement to Je-sus when
he spoke of Lazarus being raised from the dead:
John 11:21-24, KJV: Then
said Martha unto Jesus, Lord, if thou hadst been here, my brother had not died.
But I know, that even now, whatsoever thou wilt ask of God, God will give it
thee. Jesus saith unto her, Thy brother shall rise again. Martha saith unto
him, I know that he shall rise again in the resurrection at the last day.
But look now at what Jesus says to Martha
next:
John 11:25-26, KJV: Jesus
said unto her, I am the resurrection, and the life: he that believeth in me,
though he were dead, yet shall he live: And whosoever liveth and believeth in
me shall never die. Believest thou this?
Martha responded in the affirmative to
Jesus, but that’s not quite what He got when He was addressing a crowd of followers.
John 6:49-52, KJV: Your
fathers did eat manna in the wilderness, and are dead. This is the bread which
cometh down from heaven, that a man may eat thereof, and not die. I am the
living bread which came down from heaven: if any man eat of this bread, he
shall live for ever: and the bread that I will give
is my flesh, which I will give for the life of the world. The Jews therefore
strove among themselves, saying, How can this man give us his flesh to eat?
But Jesus was quick to answer them.
John 6:54-58, KJV: Whoso
eateth my flesh, and drinketh my blood, hath eternal life; and I will raise him
up at the last day. For my flesh is meat indeed, and my blood is drink indeed.
He that eateth my flesh, and drinketh my blood, dwelleth in me, and I in him.
As the living Father
hath sent me, and I live by the Father: so he that eateth me, even he shall
live by me. This is that bread which came down from heaven: not as your fathers
did eat manna, and are dead: he that eateth of this bread shall live forever.
In each of the preceding verses and
passages, we have seen the words, “die,” and “death.” In each case the Greek
word apothnesko occurs. This word
literally means: to die off, to be dead physically.
What’s sad is that in today’s society, and
particularly in the body of Christ for many generations, this has been read and
inferred as spiritual death. After all, Jesus surely didn’t mean that
Resurrection From the Dead meant that we could apply this in a literal sense!
And yet, that’s exactly what the Word says!
Jesus couldn’t have said it more plainly than He did when He said to Martha, “And
whosoever liveth and believeth in me SHALL NEVER DIE.”
Again, when Paul is writing to the Hebrews
and says the following:
Hebrews 9:27-28: And
as it is appointed unto men once to die, but after this the judgment: So Christ
was once offered to bear the sins of many.
Here once again, the word translated “die”
is that same word Jesus used, apothnesko: physical death.
Resurrection of the Dead IS a foundation
truth and principle that we must lay hold of. We have to see and understand
this as much more than a spiritual event. Of course the spiritual aspect of it
is critical! It is the restoration of our relationship and interdimensional
walk with the Lord through-out the eternity of the eternities. But in order for
it to have force NOW in this present day and time, we have to see it as
Resurrection from the sentence of death. Death cannot be a consideration for
us.
The subconscious belief that we must die
now impedes our ability to believe that we can raise the dead just as Jesus
did. And, please, don’t anyone think I’m saying that a person absolutely must
believe in physical death cancellation before they can raise the dead.
We have far too many examples of folks in
bygone eras and moves of God who did raise the dead. But God is bringing His
people beyond the old mindset and understanding.
There are current examples of people living
today who have grasped this principle and have been alive for hundreds of
years.
When
Jesus hung on the Cross, His last words were, “It is
Finished!” Blood
and water came from His side when the centurion pierced His side. What was
finished? Sin and death! What came forth from His side? A new birth! A Bride
who would live and demonstrate His Life to the world!
Some
folks think this topic is something of a hobby horse with me because I have
talked about it from time to time throughout the years, and it is frequently
the subject of conversation in small groups.
The subject of Resurrection from the dead and raising folks from the
dead really became a reality for me when I was raised from the dead roughly 35
years ago.
The
Lord had already begun to shape my thinking on this subject when I’d had two
separate experiences of raising someone from the dead in the 1970’s, but it
became very personal when I dropped dead from a heart attack in 1983, shortly
after Della and I were married. There’s
no need to repeat the whole story here since most of you have heard me share
the events that led up to it and the enormous stress I’d been under.
Nevertheless,
when I dropped in the shower and Della dragged my limp body out of the shower
into the bedroom, heaved me up onto the bed and began pronouncing life back
into me, something happened in my spirit with that event that I’ve never been
able to put into words. I came to about
15 or 20 minutes later with Della straddling me, bringing her fist down in the
air over and over and shouting, “You will come back in the name of Jesus!”
It
is the only time in my life that I didn’t have a conscious memory of being in
Heaven, or being with the Lord, and yet I have many flashes from time to time
where I remember events and revelations from Holy Spirit that could only have
happened then.
You
all know of my other trips to Heaven, and they were all conscious experiences
not connected to physical death or dying but rather waking experiences where I
was transported by Holy Spirit, by and angel of the Lord, or by Jesus Himself.
Let’s leave it here for today, and we will continue
this next week.
In case you are
missing out on real fellowship in an environment of Ekklesia, our Sunday
worship gatherings are available by conference call – usually at about 10:45AM
Pacific. That conference number is (712) 770-4160, and the access code is 308640#. We are now making these
gatherings available by Skype. If you
wish to participate by video on Skype, my Skype ID is regner.capener. If you miss the live voice call, you can dial
(712) 770-4169, enter the same access code and listen in
later. The video call, of course, is not
recorded – not yet, anyway.
Blessings
on you!
Regner A. Capener
CAPENER MINISTRIES
RIVER WORSHIP CENTER
Temple, Texas 76504
Email Contact: CapenerMinistries@protonmail.com
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