On March 20, my then-4 year old son was kicked by a horse.
It was a freak accident. He was in the barn at my in-laws' house, a horse got out into the yard, and an excited little boy ran up behind it to get a closer look. Before anyone could even react, he was kicked square in the chest and neck and launched across the yard. All I could think as I ran to him was, "There is no way he survived that impact." And as I picked his limp body up, I thought my fears were reality. Until, after what seemed like an eternity but was probably only a few seconds, he gargled and began to cry. I screamed, "HE'S ALIVE!!!"
The Lord protected him that day, and he baffled all the doctors at Children's Hospital as he had not one broken bone, no internal injuries... and he was up playing and laughing the next day. He came out of that experience with only a few broken teeth.
Though he didn't die, I thought for a few moments that he had. So when I realized I was joyfully wrong, all I could say is, "HE'S ALIVE!" And I ran around telling everybody that for about 2 weeks. He's alive. My son is alive. Praise God, my son is alive.
The whole ordeal gave me a tiny morsel of what the disciples must have felt three days after the Lord Jesus Christ was crucified. Just a morsel. Because Jesus was really dead. Beaten, crucified, hung on display for people to walk by and insult him, dying on that cross in the worst agony as God was pouring out judgment on Him for the sin of the world. Stabbed with a spear. Laid in a tomb. Dead. He's gone, our Teacher, our Rabbi, our Master... we watched Him die.
Imagine what was going through their minds the next 2 days. "Now what? We left everything to follow Him, and He's gone."
Those brief couple days must have felt like months. But on the third day, Jesus rose from the dead and appeared to His disciples. How did they react? Luke 24:41 uses an interesting phrase, they "disbelieved for joy." In other words, they exclaimed, "I can't believe it!", with smiles and tears, I'm sure.
He's alive. HE'S ALIVE! And that means everything.
His promises are true, He always keeps His Word. "...Jesus began to show His disciples that He must go to Jerusalem and suffer many things...and be killed, and on the third day be raised." (Matthew 16:21)
Satan and death are defeated. "...through death He might destroy the one who has the power of death, that is, the devil..." (Hebrews 2:14)
We can be forgiven of our sins and made alive. "For the death He died He died to sin, once for all, but the life He lives He lives to God. So you also must consider yourselves dead to sin and alive to God in Christ Jesus." (Romans 6:10-11)
God help us to never lose the impact that those first disciples felt. We are not following the moral teachings of a dead Jewish man from ancient history. We have been pardoned from sin, restored to God, and given life.
Because HE'S ALIVE!
p.s. - "I died, and behold I am alive forevermore." (Revelation 1:18)