A Prayer

Father,

Today, is a great day. Today, all your saints all around this globe are celebrating the greatest miracle in all the history of the world. We are celebrating Jesus’ resurrection. We celebrate this, Father, not because Jesus is alive again. Lazarus died and was alive again. Something different, something greater, happened when Jesus walked out of that tomb. Lazarus eventually died again. Jesus would never die again. He had overcome death itself.

That is so striking to us, Father, because from our youth we were taught to fear death. It seemed so final to the people who were teaching us about life. It seemed as if we were all powerless when it came to death. It seemed that death had the final say. But now we know better. Now we know that Jesus has come and He has done what no one else could do. He submitted to the power of death. He breathed His last like so many others. And again, it all seemed so final. But then, He rose up and destroyed the power of death. He left that tomb and life hasn’t been the same since - not for Your saints.

So, we thank You, Father. We thank You for this plan of redemption that You put into place. We thank You that Jesus has come to destroy our most powerful enemy. We thank You, Father, that the Spirit has made all of this ours.

We do have a request, Father. We ask that You would act in us by Your Spirit so that we would do better at believing this message of our freedom from death - that we would do better at believing it in the little details of our lives. Help us, Father, to reject our fears, all of them. They seem so strong, so overpowering. But they are just different expressions of death. And Jesus has overcome death for us all. Help us, Father, to live in the freedom of life that Jesus has won for us.

And it is our prayer, Father, that as we do that by Your grace, that the many around us who are still enslaved by their fear of death - that they would see how we live, that they would see our freedom because of Jesus, and that they would come and join us in following Jesus the Lord over death and the one who gives life. Amen.