As we enter into April, we enter immediately in the Easter Season! Lent is now behind us, and we celebrate the power of the Resurrection of our Saviour. On the very first Sunday in April, as we gather for worship, we hear again the ancient proclamation, “Christ is Risen!” and the one true holy and universal church replies with one voice, “He is risen indeed! Alleluia!” These are the words of celebration! The cry of absolute victory! The affirmation of our faith! Jesus, the Christ, has conquered Satan, sin, death, and the grave. Now, His victory is also our victory for He arose victorious over all His enemies and ours. By His resurrection, Jesus openly displayed His power and fulfilled the promise of His Father, “For God so loved the world, that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life” (John 3:16, ESV). For all too many, the truth and glory of the Resurrection of Jesus is merely an historical fact. They believe it. They embrace His resurrection as truth but somehow fail to full appreciate and appropriate God’s promise for themselves. Therefore, this Easter Season, let us reflect on our individual relationship to the Living Lord and all of His promises given for our resurrection. We need to embrace the fact that you and I share in the glorious heritage of the redeemed of Christ. We stand shoulder to shoulder with the people of God from every age, nation, kindred, and tongue. You and I are a part of the body of the holy catholic (universal) church, the body of Christ. The message of the resurrection is not only the victory of Christ, but also your victory as well. It is the very fiber of the Gospel. It is intimate and person. Christ did for you! This is the greatest fact in human history. Not only did Christ die for you, but He now lives for you as well. He lives that all in Him may also live! Our sins are forgiven. Our lives have changed. Our Lord Christ is our Living Saviour! Writing under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, the Apostle Paul penned these words for us in I Corinthians 15:50-58 – “I tell you this, brothers: flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God, nor does the perishable inherit the imperishable. 51 Behold! I tell you a mystery. We shall not all sleep, but we shall all be changed, 52 in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trumpet. For the trumpet will sound, and the dead will be raised imperishable, and we shall be changed. 53 For this perishable body must put on the imperishable, and this mortal body must put on immortality. 54 When the perishable puts on the imperishable, and the mortal puts on immortality, then shall come to pass the saying that is written: “Death is swallowed up in victory.” 55 “O death, where is your victory? O death, where is your sting?” 56 The sting of death is sin, and the power of sin is the law. 57 But thanks be to God, who gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ. 58 Therefore, my beloved brothers, be steadfast, immovable, always abounding in the work of the Lord, knowing that in the Lord your labor is not in vain.” As I considered the glorious victory of Christ and the importance of His resurrection for us, I wondered what words of wisdom and encouragement Martin Luther would have for us? Therefore, I surveyed some of his writings and gleaned from them his thoughts on the meaning of Christ’s victory, from his commentary on I Corinthians 15 first published in 1523:       “Out of the abundance of the heart the mouth speaks” is a common saying. St. Paul is able to speak about this article at such length because his heart is filled with it and he is so convinced of it that he regards all else as nothing by comparison. If his heart were not filled to overflowing with such thoughts, these words would never occur to him … because Christ is risen and [He] gives us His resurrection against our sin, death, and hell, we must advance to where we also learn to say: “O death, where is thy sting? ” “That is the victory by which death is to be swallowed up, so that we need fear death no longer or remain in it. For the heart is already saturated by the Gospel ... the victory gained by Christ is already present, and through Gospel, Baptism, and faith it has become our victory. “On the Last Day, when we have taken off the old, terrestrial, perishable garment and put on a new celestial one, we can destroy him completely with this victory. Then we will remain in life forever; then we will behold and perceive life as we now behold and feel the reverse.…      “Then we will really begin to glory joyfully and defiantly and say and sing: ‘O death, where is thy sting? O hell, where is thy victory?’ That is really snapping one’s fingers at death and hell and saying: ‘Dear death, do not bite me, but show your anger with me and kill me. I defy death and hell and challenge them to touch a hair on my head! Where are you now, you vile man-eaters? … I defy you to pursue me further!’ For death has already been drowned and swallowed up entirely on Christ’s body, with not as much as a speck of death’s dust remaining on Him. Now we who believe in Him share in this when the hour comes in which we see and feel how death and hell are entirely swallowed up and exterminated. At present, however, we await the hour, assured that this will surely come to pass and that we can already defiantly rely on Christ by faith over against sin, death, and hell.” The words of Martin Luther regarding the present reality of our victory over Satan, sin, death, and the grave give us a clearer understanding of the Apostle’s words, “O death, where is thy victory? O death, where is thy sting?” The Easter Season is truly a time of celebration for all Christians. It is the fulfillment of a promise. A promise made by Almighty God Himself. He sent His Son into time, space, and human history for one specific and very personal purpose, to redeem you and me from our sins. To make us new people in Christ and to give us the greatest gift He could ever give. This this end, hear His words for you and me: “For our sake he [God the Father] made him [Jesus the Son] to be sin for us, so that in him [in Christ] we might become the righteousness of God” – II Corinthians 5:21. “For if while we were enemies we were reconciled to God by the death of his Son, much more, now that we are reconciled, shall we be saved by his life” – Romans 5:8. “For the wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord” – Romans 6:23. Jesus said, “The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy. I came that they may have life and have it abundantly. I am the good shepherd. The good shepherd lays down his life for the sheep” – John 10:10-11. As we enter this year’s Easter Season, may we do so, praying and asking our gracious Heavenly Father to help us daily to embrace His promises and especially the truth of the Resurrection, Christ died for you! Thanks be to God! Pastor Jim