Excerpt from Who Is Jesus Christ?
by Bob E. Patterson

When the Gospel writers came to the end of the story, it never occurred to them to write "The End." Luke, in fact, did write a second volume of the story of Christ-The Acts of the Apostles, we call it-and indicated that the work of Christ had only just begun.

Of course, part of the work of Christ was finished forever. The revelation of his Father's love and his reconciliation of us to his Father was perfect and complete. His earthly ministry was over--the three years of teaching and healing, the agony of Gethsemane, the arrest and trial, the death on the cross. The full price for sin has been paid, and you and I have been rescued. Calvary and the empty tomb are the crowning and completion of Christ's work, it is true, but that is not the whole truth.

Christ's earthly work was done, but his heavenly work was just beginning. Christ is more that a mere figure of history to be read about and reminisced over. Calvary and Easter are past, but Christ is alive and well and very busy. The fist volume of his life has been followed by hundreds more in the last twenty centuries. Even as you read this page, Christ’s story is still being written wherever he moves in our crowded world to find the lost, to heal the sick, to comfort the brokenhearted, and to bring sanity to the demon-ridden in the name of the Father, the Lord God Almighty.

On Easter Sunday morning the first disciples saw this very clearly, and they sensed that from then on Christ was no less than the Lord and Master of all of life. They dedicated themselves to the amazing adventure of carrying the good news of his lordship from the ignominy of Galilee to the throne of the caesar in less than 300 years. Love was their only weapon as they faced the entrenched selfishness of the world. They finally knocked on the gates of Rome in spite of fire, insults, the arena, and the torture rack. They did it, but they always said it was the achievement of the living and reigning Christ, not their own doing. Christ’s life story is still in action in Tokyo, in Cairo, in London, in Atlanta, and in Mexico City where it goes from strength to strength. Christ is alive and at work.

Resurrection: The Proof of Lordship
When Jesus rose from the dead on Easter, he defeated death, revived his followers to new life, vindicated his Heavenly Father, assured our immortality, and reassumed his cosmic authority as Lord of the universe. His resurrection clarified his identity as the eternal Son of the Father and declared him to be alive forevermore in sovereignty.

The first confession of the disciples was the straightforward declaration "Jesus is Lord." If his body had remained in the tomb after the cross, no disciple would ever have spoken those three words. The fact that Jesus was alive meant that he was Lord. All four Gospels were written to proclaim the Lord, the Son of the Father, known through the resurrection. He rose from the grave to take his place at the right hand of the Father and to begin his kingly reign.

Jesus was born and died naturally as the rest of us, but he was conceived and resurrected supernaturally in a way that has no human analogy. Just as he entered the world unexpectedly and miraculously, so he rose from the tomb and left the world in a surprising way.

Bob Patterson is the author of "Who Is Jesus Christ?" To order, go to the online bookpage or call 1-800-747-3016.

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