Experiencing Resurrection Power

Experiencing Resurrection Power

I can really know Christ and experience the mighty power that raised him from the dead. I can learn what it means to suffer with him. –Philippians 3:10

Sometimes I try to listen with uninitiated ears to the phrases we Christians say all the time. What must it sound like to someone who has never heard the gospel for someone to suggest they should “ask Jesus into their heart”? I often wonder what it means to those who are skeptical of Christians when they hear us say we have a “personal relationship” with Jesus. I can’t help but wonder if they think we’re a little off upstairs. How can a human have a “personal relationship” with a deity?

It is obvious from the passion of his words that Paul wanted far more than to simply know about Jesus. He wanted to know him by experiencing him. He wanted to experience his pain and his power—he wanted it all. No holding God at arm’s length—he wanted to get personal. And getting personal with God means experiencing his power in the present tense. Paul reached for the ultimate highs and lows that are required for knowing someone in a full and complete way. He wanted to go to the depths with Christ to have fellowship with him there in his suffering, and he wanted to go to the heights with Christ to experience the power of his resurrection. Paul had already experienced the power of God in his salvation. Everyone who comes to Christ in faith experiences this resurrection power. But Paul wanted more, and I have to say, I do too. I desperately need the power of God to resist the temptations that entice me, to persevere in the pain that afflicts me, and to serve in spite of the ease that attracts me. Only as we experience his resurrection power can we endure the fellowship of his suffering.

To experience the power that raised Christ from the dead is to lay hold of everything Christ holds out to us and to anticipate the day that awaits us when “the Lord himself will come down from heaven with a commanding shout, with the call of the archangel, and with the trumpet call of God. First, all the Christians who have died will rise from their graves. Then, together with them, we who are still alive and remain on the earth will be caught up in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air and remain with him forever” (1 Thessalonians 4:16-17).

My Power Source for salvation and in suffering, I don’t want to settle for just being an acquaintance of the Almighty. I want to know you personally and powerfully. I want to share in your life and in your death, and I want to be changed.

DIGGING DEEPER