ALIVE FOREVERMORE (SUNRISE)

12 Then I turned to see the voice that spoke with me. And having turned I saw seven
golden lampstands, 13 and in the midst of the seven lampstands One like the Son of Man,
clothed with a garment down to the feet and girded about the chest with a golden band.
14 His head and hair were white like wool, as white as snow, and His eyes like a flame of
fire; 15 His feet were like fine brass, as if refined in a furnace, and His voice as the
sound of many waters; 16 He had in His right hand seven stars, out of His mouth went a
sharp two-edged sword, and His countenance was like the sun shining it its strength. 17
And when I saw Him, I fell at His feet as dead. But He laid His right hand on me, saying
to me, Do not be afraid; I am the First and the Last. 18 I am He who lives, and was
dead, and behold, I am alive forevermore. Amen. And I have the keys of Hades and of
Death.
--Revelation 1:12-18 (NKJV)
Behold, I am alive forevermore. With those words Christ gives affirmation to
the truth we gather here to celebrate this morning. All we can do in light of the
Resurrection is to simply give thanks to God. We can certainly be grateful for the things
Christ did, witnessed to in the Word: that He cleansed the lepers; that the deaf were
made to hear; that sight was given to the blind; that the dumb could speak; that there
was comfort for the sad, acceptance for the outcast, and hope for the hopeless. But His
sacrificial death and Resurrection are the things He did most worthy of our praise and
thanks, for without a cross and a Resurrection, there would not even be a church.
I. I AM HE WHO LIVES, AND WAS DEAD
During this Lent season, as during each Lent season, I have tried to point to the
cross as the center of our faith. Christs death on the cross is the culmination of all that
gave meaning to His life. His last words from the cross were, It is finished. We miss
the mark if we fail to understand that His death was His greatest purpose in life. When
we understand that, then we begin to understand why so many false teachings raise
objections to Christs death and/or His Resurrection. The truth of the Gospel witness
must stand or fall at these two points: (1) Did Jesus in fact die on a cross? And (2) Was
He in fact raised from the dead?
One objection was raised by the Gnostics, a group that emerged during the first
and second centuries, that Jesus did not really die. Their suggestion was that the body
seen on the cross was a mere shellthe spiritual being we call the Christ had
descended on Jesus at His baptism and left at His crucifixion. To understand their
objection, it helps to understand basic Gnostic beliefs. At the heart of the Gnostic system
is a duality, a separation between what is flesh and what is spirit. This belief made the
person of Christ a problem that had to be explained from the outset, since a truly human,
truly divine figure, in their system, was utterly impossible.
A more recent objection is the swoon theory, which suggests that Jesus did not
really die, but only swooned, or fainted, on the cross. This theory also suggests that He

was revived by the coolness of the tomb, and got up, rolled away the stone, and walked
out. Thats a pretty slick trick for a man who had been beaten half to death, lost large
amounts of blood, had spikes driven through his feet, and very likely had a spear thrust
through His heart. Besides, even His own words in this passage refute that theory: I am
He who lives, AND WAS DEAD.
His death was real. Not only was His death real, it was the worst kind of death we
can imagine. And this death was made even more hideous for Him, when we consider
who He is. If this was the worst death that could happen to a human being, then how
much more gruesome for one who was the very Son of God, the King of glory. What a
tremendous chasm between the beauties and glories of heaven and the place called Skull
Hill. His death was not only real, it was more real than any death ever before. Not only
was His death real, it was done voluntarily. Understand the hideousness of this death,
understand it was done by Christs willing choice, and you will understand the agony of
Gethsemane. The literal meaning of our free translation of I was dead is I BECAME
dead. There is a voluntariness and a willingness wrapped up within that idea of
becoming. Christ Himself witnessed to His own voluntary offering of Himself:
beforehand, in His statement, No one takes my life from me, but I lay it down of
myself; and on the cross, when His life is not taken away from Him, but He says rather,
Into your hands I commend my Spirit.
II I AM ALIVE FOREVERMORE
Not only do we have the certainty of the death of Christ here, but we also have the
certainty of His Resurrection. They rolled a stone in front of the tombthey put a seal
on the tombthey stationed soldiersbut the grave could not hold Him. Of course,
there have been some objections that Jesus wasnt the first to come back. The
examples given are the Shunammite womans son, Jairuss daughter, the widow of Nains
son, and Lazarus. But the one significant difference between Jesus and all those others is
that they all RETURNED to the grave. Jesus says in this text in Revelation, I am alive
FOREVERMORE. His Resurrection to a heavenly existence with a glorified body is
not to be confused with previous resurrections of earthly bodies to an earthly existence.
III. I HAVE THE KEYS OF HADES AND OF DEATH
Jesus is the Lord over death and the grave. We certainly have in this passage
several powerful statements concerning the risen Lord. But not does He say: I am the
first and the last; I am He who lives; I am He who was dead; and I am alive
forevermore. He also says: I have the keys. I was reminded of a game we used to
play when I was a Boy Scout, called Steal the Flag. Our troop met in a church which
had a large wooded area behind it. On moonlit nights in the warmer months, we would
choose up teams and play the game. We had a well-traveled path which was the dividing
line between each teams territory. Each team had a white cloth to use as a flag. The
rules were that the flag could not be more than 100 feet from either side of the trail, and
had to be placed somewhere in plain sight, uncovered. The object of the game was to
sneak into the enemys territory and steal the flag and get back to your own territory
without being captured. If captured, you would be placed in an area that served as a

prison. The game ended when someone stole the other teams flag and made it back
safely. The inevitable shout at the end of the game was, Ive got the flag! Ive got the
flag! All the prisoners would then be freed, and victory was declared.
In a manner of speaking, that is exactly what Jesus did by His death and
Resurrection. He went into the enemys camp, stole the keys, and came back. And here
in this passage, He makes the proclamation of victory: I have the keys! The prisoners
are all freed. The grave is no longer a prison-house to which death holds the key. Death
need no longer be feared: Since then, the children are sharers in flesh and blood, He
also Himself in like manner partook of the same, that through death He might bring to
nought him that had the power of death, that is the devil, and might deliver all them who,
through fear of death, were all their lifetime subject to bondage (Hebrews 2:15).
Jesus Christ took the worst symbol of suffering ever known on earththe cross
and made it a symbol of the greatest triumph. He took the thing that gives greatest fear
deathand made it the doorway to our greatest hope. Praise God today for a risen, living
Lord!