The Easter season is a time of contradictions and ironies. While we mourn, we also rejoice. While we consider the great price paid for sin on the cross and bow our heads in shame to realize our sin and rebellion nailed Him there, at the same time we are thankful for what was accomplished through it. As the old hymn says, we “cherish the old rugged cross,” finding in it “a wondrous beauty,” because by it God was able “to pardon and sanctify me.” It was brutal yet healing, ugly yet divine in its power. Such are the mysteries of our marvelous redemption.

I can only imagine the deep despair that struck the hearts of Jesus’ disciples when they witnessed or heard about His crucifixion. All their hopes dashed in one day! All they had done for three years crushed under the feet of Roman tyranny and jealous religious rulers! Their precious Jesus had been taken away, and­ like Mary, who lamented to the one she supposed to be the gardener, “They have taken away my Lord and I don’t know where to find him,” the disciples too didn’t know what to do next. Fear and sorrow and profound disappointment filled their hearts, and all they could think to do was to gather together to find some comfort in their shared pain.

It was in this context that they received the unbelievably Good News … He was alive! The women who had been at the tomb were told from the lips of angels (what better source for spiritual information could there be?) words that seemed too good to be true: “Why do you look for the living among the dead? He is not here; he has risen! Remember how he told you, while he was still with you in Galilee: The Son of Man must be delivered into the hands of sinful men, be crucified and on the third day be raised again” (Luke 24:5).

Yes, He had died. There was no erasing the pain and anguish of that. Yes, He had been taken away from them for a time, buried in a tomb sealed and guarded by the Roman government. All had seemed lost during that awful time, but now … something more powerful than death had arrived. Resurrection cancelled the effects of death, rendering it impotent and less than final. Oh what glorious news! It’s no wonder that this stupendous revelation forever changed the apostles, making them ready to risk everything in this life knowing that there is something far more powerful than our enemy death.

Understanding this truth is what drove Paul to the kind of life he lived. As he explained to the Corinthian believers, “I tell you a mystery … in a flash, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trumpet … the dead will be raised imperishable, and we will be changed. When the perishable has been clothed with the imperishable, and the mortal with immortality, then the saying that is written will come true: ‘Death has been swallowed up in victory.’ ‘Where, O death, is your victory? Where, O death, is your sting?’ … Thanks be to God! He gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ. Therefore, my dear brothers, stand firm. Let nothing move you. Always give yourselves fully to the work of the Lord, because you know that your labor in the Lord is not in vain” (1 Corinthians 15:51-58).

This glorious truth has been especially real to me this month as I have remembered the Lord’s sacrifice for me on the cross and His triumphant resurrection from the dead, and have experienced the death of my own

mother. While my mother’s passing at the age of 94 was not as shocking or unexpected as it might have been at a younger age, there is still a deep sorrow in saying goodbye to someone you have loved for over sixty years. Without the hope of reunion, such parting would be unspeakably tragic. But I have been sustained and comforted by the confidence that I will see her again in far better circumstances, without the constraints of poor health and the limitations of “looking through a glass darkly” (as Paul wrote in chapter 13 of 1 Corinthians). Like the old hymn expresses, “We shall meet on that beautiful shore … and our spirits shall sorrow no more.”

Through the “infirmities of the flesh” my highly intelligent mother was gradually reduced to someone who couldn’t remember what day it was, where she lived, or what she ate ten minutes ago. Her beauty also was “consumed away” (as it says in Psalm 39) in her last few years. She not only lost a lot of weight, but she also ended up without many teeth in the end. She even lost her glasses in the confusion of memory loss and lost her ability to read.

So many things we take for granted can be lost in this life if our bodies and minds fail us. But this is not the last chapter of our lives if we know Christ. All will be restored and so much more in the life to come! Knowing that, I rejoice for my mom because she knew Him. She is in His presence, safe from all the anxieties and fears of life she experienced here.

It gives me great joy to think about Jesus’ triumph over sin and death. Satan was sure that he had won when he inspired Judas to betray Christ and when the religious leaders persuaded the Romans to crucify Him. Finally he would defeat his arch rival and bring the advancement of God’s kingdom to an abrupt end. What he had failed to do in the wilderness through the temptations had finally been won through a Roman cross.

How stupid he was! Paul wrote in 1 Corinthians 2:8 that had the rulers of this age (evil men inspired by Satan) known what they were doing, “they would not have crucified the Lord of glory.” For in doing that, they ushered in the plan of God’s redemption and their power was overthrown just three days later by His resurrection. “Oh, the depth of the riches of the wisdom and knowledge of God!” Paul writes in another place. He turns everything that looks so terrible, so powerfully bad, into something amazingly good. We may groan as we await the transformation, experiencing the very real pains of suffering, sorrow, calamity, disease, and physical death, but we have hope as we await the fulfillment of all God’s promises to us. One day we will be liberated from earth’s bondage to decay and be brought into the glorious freedom of the children of God (Romans 8:21).

This is the heart, the joy, of our Easter celebration. Death can no longer be proud of its power. It is not final, and it cannot separate us from one another for long. There will be a glad reunion with all the saints who went before us, and with our glorified bodies we will stand together before the One who died for us and has overcome all so we can enjoy His fellowship forever. Thank you, Lord Jesus, for your mighty victory over sin and death. You alone are worthy! How I praise you, and how I love you!

And as for you, death: Be not proud. Your triumph is short and one day you will be no more. Hallelujah!