Pangs Have Been Loosed
"[T]his Jesus, delivered up according to the definite plan and foreknowledge of God, you crucified and killed by the hands of lawless men. God raised him up, loosing the pangs of death, because it was not possible for him to be held by it." -Acts 2:23–24 This is part of the defining sermon at the foundation of the church. Peter is preaching to the gathered crowd who came around when the Holy Spirit fell on the believers waiting after Jesus' ascension. This is what the preacher says of Jesus, that he was delivered according to plan, to solve the wrath against sin, and he was raised up because death couldn't hold him. We know this pretty well if we have been around the church for any length of time. But let us not move over it quickly today because this is actually the center of our hope in life today and proof of the finished work of the cross for us. These words of Peter are true, and because what he describes happened, we are forever changed and empowered to live.