...For what I received I passed on to you as of first importance; that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures, that he was buried, that he was raised on the third day according to the Scriptures, and that he appeared to Peter and then to the Twelve, After that, he appeared to more than five hundred of the brothers at the same time, ...
"By raising Christ from the dead, God the Father was in effect saying that He approved of Christ’s work of suffering and dying for our sins, that His work was completed, and that Christ no longer had any need to remain dead.
There was no penalty left to pay for sin, no more wrath of God to bear, no more guilt or liability to punishment — all had been completely paid for and no guilt remained.
When the Father in essence said to Christ, all the penalty for sins has been paid and I find you not guilty but righteous in my sight, he was thereby making the declaration that would also apply to us once we trusted in Christ for salvation.
GALATIANS 2: 20 -21 “ I have been crucified with Christ and I no longer live, but Christ lives in me. The life I live in the body, I live by faith in the son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me. I do not set aside the grace of God, for if righteousness could be gained through the law, Christ died for nothing!”
GALATIANS 5: 4-6 “ You who are trying to be justified by law have been alienated from Christ: you have fallen away from grace. But by faith we eagerly await through the Spirit the righteousness for which we hope."
ROMANS 4:7-8 “Blessed are they whose transgressions are forgiven, whose sins are covered. Blessed is the man whose sin the Lord will never found against him.”
1 THESSALONIANS 5:8-11 “But since we belong to the day, let us be self-controlled, putting on faith and love as a breast plate , and the hope of salvation as a helmet. For God did not appoint us to suffer wrath but to receive salvation through our Lord jesus Christ. He died for us so that, whether we are awake or asleep, we may live together with him. Therefore encourage one another and build each other up, just as in fact you are doing.”
PHILIPPIANS 2: 7-8 “But made himself nothing, taking the very nature of a servant, being made in human likeness. And being found in appearance as a man he humbled himself and became obedient to death - even death on a cross!”
1 PETER 2: 9 “ But you are a chosen people, a royal priest-hood, a holy nation, a people belonging to God, that you may declare the praises of him who called you out of darkness into his wonderful light.”
ROMANS 1: 16 “I am not ashamed of the gospel, because it is the power of God for the salvation of everyone who believes: first for the Jew, then for the Gentile.
“Christ - not home repairs, clean air, or successful children - is our life. On the other hand, we might forget who we are and respond instead in self-righteousness, a craving for respectability, or even a faithless self-loathing.
Our problem is that if we don’t continually remind ourselves of how he has chosen, renamed, and remade us, the stumble to grow in Christian character will become nothing more than another attempt at self-improvement, and self-improvement always results in self-loathing and pride.
Our Savior has declared that we are completely dependent upon him and what he accomplished for us, but in overconfidence we hastily run past his accomplishments and seek rest in our own.
Obedience has to be motivated by love for God in response to his great grace or it is destined to fail. And it can only be motivated by love when we know that our relationship with our heavenly Father is eternally secure. If we want to know the fullness of God’s grace, life and power in our daily lives, there’s only one way to do so.
We’ve got “to know the love of Christ that surpasses knowledge”(Eph. 3:19) Remembering Christ’s love in the Gospel is not merely the invitation to God’s family, but it is also the foundation of our experience of his person. Only constant meditation on Christ’s love will make us eager to be with him."