Three Defeated Foes & Why That’s Important – Death

INTRODUCTION

In the first blog of our Easter series we looked at how the Lord Jesus defeated Satan and in the second we saw how He defeated Sin. Let us now look into how our Lord defeated the last enemy – Death!

THE THIRD & FINAL ENEMY – DEATH

In the original creation, as is seen in the first chapter of the Bible, death was nowhere to be found. It was non-existent because the only thing God created was life. And yet, when Adam and Eve rebelled against God, the man and the woman quite literally cut themselves off from the life-source. A simple way to illustrate this would be to imagine a lamp that is plugged in and shining brightly…that is, until you cut the power cord. Or think about walking up to a rosebush and cutting one of its flowers from the stem…as soon as you cut it, though it still looks pretty on the outside, you have cut it off from the only thing keeping it alive – this is what happened to our ancestors.

God did not create death, but death was ushered in because mankind chose to subject themselves under its rule. As such, it now reigns supreme and has dominion over our lives. What all of us have learned about the government over the past few years is that, once you give someone or something power and control over your life, they will never let it go without a fight. The death-grip is real and there is no escaping it…that is, until One Man long ago literally stared death in the face and walked completely unscathed out of the grave!

Out of the three great enemies we face, this is probably the easiest one to understand because we continually talk through, reflect upon, and preach about the resurrection of Christ. In fact, our entire faith rests upon both the centrality and certainty of God raising Jesus from the dead on Easter morning (1 Corinthians 15:12-22). The Apostle Peter, preaching on the day of Pentecost, proclaimed in Acts 2:24 that “it was not possible for Him to be held by it!” What is seen all over the Scriptures is that even death itself has no power over our God because He is so much greater and stronger, and He has risen victoriously and triumphantly from the dead (cf. Revelation 1:17-18).

WHY IS THIS IMPORTANT TO CONSIDER?

This is important to consider because when we place our faith in Christ, though we may lose our physical bodies one day, He has guaranteed us that in Christ we will live forever in glory (John 3:16; Romans 6:5; Ephesians 2:4-6)! Not only that, but one day soon our God will put Death itself to death. It is why, in 1 Corinthians 15:26, the Apostle Paul wrote that “The last enemy to be destroyed is death.” The Apostle John, piggy-backing on this, said in Revelation 20:14 that he saw “Death and Hades were thrown into the lake of fire…” and then went on to say in the next chapter how “the first heaven and the first earth had passed away.” Literally everything that characterizes this old current creation will one day die and be forever gone and fully replaced with a better creation – one that lives forever!

Remember: death has already been defeated at the resurrection of Jesus because our God proved beyond a shadow of a doubt that He is greater! It was as if Jesus absolutely crippled it and declared death to be on hospice and now we are all simply waiting for the heart monitor to stop beating. The third enemy was death and Jesus overpowered it.

Thus, Death was defeated.

About the Author

Cameron Neace is the pastor of Watermark Church. Born & raised in Missouri, he & Caitlin and their two cats, Pierogi & Poptart, have called Union home since 2023. In his free time, Cameron enjoys playing board games, writing, reading, & drinking coffee.