The Supremacy of Christ

I didn’t have an extended time of prayer yesterday… and I paid the price. When I pray, the day seems longer and my attitude can handle whatever happens. Not so yesterday. I was constantly dropping things, crabby, and didn’t get much done.

Today’s devotional tells me why. It is about the supremacy of Christ. He rules over illness, the weather, evil spirits, and all created matter.

And standing over her, [Jesus] rebuked the fever, and it left her; and she immediately got up and waited on them. (Luke 4:39)
They came to Jesus and woke Him up, saying, “Master, Master, we are perishing!” And He got up and rebuked the wind and the surging waves, and they stopped, and it became calm. (Luke 8:24)
While [his father] was still approaching, the demon slammed [the boy] to the ground and threw him into a convulsion. But Jesus rebuked the unclean spirit, and healed the boy and gave him back to his father. (Luke 9:42)

When Jesus speaks, He has not only the will to change things but the power to do so. Illness may have to do with chemical reactions in our body cells, with molecules and electrons and the laws of physics and chemistry, yet Jesus designed those laws ages ago and sustains them each day…

For by him all things were created, in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or rulers or authorities—all things were created through him and for him. And he is before all things, and in him all things hold together. (Colossians 1:16–17)
He is the radiance of the glory of God and the exact imprint of his nature, and he upholds the universe by the word of his power. After making purification for sins, he sat down at the right hand of the Majesty on high... (Hebrews 1:3)

… but His Word is above all these laws, reversing them by rebuking them. As Piper points out, when Christ thinks a thing with sufficient intentionality, it materializes. All matter is utterly dependent for its origin, existence, and stability on the thought of Christ.

What about the other minds besides Christ’s? For example, unclean spirits? The NT clearly shows that the mind of Christ rules them too. One thought from Him and whether matter or mind, He sustains. He governs or it can also be altered, healed, cherished forever, or extinguished. All that exists hangs on His will. This is amazing and faith-building!

PRAY: When I pray and give myself and my day to You, this is not mere sentiment or even a yielding of my will. It is asking You to do what I ask (or even more) by the power of Your will. When I pray, it requires humility as well as faith in Your all-encompassing, all-sustaining, all-governing power. If I do not pray, who or what am I trusting? This is the Gospel repeated again. I cannot save myself and I cannot keep myself in Your will and expect great things. Only You, in Your enduring and faithful grace, can do that. I’ve no excuse for neglecting prayer, only a confession of the sin of it.

Jesus left the tomb

A few years ago, a person knowledgeable about such things explained why Jesus could walk on water and suddenly appear in rooms with locked doors. He said that the space between the tiny molecules that make up matter is so large by comparison to the matter that another object should easily be able to pass through it. We sit on a chair, but the molecules of a chair are far enough apart that the molecules of our bodies (also far apart) should be able to pass through the chair, but they don’t. We walk through air, float or sink in water, but anything is theoretically possible.

Obviously we need our world to be this way, but how does it work? The Bible says of Jesus…

For by him all things were created, in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or rulers or authorities—all things were created through him and for him. And he is before all things, and in him all things hold together. (Colossians 1:16–17)

He controls it. In Him, all things hold together. While this principle is consistent and dependable (I can rely on a chair to hold me from passing through it to the floor), He can change the rules if need be. That is why He can walk on water and walk through walls. That is also why He didn’t need to have the stone rolled away so He could get out of the tomb.

And looking up, (the women) saw that the stone had been rolled back—it was very large. And entering the tomb, they saw a young man sitting on the right side, dressed in a white robe, and they were alarmed. And he said to them, “Do not be alarmed. You seek Jesus of Nazareth, who was crucified. He has risen; he is not here. See the place where they laid him. (Mark 16:4–6)

Today’s devotional reading says that large stone was not rolled away for Him to come out, but that they might go in! It was not the means of His exit but the means of their entrance. This makes the resurrection more than a piece of history; it makes it also a pledge and a promise, for God rolled away the stone not that Jesus might rise but that we might know he had risen. The women went into the empty tomb and saw only the place where they laid Him.

Going into a cave could be scary, never mind a stone tomb, but the women only saw grave clothes. Jesus was not there. In history, even His enemies and all skeptics have never argued or denied that His tomb was empty. They have tried to figure out what happened to His body, but no other answer fits the information we are given except that Jesus defied and defeated death. The tomb was neither cold nor eerie. It was quiet and calm, a place He merely rested for awhile and now one more assurance that He has risen indeed.