Get Free At Last


Get Free At Last

I am going to be writing in the coming weeks about a path all of us walk down—the path between life and death. Today I want to focus on the free gift of not being afraid of death, a gift which Jesus Christ freely offers to all those who will receive it.
In Hebrews 2: 14-15 we read, “Therefore, since the children have flesh and blood, He (Jesus) too shared in their humanity, so that by His death He might destroy him who holds the power of death, that is, the devil, and free those who all their lives were held in slavery by their fear of death.”

This passage says that the Eternal Word of God, God’s Son Jesus, took on a human nature, including death, 1. To destroy the one who holds the power of death (the devil) and 2. To free those enslaved to the fear of death!
Contrary to what some people may think, death is not a part of God’s good creation.  God made a world without death. Hebrews says the devil “holds the power of death.” Death is an enemy.  In fact Paul writes in scripture that death is the last enemy to be destroyed. (I Corinthians 15:26)

Imagine if you were on vacation and a thief broke into your house and ransacked it.  You would be shocked, sad, and angry.  In John 11:33 and 38 there are indications that Jesus reacted similarly to the death of his friend Lazarus. The Holman Standard Christian Bible says Jesus “was angry in His Spirit,” verse 33, and “angry in Himself,” verse 38. There is a footnote which says, “The Greek word is very strong and probably indicates Jesus' anger against sin's tyranny and death.” The NET Bible says Jesus was “deeply moved,” or “deeply indignant,” and it adds this note: “he was angry because he found himself face to face with the manifestations of Satan’s kingdom of evil. Here the realm of Satan was represented by death.”

So, back to Hebrews 2:14-15. Jesus came to destroy the one (Satan) who holds the power of death and to free us from the paralyzing fear of death. The devil is like a thief who has ransacked God’s good creation, and Jesus has come in the flesh to defeat and destroy him. We read in Colossians 2:15 that on the cross Jesus disarmed the devil and the other powers of darkness and he defeated them.
But not only that. God knows that many people are still literally paralyzed by the fear of death. (Hebrews 2:15 says that they are enslaved to that fear.) So Jesus died to set us free from that enslavement!

Sometime this week I hope to go to a good French restaurant with my daughter and later in the week with my son. Imagine if I paid in advance the price for my children to have a great meal with me at a fine restaurant and then they never joined me to dine. 
Wouldn’t that be a waste?

Well God has paid the price for you to be set free from the fear of death. And yet many people never take Him up on His paid-up offer. How sad.

Accept Jesus into your life as Savior, Lord, and Healer. He paid the price for you to be set free from the fear of death! Determine that not one drop of His blood shed for you to be free of the fear of death will be wasted by your continuing to live in that fear. 

Take full advantage of what Jesus has paid for and be free of death’s fear!

Winfield Casey Jones is a retired pastor and can be reached at wrjones2002@gmail.com. this column first appeared in the Pearland and Friendswood Reporter News.




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