Hosea 13:14 I will ransom them from the power of the grave; I will redeem them from death: O death, I will be your plagues; O grave… For long ages,, it must. have almost seemed as if God had forgotten His challenge. Death reigned from Adam to Moses"; from Moses to David, who "died and was buried"; and from David to Christ. One of the earliest chapters of the Bible (Genesis 5.) is a cemetery of the old world; and in the case of each the monotonous announcement follows, "and he died." The generations of mankind spring smiling and beautiful on mother earth, like the clover crops of successive years, as if to defy or with their charms to fascinate the tyrant reaper. But all to no avail. There were only two exceptions to the dread monotony of death — the rapture of Enoch, and the ascension of Elijah; they were like the early crocus or aconite, which announces the coming of the spring. All the rest died. At last He came in human form who had been fore-announced as death's death, the destined fulfiller of the promise of paradise. At least He will not succumb. He will not see death! Or if they meet, before one glance of His eyes, "which are as a flame of fire," surely death will wane as the moon when smitten by sunlight! But contrary to all that we might have thought, it was not so. He, too, the Prince of Life, having entered the lists with the fell tyrant, allowed Himself to be led as a lamb to the slaughter. And it might have seemed therefore that none, not even God, could break the thrall of death. Such was the appearance; but not the fact. We are reminded of the old Greek story that when the city of Athens was doomed to supply each year a tribute of youths and maidens to the monster of Crete, the here Theseus embarked with the crew, and accompanied the victims that he might beard the dreadful ogre in his den, sad slaying him, for ever free his native city from the burden under which it groaned. So Christ through death abolished death, and "destroyed him that had the power of death, that is the devil, and delivered those who through fear of death were all their lifetime subject to bondage." Here was fulfilled the Divine announcement, "O death, I will be thy plagues." Nor is this all. In the last vision vouchsafed to man of the ascended Christ, the keys of death are said to hang at His girdle, and He has the power to shut so that none can open, and to open so that none can shut. Nor is even this all. The day is not far distant when all His saints "that are in their graves shall hear His voice, and shall come forth"; then shall be fulfilled the saying that is written, "Death is swallowed up in victory." Nor is even this all. The world of men is to participate in the resurrection power of death's victor. "As in Adam all die, even so in Christ shall all be made alive." They shall come from the ages before the flood; from the foot of the pyramids, where the slaves of the Pharaohs mingled their dust with the bricks they made; from the earliest scenes of life, and from the latest; from the most enlightened races of mankind, and the most degraded; from the most warlike and the most peaceful tribes; cathedral vaults shall split and give up their contents; Marathon, Austerlitz, and Waterloo shall add their contributions; the sea shall give return of the harvest sown through the centuries. Nor is this all. All enemies are to be put beneath His feet. The last enemy to be destroyed by Emmanuel shall be death itself. In what its destruction shall consist we do not know; except that in that world which the King who sits upon the throne shall create, we are told, "There shall be no more death." No funeral cortege shall wind its way over the golden pavement. How gloriously then will God realise the words that glisten before our eyes this Easter morning! Already in the resurrection of our Lord Jesus Christ from the dead we see that the empire of death is doomed. But, in the meanwhile, is there no comfort for us who are compelled to live in the valley shadowed by death? There is, because He goes beside us; and the Psalmist, who had spoken of Him in the third person, addresses Him in the second as that shadow comes nearer: "He restoreth my soul; Thou art with me." And if this should not be the case, and we were doomed to go down, each alone, to die, yet even then we need not be without solace. Death is abolished! The wasp struck its sting into the Cross of the dying Lord, and lost it there, and is now stingless for ever. The poison fang of the viper has been extracted; Goliath beheaded by his own sword. The teeth of the lion have been drawn. (F. B. Meyer, B. A.) Parallel Verses KJV: I will ransom them from the power of the grave; I will redeem them from death: O death, I will be thy plagues; O grave, I will be thy destruction: repentance shall be hid from mine eyes. |
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