What the Grave Couldn’t Do
by Cody Anderson Corinth Missionary Baptist Church
Death brings about a serious concern for everyone. Throughout Scripture, death is portrayed as a great enemy. Genesis 3:19 states, “…for you are dust, and to dust you shall return” (ESV). Since the curse of sin, we have been handed this verdict.
The grave is the final judgement for man’s vain efforts to cover their sin, correct their behavior, and be obedient enough.
What man, the Law, and Israel couldn’t fix, a grave would provide the way.
Death was not about the natural end of man, but the final judgment of our spiritual state. While man, the Law, and Israel had their limitations, so does the grave now.
The death of Jesus Christ was not some correction God had to make.
The crucifixion was the climax of the salvation of man from the beginning.
We have already talked about how man tried to cover themselves, but God slayed an animal to cover them.
This is the earliest indication of how the seed of woman would restore what sin marred.
The weight that man had tried to offload through the law and sacrificial system would be placed on the body of Christ.
During the Passover, the angel of death simply, for a night, overlooked the houses with the blood.
At the cross, sin was not overlooked; it was judged once and for all.
In Isaiah 53:5, it says, “He was pierced for our transgressions; he was crushed for our iniquities” (ESV). The prophet spoke of something in the future as if it had already taken place.
This was a part of God’s plan from the beginning. It wasn’t God shooting from the hip when surprised by the sin of man.
Christ died. He was laid in the grave. Just as the grave received all those buried before and after Christ.
This time it would be different, though.
This grave would only be borrowed for a few days. Christ’s death was tragic, but the resurrection was not a reversal of death.
The resurrection of Jesus was a victory over the final adversary of man. Acts 2:24 says, “God raised him up, loosing the pangs of death, because it was not possible for him to be held by it” (ESV).
Death had no jurisdiction over the Son of Man.
For where there is sin, death will receive its due. In Christ’s case, no sin would be found, so there is no rightful wage.
Jesus entered death on our behalf.
The Son of God did not deserve death, but He bore the weight for all who would believe.
His payment paid in full the death of all us sinners. The resurrection is the receipt that our debit is paid, and Christ’s work of salvation is finished.
What began in the garden with death now culminates with life.
The curse that came through Adam is overcome through Christ, and the final enemy is defeated.
Since the grave could not hold Christ, it does not have the power to hold those who are in Christ.
The sting of death is sin, and it has been swallowed up in victory by way of the empty tomb.
The law of God has been fulfilled. The perfect sacrifice laid down His life so that sin and death no longer have any claim on those who would follow Him.
I am not trying to convince you that death is no more.
I would be a fool to say that. Graves continue to be filled every day. But those who are in Christ no longer have to fear the judgment of death.
Now death is but a doorway to another destination.
Once a believer draws their final breath, they will open their eyes in the presence of the One who died for them.
What the grave could not do is hold Christ.
Salvation will not be denied to those who trust in Him.
Man tried to cover their sin.
The law showed us we could never be good enough.
We saw that the sacrificial system would never fully atone for the sins of the people.
The Son of God had to come in the form of man, completely be obedient according to the law, and lay down His life in order to defeat sin and death so we could be reconciled back to a Holy God.
