Cancer Blog #75
By Brian Zimmerman
Begun on July 31, 2021
Email: dyingman1@yahoo.com
My Dying Words
Entry #75– The Prince of Life
February 28, 2023
[Act 3:14-15] 14 “But you disowned the Holy and Righteous One and asked for a murderer to be granted to you, 15 but put to death the Prince of life, [the one] whom God raised from the dead, [a fact] to which we are witnesses.
We continue to look at Peter’s sermons in the book of Acts as he points the finger at his countrymen, holding them responsible for the death of Jesus. Peter uses a number of titles for Jesus in this sermon: the Christ, (God’s) servant, the Holy One, the Righteous One. The title that seems most important to Peter in his accusation (the one he uses in the passage I quote above) (vs. 15): “[you] put to death the Prince of Life…” Another possible translation for “Prince” is “Author”, so we would read: “… the Author of life.” How can one who is in charge of, or the one who created life itself be put to death? It would seem impossible to do. Yet Jesus, who brought about life in the universe at the beginning of creation and begins again with new life in the new creation, still died on a cross. Though He was God, Jesus was also a man and so subject to death, and could be executed by His own people as Peter says. But God the Father raised Him from the dead. Death could not hold Jesus because of the power of the Spirit. This escape from death was not imaginary, fictional, or a wishing and hoping dream. It was “a fact to which we are witnesses.”
Peter declares that just as a flesh and blood Jesus died and was put in the ground, so is the fact that a flesh and blood Jesus woke up and became the Author of life yet again, this time of a new life of immortality, one no longer subject to death or decay.
Once more, we who are still subject to death and may have already ( or definitely will receive) a terminal diagnosis, now have the certainty, hope, and even joy of knowing that we have not just a great example or teacher, but the author of life who cannot be held by death. That hope has been attested to as fact, His new life proclaimed by His earliest and closest disciples. These who found new courage to speak of this work of life had that courage because of this new life. They proclaim it to others who are also in great need of hope to escape their fear as well as their certainty of death. Peter pronounces not just an accusation of guilt and condemnation, but offers the blessing of a springtime of never ending life. We must reflect on that message when we receive our terminal diagnosis, or whenever we have the opportunity to share this fact with those who live still under the shadow of death, a sad place of despair and darkness.
NEXT: Lord the Dead and of the Living