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God raised Jesus
God raised Jesus
God raised Jesus up from the dead:
the man they crucified.
When he died he paid for my sins:
and now he's risen I am justified.
When I was still weak and powerless,
Jesus died in the sinners' place.
Risen now, he meets me to bless,
I'm saved from wrath by his grace.
While I was unclean, Christ died for me,
I was justified by his blood.
How much more shall he set me free
from wrath, and bring me to good?
An enemy once, I'm reconciled
by the death of God's Son in pain.
How much more, now I am his child,
his risen life is my gain.
By trespasses of the human race
death and hell reigned supreme through sin.
But we gain abundance of grace
by Christ's new life ent'ring in.
Words and tune copyright © John Hartley 2006.
Based on Romans 4:25 and 5:1&6, 5:9, 5:10 and 5:17.
Story behind the song
I wrote this song as part of a series for Easter about the resurrection of Christ: my aim was to turn bible passages into songs. But as I searched for passages about the resurrection in St Paul's letters, I found myself wrestling with this question: what did St Paul's believe the resurrection accomplished that the cross had not already accomplished. I'm in no doubt that Paul believed the resurrection happened - 1 Corinthians 15:1-11 makes that clear - and he believed we could therefore be certain of forgiveness. One bible commentary put it like this: the resurrection assures us that the benefits which Christ won for us on the cross really are ours. But is that all?
The question was focussed for me in Romans 4:25 - "Christ died for our sins, and was raised to life for our justification." Is this just a literary device of parallelism, which Paul is using for emphasis? Does he mean that the effect of the cross is the same as the effect of the resurrection? Or is there a difference between the two halves. I've read several commentaries which say the former - and particularly as the word "justification" is later used as a result of the cross (Romans 5:9 - the second verse of the song), I can see reasons for taking this line. But somehow it doesn't satisfy me. Surely the resurrection must be more than showmanship?
I'm grateful to Eric, a colleague, for pointing out to me that Paul's doctrine of the resurrection includes the transformation of the lives of believers. Without the resurrection the gospel is only sin-management, but with it, it is a transformation. The doctrine of the resurrection of Christ leads Paul to celebrate the impact of Christ's risen life in the lives of those who follow him, with whom he is united.
So the aim of this song is to explore a series of verses in Paul's letter to the Romans which contrast the achievements of the resurrection in our present experience with the achievements of the cross. In each verse, the first half is what Christ did in his death for us - important enough by itself, but complemented and fulfilled by the second half which is what Christ still does for us in his resurrection from the dead.
John Hartley
Windows Media Player. When you click the left-hand "play" button your computer should have started to play the tune. If it didn't, you might be able to get the tune by clicking here, or by right-clicking the link, choosing "save target as", saving it onto your computer, and then opening it with a music-playing program.
Please remember that a midi file of a tune isn't supposed to be a state-of-the-art musical arrangement - it is only supposed to give a basic idea of how the tune goes. Any reasonable organist / keyboard player / music group could make it sound far better.