He is Risen – Do Not Be Afraid!
~ Today’s He Is Risen calligraphy and mini Bible study of Matthew 28 were designed to help you not be afraid. ~
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Think back to when contemporary Christian music was just becoming a thing – late 70’s, I think. For those of you not even born yet, bear with me for a sec.
There was a song back then by The 2nd Chapter of Acts that I flat wore out on my record player. (If you don’t know what a record player is, you can google it!)
To this day, I have not tired of that song.
We even had the piano version played at our wedding as we were exiting the church! Our first song as man and wife. It is called The Easter Song and I think about it every Easter.
I always secretly hope that I’ll hear it at church on Easter morning. But, alas, not many 70’s songs made it into our hymnals. Well, maybe 1870’s. {grin}
Anyway, I’m thinking about that wonderful song today because it is Matthew 28 in a nutshell.
Which is where we are going today.
A little background – I wanted to hand-letter an Easter verse for you (and me!) to display this month. But which one?
He is Risen Calligraphy of course!
I almost did 1 Peter 1:3 which says …
1 Peter 1:3 (NIV): Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ! In his great mercy he has given us new birth into a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead,
An amazing verse (which as you can see, I did eventually hand letter it, too).
But I ended up in Matthew 28 and I noticed some interesting things I hadn’t focused on before.
Don’t you love when God does that?
Since I’ve been looking up fear verses lately for My Fear Verse Project, guess what stood out to me this time?
Check out these verses in light of our fear project.
Matthew 28:1-3: Now after the Sabbath, toward the dawn of the first day of the week, Mary Magdalene and the other Mary went to see the tomb. And behold, there was a great earthquake, for an angel of the Lord descended from heaven and came and rolled back the stone and sat on it. His appearance was like lightning, and his clothing white as snow.
Can you even imagine?
Verse 4: And for fear of him the guards trembled and became like dead men.
Ok. I just have to stop and smile at this. The men – tough guards no less – fainted in fear, but the women didn’t!
You go girls!
Verse 5: But the angel said to the women, “Do not be afraid, for I know that you seek Jesus who was crucified.
So it sounds like they were afraid too – just like we probably would have been – but they didn’t faint.
Verses 6-7: He is not here, for he has risen, as he said. Come, see the place where he lay. Then go quickly and tell his disciples that he has risen from the dead, and behold, he is going before you to Galilee; there you will see him. See, I have told you.”
Facing their fear paid off. They were entrusted with a pretty important job!
Verse 8: So they departed quickly from the tomb with fear and great joy, and ran to tell his disciples.
Interesting how fear and great joy go together.
Verses 9-10: And behold, Jesus met them and said, “Greetings!” And they came up and took hold of his feet and worshiped him. Then Jesus said to them, “Do not be afraid; go and tell my brothers to go to Galilee, and there they will see me.”
Allow me to repeat that.
Jesus said to them, “Do not be afraid; you go girls!”
And they did.
They were obedient even though they were afraid!
Evidently they had good reason to be afraid because verses 11-15 explain the cover-up being planned to blame the disciples for stealing Jesus’ body.
My Study Bible points out that the disciples were also afraid and they stayed behind locked doors in Jerusalem (see John 20:19). So Jesus met the women first (Luke 24:36) and then the disciples later in Galilee (John 21).
How cool is that?
Jesus met them there first.
He helped them through their fear!
And the last sentence in Matthew is in red letters – Jesus, our risen Lord, says, “And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age.”
Jesus will meet us there too – whenever and wherever we are afraid.
And I pray we will be obedient like Mary and Mary!
*My prayer for you is … that this blog will inspire you to open your Bible every single day to seek God’s face and write His Word on your heart – because HE’S the key to lasting heart change!
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You might also enjoy these related posts …
Read > How Can I Gain Hope and Confidence?
Check Out > My Personal Bible Study Method
Want a FREE SAMPLE of our Fear Not 365 Scripture Writing Plan?
Shop > Our Scripture Writing Journals!
I have had the frame stand above for years, but here is one just like it in wrought iron. I think I might like the wrought iron better than my gold one! It is the perfect way to display and easily switch out your printables. If you print out on quality cardstock you won’t even need a cute clip board.
Have fun displaying your printables – see more display ideas on my Pinterest board.
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