This glorious victory we celebrate today. Above all we must firmly believe that in Christ there was a contest between God and the devil, between righteousness and sin, between life and death, between that which is good and that which is evil, between purity and all manner of corruption, and that the triumph was on the side of God. This scene we ought to cherish fondly and earnestly, and often to contemplate. In the former scene of suffering and death we witnessed our sin, our sentence of condemnation and death resting heavily upon Christ, making Him a distressed, pitiable Man; now, on Easter, we have the other scene unalloyed with sin; no curse, no frown, no death is visible; it is all life, mercy, happiness and righteousness in Christ. This picture can and should cheer our hearts. We should regard it with no other feeling but that today God brings us also to life with Christ. We should firmly believe that as we see no sin nor death nor condemnation in Christ, so God will also, for Christ’s sake, consider us free from these if we faithfully rely upon His Son and depend upon His resurrection. Such a blessing we derive from faith. The day will come, however, when faith shall be lost in sight and full fruition.

Nevertheless, while we are here on earth sin, death, disgrace and reproach, and all kinds of wants and infirmities remain with us, and we must patiently bear them. These all relate, however, only to the flesh; for in our faith we are already happy. As Christ arose from the dead, and has a life eternal, free from sin and death, so have we these treasures in faith. And as surely as the devil could not prevail against Christ, but had to flee, so surely will he also flee from the Christian who believes. In the end our body will also be perfected, so that neither sin nor death can have power over it. For the present we are as weak and sinful as other people, only that we strive to shun open and gross sins. It is true, Christians may also, now and then, be guilty of these, but they remain not in them; they flee them again through earnest repentance, and obtain through faith forgiveness of all their sins. (Luther’s House Postil, First Easter Sermon, The Power and the Benefit of the Resurrection of Christ Matthew 28:1-10, Volume 2, p. 492-493)

In the strength of this faith the early Christians composed and sang in Latin and German so charmingly and truly: “Christ is arisen from the grave’s dark prison. So let our song exulting rise.” {LW 124} And again: “The Lamb the sheep has ransomed; Christ, who only is sinless, Reconciling sinners to the Father. Death and life have contended in that combat stupendous: The Prince of life, who died, reigns immortal.” {LW 10} Whoever composed these old hymns must certainly have had a proper and Christian conception of the great event, else he could not have depicted so skillfully the scene when death assaulted life, and when the devil madly rushed against it. Our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ permitted Himself to be slain; yet death was much mistaken in his aim; for the life in this Person whom he attacked was eternal. Death was not aware of this, that an eternal and divine power was enclosed in the mortal body, and was vanquished in the tilt; he attacked Him who cannot die, though He did die on the cross. For as surely as the human nature in Christ was dead, His divine nature was incapable of death, though it was so concealed in Him during His passion and death, as our old teachers represent it, that it manifested itself in no wise, and this for the very purpose that Christ might die. Death did all that he could do; but since the Lord, according to His divine nature, is life itself, He could not remain dead, but freed Himself from death and ail his auxiliaries, vanquished sin and Satan, and now rules in a new life, exempt from all disturbance of sin, the devil, and death. This is indeed a strange, perplexing declaration: Christ, though He died, still liveth, and by His dying despoiled death of all his power. Reason cannot comprehend this; it is a matter of faith. But to us it is a source of great comfort to know and to believe that death has lost his reign, and that we owe this, praise be to God, to that One whom death attacks and overcomes as he does all mortals, but whom he cannot hold; for, in the struggle ensuing, death himself perishes and is swallowed up, while Christ, who had died, lives and reigns forever. (Luther’s House Postil, First Easter Sermon, The Power and the Benefit of the Resurrection of Christ Matthew 28:1-10, Volume 2, p. 490-491)