WHAT HAPPENED AT THE CROSS EARTHQUAKE WHEN GRAVES OPENED & PEOPLE CAME OUT IN Matthew 27:45-56?
Point-1: Jesus Showed Death Was Subdued
and the tombs were opened, and many bodies of the saints who had fallen asleep were raised, and coming out of the tombs after His resurrection, they entered the holy city and appeared to many. (Matthew 27:52ā53)
The sixth miracle at the crucifixion was closely related to the previous one, as the supernatural earthquake not only gave the world a foretaste of divine judgment but also caused many tombs to be opened.
However, the significant miracle of that event was not the mere opening of tombs, as could occur during any earthquake. The great miracle was that many bodies of the saints who had fallen asleep were raised. After the veil of the Temple was torn in two and the earth around Jerusalem was violently shaken, the Lord selectively raised the bodies of certain believers who had died.
Matthew points out that many, but not all, bodies of the saints who had died were resurrected, making clear that this resurrection was divinely restricted to a limited number of believers. They had trusted in God during the time before and under the Old Covenant, and some of those bodies may have been in their graves many hundreds of years. When Jesus died, their spirits came from the abode of righteous spirits and were joined with their glorified bodies that came out of the graves. This was full and final resurrection and glorification, making this miracle another foretaste of Godās sovereign work during the end times, when āall the dead in Christ shall riseā (1 Thess. 4:16).
It is important to note that the phrase coming out of the tombs should be followed by a period, indicating the close of the sentence. After His resurrection begins a new sentence and introduces a distinct truth: those select resurrected saints then entered the holy city and appeared to many.
Those saints did not appear in Jerusalem until after the Lordās own resurrection because He was divinely appointed to be āthe first fruits of those who are asleepā (1 Cor. 15:20). And just as Christ Himself appeared after His resurrection only to those who already believed in Him, it would also seem that the many to whom the resurrected saints appeared were all believers. We are not told what they said to their brethren in the holy city, but their bodily appearance testified to Christās resurrection and Godās promise to raise all those who put their trust in Christ (1 Cor. 15:22, 51ā53).
Through those six miracles, the Father said that the cross is the only hope for eternal life. When oneās sin is carried away by Christās atoning death, the wrath of God is appeased for that believer, and he is delivered from the death and condemnation that the Lord endured on his behalf. For those who believe in the Son, access to God is open wide, and they are assured of living in His eternal and indestructible kingdom in eternal and indestructible bodies.[1]
Q&A-95; 2015SEP27
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