What Does It Mean that Jesus Is "The Firstborn from the Dead?"

What Does It Mean that Jesus Is "The Firstborn from the Dead?"

Justin Holcomb

At the beginning of the book of Revelation, John writes this greeting to the churches he’s addressing:

Grace to you and peace from him who is and who was and who is to come, and from the seven spirits who are before his throne, and from Jesus Christ the faithful witness, the firstborn of the dead, and the ruler of kings on earth. (Rev. 1:4–5)

The title “firstborn of the dead” for Jesus is of great theological importance, especially with Easter in the background. The Greek word for “firstborn” that John uses is prōtotokos, a word that literally refers to birth order—the first child born. This is a concept of great significance in the Old Testament, where the firstborn son inherited his father’s place as head of the family, receiving the father’s blessing and a double portion of the inheritance (Deut. 21:17). After the Passover in Egypt, God told his people that every firstborn child was set aside as his own (Ex. 13:2), and the nation of Israel as a whole was referred to as God’s “firstborn son” (Ex. 4:22).

Because of the biblical significance attached to the concept, the word “firstborn” acquired a metaphorical sense and came to also refer to the special status of the firstborn as the preeminent son and heir. In the New Testament, Jesus is shown to be the “new Israel,” the culmination and fulfillment of God’s promise to bless all the nations through the offspring of Abraham (Gal. 3:7–8, 16). Jesus fulfills the intended role of Israel as God’s faithful firstborn son in his perfect life and sacrificial death, and he is vindicated by God in his glorious resurrection.

In referring to Jesus as the firstborn of the dead, John is drawing words and imagery from Psalm 89, which celebrates the kingship of David and his line with phrases like “the firstborn,” “the highest of the kings of the earth,” and the idea that the Messiah’s throne will be a “faithful witness in the sky.” Calling Jesus firstborn portrays him as the heir of David, exalted and lifted up as the representative of his people.

Numerous other times in the New Testament Jesus is referred to as prōtotokos, firstborn:

For those whom he foreknew he also predestined to be conformed to the image of his Son, in order that he might be the firstborn among many brothers. (Romans 8:29)

  He is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of all creation. (Colossians 1:15)

He is the head of the body, the church. He is the beginning, the firstborn from the dead, that in everything he might be preeminent. (Colossians 1:18)

When he brings the firstborn into the world, he says, “Let all God’s angels worship him.” (Hebrews 1:6)

Two other passages convey the same idea with slightly different language:

“[The prophets and Moses said] that the Christ must suffer and that, by being the first to rise from the dead, he would proclaim light both to our people and to the Gentiles.” (Acts 26:23)

In fact, Christ has been raised from the dead, the first fruits of those who have fallen asleep. For as by a man came death, by a man has come also the resurrection of the dead. For as in Adam all die, so also in Christ shall all be made alive. But each in his own order: Christ the first fruits, then at his coming those who belong to Christ. (1 Corinthians 15:20–23)

As “firstborn of the dead,” Jesus is both first in time and first in preeminence. As the first to be raised from the dead, Christ is the founder and initiator of the new era God is bringing about through Jesus’ victory over sin and death. Jesus’ resurrection from death opens the way for all who trust in him to follow him in a resurrection like his when he returns. This is important because it shows that our ultimate hope is not just for our souls to go to heaven, but for our physical bodies to be raised to new life like Jesus’ was. He is the firstborn of the resurrection.

In Revelation 1:5 we also see the metaphorical sense of the term, showing Jesus’ supremacy in authority and kingship after his resurrection. Biblical scholar G.K. Beale explains,

John views Jesus as the ideal Davidic king on an escalated eschatological level, whose death and resurrection have resulted in his eternal kingship and in the kingship of his beloved children . . . . “Firstborn” refers to the high, privileged position that Christ has as a result of the resurrection from the dead . . . . Christ has gained such a sovereign position over the cosmos, not in the sense that he is recognized as the first-created being of all creation or as the origin of creation, but in the sense that he is the inaugurator of the new creation by means of his resurrection.

We can draw all this together to see that there are two central ideas in the title “firstborn of the dead” in Revelation 1:5. First, the allusion to Psalm 89 shows that Jesus fulfills all history as the messianic King descended from the line of David. Second, being the “firstborn of the dead” means that Jesus is both the first to rise and the first in supremacy. He is the first to rise from the dead and thus the first of the new creation. He is also the inaugurator of the new creation and sovereign over everything. He is the rightful heir to it all.

Christians have a sure hope that one day we will follow Christ into the resurrection and new creation, and, because we are in Christ, will reign with him as the firstborn of God, heirs of all things in heaven and on earth. Rejoice! Christ is risen. He is risen indeed. 

Justin Holcomb is Theologian in Residence at Mars Hill Church, where he also serves as Executive Director of Resurgenceand the Leadership Development department. He is also Adjunct Professor of Theology and Philosophy at Reformed Theological Seminary.

Justin wrote On the Grace of God. He and his wife, Lindsey, are the authors of Rid of My Disgrace: Hope and Healing for Victims of Sexual Assault. He is also the editor of Christian Theologies of Scripture. You can find him on Facebook, Twitter, and JustinHolcomb.com.  

Betsy McCaughey: Disaster for Dems - ObamaCare and the 2014 Vote | Democrats | Fox Nation

Betsy McCaughey: Disaster for Dems - ObamaCare and the 2014 Vote | Democrats | Fox Nation


Many workers in industries such as retail, hospitality and home care will lose on-the-job health coverage, forecasts the ADP Research Institute — and many will also be demoted to part-time status because of ObamaCare.
Why? The president’s health law mandates that all employers with 50 or more full-time workers provide its “essential benefit package” if they offer insurance — and that package costs about twice what these industries now offer. Many employers will drop coverage, and pay the (smaller) fine; others will try to avoid that 50-employee limit by using more people part-time.

The American Spectator : Death to Daylight Saving Time

The American Spectator : Death to Daylight Saving Time

By DAVID CATRON on 3.11.13 @ 6:07AM

Ditching DST would save billions in medical care and energy costs.

This morning you were required to get out of bed an hour earlier than you rose last Monday. If you are like most people, you did so in the same spirit of resignation with which you endure winter rain, believing that there are benefits to be gained from Daylight Saving Time that outweigh its discomfort and inconvenience. This belief, however, has no basis in reality. Unlike cold rain, which at least provides sustenance for the land and its inhabitants, DST offers no benefit whatsoever. Indeed, evidence is mounting that it actually constitutes a threat to your health and adds substantially to the cost of American medical care.

This, you may think, is an exaggeration perpetrated by a late riser rendered cranky by the necessity of getting up an hour before his body clock is ready to deal with the travails of Monday morning. But, while I confess to considerable irritation at this prospect, it is nonetheless true that the change to DST is bad for your health. As Bora Zivkovic writes in Scientific American, “Chronobiologists who study circadian rhythms know that for several days after the spring-forward clock resetting … traffic accidents increase, workplace injuries go up and, perhaps most telling, incidences of heart attacks rise sharply.”

Heart attacks? Yep. Zivkovic explains: “As the faint light of dawn starts preparing our bodies for waking up… our various organs, including the heart, also start preparing for increased function. If the alarm clock suddenly rings an hour earlier than usual, a weak heart can suffer an infarct.” A what? This is medical jargon for a piece of tissue that dies because its blood supply has been cut off. If this happens to your heart, you’re in what our 41st President would describe as “deep doo-doo.” And your risk of suffering this calamity is far higher in the early morning, right about the time that alarm goes off, than at any other time of day.

So, if the frequency of heart attacks, traffic accidents and workplace injuries—which are usually very expensive to treat—goes up dramatically when we change the clocks, why do we do it? At a time when the “low-information voter” has been much discussed by pundits, you will not be surprised to learn that most people have no idea. For years, I have done my own unscientific survey of friends, co-workers, et al., and the percentage of people who actually know why they change their clocks is shockingly low. A small percentage will say it saves energy, but none of are able to explain how resetting their clocks could accomplish this miracle.

Nonetheless, saving energy is the ostensible object of the exercise, despite the absence of any real evidence that it actually works. The notion that adjusting clocks seasonally to avoid “wasting” daylight has a long pedigree, but it was never attempted on a large scale until the two world wars of the 20th century, during which various powers adopted DST to conserve oil and coal. It reared its ugly head again in the U.S. during the energy crisis of the 1970s in an attempt to reduce energy demand and was subsequently adopted throughout the contiguous 48 states and Alaska. Notable exceptions were Arizona and most of Indiana.

The latter finally joined the DST herd in 2006 and research into the effects of that conversion has produced some not-so-surprising results. The Wall Street Journal reports that two economists from the University of California-Santa Barbara used “more than seven million monthly meter readings … covering nearly all the households in southern Indiana for three years … to compare energy consumption before and after counties began observing daylight-saving time.” For DST skeptics, the study’s findings will provide a considerable amount of schadenfreude. As it happens, DST actually increases energy consumption.

As the Journal puts it, “Having the entire state switch to daylight-saving time each year, rather than stay on standard time, costs Indiana households an additional $8.6 million in electricity bills.” It turns out that the change drove an increase in air-conditioning costs as well as an increase in heating costs. There was a drop in lighting costs, but that is the least expensive use of electricity. In other words, by imposing DST, the state of Indiana quite literally forced its residents to fork out millions of dollars for the privilege of joining their fellow Americans in having their circadian rhythms thrown out of whack.

Which brings us back to the health implications of DST. It causes dramatic spikes in expensive health problems like heart attacks, traffic accidents, and workplace injuries. In addition, it forces us to consume more energy, which is not getting any cheaper under the Obama energy policies. So it would seem that a good way to save an enormous amount in health care costs as well as energy costs would be to deep-six DST. Will that happen? Probably not. It makes too much sense. If that seems depressing, don’t worry. Depression is another well-documented effect of the annual change to Daylight Saving Time. It’ll wear off soon, if you live.