Those who disbelieve the Resurrection present a powerful argument against themselves if, instead of all the demons and the gods they worship driving away Christ, whom they call dead, Christ proves all of them dead.
If it is true that a dead person can do nothing, yet the Savior does so many works every day: He draws people to godliness, persuades them to virtue, teaches them about immortality, leads them to desire heavenly things, reveals knowledge of the Father, inspires strength against death, shows Himself to each person, and overthrows the godlessness of idolatry. The gods and demons of unbelievers can do none of these things; instead, at Christ’s presence they become dead, their display powerless and empty. By the sign of the Cross all magic ceases, all sorcery is abolished, all idols are deserted and abandoned, every senseless pleasure ceases, and everyone looks up from earth to heaven. Whom, then, should we call dead? Christ, who does so many things? But activity does not belong to one who is dead. Or the one who does nothing at all but lies as though lifeless, as demons and idols do because they are dead?
The Son of God is “living and active”; every day He works and brings about the salvation of all. But every day death is shown to have become weak, while idols and demons, rather than Christ, are shown to be dead, so that no one any longer doubts the Resurrection of His body.
Anyone who disbelieves the Resurrection of the Lord’s body seems not to understand the power of the Word and Wisdom of God. If He took a body for Himself and made it His own, as the argument has reasonably shown, what was the Lord to do with it? What was to become of the body once the Word had entered it? It could not avoid death, because it was mortal and was to be offered to death on behalf of all; for this reason the Savior prepared it for Himself. Yet it could not remain dead, because it had become the temple of Life. Therefore it died because it was mortal, but came to life again because of the Life within it. His works are evidence of its Resurrection.