Not Yet

Jesus has absolute power over death, and by believing on Him, we enter into a relationship in which
we can experience His resurrection power. Romans 6 states:
8 Now if we died with Christ, we believe that we shall also live with Him,
9 knowing that Christ, having been raised from the dead, dies no more. Death no longer has dominion over Him.
10 For the death that He died, He died to sin once for all; but the life that He lives, He lives to God.
11 Likewise you also, reckon yourselves to be dead indeed to sin, but alive to God in Christ Jesus our Lord.

Our Lord Jesus defeated the power of sin and death when He was crucified, then resurrection.  Because He was the perfect sacrifice for our sins, death could not hold Him.  We now have the capability to walk in the newness of life that He promised.  In that life in Christ, we have the ability to experience His victory, to walk in His truth, and to know the power of His Spirit, who has raised us up in Him.  As the Scriptures teach, with Him, nothing is impossible.

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Jesus had been summoned to the city of Bethany where Lazarus and his sisters Mary and Martha
lived. Lazarus had died, and Jesus, rather than panicking, confidently went to Bethany and performed a miracle demonstrating His power over death. John 11 says:
23 Jesus said to her, "Your brother will rise again."
24 Martha said to Him, "I know that he will rise again in the resurrection at the last day."
25 Jesus said to her, "I am the resurrection and the life. He who believes in Me, though he may die, he shall live.

The Bible tells us that nothing is impossible with God.  I would contend that God specializes in the impossible, and we can experience those times where we not only give credit to God for how He has worked, but realize that without Him, certain things would not have occurred.

One of those "certain things," being characterized as a true miracle, took place in the life of Christopher Wickland, a pastor in England.  CBN News reported that the pastor was "...jumping at a trampoline park with three of his youngest children, when he became sick and collapsed, according to The Daily Echo." Park employees had administered CPR, but Wickland "had stopped breathing for 15 minutes."

His heart was re-started with a defibrillator four times, and he was taken to a hospital, where he was placed in ICU.  The article states:

Doctors at the hospital informed Wickland's wife Tracey about their grim prognosis. He had suffered a cardiac arrest and had died for 15 minutes. They also warned her that he could suffer brain and heart damage as a result if he was lucky enough to pull through.

That's when Tracey went to work. She immediately posted about her husband's condition on social media and asked if people could start praying for him.

After being in an induced coma for 48 hours, the following Sunday morning, as the church was having services, Christopher woke up.  The article says that Wickland shared with The Daily Mail: "This is a miracle that is all down to divine providence and the very quick actions of some people...My congregation and other Christians around the world were also praying for me. All this power was harnessed to keep me alive. I'm not lucky, I'm blessed." In that article, Tracey attributed the fact that he was alive to all the prayers being lifted up.  The Daily Mail headline, in its sensational style, blasted out: "Reverend resurrection..."

And, the pastor is amazingly healthy, stating, "I've been checked out by the doctors several times now and there's absolutely nothing wrong with me. They can't believe that I died for so long and there's no permanent damage."  The BBC has also done a story on this amazing recovery.

I think this story can remind us that God's nature is to bring dead things back to life. That actually occurs with the physical death of a believer - once we depart from this world, Scripture teaches that we are with the Lord.  There may be instances when that does not occur, such as the incident I just related, but we are all partakers of Christ's resurrection, if we have been born again.  And, that includes our deliverance from the power of sin and death to the power of life in Christ, as well as our transferral from death on earth to life in eternity with Him.  We are raised up with Jesus.

We can also be motivated to celebrate stories of God's faithfulness.  Christians have experienced a new life - that is the incredible miracle of the new birth. Perhaps we have encountered life-saving or life-altering incidents.  We can give God the glory and testify to what He has done, and rejoice in what God has done in the lives of others.