The Lord Jesus went through death and overcame death, He has the keys of death and Hades, for He abolished death and overcame Hades; if we give Him the ground and opportunity and free way to move and act among us, both death and Hades will be under His control!
Praise the Lord! Lord Jesus, we give You the ground in our being today. We give You the opportunity in us to do what You want to do. We allow You to have a free way in us and among us. Have Your way, Lord, in our being, in our life, in our family life, and in the church life. Hallelujah, Christ has the keys of death and of Hades, and when He has a way in us, death and Hades are under His control! Praise the Lord!
It is so amazing to prayerfully consider what it means that Christ has the keys of death and Hades, for this brings us into a deeper realisation and appreciation of what Christ is, what He has done, and what He can be enjoyed by us in our daily experience.
One particular aspect of Him having the keys of death and of Hades is that He went to the abyss, visited it, and then overcame it and came out in resurrection. No one gets out of the abyss, but the Lord has conquered it.
We may not fully appreciate or apprehend what this means, but we can experience Christ making His home deep down in our heart as we open the depths of our being to Him.
There are many things in us, even in the depths of our being, which we don’t know about, we don’t remember, and we don’t agree with.
From time to time, something happens to open us up and we see what lies beneath the surface, what is in the abyss of our being. We may try to suppress this, but we can’t; we may try to deny it, but these things came out of us.
What we need to do is open to the Lord and just let Him shine on us. Only He can overcome the abyss. Only He can descend to the abyss of our being, shine His light there, and cause us to be enlightened and purified.
If we just say Amen to His shining, if we say Amen to His enlightening and exposing of the abyss in our being, He can come in and make His home deeper down into our being.
He wants to reach the depths of our being; He wants the depths of God to become our depths, and He wants Christ to be wrought deeper into our being. Oh, so wonderful! So glorious!
We can just open to Him and allow Him to make His home in us, even in the depths of our being, and something will happen: we will be produced as those who have the ministry of life to minister the Christ wrought into us to others also! Hallelujah!
Christ Abolished Death on the Cross and Overcame Hades in His Resurrection: now He has the Keys of Death and of Hades!
Christ is the First and the Last and the living One; He became dead, and behold, He is living forever and ever, and He has the keys of death and of Hades (Rev. 1:17-18).
The most powerful thing in the universe is death; when death comes, there’s nothing we can do – we can only surrender to it. When death knocks at the door, no matter how much we try to delay it, death will find a way.
Because man fell due to sin and disobedience, death came in and is now operating on the earth to collect all sinful people and to bring them to Hades.
Death is the collector, and Hades is the place where the dead people are kept. All men live only once and then die; once death takes them, they are kept in Hades, the collecting place, the place where we are kept until the resurrection of the dead and the judgement before God.
But here was a man, Jesus Christ, who was not an ordinary man; He was a God-man, for He was both God and man, both man and God.
This first God-man, Jesus Christ, went to death willingly, and He was put to death unrighteously on the cross. He died in His human part, and as soon as His body was killed, His Spirit was made alive.
He could not be killed in His Spirit, for He is the resurrection and the life (John 11:25). He was in death, He took a tour of death and Hades, and He came out of death in resurrection.
Death tried its best to hold Him, but it was powerless to do so, for God loosed the pangs of death and Christ came out of death in resurrection (Acts 2:24).
Christ possesses the indestructible life (Heb. 7:16), and He is the ever-living One.
Christ delivered Himself to death, but death had no way to detain Him; instead of being defeated and detained indefinitely by death, He remained in death for three days, and on the third day He rose up in resurrection.
With Christ, praise the Lord, death has no sting, and Hades has no power! Hallelujah!
When He rose from the dead, Christ was victorious over death, Satan, Hades, and the grave. All these cooperated together, forming an evil group, to defeat Christ, hold Him in death, and render Him lifeless and powerless.
On the one hand, Christ as the Son of Man was vindicated by God and was proved to be a success in His achievements when He resurrected. On the other hand, He was victorious over death, Satan, Hades, and the grave! Praise the Lord!
Christ as the Son of Man overcame death and destroyed Satan (Heb. 2:14). He not only overcame death and destroyed him who has the might of death but even more, He took the keys of death and of Hades in His hands and walked out of death in victory.
He is victorious over the grave and over death. Such a Christ is now walking in the midst of all the local churches in His recovery today, taking care of them as the golden lampstands.
The One who cares for us in love, trimming the wicks and adding the oil, is the One who has the keys of death and of Hades. He finished His tour through death and simply walked out of death, for death had no hold on Him.
Christ conquered death, subdued death, and walked out of death victoriously. He overcame death through the cross and He overcame the grave in His resurrection.
We were redeemed by His walking into death and coming out of death (Eph. 1:7; Rom. 4:25), and now, praise the Lord, death has no power over us (1 Cor. 15:54-55)! Because we are in Christ, the redeeming One, death has no power on us!
Praise the Lord Jesus, who has passed through death and entered into resurrection victoriously! Hallelujah, Christ became dead, and then He lived again! Praise the Lord, Christ abolished death on the cross and He overcame Hades in His resurrection! Amen, Lord, we praise You for Your victory! Jesus Christ is Lord! Jesus is living forever and ever! Hallelujah, Christ is the First and the Last, and He now has the keys of death and of Hades! Wow, a man, Jesus Christ, not only overcame death and Hades, but also has the keys of death and of Hades! We praise You, Lord, for overcoming death, the grave, Hades, and the abyss! We praise You for walking out of death with the keys of death and Hades! We believe into You! We are joined to You as one spirit. We stand one with You today. Overcome any death in us. We believe into You and we are redeemed by Your walking into death and coming out of death! Jesus Christ is Lord! Now death has no power over us, for we are in Christ, the redeeming One! Praise the Lord! Amen!
Give the Lord Jesus the Free Way to Move and Act among us and Both Death and Hades will be under His Control!
The One to whom we are joined in spirit, Jesus Christ, is the One who has the keys of death and of Hades. This is wonderful! This is glorious!
We believers in Christ not only believe that Christ came as God incarnated to be a man, and we not only hold dear the fact that He was raised from the dead, and He is in resurrection.
But even more than this, Christ not only overcame death and came out of death: He holds the key of death and of Hades in His hands! And He is the Head of the Body, the church; we are the Body of Christ, the One who holds the keys of death and of Hades.
Because Christ is the One in the church who is the Holder of the keys of death and Hades, now death and Hades have no power over us.
He is the One walking among the churches, He is the Head of the church, and to Him we are joined as one spirit today (1 Cor. 6:17). Praise the Lord!
We human beings cannot deal with death; death is too strong for us. When death comes in, we are defeated, for we simply have no ability to handle it. When death comes in, many are overcome by death.
But if we give the Lord Jesus the ground in us, if we only give Him the opportunity and the free way to move and act among us, both death and Hades will be under His control.
This is how we can overcome death today. We are not speaking about physical death; the physical death will come and, unless the Lord raptures us, we will pass through death.
But the spiritual death and the psychological death is under the Lord’s control, for He has the keys of death and of Hades in His hand. He is only waiting for us to give Him the free way to move and act among us.
We just need to give Him the free way. When we do this, when we give the Lord the ground in our being and the free way to act and do what He wants to do in us and in the church life, both death and Hades will be under His control.
The opposite is true also; if the Lord Jesus doesn’t have the ground in the church, if we don’t give Christ the free way to do what He wants to do in us and among us, death becomes prevailing, and Hades becomes powerful to hold the dead ones. Oh Lord!
May we see that Christ has the keys, the authority, of death and Hades. Death and Hades are under His control. Death is subject to Christ, and Hades is under His control.
He already went through death; He was persecuted to death, but death was not the end, for death was the gateway into resurrection. When He entered into death, He came to the threshold of resurrection.
We in the church may experience death, for death may come in to attack the church and invade the church.
However, even when the church is suffering, we should not be frightened by persecution or terrified at the prospect of being killed, for once death comes in, we are on the threshold of resurrection. Hallelujah!
He has won the victory over death, Satan, Hades, and the grave; as such a One, He is now walking among the churches to impart what He is into us and to make us intensely living and intensely shining.
Christ overcame death and overcame Satan; as the Son of Man, He overcame death, He overcame Satan, He overcame the grave, and He overcame anything negative.
He is now walking among the local churches, taking care of them as the golden lampstands, and leading them through the experience of Himself as the One who has the keys of death and of Hades.
May we learn day by day in our Christian life personally to give the Lord the ground in our being.
May we give Him the opportunity to do what He wants to do in us.
May we give Him the free way for Him to move act in us and also among us, so that any death may be swallowed up, the church may be built up, and the gates of Hades would not prevail against the builded church (Matt. 16:18).
We are joined in spirit to the One who has the keys of death and of Hades, and death and Hades are under His control. May we not only see this and rejoice for this, but even more, experience Him as such a One today.
May we both personally and corporately enter into the rich experience of Christ as the One who has the keys of death and of Hades. May we offer Him the prayers He needs for Him to apply this to our Christian experience today!
This is how we cooperate with Him, by praying to open to Him and allow the way and ground that He needs in us to do what He wants to do, and He will defeat and swallow any death, and Hades will be under His control.
Lord Jesus, we praise You as the One who is the Holder the keys of death and Hades! Praise the Lord for our Head, Jesus Christ, who holds the keys of death and Hades! Hallelujah! We believe into You, Lord, and we believe that the keys of death and Hades are in Your hand. Even though it’s impossible for us to deal with death, we can come to You, we can open to You, and we can overcome death! Amen, Lord Jesus, we give You the ground in our being. We give You the opportunity in us. We give You the free way to move and act among us today! May You have a free way in us and among us. Amen, Lord, may we see that Christ has the keys, the authority, of death and Hades! Praise the Lord, death is subject to Christ, and Hades is under His control! Amen, Lord, may You have a full way in us and among us in the church life today! We open to You as the Son of Man walking among the churches! Apply Your death-overcoming life to us today! Praise the Lord!
References and Hymns on this Topic
- Inspiration for this article/sharing comes from the Word of God, the enjoyment in the ministry, a sharing by brother Ron Kangas on this topic, and portions from, The Conclusion of the New Testament, msg. 59, by Witness Lee, as quoted in the Holy Word for Morning Revival on, Experiencing, Enjoying, and Expressing Christ (4) (2025 December Training), week 38 (msg. 2), Christ Having the Keys of Death and Hades – day 5.
- Hymns on this topic:
– Death cannot hold the resurrection life, / The life of God eternal manifest; / ’Tis uncreated, indestructible, / ’Tis Christ Himself, unconqu’rable, expressed. / Oh, may I know this resurrection life, / In every kind of death its pow’r outpoured, / In my experience ever realize / This life is nought but Christ my living Lord. (Hymns #639 stanzas 1 and 6)
– His kingdom cannot fail; / He rules o’er earth and heav’n; / The keys of death and hell / Are to our Jesus giv’n: / Jesus, the Savior reigns, / The God of truth and love: / When He had purged our stains / He took His seat above. (Hymns #146 stanzas 2-3)
– His life is fully qualified / To bring us through to glory; / Were it not for His tested life, / ’Twould be another story / His life was fully tried on earth, / To crucifixion from His birth: / He passed through death and Hades. / He’s pledged to save us to the full, / His life is operating; / He’s doing everything for us / ’Tis all for our perfecting; / Our life’s a failure at its best, / Only His life can stand the test: / His life brings full salvation! (Hymns #1130 stanzas 4-5)
