We see from the following verses that it was the Spirit of Christ that raised Him from the dead. Where was that Spirit of Christ while He was dead in the tomb for three days and nights? It was in heaven, John 3:13, just as it was in Heaven while Jesus was speaking face to face with Nicodemus in John 3:13. What spirit dwells in us? It is the Holy Spirit life and soul of Christ. It is the Holy Spirit Divine Nature of Christ. It is that same Spirit which Christ laid aside at His Incarnation, that raised Christ. That is why He could say the He would raise Himself.
Therefore doth my Father love me, because I lay down my life, that I might take it again. No man taketh it from me, but I lay it down of myself. I have power to lay it down, and I have power to take it again. This commandment Have I received of my Father."
The commandment, the power, was given to Christ via His own Holy Spirit life and soul, which was commended to the Father before at the Incarnation and again on the Cross. The Father was in control of the Holy Spirit of Christ while He was in the Tomb, and even after that, because Jesus said that when He returned to the Father that He would pray that His (Christ's Holy Spirit life and soul), would be sent to us.
"But if the Spirit of him that raised up Jesus from the dead dwell in you, he that raised up Christ from the dead shall also quicken your mortal bodies by his Spirit that dwelleth in you." Romans 8:11.
Whose Spirit is it that dwell in us?
"Even the Spirit of truth; whom the world cannot receive, because it seeth him not, neither knoweth him: but ye know him; for he dwelleth with you, and shall be in you. I will not leave you comfortless: I will come to you." John 14:17, 18.
Who is speaking in the above verse? Jesus Christ.
"The Holy Spirit is the breath of spiritual life in the soul. The impartation of the Spirit is the impartation of the life of Christ. It imbues the receiver with the attributes of Christ. Only those who are thus taught of God, those who possess the inward working of the Spirit, and in whose life the Christ-life is manifested, are to stand as representative men, to minister in behalf of the church." Desire of Ages, 805.
"Christ declared that after his ascension, he would send to his church, as his crowning gift, the Comforter, who was to take his place. This Comforter is the Holy Spirit,--the soul of his life, the efficacy of his church, the light and life of the world. With his Spirit Christ sends a reconciling influence and a power that takes away sin.
In the gift of the Spirit [HIS LIFE--THE SOUL OF HIS LIFE], Jesus gave to man the highest good that heaven could bestow....
The Spirit was given as a regenerating agency, and without this the sacrifice of Christ would have been of no avail....
It is by the Spirit that the heart is made pure. Through the Spirit the believer becomes a partaker of the divine nature. Christ has given his Spirit as a divine power to overcome all hereditary and cultivated tendencies to evil, and to impress his own character upon the church." E.G. White, Review and Herald Articles, May 19, 1904, vol. 5, p. 42.
"And Jesus, in turn, was conceived of the Spirit (Matt. 1:8-21), baptized by the Spirit (Mark 1:9, 10), led by the Spirit (Luke 4:1), performed His miracles through the Spirit (Matt. 12:24-32), offered Himself at Calvary through the Spirit (Heb. 9:14, 15) and was, in part, resurrected by the Spirit (Rom. 8:11)." SDA's Believe, 27 Fundamentals, p. 62, col. 2.
"The Spirit was given as a regenerating agency, and without this the sacrifice of Christ [on the Cross] would have been of no avail." E.G. White, Review and Herald, May 19, 1904, The Promise of the Spirit, pr. 3,
God bless you in this all important study of who we worship and the great Sacrifice that was made not just at the Cross, but at the Incarnation of the Son of God. Any denial of either one of these sacrifices precludes the other, because they are totally contingent upon one another.
Ron Beaulieu