We do want to welcome you to the service this morning and thank you for coming out on this beautiful day and to honor the resurrection of our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. This morning, just a couple things I’d like to share with you. First of all, as you came up, you probably saw we have a new sign on the front of the church.
You know, I do want to thank Paul for making that sign for us. It looks really nice. Our old one was getting ready to fall off the wall and Paul made a new one and it’s going to last a lot longer too.
It’s a little more sturdy than the old one. So we do want to thank him very much for doing that. It’s a blessing to have everybody here this morning on this day.
I apologize for the lack of a good job of getting the snow out of here, but it was just we thought we were getting it done and then the blader came by this morning and gave us a mound this high in front of everywhere we needed to get in. So we had to get a little bit of that moving this morning yet, but I do appreciate you all coming out on this wonderful day to celebrate the resurrection of our Lord Jesus Christ. This morning I would like to read the account of the resurrection from John’s Gospel, John chapter 20.
John 20:1-30
The first day of the week cometh Mary Magdalene early, when it was yet dark, unto the sepulchre, and seeth the stone taken away from the sepulchre. 2 Then she runneth, and cometh to Simon Peter, and to the other disciple, whom Jesus loved, and saith unto them, They have taken away the Lord out of the sepulchre, and we know not where they have laid him. 3 Peter therefore went forth, and that other disciple, and came to the sepulchre. 4 So they ran both together: and the other disciple did outrun Peter, and came first to the sepulchre. 5 And he stooping down, and looking in, saw the linen clothes lying; yet went he not in. 6 Then cometh Simon Peter following him, and went into the sepulchre, and seeth the linen clothes lie, 7 and the napkin, that was about his head, not lying with the linen clothes, but wrapped together in a place by itself. 8 Then went in also that other disciple, which came first to the sepulchre, and he saw, and believed. 9 For as yet they knew not the scripture, that he must rise again from the dead.
10 Then the disciples went away again unto their own home. 11 But Mary stood without at the sepulchre weeping: and as she wept, she stooped down, and looked into the sepulchre, 12 and seeth two angels in white sitting, the one at the head, and the other at the feet, where the body of Jesus had lain. 13 And they say unto her, Woman, why weepest thou? She saith unto them, Because they have taken away my Lord, and I know not where they have laid him.
14 And when she had thus said, she turned herself back, and saw Jesus standing, and knew not that it was Jesus. 15 Jesus saith unto her, Woman, why weepest thou? whom seekest thou? She, supposing him to be the gardener, saith unto him, Sir, if thou have borne him hence, tell me where thou hast laid him, and I will take him away. 16 Jesus saith unto her, Mary. She turned herself, and saith unto him, Rabboni; which is to say, Master. 17 Jesus saith unto her, Touch me not; for I am not yet ascended to my Father: but go to my brethren, and say unto them, I ascend unto my Father, and your Father; and to my God, and your God. 18 Mary Magdalene came and told the disciples that she had seen the Lord, and that he had spoken these things unto her.
19 Then the same day at evening, being the first day of the week, when the doors were shut where the disciples were assembled for fear of the Jews, came Jesus and stood in the midst, and saith unto them, Peace be unto you. 20 And when he had so said, he shewed unto them his hands and his side. Then were the disciples glad, when they saw the Lord. 21 Then said Jesus to them again, Peace be unto you: as my Father hath sent me, even so send I you. 22 And when he had said this, he breathed on them, and saith unto them, Receive ye the Holy Ghost: 23 whose soever sins ye remit, they are remitted unto them; and whose soever sins ye retain, they are retained.
24 But Thomas, one of the twelve, called Didymus, was not with them when Jesus came. 25 The other disciples therefore said unto him, We have seen the Lord. But he said unto them, Except I shall see in his hands the print of the nails, and put my finger into the print of the nails, and thrust my hand into his side, I will not believe.
26 And after eight days again his disciples were within, and Thomas with them: then came Jesus, the doors being shut, and stood in the midst, and said, Peace be unto you. 27 Then saith he to Thomas, Reach hither thy finger, and behold my hands; and reach hither thy hand, and thrust it into my side: and be not faithless, but believing. 28 And Thomas answered and said unto him, My Lord and my God. 29 Jesus saith unto him, Thomas, because thou hast seen me, thou hast believed: blessed are they that have not seen, and yet have believed.
30 And many other signs truly did Jesus in the presence of his disciples, which are not written in this book: 31 but these are written, that ye might believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God; and that believing ye might have life through his name.
We serve a risen Savior, and as the song says, we serve a risen Savior, he’s in the world today, and it doesn’t matter what men will say, because the reality is, he’s alive. There’s another song that goes, he’s alive, he’s alive, I know he’s alive.
We come to worship the living Lord today, and thank him for going to the cross, for laying down his life, for paying the penalty for our sin, and rising from the dead, gaining victory over sin and death.
Let’s just go to the Lord in prayer. Dear Lord and Father, we thank you so much this day for all that you have done for us, for showing us your mercy and your grace. Lord, we thank you for the depth of your love, and that when we were yet sinners, you laid down your life and paid the penalty for our sin. And then you were buried and rose again from the dead, showing that you had gained victory over death and sin itself, and that we no longer have to fear death, but if we trust in you and accept the free gift of salvation, you have told us that we shall live with you eternally and be with you forever. Lord, I pray that you would just be with us and help us to focus on you in the account of all that you did for us over 2,000 years ago. And Lord, I pray that you would just help us to seek to honor you this day and worship you this hour in spirit and truth. Lord, we think of the many in our nation that do not know you, and we think of the many that profess your name but do not believe in the resurrection, or don’t believe in the miracles, or don’t believe the gospel message, but yet they say they’re Christians. And Lord, I pray that you would open eyes and touch hearts even on this celebration day of your resurrection. And Lord, that you would just help us to be able to share with others the hope that we have in Jesus, and the fact of the reality of your existence, and the fact of what you have done for us, and Lord, all that you are even doing this day. Lord, I pray that you would just be with Christians around the world today, and as we focus on you, being reminded of the fact that you rose from the dead and you gained victory on our behalf. Lord, I pray that you would just be with them.
Many suffer persecution for their faith, and Lord, I pray that you would just give them strength, boldness, and courage, and give them and show them your love in a special way today. Lord, I pray that you would just be with the leaders of our nation as we’re in a time of trial and things are going on in our country, as well as in the Middle East. And Father, that it would be those that would seek to kill anyone who would stand for your word and the gospel message.
And Lord, I pray that you would just be with our leaders, give them wisdom, and may they do that which is right. Be with the Christians today in Iran, and Lord, we thank you for what you are doing there, that revival is breaking out in Iran. People are turning from Islam to accept Jesus as their Lord and Savior.
And Lord, even though Christians are persecuted tremendously by the government, Lord, I pray that you would just be with them and continue to bless people and draw people onto yourself. Lord, be with the nation of Israel today, and Lord, we thank you that there are people and Jews and Arabs in Israel that are coming to know you as Lord and Savior. And Lord, continue to work through the ministries that are sharing the gospel in Israel.
Enable them to continue to be able to share. And Lord, I pray that you would just touch many lives there as well. Lord, now be with us today, and as we focus on all that you have done and are doing for us, Lord, I pray that you would just speak to our hearts, be with those who cannot be with us today.
We think of those that have traveled to be with loved ones, watch over and protect them, and may they have a blessed time of focusing on you as they are with family and friends. This we ask in Jesus’ name, Amen. This time, if you would turn with me to hymn number 189.
As Jesus was dying on the cross, a unique event occurred, and that happened at the temple. And this song speaks of that event. And the moment of Jesus’ death, the scriptures tell us that the curtain between the Holy of Holies and the Most Holy Place, where the Ark of the Covenant stood, ripped, but it tore from top to bottom.
It was showing the Jewish people and the priests that there no longer was a veil between them and God, because Christ had come. The Messiah was with them, and He had paid the price that tore the veil in two. There no longer had to be a lamb sacrificed once a year during Yom Kippur to symbolize taking away the sins of the nation and the people.
For now, the Messiah had come. The Lamb of God had been sacrificed and had taken away the sins of the world to all who would believe. Let’s just sing hymn number 189, The Unveiled Christ.
Singing
Once our blessed Christ of beauty was veiled off from human view. But through suffering, death, and sorrow, He has rent the veil in two. O, behold the man of sorrows! O, behold Him in plain view! Lo, He is the mighty Conqueror, Since He rent the veil in two.
Lo, He is the mighty Conqueror, Since He rent the veil in two. Yes, He is with God the Father, Interceding there for you. For He is well beloved, Since He rent the veil in two.
O, behold the man of sorrows! O, behold Him in plain view! Lo, He is the mighty Conqueror, Since He rent the veil in two. He is the mighty Conqueror, Since He rent the veil in two. Holy angels bow before Him, Men of earth, praise Christ in two.
For He is the mighty Conqueror, Since He rent the veil in two. O, behold the man of sorrows! O, behold Him in plain view! Lo, He is the mighty Conqueror, Since He rent the veil in two. Lo, He is the mighty Conqueror, Since He rent the veil in two.
Then if you would turn with me to 191. When Jesus was on the cross, shortly before He gave up the ghost, He spoke these words, It is finished. The actual word He spoke was tetelkoi.
It’s a word that means, it’s a transactional word, and it means the price has been paid. The debt is over. It’s been met.
The debt has been paid. And Jesus, when He died, He said, It is finished. The transaction is done.
The sins have been forgiven for all who will trust in Me. I have shed My blood, as has been promised by the prophets of old, by the Lord Himself to Adam in the Garden of Eden, that one would come who would be the seed of the woman, who would crush the serpent’s head. Isaiah spoke of the fact that by His stripes we would be healed, and by His blood our sins would be forgiven.
Then if you would turn with me to 191. When Jesus was on the cross, shortly before He gave up the ghost, He spoke these words, It is finished. The actual word He spoke was tetelkoi.
It’s a word that means, it’s a transactional word, and it means the price has been paid. The debt is over. It’s been met.
The debt has been paid. And Jesus, when He died, He said, It is finished. The transaction is done.
The sins have been forgiven for all who will trust in Me. I have shed My blood, as has been promised by the prophets of old, by the Lord Himself to Adam in the Garden of Eden, that one would come who would be the seed of the woman, who would crush the serpent’s head. Isaiah spoke of the fact that by His stripes we would be healed, and by His blood our sins would be forgiven.
And this is what happened at that moment if the transaction occurred. Let’s just sing the song, It is Finished. There’s a line that’s been drawn through the ages.
On that line stands an old rugged cross. On that cross a battle is raging for the gain of man’s soul or his loss. It is finished.
Singing
The third verse of this song spoke of some events that occurred besides the curtain being torn that day. We’ve been looking the last few Sundays at events leading up to this day where Jesus was crucified. And three days later what would follow where he would rise from the dead on Sunday morning.
This was Passover week. There’s a unique thing happening this year that doesn’t happen every year. Because we’re on the Gregorian calendar and the Jewish nation of Israel is on the lunar calendar.
They have 360 days in their year. We have 365. And so the events always don’t happen together.
Even though what the Christian church celebrates and is referred to as Easter by most people, Resurrection Sunday, was actually the culmination of that Passover week. And this year Passover is at the same time as Resurrection Sunday. Just to review a few things before we look into it.
I’m going to be looking at some different passages this morning. And we’re going to culminate with Paul’s talk on the resurrection in 1 Corinthians chapter 15. But I want to just share with you and remind you again all the things that transpired.
Go back and review this week. Jesus had entered in. He had come the few days before.
He had raised Lazarus from the dead. He had healed the blind man from his blindness as he was marching to Jerusalem, going into Jerusalem. He had had the encounter with Zacchaeus and talked about the fact that Zacchaeus understood the importance of what it was to trust in God and salvation.
Had come to Zacchaeus’ heart that day. And then on Sunday morning, which we refer to as Palm Sunday, which was a week ago today, Jesus entered Jerusalem on the back of a donkey. And the people were following Him.
There was a mass of people that were following Him that had gathered together as He had walked. And they had come all the way from northern Israel up by Capernaum on the north shore of the Sea of Galilee. They had come to Jerusalem for that, to enter in for Passover.
And on the way that they had walked, which took some time to get there, people began to gather and follow Jesus because they had heard of Him. They had heard His teaching. They had heard His miracles.
Then when they got and saw what He did at Lazarus, raising Lazarus from the dead, even more crowds came. And the Scriptures tell us that they went out to see Lazarus and to meet Lazarus and see Him who was raised from the dead by Jesus. And now, remember last Sunday, as He entered into Jerusalem, there was a multitude of people around them.
And they were all shouting, Hosanna to the King of David! Save us! Save us! And the Pharisees told Jesus, tell them to be silent. And Jesus said, if they are silent, the children, they can’t be made silent. Literally, the rocks would cry out as Jesus entered Jerusalem.
Remember the first thing He did when He went to the temple on Monday morning was to challenge the Pharisees and to challenge the Sadducees and tipped over the temples of the money makers that were in the temple and drove them out with a whip. He challenged the Pharisees and the Sadducees and the Herodians, answering their questions where they couldn’t respond to Him and they asked no more. He then went with His disciples and they met.
And He met on the Mount of Olives and we looked about that a little bit on Wednesday night, a meeting on the Mount of Olives and all that was involved there where He spoke of future events where they asked Him, when will Your kingdom come? Because they were still confused. We even saw from the passage this morning that we read out of John’s Gospel. The disciples still were confused.
They didn’t understand. They thought that He had come to establish the kingdom and now He was dead after He told them the events that would be coming before His kingdom would come. It was shortly after that that they came, arrested Him and He experienced six illegal trials.
Three at the hands of the Jewish people and three at the hands of the government. Every one of them totally illegal. The last one, when He was brought to Pilate the second time, Pilate said he washed his hands of this because he saw no fault in the man and it’s at that time that he offered Barabbas instead of Jesus.
And the people cried, set Barabbas free and crucify Jesus. So, Jesus was then turned over to the Roman soldiers who mocked Him, beat Him, put a thorn of crowns on His head, a purple robe on His shoulders, gave Him a reed as a scepter and said, the King of the Jews and bowed down before Him in mockery. They then tore the robe off Him and made Him carry His cross to where He was crucified.
As He’s carrying His cross, He fell under the weight of it and they got a man from the crowd that was gathered watching what was happening and made Him carry it for Him. This was a common thing for the Romans to do because they weren’t going to let a crucifixion get by simply because a man couldn’t get His cross out to where He was going to be crucified. Jesus was then taken out to a place that was called Golgotha, the place of the skull, or the hill of the skull.
Now, it’s interesting, if you go to Israel today, the Catholic Church, they have within the walls of the old city a place where they say Jesus was crucified. It wasn’t. That is not the place.
It cannot be the place. Because He was taken outside the walls of the city to Golgotha, way back at the time of Moses.
Outside the walls of the city, Tlgalgotha, way back at the time of Moses, when you were a leper, you had to go outside the camp. You couldn’t stay in the camp, because you were unclean, and you could never get clean until the leprosy would leave, and they didn’t have antibiotics back then, and it was really a death sentence unless God would miraculously heal you. Jesus was taken outside the camp, just as it was foretold by the prophets, where he would be put to death.
As they nailed him on the cross, I want you to understand the events that transpired there, and then we’re going to get to Sunday morning. Jesus is being nailed to the cross, at the same time that the lambs are being prepared for sacrifice for Passover. Remember what John had said when Jesus had come to the Jordan River at the beginning of his ministry, and John saw him coming, and he said, Behold the Lamb of God, which taketh away the sins of the world.
This lamb was going to be sacrificed on that Passover day. The Catholic Church and many Bible people refer to the fact that Jesus died on Friday, I believe it was Thursday, because Thursday is when the lambs would have been killed, and Jesus would have been crucified the same day the lambs were killed. It also gives you the adequate amount of time for three days and three nights in the tomb, because if it was Friday, you really have to try and do twisting and turning and converting to try and get three days and three nights.
But as he was being sacrificed at the moment the lambs were being sacrificed, and it says in Scripture that he gave up the ghost. They did not kill him. It says that he died, and when he died, things happened.
One is, we sang the song, in the temple the giant curtain, and this curtain was thick. This wasn’t just like a little curtain you have on your house at home. This was a thick curtain.
You could not rip this curtain. And when Jesus died, the curtain was ripped from top to bottom. God ripped the curtain.
And as I mentioned earlier, the purpose of that happening was to show to not only the priests, not only to the Jewish people, but to all who would read about it and hear about it, that God had opened a way to come to him. You no longer had to go through the sacrificial system because the Lamb of God had been sacrificed. And now you could freely come.
The author of Hebrews talks about the fact that you and I as believers in Jesus Christ have the opportunity to boldly come into the throne room of God. Do you realize that the Jewish people at the time that Jesus was living did not have that freedom? They needed to come through the sacrificial system. They needed to go through the priests.
Now, Peter tells us, we are a royal priesthood. God has given us the ability to come into his presence because of what Jesus did on that Passover day. It also tells in Scripture that for three hours the sun didn’t shine.
It also mentions that there was a giant earthquake. It’s as if the whole world was telling the people, something significant is happening now that is not normal. And the significance of it all was stated by our Lord when he said, The transaction is complete.
This was a transaction that had been put in place before the foundations of the world. The Scriptures tell us, and Paul reveals to us and has also spoken in other places in the book of Ephesians, Paul tells us that before the world was created, God had determined that the second person of the Trinity would go to take the sins of the world upon himself. And this was before anything had been created.
God knew that if he gave us the ability to choose, we’d choose wrong. But he also didn’t want robots to worship him. He wanted people when they say, I love you Lord, they mean, I love you Lord.
And so he gave us the ability to choose. To choose to love him, or to choose to love ourselves more than him. To choose to obey him, or to choose to seek to find anything that we thought was significant and important, but would only lead to our own detriment and death.
And as he knew that as he gave man this great choice, man would choose wrong. And so how could he maintain justice, purity, and holiness, and yet redeem or buy back man out of his wrong choices and his rebellion and sin. And so before he created anything, he determined Jesus would go to the cross.
Jesus would, who would take on the form of a man and be without sin, would go to the cross and become sin for all who would trust in him. And he would pay the price for their rebellion and wrong choices. And that day had come.
The world should have known it. Even his disciples did not realize the great significance of that moment at that time. As he died, as he gave up the ghost, as he said it is finished, the Roman soldiers came by.
And they were going to hurry the death along. And so they came, and when they got to Jesus, they saw he was already dead. And one of the soldiers took his spear and ran it through Jesus’ side between the ribs.
And it tells you exactly where he put it. And when he put that spear, it hit Jesus’ heart. And it says that water and blood ran out.
From a human anatomy perspective, that’s exactly what would happen. There’s a sack around the heart that would appear to be water, and the heart would also have blood. What they normally would do, and what they did to the other two men who were on each side of Jesus, they would break their legs.
But the scriptures had foretold, and Isaiah had said, that not a bone would be broken upon his body. Why is that significant? Because it shows he did give up the ghost. He was in control, even when it appeared everything was spiraling out of control, from the perspective of his followers.
But because they didn’t have to break his legs, he was already dead. You see, they broke the legs of someone who was on the cross, because what the people who were on the cross would do, they would drive a nail between your feet, and then they would drive the nail through your, it wasn’t really through your hand-hand, but it would be through this portion of your flesh. And so you’d be hanging, and the weight would cause you to begin to fall, and it would cause you to have trouble breathing.
And so what those who were being crucified would do is, they’d raise themselves up like that to be able to breathe. If they weren’t dying fast enough, they’d come and they’d break their legs, because then guess what you couldn’t do? You couldn’t raise yourself up and breathe. So you’d die quicker.
They wanted this to be done with, because they didn’t want to prolong it, because of the Jewish feast of Passover, and they didn’t want to create riots among the Jews. But when we got to Jesus, he was dead. Now it was interesting too, because when Jesus died, they would take him down off the cross.
Now it says they needed to take him down off the cross, because they needed to get him prepared for burial. And two men were responsible for that. Joseph Arimathea, who was a member of the Sanhedrin, a very wealthy man who lived in a town that was a bit of a distance from Jerusalem, Arimathea, came and asked Pilate if he could have the body of Christ to bury, and take care of it.
I believe it’s the Gospel of John, it says that Nicodemus came and helped him, and they took the body down, and they wrapped it in linen, linen that was from Joseph’s linen for his burial, but they wrapped it in this linen, and they took it to Joseph’s grave, which had never been used, and he was a wealthy man, and he had a grave in outside of Jerusalem, and they placed the body of Jesus in there, but they didn’t get time to put all the spices that they were supposed to on the body before they had to stop. The Roman soldiers were then told by Pilate to take watch of the tomb, because the priests, the Sadducees and the high priests, came to Pilate and said, you know they’re going to try and steal his body, because they said he’s going to rise from the dead, and so we want to make sure they can’t steal his body, will you please put and secure the tomb? So what they did is they stamped it with a Roman stamp, and they sealed it, and they put a Roman guard there. Anyone who touched that tomb will be in danger of going before the Roman magistrates and suffering a like death.
That’s how serious it was, and they put a guard in front of it too. A group of Roman soldiers. That’s why when we read the text this morning, and Mary Magdalene is going down there, she’s going down, and her and the other women are going down, and you can read the other women are found in the other Gospels.
They’re going down to finish putting the spices on Jesus’ body, but they don’t know how they’re going to be able to open the tomb, because there are only women, and there’s this giant rock, and it’s been sealed. And then we saw how when Mary Magdalene gets close, she sees the tomb is open, the rock is rolled away. The guards aren’t there, and she goes, and it’s the account we read this morning.
Now it’s interesting also, to leave their post of duty meant death to the Roman soldiers, that they weren’t there. It’s interesting, the high priest came to the Roman guard, and he said, tell them the disciples came and stole his body, and we will go and make sure that you are not prosecuted. We’ll protect you for perpetuating this lie.
And early on, that’s what the lie was, that Jesus’ body had been stolen by his apostles, by his disciples. But it wasn’t true. Jesus then had risen from the dead.
I want you to understand this. This is not something that’s light. I mean, if you grew up in the church, ever since you were a little kid, you heard about Jesus rising from the dead, you heard about seeing all the choruses and all this.
If you came to know Christ later on in life, you still can kind of just not realize the significance and the importance of this event. If you go to the world today, there is no other religious leader, no other king, ruler, that rose from the dead. Muhammad’s in his grave.
Buddha’s in his grave. The gurus in India are in their graves. There’s only one grave that sits and stands empty, and that is the grave of our Lord Jesus Christ, because he was God that took on the form of a man, took our sins upon us, paid the penalty for our sins at the cross during Passover, died with the Passover lambs, was our lamb, and paid the penalty with his blood for our sin, was buried and rose again from the dead.
Now what I want to do is, now I want you to turn with me to 1 Corinthians chapter 15. 1 Corinthians chapter 15. And I want you to see an important… This chapter was written by the Apostle Paul to answer doubts the Corinthians had and lies that were being spread to attack and undermine their faith.
One of the biggest lies that people will attack Christianity today is how can you believe that a man rose from the dead? How can you believe that Jesus actually rose? Paul is going to give us in the introduction of this portion of his letter of the beginning of chapter 15 answers to those questions. I want to tell you there have been many men who were agnostic or atheist and were going to prove Jesus did not rise from the dead. One was a lawyer from Harvard.
He was a prosecutor. He taught kids how to be prosecutors and prosecute cases. And he was going to go and dig up all the evidence that would show Jesus did not rise from the dead, Jesus was not who he said he was, and Jesus was not God.
After the man got through scouring the scriptures and looking at the evidence that’s even contained within secular history, he was converted to Christianity and becomes one of the great defenders of the faith. This is not something to just take lightly. Jesus has called you to believe in the reality and truth of what he has shown us.
And you’ve got a whole world system that rises up in rebellion and tries to silence this message or make it irrelevant or change it because they do not want people to come to know Christ as their Savior and they do not want people to worship God. Why? Because this world system is controlled and manipulated by Satan himself. The scriptures tell us the day in which we’re living, Peter says, Satan is a roaring lion going about seeking whom he may devour.
The Bible in the book of Revelation tells us that as the things begin to happen and transpire that are spoken of in the book of Revelation in the last days, Satan will realize his days are short and he will become even more agitated and attacking the truth. And I think you see that today. Never before in the history of our world have you had more anti-Christian beliefs and attacks upon the gospel message than you have today.
Let’s take a look at what Paul says. Moreover, brethren, declare unto you the gospel which I preached unto you, which also ye have received, and wherein ye stand, by which also ye were saved, if ye keep in memory that I preached unto you, unless ye have believed in vain. Vain means emptiness, unless your belief is empty and doesn’t mean anything.
Should it mean something? For I delivered unto you, first of all, that which I also received, how that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures. You can read Isaiah 53. You can read in the Psalms books that were written hundreds of years before Christ came but spoke of His coming.
And that He was buried and that He rose again the third day according to the Scriptures. And then I want you to see the evidence that Paul lays out. And most people don’t ever read this particular portion of 1 Corinthians and don’t even look at the evidence.
I want to tell you today, if there was a court case and you needed, what would you need to prove your case? You’d need evidence and witnesses, right? You couldn’t prove your case without evidence or witnesses. But Paul makes a point that he was seen of Cephas and then of the twelve. He was seen of Peter and the other disciples more than once.
I didn’t have time to get in today, but you can see, we looked at one of the cases where the twelve saw him in the upper room along with others that were followers of Christ that were there. We also know that Jesus, after He rose from the dead, met His disciples and told them to go up to the northern shore of the Sea of Galilee and He would meet them there. We have the account given.
And at that particular point in time, there was still doubt because they fully did not comprehend what had happened. And if you go and you will look, and Peter goes up there and we see this in John’s gospel that Peter says, I don’t know about you guys, but I’m going fishing. And that is not an insignificant statement because what he is saying is, I’m going back to that which I knew.
He was a fisherman. Two of the men that go with him, I think it’s about ten of the twelve disciples are with him and they go fishing. Two of the ones that go with him are James and John.
They were partners with Peter and Andrew in the fishing business. They go fishing. And the account is, they go fishing and they fish all night on the Sea of Galilee.
Their home lake. They know where the fish are. They’ve done it for their life and they’ve done it for a living.
They would be the tour guides that would take you out if you wanted to go fishing. Guess what they come up with? Nothing. And as they’re rowing back to shore, they see somebody on the shore that’s cooking fish.
And it’s Jesus. That’s the encounter when Peter has the encounter with Christ where Christ asks him three times, Do you love me, Peter? And three times Jesus says, Feed my sheep. And all of a sudden, things begin to click in Peter’s mind.
Well, Paul is telling us these disciples see Jesus. They’ve seen Him more than once. And after that, He was seen above 500 brethren at once, of whom the greater part remain unto this present, and some have fallen asleep.
When Paul wrote the letter to the Corinthians, the majority of those 500 people who had seen Jesus in addition to the disciples were still alive. Most of the disciples, with the exception of James, were still alive. Paul had met them.
He’d talked to them. Paul himself had met Jesus on the road to Damascus. And Paul was saying, You want evidence? Here’s the evidence.
And when he wrote to the Corinthians, he said, If you want, when this letter was written, you want to go and talk to these people, they’re still living. Go tell them. And talk to them, and they’ll tell you they’ve seen Jesus.
Do you think if you had 512 witnesses that attested to the fact that they’d seen somebody alive, that that person would be alive? But Paul doesn’t stop there. And after that, he was seen of James, then of all the apostles again, and at last of all, he was seen of me also, as of one born out of due time. For I am the least of the apostles, that I am not meet to be called an apostle, because I persecuted the church of God.
Now I want you to stop and think. And you look at the zeal with which Paul persecuted the Christian church, and persecuted those that said they’d seen Jesus and believed in the resurrection and the power of God to forgive sins through Jesus. And he says, I believe.
You know, Jewish rabbis today, a lot of them, if they look at the New Testament, they will say the person they have the greatest problem with is Paul. Why? Because Paul was one of them. He was zealous for the law.
He was zealous to follow the law like the Pharisees followed. He says in his own words, I was a Pharisee of Pharisees. I wasn’t a normal Pharisee.
I went to the extremes of being a Pharisee. We looked at Pharisees a couple of weeks ago. And yet he who was a Pharisee of Pharisees, persecuted Christians, sought to have them put to death, was converted, and now is the apostle of Jesus Christ.
That is, God has entrusted him with the gospel message. But by the grace of God, I am what I am. And His grace, which was bestowed upon me, was not in vain.
But I labored more abundantly than they all. Yet not I, but the grace of God, which was with me. Therefore, whether it were I or they which we preach, and so we believe.
Now I want you to look with me and turn to verse 51 of chapter 15. Prior to this, Paul describes the resurrection. He shares the resurrection.
He shares why the resurrection needs to be believed. But I want you to look at verse 51. Behold, I show you a mystery.
We shall not all sleep, but we shall all be changed. In a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trumpet, for the trumpet shall sound, and the dead shall be raised incorruptible, and we shall be changed. That is the living.
Paul is speaking here of the rapture. It will occur for the believers. For this incorruptible must put on
Now it’s interesting, a lot of people say, well what about the unbeliever? And you have whole groups of people that would teach that the unbeliever just is annihilated, just becomes nothing. You have people that claim that they’re not, I don’t believe in God because I’m just going to be dust anyway. No.
You realize that every person will live eternally in one of two places, heaven or hell. You’ll put on the eternal, it’ll either be eternal righteousness in Christ Jesus, or you’ll live eternal damnation because of your rebellion and non-acceptance of the Lamb of God that came to take away the sin of the world. Paul is talking to the believer here and he says, the mortal must put on immortality, that which is corrupt, and guess what? Our bodies are corrupt.
But we’re going to be incorrupt one day, the believer, because we’re going to have incorruption. So when the corruptible shall have put on incorruption, and this mortal shall have put on immortality, then shall be brought to pass the saying that is written, Death is swallowed up in victory, O death, where is thy sting? O grave, where is thy victory? The sting of death is sin, and the strength of sin is law. I want to explain that to you.
The sting of death is sin. Sin is what results in our physical death, and it’s what results in our spiritual death, where we shall be eternally in hell to pay our rebellion against God. That’s the sting of sin, is death.
And he goes on and he says, and the strength of sin is the law. What does he mean by that, the strength of sin is the law? Well, doesn’t the law set us free from sin? No, the law only reveals the fact that we’re sinners and we can’t set ourselves free. The strength of sin is the law, because the law shows us, I can’t save myself, and I am a sinner, and there’s no hope for me.
That’s the strength of sin, is the law, and it reveals to us we’re in a hopeless position. But it doesn’t stop there. But thanks be to God which giveth us the victory through the Lord Jesus Christ, through the Lamb of God which came to take away the sins of the world, through the one who died at the Passover, and was the Lamb that came and died on the cross, was buried, rose again from the dead.
He gave victory over our sin. Verse 58, Therefore, my beloved brethren, be ye steadfast, unmovable, always abounding in the work of the Lord, forasmuch as ye know that your labor is not in vain in the Lord. And so he’s telling us there, okay, you look at your life, and you’re saying, it doesn’t appear I’m accomplishing anything for God.
That’s not true. If you seek to walk with the Lord, God will bring people into your life that only you could touch. We all don’t have to have a giant platform, because guess who Jesus dealt with one person at a time? He dealt with the woman caught in adultery.
He dealt with the Samaritan woman who came to the well when nobody else was supposed to be there. He dealt with Zacchaeus up in a tree that nobody else wanted to talk to. He came to the Apostle Paul one-on-one and said, Why are you persecuting me? See, God has placed us where He wants us for His purposes.
What we need to do is understand our position in Christ and the tremendous power that He’s given to us to accomplish those purposes. The same power that raised Jesus from the dead, that gave victory over death and sin, is the power that has delivered you from your sin, that has made you a child in Jesus Christ, that has transformed your life, that makes you so that you can understand the wickedness of this world in a way that the people that are caught up and love it will never understand it, and you see where it leads people, and you have a desire to save and set people free. You are one that has been redeemed and saved for a purpose.
And the purpose is to bring glory to God in your redemption and through it. The Apostle Paul was writing to the church at Corinth, because the church at Corinth had a lot of problems. You can read the whole book and you’ll see that they had sin problems in the church.
And Paul was writing to them and he comes to this chapter 15 and he’s going, What are you guys doing? Don’t you understand your position in Christ? Don’t you understand what you’ve been called to? Don’t you understand what it means to be a Christian? Don’t you understand what Jesus has done? Why do we want to continue sinning? Why do we want to continue in rebellion? When we can worship the one who set us free. We can worship the God who created all things and the God who gave us physical life, but much more importantly gave us spiritual life. And may we seek to honor and worship Him.
We come today to honor and remember the resurrection of our Lord Jesus Christ. He rose from the dead. Those who have tried to silence that resurrection and have actually gone and looked at the evidence will see it all points to the fact it’s a reality, it’s a fact, it’s truth.
The question is, what do you do with truth? Do you accept it? Do you accept the gift of salvation that God has given to you? Or do you deny that it’s true and continue to go on in your rebellious ways? There’s a day of accountability for all mankind. There’s the book of life and the book of judgment. Which will your name be written in? Let’s just go to the Lord in prayer.
Lord, I pray that you just help us to understand these things. Help us to look at what Jesus did for us way back 2,000 years ago. He entered Jerusalem on Palm Sunday, but He didn’t come to be the King of an earthly kingdom at that time.
He came to redeem men from their sin. He came to be the Lamb of God that would be placed upon the cross as a sacrifice for the sins of the whole world. And even His own disciples didn’t understand until all of a sudden He came and opened their eyes to the understanding of what they had been called to and who they were and why He had come to set them free.
Lord, help us to all understand and to walk in obedience to You and walk in Your power and Your grace and Your love. This we ask in Jesus’ name. Amen.
In closing, if you would turn with me to hymn number 398. Out on the highways and byways of life, many are weary and sad. Carry the sunshine where darkness is ripe, making the sorrowing glad.
Make me a blessing, make me a blessing, out of our life may Jesus shine. Make me a blessing, O Savior, I pray. Make me a blessing to someone today.
Tell the sweet story of Christ and His love. Tell of His power to forgive. Others will trust Him if only you prove through every moment you live.
Make me a blessing, make me a blessing, out of my life may Jesus shine. Make me a blessing, O Savior, today. Make me a blessing to someone today.
Give as was given to you in your need. Love as the Master loved you. Be to the helpless a helper indeed.
Unto the mission be true. Make me a blessing, make me a blessing, out of my life may Jesus shine. Make me a blessing, O Savior, I pray.
Make me a blessing to someone today. Lord, I pray that you would just help us to be a blessing and share with others the hope that we have in Jesus. Help us to understand the tremendous gift that was given at that Passover 2,000 years ago when you died on the cross and became the Lamb of God to take away our sins, when the veil was rent in two, when you established your Spirit in our hearts.
Go with us now, we pray, in Jesus’ name, Amen.