1 Peter 1:3-9 - The Significance of Jesus’ Resurrection

Pray

Father, it’s such a wonderful thing that we can freely open up your Word and read what you have revealed about yourself, about your Son, about how we need a savior and you provided our savior in your Son, Jesus.

As we come to your Word right now, I pray that you would open all of our hearts and minds to receive it and to understand it.

Please give me clarity and power to preach it.

Lord, the power to preach your Word can’t come from me, I’m powerless, it’s got to come from you.

So, I pray that you would use me to powerfully speak into each of our hearts to change us into the likeness of your Son Jesus.

It’s in his name I pray all of this. Amen.

Intro

Well, we are going to be talking about Jesus’ resurrection today.

It seems to me like an appropriate Sunday to do so, being Easter and all.

But on this day that we set aside to celebrate the glory of the empty tomb, I want you to remember that the world doesn’t pause from throwing difficulties and hardships at us.

Just because we’re celebrating Jesus’ resurrection, that doesn’t mean that our pain and sorrow take a break.

And when difficulties come, we actually tend to lose sight of everything but those difficulties.

When you stub your toe, all of your focus goes to the pain in your toe and somehow alleviating that pain.

When you go through a messy divorce all your focus goes to making sure your life doesn’t fall apart.

When you find out that your finances are in shambles and you can’t even afford to buy food all your focus goes to finding ways to make money so you can eat.

When your family member is diagnosed with stage 4 cancer all your focus goes to finding a cure.

When you go through these kinds of circumstances your focus is on your difficulties and pain and sorrow, and not on your hope and faith and joy.

We tend to lose sight of our hope, faith, and joy when we experience hardship in life.

And because of this tendency, God has reminded us, through the Apostle Peter in 1 Peter 1:3-9, that our hope, faith, and joy are not found in our circumstances.

Instead, they are found in Christ, specifically in his resurrection, in our inheritance, and in his return when we will fully obtain our inheritance of eternal life with him because of his death and resurrection.

In 1 Peter 1:3-9, Peter explains three ways that Jesus’ resurrection is significant in our lives that are full of difficulties.

Remembering Jesus’ resurrection produces our living hope, it protects our precious faith, and it prefigures our glorious joy.

We’re going to walk through this passage and take a good look at each of these ways Jesus’ resurrection is significant for us as we navigate the difficulties of life.

And first up, we’re going to see how Jesus’ resurrection is significant for our hope in verses 3 and 4.

1 Peter 1:3–4 ESV

Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ! According to his great mercy, he has caused us to be born again to a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead, to an inheritance that is imperishable, undefiled, and unfading, kept in heaven for you,

Here Peter tells us that remembering Jesus’ resurrection…

Produces our Living Hope (3-4)

Peter launches this introductory paragraph of his letter by exclaiming, “Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ!”

Peter is praising God the Father specifically.

What follows this exclamation of praise is a description of how Jesus’ resurrection is significant in our lives.

But we have to remember that Jesus’ resurrection was initiated and planned under the authority of God the Father.

He’s the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, and by our faith in Jesus we are adopted into his family so that he’s also our Father.

And as our Father he’s provided everything we need.

Peter says that our second birth was caused by God the Father’s great mercy.

Jesus explained our second birth at length to Nicodemus in John chapter 3.

Essentially, when we put our faith in Jesus we enter into the New Covenant with God.

And under that New Covenant God gives us a new heart and he puts his Spirit within us and cleanses us from our sin as he said in Ezekiel 36:25–27 “I will sprinkle clean water on you, and you shall be clean from all your uncleannesses, and from all your idols I will cleanse you. And I will give you a new heart, and a new spirit I will put within you. And I will remove the heart of stone from your flesh and give you a heart of flesh. And I will put my Spirit within you, and cause you to walk in my statutes and be careful to obey my rules.” .

In doing all of that he gives us new life, spiritual life depicted as being born again spiritually.

Born again to new life in Christ.

Paul described this in Romans and 2 Corinthians.

In Romans 6:4 he described this as depicted in baptism, “We were buried therefore with him by baptism into death, in order that, just as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, we too might walk in newness of life.”

In 2 Corinthians 5:17 he described this in terms of abandoning our old life of sin, “Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation. The old has passed away; behold, the new has come.”

But the important thing to remember in our passage in 1 Peter is that this new life, this second birth, was caused or initiated by God the Father’s great mercy.

He had mercy on us because we were helpless, we couldn’t do anything to begin this new life in Christ.

He also had mercy on us because we were hopeless, we couldn’t even see that we needed new life in Christ.

God saw us in our pain and misery and ultimately our head-long run toward eternal punishment in hell, self-inflicted because of our sin.

He saw us there and his mercy compelled him to save us, to give us new life by sending his son, Jesus, to become a man, to die in our place, and to rise again three days later so that we could have new life, eternal life, in him simply by believing in him and submitting to his authority over our lives.

Peter says that our second birth, our new life in Christ, is a living hope.

We were born again to a living hope.

But what exactly does Peter mean by that term, “living hope?”

What about our hope in Christ, our hope in our new life in Christ, what about that is “living?”

Well, it’s “living” because it’s based on the resurrection of Jesus… he’s not dead, he’s alive!

The very thing that we are hoping in, our new eternal life, is proven by Jesus’ own resurrection from the dead.

He defeated death and his resurrection is proof that he will deliver on his promise.

He promised that by faith in him, we will also be raised to eternal life with him.

Jesus promised this in John 6:40 “For this is the will of my Father, that everyone who looks on the Son and believes in him should have eternal life, and I will raise him up on the last day.”

Our hope in Christ is also “living” in contrast to the dead hope of the world.

Peter calls our eternal life our inheritance, but he explains how our inheritance of eternal life is different from worldly inheritance.

Putting your hope in your inheritance is a very common thing to do.

An inheritance is usually a financial or material windfall that can alleviate a lot of burdens.

But hope in a worldly inheritance is a dead hope.

It’s dead because worldly inheritance is subject to being destroyed, being desecrated, and being diminished.

Natural disasters, or anything really, can destroy our worldly inheritance.

It can be destroyed by wildfires or house fires, by floods or broken water pipes, by earthquakes or tornadoes, by anything really.

But Peter says that our inheritance in Christ, our eternal life is imperishable, it can’t be destroyed.

Also, sin in ourselves or in others can desecrate our worldly inheritance.

It can be desecrated through cheating or lying to get it, or using the inheritance in a sinful way, spending it on our sinful pleasures.

But Peter says that our inheritance in Christ, our eternal life is undefiled, it can’t be tainted by sin.

Also, time can diminish our worldly inheritance.

An inheritance that at one time could provide for our needs for the rest of our lives, now it barely provides for a single month of necessities for life because of inflation.

But Peter says that our inheritance in Christ, our eternal life is unfading, it can’t diminish with time.

Our hope is living because it’s hope for our eternal life based on the eternal life of Christ displayed in his resurrection, and it’s living in contrast to the dead hope of the world.

Our eternal life is our inheritance that’s kept perfect (imperishable, undefiled, and unfading) by God the Father in heaven.

He’s the one that makes sure it stays perfect for us.

Our living hope is in Christ because he’s the one who secured it for us through his death and resurrection.

But our living hope, our eternal life, is also kept secure in heaven by God the Father waiting to give it to us.

Now, the thing about hope is that it looks forward to something that hasn’t happened yet.

But when we remember Jesus’ resurrection, our hope ignites in certainty.

We will absolutely, 100% be raised to eternal life in Christ because he promised and he never lies and he proved it by his own resurrection.

But in Proverbs 13:12 we read, “Hope deferred makes the heart sick, but a desire fulfilled is a tree of life.”

God has given us right now a taste of our future eternal life in Christ.

We get to experience new life in Christ now, though the fullness of that new life will be given when Jesus comes back.

The fullness is kept in heaven for us, but the Holy Spirit in the new covenant gives us new life right now, he changes us so that we want to do what God wants us to do, we want to obey him because of our love for him, because he loved us so much he gave us his Son, Jesus.

Our hope is not deferred, our desire is fulfilled, though it will be fuller when Jesus comes back.

But if we lose sight of Jesus’ resurrection, it may seem deferred.

If we get overwhelmed by the pain and sorrow and difficulties of life in this world, then we may forget Jesus’ resurrection in the moment.

And forgetting Jesus’ resurrection makes our hope seem deferred, and it makes our heart sick.

So when hardship comes, remember Jesus’ resurrection.

But it’s practically impossible to force yourself to remember something you’ve forgotten in the moment.

We need each other.

We need to remind each other of Jesus’ resurrection as the basis for our living hope.

We need to remind each other that our hope is not deferred, it’s living, it’s absolutely certain, and we experience a measure of it right now.

And we can pray and lift each other up in prayer with our anxieties, our cares in this life.

Peter says later in this letter in 1 Peter 5:7 that you ought to approach God humbly “casting all your anxieties on him, because he cares for you.”

So, we saw how remembering Jesus’ resurrection produces our living hope.

Next, we will see how it’s significant for our faith in verses 5 through 7.

1 Peter 1:5–7 ESV

who by God’s power are being guarded through faith for a salvation ready to be revealed in the last time. In this you rejoice, though now for a little while, if necessary, you have been grieved by various trials, so that the tested genuineness of your faith—more precious than gold that perishes though it is tested by fire—may be found to result in praise and glory and honor at the revelation of Jesus Christ.

Here Peter tells us that remembering Jesus’ resurrection…

Protects our Precious Faith (5-7)

Peter had said in verse 4 that God protects your inheritance in heaven, and now he explains how God protects you, too.

By God’s power, you are being guarded, or protected, so that you will absolutely inherit the eternal life he is protecting for you in heaven.

This is the doctrine of the perseverance of the saints.

If you are saved by God, then you can’t lose your salvation because it’s not dependent on you.

Your salvation has never been dependent on you, and it never will be.

It’s always been dependent on God and his power to keep you, to protect you.

Jesus said in John 6:38–39 “For I have come down from heaven, not to do my own will but the will of him who sent me. And this is the will of him who sent me, that I should lose nothing of all that he has given me, but raise it up on the last day.”

A bit later in John 10:27–30 he said, “My sheep hear my voice, and I know them, and they follow me. I give them eternal life, and they will never perish, and no one will snatch them out of my hand. My Father, who has given them to me, is greater than all, and no one is able to snatch them out of the Father’s hand. I and the Father are one.”

Paul understood what Jesus was talking about, and he encouraged believers in the security of their salvation multiple times.

He wrote in Romans 8:38–39 “For I am sure that neither death nor life, nor angels nor rulers, nor things present nor things to come, nor powers, nor height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord.”

In Philippians 1:6 “And I am sure of this, that he who began a good work in you will bring it to completion at the day of Jesus Christ.”

and in Ephesians 4:30 “And do not grieve the Holy Spirit of God, by whom you were sealed for the day of redemption.”

One of the most beautiful benedictions in the New Testament talks about our eternal security in God’s power and not in our own in Jude 24–25 “Now to him who is able to keep you from stumbling and to present you blameless before the presence of his glory with great joy, to the only God, our Savior, through Jesus Christ our Lord, be glory, majesty, dominion, and authority, before all time and now and forever. Amen.”

If you are saved, then nothing… NOTHING… can take that from you, not even yourself, because almighty sovereign God is protecting you so that you will absolutely receive your inheritance of eternal life.

Peter says that God is protecting us for a salvation ready to be revealed in the last time.

I mentioned this a bit earlier, but there is both a present and future reality to our salvation.

Earlier I talked about this in terms of our eternal life, but really our eternal life is part of our salvation along with our forgiveness, redemption, justification, sanctification, glorification, adoption.

It’s all really the same thing, just talked about in slightly different ways.

Different facets of the same beautiful gemstone of our salvation.

Our salvation will be fully revealed and given to us in its entirety when Jesus comes back.

But even now we really possess it, we’re really saved.

We already experience every aspect of our salvation in a small way.

But when Jesus comes back we will experience it’s fullness.

It’s ready to be revealed.

Everything that needed to be done to accomplish our salvation has already been done by Jesus at the cross and the empty tomb.

It’s ready, waiting for Jesus to come back so that we can take full possession of our inheritance.

And God is protecting us so that when Jesus comes back, our ready and waiting inheritance will immediately be given to us.

This is a great reason to rejoice.

And Peter says as much, but he presents a sort of paradox here.

We rejoice even though we are grieved by various trials.

How can we rejoice in the midst of our trials?

Peter already mentioned that we’re protected by God unto salvation, but we still endure hardship.

That’s because God doesn’t protect us from hardship, he protects us by solidifying our faith from falling away from Christ, and he uses hardship to do that.

Peter understands that our faith is worth protecting, that God sees our faith as worthy to protect.

He likens our faith to gold, precious, valuable gold.

Even though we value gold so much, we still put it through intense heat that would destroy other lesser things.

And we put it through that heat so that it will become more valuable by burning away the impurities in it.

Our faith is subjected to the intense heat of difficulties in our lives so that the impurities of sin and heart idols are burnt away and our faith becomes more valuable for having those impurities removed.

It becomes tested as genuine and not a counterfeit.

But our faith is also unlike gold in that our faith will endure in eternal life where gold will perish.

At the very least, gold will utterly lose its value where our faith will increase in value.

Think about it…

When Jesus comes back and he brings in the new heaven and the new earth and the new Jerusalem gold will no longer be a precious item but a thing to be walked on.

Revelation 21:21 says, “And the twelve gates were twelve pearls, each of the gates made of a single pearl, and the street of the city was pure gold, like transparent glass.”

Gold will be de-valued at that time, but our faith will endure and actually increase its value.

At that time our faith will no longer be needed as faith because we will see God as he is.

The author of the book of Hebrews defined faith in Hebrews 11:1 “Now faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen.”

Faith is necessary when we can’t see.

And right now we can’t see God because he’s Spirit.

We can see how God affects the world, and how it makes the most sense for him to be there even though we can’t actually see him.

And when Jesus was on the earth people really saw him, and we have historical records in the Bible and others that testify that he really existed in the physical world.

But now we have to rely on those records because Jesus is out of sight, sitting at the right hand of the Father, interceding for us right now.

But there is coming a time when faith will not be needed anymore because we’ll be able to actually see God.

John explained this in 1 John 3:2 “Beloved, we are God’s children now, and what we will be has not yet appeared; but we know that when he appears we shall be like him, because we shall see him as he is.”

At that point our faith won’t disappear, it won’t be cast aside.

No, it’ll be transformed into praise and glory and honor because our precious faith is what God uses to protect us through the trials and difficulties of life.

Jesus will look at us as our faith endured by God’s power to his return, and he’ll transform our faith into praise and glory and honor when he says as he explained in his parable in Matthew 25, “Well done good and faithful servant. You have been faithful over a little; I will set you over much. Enter into the joy of your master.”

Sometimes our faith can be shaken, though, especially when we go through these various trials and lose sight of how God uses them to strengthen our faith.

When we lose sight of that it opens us up to doubt God’s goodness or his purposes.

When we lose sight of Jesus’ resurrection, then our difficulties and pain in life threaten to throw us into despair.

But Jesus’ resurrection proves his defeat of death and it gives meaning to our own difficulties.

If Jesus suffered and died but he defeated death, then we ought to consider it an honor to suffer likewise.

If Jesus said that he will surely raise us up on the last day like he was raised, then we ought to have faith and hold on knowing that he will never let go of us.

If Jesus’ glorious resurrection was necessarily and purposefully preceded by suffering so that he could sympathize with us, then our suffering must also have a purpose.

Because of Jesus’ resurrection we are adopted into God’s family, considered heirs with Jesus.

And Paul explained in Romans 8:16–17 “The Spirit himself bears witness with our spirit that we are children of God, and if children, then heirs—heirs of God and fellow heirs with Christ, provided we suffer with him in order that we may also be glorified with him.”

God uses our trials to protect our faith, to strengthen our faith, and to prove our faith genuine when we remember Jesus’ resurrection.

So, we’ve got to remember and remind each other about Jesus’ resurrection so that God will use our various trials to protect our precious faith rather than us being thrown into despair.

So, we saw how remembering Jesus’ resurrection produces our living hope, and it protects our precious faith.

Next, we will see how it’s significant for our joy in verses 8 and 9.

1 Peter 1:8–9 ESV

Though you have not seen him, you love him. Though you do not now see him, you believe in him and rejoice with joy that is inexpressible and filled with glory, obtaining the outcome of your faith, the salvation of your souls.

Here Peter tells us that remembering Jesus’ resurrection…

Prefigures our Glorious Joy (8-9)

Peter says that even though you’ve never seen Jesus, you still love him.

Your love for Jesus is based on your faith in him, who he is and what he’s done.

You love him because you believe that Jesus is God who became human, died in your place on the cross, and then rose again three days later so that you would be saved from sin and death.

But then Peter goes a step further and says that even your faith is based on something.

Your faith, your belief in him is based on your hope in him even though you don’t see him right now.

As we saw earlier in Hebrews 11:1 “Now faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen.”

Both faith and hope are necessarily rooted in what is unseen.

We can remember the past, but if something happened before we existed, then what happened in the past must be believed in faith.

And we absolutely cannot see the future, but God sees and determines the future and he’s told us what we can expect in hope.

And we hope in what God has promised and we hope in Jesus even though we cannot see him right now.

Paul explained this in Romans 8:24–25 “For in this hope we were saved. Now hope that is seen is not hope. For who hopes for what he sees? But if we hope for what we do not see, we wait for it with patience.”

So Peter says that we have both faith and hope looking forward to Christ and the fullness of our salvation in him whom we have not seen and we cannot see right now.

And as we look forward in faith and hope to the fullness of our salvation, receiving our inheritance of eternal life, even now we experience abundant joy in that faith and hope in Christ.

When we finally get to be in Jesus’ loving and satisfying presence forever, when we receive our inheritance of eternal life, we will rejoice for the rest of eternity.

Our joy will last forever.

But even now, as we look forward to that time, we rejoice.

We get to experience a little taste of that joy as we look forward to its fullness to come.

And even that little taste of joy is more than we can even describe right now.

Peter says that our joy right now is inexpressible and filled with glory just like it will be in eternity, though in eternity it will be filled with infinitely more glory and we will have all of eternity to figure out how to express it.

Right now our glorious joy is prefigured, or anticipated and partially experienced.

Like how a shadow or type from the old testament prefigured the coming Messiah.

Right now our glorious joy is inexpressible because it’s overwhelming to our finite minds.

Paul prayed in Ephesians 3:18–19 that you “may have strength to comprehend with all the saints what is the breadth and length and height and depth, and to know the love of Christ that surpasses knowledge, that you may be filled with all the fullness of God.”

Our joy is inexpressible right now because the magnitude of God’s power and the massive brain-breaking love of Christ is too much for us to fully grasp right now.

And Peter says that we have joy because we will obtain the outcome of our faith.

The outcome of your faith is the salvation of your soul.

Saved from sin and death.

Saved from the power, penalty, and presence of your sin against God.

Even now we are saved from the power and penalty of sin, we are no longer enslaved to sin, and we are no longer headed toward eternal punishment because of our sin against eternal almighty God.

But we look forward in hope, faith, and joy to when our salvation will be fully realized, when we will be saved from the presence of sin as well.

Then our hope and faith will be transformed into praise and glory and honor.

But our joy will be the same joy, only bigger.

Its easy to lose your joy while waiting for the fullness of your salvation when Jesus comes back.

When the pain and sorrow of life comes, our joy gets crowded out just like our faith and hope are threatened.

Joy and sorrow are opposites, so how can we have sorrow in life and still have joy?

Jesus told his disciples in John 16:20–22 “Truly, truly, I say to you, you will weep and lament, but the world will rejoice. You will be sorrowful, but your sorrow will turn into joy. When a woman is giving birth, she has sorrow because her hour has come, but when she has delivered the baby, she no longer remembers the anguish, for joy that a human being has been born into the world. So also you have sorrow now, but I will see you again, and your hearts will rejoice, and no one will take your joy from you.”

We can be joyful now in the midst of sorrow when we look forward to the time when our sorrow will be turned into joy.

Paul explained to the Thessalonian church in 1 Thessalonians 1:6 “And you became imitators of us and of the Lord, for you received the word in much affliction, with the joy of the Holy Spirit,”

We can be joyful now in the midst of affliction only by the power of the Holy Spirit reminding us of the outcome of our faith, the salvation of our souls.

The author of the book of Hebrews commended his readers in Hebrews 10:34 “For you had compassion on those in prison, and you joyfully accepted the plundering of your property, since you knew that you yourselves had a better possession and an abiding one.”

We can joyfully go through loss when we look forward to our infinitely better possession of eternal life with Jesus when he comes back.

And all of this is because of Jesus’ resurrection.

When we remember Jesus’ resurrection, how he died for us but didn’t stay dead, then we can have joy and confidence that our sorrow, affliction, and loss will also not stay that way.

Jesus rose from the dead three days after he died for us, so we can endure for a little while like he did, looking forward to the time when all of this sorrow and affliction and loss will be gone.

Jesus endured the most painful and sorrowful death taking on all of our sin and the full wrath of God the Father, and he did that because he looked forward to the outcome of all of that, his resurrection and all of our salvation because of it.

That’s what the author of Hebrews said in Hebrews 12:2 “looking to Jesus, the founder and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross, despising the shame, and is seated at the right hand of the throne of God.”

Out hope and faith and joy are all based on Jesus’ death and resurrection on our behalf and the coming day when he will return and our salvation will be fully realized, our inheritance of eternal life fully obtained.

So, we’ve got to remember Jesus’ resurrection so that we can maintain our joy even in the midst of the difficulties of life.

And we’ve got to remind each other of that because its easy to lose our joy when our sorrow in life is so potent.

Conclusion

Peter’s original audience for this letter… they were going through some very difficult times.

Persecution, pain, sorrow, loss.

And he told them right at the beginning of his letter to them, he told them to look to Jesus.

Look to Jesus for hope, faith, and joy through his resurrection.

Because of Jesus’ resurrection we have a living hope, our inheritance of eternal life.

Because of his resurrection we have faith that will result in praise and glory and honor.

Because of his resurrection we have joy as we obtain the outcome of our faith, the salvation of our souls.

Because of Jesus’ resurrection we can have a taste of all these things now by looking forward to their fullness when Jesus comes back.

In the moment, in your difficulties in life whatever they may be, you can presently have hope and faith and joy when you look back in the past at Jesus’ resurrection and how that affects your future salvation and inheritance of eternal life when he comes back.

I’ve said it multiple times, but I’ll say it again.

Remember Jesus’ resurrection, and remind each other about it because the difficulties of life tend to make us forget it.

And when we forget Jesus’ resurrection our hope dies, our faith falters, and our joy is swallowed up in sorrow.

We’ve got to keep on reminding each other of Jesus’ resurrection.

Not just on Easter Sunday, but every Sunday, as often as we can.

The difficulties of life happen every day, so we’ve got to remind each other of Jesus’ resurrection every day, too.

Now, if you haven’t put your faith in Jesus yet, then I beg you to do so now.

I’ve been talking about how Jesus’ resurrection gives us hope and faith and joy, but if you don’t believe in him then the reminder of his resurrection will have no effect on you.

You’ve got to believe that he is the Christ, the Son of God, God who became a man, lived a perfectly sinless life, died on the cross, and rose again three days later.

If you believe that.

If you believe Jesus did that for you, so that you could be forgiven of your sin and reconciled to God.

Then you are saved.

The Apostle Paul wrote in Romans 10:9 “because, if you confess with your mouth that Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved.”

All you need to do is believe that Jesus is who he said he is and that he did everything necessary for you to be forgiven by dying on the cross and rising from the dead.

Believe that in your heart and confess with your mouth that he is Lord.

Submit to his authority over your life, and tell him in prayer, and tell us also so that we can rejoice with you and welcome you into new life, eternal life in Christ.

Pray

Father, thank you for giving us hope, faith, and joy in your Son Jesus.

Thank you for your great mercy that you caused us to be born again to a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus.

Thank you for protecting our faith by refining it through our various trials.

And thank you for giving us joy even now as we endure those trials looking forward to the inexpressible joy we will have living in your loving and satisfying presence forever.

Please help us to remember these things, and help us to remind each other so that we don’t lose hope, so that we don’t lose faith, so that we don’t lose our joy in Christ.

As we celebrate Jesus’ resurrection today, Father help us to truly understand its significance not just for our future in eternity with you, but also its significance in our lives right now.

We thank you and praise you in Jesus’ name. Amen.

Communion

Well, today is set aside to specially remember Jesus’ resurrection.

But we also set aside the first Sunday of every month to specially remember Jesus’ death on our behalf through communion.

This celebration of Jesus’ death is only for believers, and there are a few things that indicate to the rest of the church the genuineness of our faith.

These things are really meant to ease my conscience because I don’t want to be guilty of giving anyone a false sense of security in their salvation if they aren’t actually saved.

These indicators are baptism and church discipline.

If you’ve put your faith in Jesus to be saved and reconciled to God, and you’ve confessed that in baptism then that indicates to the rest of the church that your faith is genuine.

Also, if you’ve not given any reason to doubt your confession in unrepentant sin resulting in the final stage of church discipline, then that also indicates to the rest of the church that your faith is genuine.

If you believe but you haven’t been baptized yet, then you can still celebrate with us, but please come and talk with me and we can find a good time and place to get you baptized asap.

If you have refused to repent of your sin that others have pleaded with you to repent of, then please do not celebrate with us until you have reconciled with those you have sinned against.

In a slightly different context Jesus said in Matthew 5:23–24 “So if you are offering your gift at the altar and there remember that your brother has something against you, leave your gift there before the altar and go. First be reconciled to your brother, and then come and offer your gift.”

It’s not exactly the same as celebrating communion, but I think the principle is the same.

Jesus wants repentance and unity among his people more than he wants offerings and more than he wants us to participate in this celebration of remembrance.

Again, if you are an unbaptized believer, then you are welcome to participate, but do your best to get baptized asap.

And if you are a believer under the final step of church discipline, then please, don’t participate with us right now, first repent and be reconciled to your brothers and sisters in Christ.

Other than that, if you are a baptized believer in good standing with your church, then you are welcome to participate with us.

Now, once all who are participating in this celebration have the elements I will pray and we will eat and drink together in remembrance of Jesus’ death on our behalf.

I’ve been preaching about remembering Jesus’ resurrection so that God will use that remembrance to hold fast our hope, faith, and joy as we also look forward to our inheritance of eternal life in Christ.

Now we’re talking about remembering Jesus’ death on our behalf.

It’s interesting to me that Jesus couldn’t have been raised from the dead if he didn’t die, and he couldn’t have died if he didn’t become a mortal man.

His incarnation, death, and resurrection are all necessary components of our reconciliation.

Subsequent necessary steps all leading to Jesus being the perfect mediator between God and man because he’s 100% God and 100% human, and he suffered and died to sympathize with us as our great high priest, and he rose from the dead paving the way for our own resurrection to eternal life because of our forgiveness and reconciliation with God.

We celebrate his incarnation at Christmas.

We celebrate his resurrection at Easter.

And we celebrate his death every time we participate in communion together.

Now, we remember all three every time we talk about the gospel.

But we specifically celebrate these different aspects of what Jesus did to save us in these celebrations.

A couple of weeks ago we got to fellowship with Calvary Chapel on a Thursday evening.

Together we witnessed a presentation from Chosen People Ministries of how the Passover celebration pointed to the Messiah and how Jesus is the fulfillment of it as the Messiah, the Christ.

I won’t go into all the details because then we would be here for a very long time.

But the part that stuck out to me was how Jesus took the last parts of the Passover order and changed them into our communion celebration because they pointed to him and what he would do on the cross in the first place.

I’m going to read about this from Luke 22:14-20, then I’ll pray and we will eat and drink together.

Luke 22:14–20 “And when the hour came, he reclined at table, and the apostles with him. And he said to them, “I have earnestly desired to eat this Passover with you before I suffer. For I tell you I will not eat it until it is fulfilled in the kingdom of God.” And he took a cup, and when he had given thanks he said, “Take this, and divide it among yourselves. For I tell you that from now on I will not drink of the fruit of the vine until the kingdom of God comes.” And he took bread, and when he had given thanks, he broke it and gave it to them, saying, “This is my body, which is given for you. Do this in remembrance of me.” And likewise the cup after they had eaten, saying, “This cup that is poured out for you is the new covenant in my blood.”

Pray

Father, thank you for this celebration.

Thank you that we get to participate with Jesus in his death on our behalf by remembering him in this way.

Thank you for the promise of our salvation in him even as you foreshadowed it in the Passover.

I pray that you would help us remember him not just when we eat this small meal of remembrance, not just on Sundays, Lord, but every moment of every day.

Never let us forget all that Jesus has done for us from the manger to the cross to the empty tomb.

Please bless us now as we celebrate your Son’s death on our behalf, and as we continue today celebrating his resurrection.

We pray this in Jesus’ name. Amen.