Resurrection Sunday 4.2.26

Text

1 Co 15:1-11

Introduction

God has always been the God who gives life to dead things

This morning we celebrate because the promises of God through Christ were confirmed through a tangible, historical event — the resurrection. We will dig into that momentarily.

In some ways, what we are celebrating this morning is simply the very essence of who God is, revealed in the resurrected Jesus. I’ll begin with this second point and move backwards into the first.

Survey of General Biblical Historical Moments

Genesis

Gen 2:7, 9

After the fall, one of the great questions is: how can we return to the mount of the Lord and enter again into life?

This is a key question for us because God put eternity into our heart (Eccl. 3:11)

God offers hope through the promised redeemer seed (Gen 3:15)

Gen. 22 | Heb 11:17-19 | Rom. 4:16-22

God is fully able to do that which he promised.

Jesus was delivered up for our trespasses and raised for our justification (v. 25)

Story of Joseph (Gen. 37-50)

Note that the end of Genesis indicates that God takes evil and works toward Good

Psalms

Ps. 16:8-11 | Acts 2:23-36 (David rests in the Lord but looks forward to the Messiah who will come from his lineage and testifies about the resurrection for him)

Jonah

Jonah 2:1-10 (Jonah calls out to God from the belly of the fish from Sheol)

Jonah captures God’s heart in his arguing with God in Jonah 4:2

Ezekiel

Eze 37:1-14 - God promises that He will restore Israel through resurrection; verse 14 indicates that this action is going to be tied up in the same new-covenant action that is accomplished by the Messiah.

Note that Ezekiel, Jeremiah, and Isaiah all tool through similar questions, but they accomplish different facets of promise.

Isaiah is very concerned to chart out a vision of promise through judgment in which the people of Israel are delivered by the work of the suffering servant who purchases a new covenant | Isaiah also includes a vision of God accomplishing salvation for humanity in general.

Ezekiel will stress the resurrection and the accomplishment of God’s work

Jeremiah will be the one who actually uses the phrase “new covenant” and speaks of God writing his law on the hearts of His people

Survey of Specific Biblical Historical Moments

Three resurrections (or possibly better to call them resuscitations) between the ministries of Elijah and Elisha

1 Kings 17:17-24 (Widow’s dead son at Zaraphath)

2 Kings 4:18-37 (Shunammite woman’s son dead)

2 Kings 13:20-21 (Posthumously, touching Elisha’s bones)

Promise of the dead being raised in a physical sense in the last days in Daniel 12:2

The Witness of the Old Testament

Points vividly to the very God who takes dead people and brings them back to life.

Resurrection Promised by Jesus

Matt. 16:1-17:23

Jesus tells the Pharisees that they will receive the sign of Jonah (v. 4)

After Simon Peter confesses Jesus, it is by his faith that he is called Simon son of Jonah (v. 17); this is clearly a renaming because we know that Peter was the son of a man named John (1:42)

In v. 18, according to Peter’s faith, he is promised that the church (all those who share in the faith which Peter demonstrated) would prevail over the gates of Hades

In verse 21, tells his disciples his mission. He will be crucified and rise on the third day.

Jesus repeats this claim of resurrection several times so that it is crystal clear — Jesus claimed that he would be raised from the dead

John 11:17-27

V. 24 - Martha was counting on the resurrection on the last day

V. 25 - Jesus says: “I am the resurrection and the life. Whoever believes in me, though he die, yet shall he live, and everyone who lives and believes in me shall never die.”

John 20:1-9

Note verse 9 which says that the women and the disciples they did not understand the Scripture which said that Jesus must rise from the dead

1 Co. 15:3-11

What we celebrate this morning is a plain reality that God raised Jesus from the dead.

Significance

Why do these things matter?

1 Co. 15:17 - The resurrection verifies who Jesus is and that the promises of Jesus are true for you.

How do you know that your sins are cleansed by Jesus? Because of the resurrection.

1 Co. 15 (whole chapter) - communicates that we will follow Jesus in his resurrection and receive glorified bodies just like our Lord.

Resurrection is tethered to a deep, God-reality where God is the life giver.

What is especially beautiful is that if you are able to see God as the life-giver, when you take the resurrection to your heart and depend on the Lord for your life, you will be saved. Romans 10:9-10

God will cause many aspects of your life, even now, to start blossoming when you start looking to him as your resurrection.

It is the resurrection and the hope of life that drives us into the arms of Jesus because we know that nothing in this world supplies what Jesus supplies

The resurrection was long awaited and accomplished.

The resurrection is real.

Take specific note about the public nature of Jesus’s miracle and that the truths we proclaim this morning are not like other religions which bank on secrecy. Jesus was raised and revealed himself to many including the apostles.

The New Testament stands as a series of testimonies which feature witness accounts of the resurrected Christ.

Will You

Believe in the Lord Jesus?

Receive forgiveness for sins and the promise of His resurrection?