Easter Sunday - 2nd Draft (2)

The Cross Before Us: Living the Resurrection Life

Intro

Welcome - Intro myself

New Sermon series

Easter Overview

Its Ressurection Sunday. Today, we celebrate the victory that Jesus won because its a victory that we all get to share in when we accept Him and His gift of salvation.

On Friday, we remembered His death and sacrifice - when all seemed doomed and dark. But on the third day He rose up from the dead and overcame the world and overcame sin.

Jesus led by example and His death and ressurection are part of that example.

Today, we remember His victory and a lot of us here today want victory of our lives - over the struggles, over shame, over burdens.

There was a time in my life where I thought that I could just try really hard to be like Jesus and receive the victory in Christ.

No matter how hard I tried, I couldn’t measure up. Instead of victory, I found more burdens.

Jesus showed us that to live in victory, there had to be a time of sacrifice beforehand.

Without Jesus’ death, there would be no ressurection.

If Jesus didn’t come and die for us and come back from the dead, then He wouldn’t be God.

He did so and then He tells us to do the same. Not in the physical sense, but in a spiritual sense that we’ll talk about today.

Before we end service today, there will be an opportunity for baptism.

We have everything you need to do so.

Denying Self, Picking Up Our Cross, and Losing Our Lives

Luke 9:23–24 TPT

Jesus said to all of his followers, “If you truly desire to be my disciple, you must disown your life completely, embrace my ‘cross’ as your own, and surrender to my ways. For if you choose self-sacrifice, giving up your lives for my glory, you will embark on a discovery of more and more of true life. But if you choose to keep your lives for yourselves, you will lose what you try to keep.

“If you truly desire to be my disciple, you must disown your life completely….”

Sometimes we read the scriptures and we don’t hear the true meaning.

I would hear the words but in my heart I would hear - “If you truly desire to be my disciple, you better not mess up and you need to act like Jesus daily.”

This scripture isn’t about not messing up and acting perfectly. Its not about making better decisions or just having better discipline.

I found out that when we think of it that way, we fail. Because we can’t do it.

It starts with a desire to actually be a disciple of Jesus. Not a desire to be perfect.

We have to have a desire for Jesus. Why? Because He’s the only one who holds the victory. He’s the only one who overcame the world. He’s the only way to God the Father.

If we try on our own, we fail. But with Jesus, all things are possible.

Walmart/Oreos

I might be able to resist the Oreos one day, maybe even for a while. But when my focus is only to be perfect by not messing up, I will mess up.

But if my focus is on something better - being healthy - I’ll stay focused on the purpose and not the substance or the actions. Because clearly I’m not going to chose a carrot over an Oreo in my own strength - if I was just going by how I feel… but if I have a purpose in doing so, I can focus on that and walk by the Oreos.

You see, we can’t just quit something thats bad for us without replacing it with something thats good. We have to focus.

The same is true with God - We walk away from our sin by asking God to replace it with something better. Its His plan that’s better.

This is how we disown our lives: We take the focus off of the ourselves and onto the desire to be His disciple.

Does that mean we have to understand it? Does that mean we have to be perfect? If we’re just figuring it out, thats okay.

Fix your eyes upon the cross of Jesus.

“Embrace my “cross” as your own, and surrender to my ways. For if you choose self-sacrifice, giving up your lives for my glory, you will embark on a discovery of more and more of true life…”

We must embrace our cross as our own. That means as Christ suffered, so do we.

Why? Because we share in the fate of Christ when we are following Him as His disciple.

Thats how we discover how to be a follower of Christ.

Andrew - picking up the cross - Taping papers to the log

To follow Christ, we must deny ourselves, lose our lives, and pick up our cross - we don’t want to do those things. But its not about wanting to do those things specifically….

Yes, we pick up our cross, but what Jesus did was carried the entire weight of our sin and our past and takes us from us to erase it.

Put papers on cross

Thankfully this isn’t the end of the story. If all we did was pick up our cross, carry our burdens, we’d be doomed to the fate of punishment and death.

But Christ tells us to choose self sacrifice to give up our lives for His glory and we’ll discover true life.

This means that before Christ, we weren’t truly living. We didn’t have what it took.

Picking up our cross isn’t the end of the story.

Theres resurrection and theres new life. That doesn’t come without picking up our cross.

We don’t get to skip that part.

Our suffering - everything we’ve gone through and are going through and will go through was nailed to the cross with Jesus.

When we pick up our cross, we get to experience all the things we carried around ourselves turned around for God’s glory. Just like Christ’s death was turned around for God’s glory.

Not because anything we’re doing, but because of who went ahead of us. Who bore the punishment on the cross. Who was crucified and resurrected.

Andrew can sit down?

Jesus told His disciples about His future crucifixion and suffering and they were stunned, they were confused.

You might not understand this today but guess what: No one else understood it at the time either.

This is less about knowledge and more about a decision and desire to follow Christ.

Think about this:

The people then had more of an opportunity to know Jesus than us and they still crucified Him. They still denied Him.

They saw His miracles. They experienced His healing. His teaching. They got something out of Him. But when He wanted them to make a decision to give up something….

We have to make a decision today based on faith: To follow Him or not. We can’t just simply believe in Him.

The decision to follow Him comes with specific direction: Take up your cross and follow Him.

The cross was a punish ment for criminals - our Savior was crucified on criminals cross and He calls us to take up our cross.

So when Jesus says “take up your cross,” it implies that theres some form of punishment going on.

It would be like me saying, “everyone, take up your electric chair, or lethal injection and follow me!”

Its not just sin that we must deny, but we must deny ourselves - even when it looks like its “good” or “feels good” - and pick up our cross.

The sacrificial image of Christ isn’t one we focus on as much when we’re excited about all the “good stuff” that comes with being a Christian.

The sacrificial image of Christ is showing us that its not about being perfect to look like Christ.

To look like Christ doesn’t mean that we get to go do miracles, bless people, pray for people, serve people, go to church - it means we embrace the suffering servant who died on the cross while taking up our cross.

Its messy, its dirty, its painful, it makes us vulnerable - but when we see the cross, its not empty - our Savior is hanging on it.

We might have gotten dressed up today, but we can’t stand in victory without the suffering with Christ. That means we have to give up our flesh.

We don’t depend on our flesh, we depend on Jesus and we focus on the cross and the crucified Jesus and thats what brings this about in our life

We can celebrate His resurrection, but the only way that it matters is if we remember the blood and body that was shed and broken.

We must deny not just ours but others. Don’t put your faith in flesh. Even Jesus’ flesh had to die and we’re doomed to the fate of flesh - death.

But if we depend on Christ, we get to share in His fate, which is eternal life.

We share in His sufferings and then we share in His victory!

Andrew comes back

Even when Christ was carrying the cross, the Godman’s flesh was weakening - Think about this: Even God showed us that the flesh had to be broken before we saw victory.

Let me tell you something:

I thought that I could have victory without my flesh being broken. I ran from the burden of the cross while chasing the resurrection.

But heres the thing: those are opposite directions. I was never going to make it.

Luke 23:26 TPT

As the guards led Jesus to be crucified, there was an African man in the crowd named Simon, from Libya. He had just arrived from a rural village to keep the Feast of the Passover. The guards laid Jesus’ cross on Simon’s shoulders and forced him to walk behind Jesus and carry his cross.

When we give up our life - its painful. We might be at rock bottom. We might feel pain. We might feel suffering. It might effect the people around us.

But we are like Simon. We are united with Christ - to share in His fate, His death AND victory.

Simon was called up to help Jesus carry the cross - was there to take up the cross and walk with Jesus.

So when we give up our life we end up right here - with a suffering Jesus. Because no matter the pain we go through, Christ took on all the pain. And He’s right there with us.

We don’t take up the cross because Jesus needed help. Its that Christ isn’t asking us to do something that HE hasn’t already done. He’s meeting us where we’re at.

Whats crazy is that Simon wasn’t really helping Jesus, but Jesus was helping Simon.

Simon might’ve helped carry the cross, but it was only to show that the flesh wasn’t enough.

It was a reminder to us all that we carry the weight of condemnation on our shoulders and its not possible for us to do what Jesus did.

We might be able to carry this cross all the way, but we can’t pay for our sins .

But Christ tells us to carry our cross and crucify our flesh.

How do we carry our cross?

We do the same thing… we look at Jesus. We follow Jesus. We fix our eyes upon Jesus. On a crucified Jesus.

You want to see the empty tomb? Well first, look at the cross - that wasn’t empty, but had our Savior hanging from it.

The cross isn’t empty, the tomb was empty, the cross held our suffering Savior.

You see, He didn’t ask anything of us He wasn’t willing to do first.

We see Him carrying His cross.

“Whoever loses his life for for My sake, will find it.”

To deny yourself doesn’t mean holding. It means losing your life. Denying yourself and replacing self with Christ.

In our best effort to follow Christ without denying ourselves, we end up trying to be the savior of our own lives and failing. I did that for too long.

It means that when we overcome desires one day, we might be able to resist, but tomorrow will come and we fail.

Watch this: Christ told His closest followers to deny themselves and shortly after, they denied Him.

When pressure is applied to our flesh, what happens when we’re on our own?

When hunger strikes, we eat.

When lust hits, we act.

When anger arises, we take it out.

When depression consumes, we fill it with something.

When our feet are held to the fire, we fold.

When pressure was applied to Jesus He didn’t fold. His flesh didn’t want to be tortured and hung on a cross, but His purpose and Spirit did- He denied His right as God to not endure such things and sacrificed Himself for our sake on the cross.

When pressure came to His followers, they turned their backs. They gave in.

Judas sold Jesus out.

Peter - one of Jesus’ closest friends. Denied knowing Christ when confronted in the temple for even being associated with Jesus.

Peter was confronted three times. Each time, his denial intensified. He started by just saying “I don’t know Jesus.” By the third, he was cursing.

Why? Because the pressure increased. He was not denying Himself comfort, but desperately clinging to saving himself from harm and disassociating himself from Jesus.

He didn’t deny believing in Jesus. He denied having a relationship with Jesus.

He was denying a relationship. A closeness. He was known for being someone who was close to Jesus.

Watch this: Everyone at this time believed in Jesus - But this was about who was following Jesus. Because who care if you believe in Him?! Did you follow Him?!

They acknowledged His presence and even His power, but it was about the relationship with Him that was important. It was the relationship being put to the test.

What would happen if we were put to the test right now for our relationship with Christ?

I don’t care if you believe in Him - The Muslims believe in Jesus, The Jews believe in Jesus… To an extent, they believe in His power… but thats not enough. Thats not what this is about. That’s not salvation.

Without a reliance on Jesus, we will try to rely on our own strength. It will always fail us.

Peter’s story of denial wasn’t to show that he was a bad person who was not a true believer. It was to prove that we can’t do it on our own and that even when our human weakness is what we rely on, theres restoration in simply turning back toward Jesus and repenting - saying sorry - for our lack of faith in Him.

Being Like Christ - A Suffering Servant

Philippians 3:10–11 NASB 2020

that I may know Him and the power of His resurrection and the fellowship of His sufferings, being conformed to His death; if somehow I may attain to the resurrection from the dead.

You might remember the WWJD bracelets.

Maybe its a good thing in situations to ask ourselves the question: WWJD?

But to be like Christ is not to ask the question, WWJD, but is a simpler question, but deeper - do I know Jesus?

To be like Christ is to know Him and submit to His will.

Its not enough to believe in Christ. We must die with Christ.

Think about it. Everyone wants a resurrection story, but few want to carry the weight and sacrifice.

There is no action that we can take to ensure ressurection. Its just knowing the resurrected One.

That means that our aim should not be to do good, but to know the resurrected One. Jesus.

To be like Christ is to know Him, not simply act like Him.

I would strive to act like Christ by being a good leader, a good person, a good Christian, make good decisions, etc.

But I found out that God isn’t up there going - is that guy doing what Jesus would do? Because Jesus already did the thing… God is up there going - does that guy know Jesus?

Do you ever meet a stranger who has mannerisms of a someone else you know who reminds you of them? Just because they act like them doesn’t mean theres a relationship connecting them.

In the same way, we can act like Jesus but thats not what knowing Christ is.

But to know Christ is more than knowing about Christ.

To know Christ is to share in His victory, but also sharing in His sufferings.

Sometimes, we spend our Easter services just talking about Christ so you’ll make a decision to believe in Him. I don’t care if you accept Him today as much as I care that you pursue Him today.

If you have accepted Him, then you are saved.

You can’t act like Jesus and talk like Jesus and say that you know Him… its about seeking His presence.

Closing

Altar

The crucifixion and resurrection wasn’t a one time event.

Today, we can see our old lives crucified with Christ and we can be resurrected into new life.

Don’t do it because you want to quit something. Don’t do it because you want a fresh start. Don’t do it because you’re just overwhelmed.

Do it because you believe and have repented. Do it because you want to share in the suffering and the Glory of Jesus Christ. Do it because you want to give up your life to gain whatever life God prepared for you.

His death means that we can die to our sin and His ressurection means we can have new life. Our baptism symbolizes that eternal decision.

Baptisms

Romans 6:4–6 NASB 2020

Therefore we have been buried with Him through baptism into death, so that, just as Christ was raised from the dead through the glory of the Father, so we too may walk in newness of life. For if we have become united with Him in the likeness of His death, certainly we shall also be in the likeness of His resurrection, knowing this, that our old self was crucified with Him, in order that our body of sin might be done away with, so that we would no longer be slaves to sin;

When we’re baptized, we’re publicly declaring that we’re united with Christ not just in His resurrection, but with His death.

Our old selves are hung on a cross so that we can walk in newness of life.

In our new life, we have power and purpose - just like P. Ben talked about. We’re free from bondage of sin, and we are now bearing our cross and walking in our resurrected life.