The Risen Jesus
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Introduction
Introduction
I have never been to the Grand Canyon. I’ve seen pictures, but based on the pictures of places that I have been, I am sure that they are a joke compared to the reality. I know a little bit about the Grand Canyon, because I know some people who have been there, and have come back to tell me about it. If I trust them, I can learn something before I ever experience it myself. I may make it to the Grand Canyon one day and I may not. But one trip we are all going to make is the trip out of this life. And I am so glad that we have the testimony of someone who has completed the round trip to tell us all about it.
This morning we are beginning a new series entitled “Life After Life.” What is heaven like? What happens to babies, pets or the mentally handicapped when they die? Do they become angels or ghosts? Do they watch over us? Wouldn’t it be boring to sit on a cloud and play a harp all day? (Probably, but don’t worry - you don’t have to). All of these questions and more are going to be on the table in the next few weeks. I have quite a few which some key passages will answer, but I want to know your questions too! Send me an e-mail or a text, or go on our Facebook page and ask away, and I will make sure that I draw those points out.
Today, we are at the cornerstone of the whole thing. The reason we have hope after life - the reason that we can know anything about it at all - is because Jesus has been there and told us. Maybe you’re a believer with a lot of questions about life after this life. Philippians 3:21 says that one day, we are going to have a body like Jesus’. So there might be some things you can learn. Maybe you’re a skeptic who is not sure if there really is life after death, or you struggle with believing that if there is a God that He cares much about what we do anyway. You ought to be especially interested in what happened one Sunday nearly two thousand years ago that convinced a bunch of good, down-to-earth Palestinians to give up everything to follow someone who had been publically lynched. If He made a round trip through the grave, then everything else He said deserves some attention. Maybe you intellectually accept that there probably is a God, but feel like there is something more, just beyond your grasp. You believe in Him like you believe there was a George Washington or a Julius Caesar, but if He is alive, there ought to be more than that. We’ll have something for you too. No matter who you are, this morning we are going to deal with the one question you simply cannot afford to ignore. When you close your eyes for the last time, what do you see next?
Open up your Bibles to Luke 24:13. This is the third day since the crucifixion. For months, Jesus had been telling His disciples that the Son of Man would have to be crucified, and on the third day He would rise again. It is Sunday, the disciples have been scattered in fear. Some early reports have come that the tomb was empty, but they continue bewildered about their ordinary business, unsure of what to do. The One all of their hopes had been pinned on has apparently failed, and their broken hearts are aimless. If you have ever lost someone you loved, you can probably understand exactly. You make odd decisions, move in fits and starts and spin in circles in your pain. Until, for you, like them, Jesus shows up. We are normally in the habit of reading our entire text through, but I am going to let this story unfold naturally, and if you have heard it before or not, I want to let you think of it as the first time.
And, behold, two of them went that same day to a village called Emmaus, which was from Jerusalem about threescore furlongs.
And they talked together of all these things which had happened.
And it came to pass, that, while they communed together and reasoned, Jesus himself drew near, and went with them.
But their eyes were holden that they should not know him.
Explain: We will recognize each other, and we can know Jesus.
And he said unto them, What manner of communications are these that ye have one to another, as ye walk, and are sad?
And the one of them, whose name was Cleopas, answering said unto him, Art thou only a stranger in Jerusalem, and hast not known the things which are come to pass there in these days?
And he said unto them, What things? And they said unto him, Concerning Jesus of Nazareth, which was a prophet mighty in deed and word before God and all the people:
And how the chief priests and our rulers delivered him to be condemned to death, and have crucified him.
But we trusted that it had been he which should have redeemed Israel: and beside all this, to day is the third day since these things were done.
Yea, and certain women also of our company made us astonished, which were early at the sepulchre;
And when they found not his body, they came, saying, that they had also seen a vision of angels, which said that he was alive.
And certain of them which were with us went to the sepulchre, and found it even so as the women had said: but him they saw not.
Shocked that He apparently does not know - grief, funeral procession doesn’t stop. Sentani.
Jesus doesn’t lie to them, but He doesn’t volunteer everything He knows either. Some of us could learn from that. It is possible for something to be in my head without it being in my mouth. They stop short of calling Him messiah or Lord, but still see Him as a prophet. They know He is special, but do not have any category for it. He was handed over and crucified. This dashed their hopes of seeing Him deliver Israel were because of His death, which was the way He would deliver Israel.
Sometimes people overplay this and act as if the Israelites did not expect any spiritual benefits from the Messiah, and only wanted political deliverance - not spiritual. This overstates it. The popular imagination could not see how you could have one without the other, because they assumed spiritual wholeness was always physically blessed. So they see Jesus was a prophet, but then He died.
Liar/Lunatic/Lord - CS Lewis
See/didn’t see, testimony of women would not be made up. “Hysterical women” pagans.
Then he said unto them, O fools, and slow of heart to believe all that the prophets have spoken:
Ought not Christ to have suffered these things, and to enter into his glory?
And beginning at Moses and all the prophets, he expounded unto them in all the scriptures the things concerning himself.
Suffering was inevitable and the path to glory. What do we expect? Jesus in the Scriptures
As many were astonied at thee;
His visage was so marred more than any man,
And his form more than the sons of men:
All we like sheep have gone astray;
We have turned every one to his own way;
And the Lord hath laid on him the iniquity of us all.
He was oppressed, and he was afflicted,
Yet he opened not his mouth:
He is brought as a lamb to the slaughter,
And as a sheep before her shearers is dumb,
So he openeth not his mouth.
He shall see of the travail of his soul, and shall be satisfied:
By his knowledge shall my righteous servant justify many;
For he shall bear their iniquities.
Therefore will I divide him a portion with the great,
And he shall divide the spoil with the strong;
Because he hath poured out his soul unto death:
And he was numbered with the transgressors;
And he bare the sin of many,
And made intercession for the transgressors.
And I will put enmity between thee and the woman, and between thy seed and her seed; it shall bruise thy head, and thou shalt bruise his heel.
My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?
Why art thou so far from helping me, and from the words of my roaring?
For dogs have compassed me:
The assembly of the wicked have inclosed me:
They pierced my hands and my feet.
I may tell all my bones:
They look and stare upon me.
They part my garments among them,
And cast lots upon my vesture.
Or the trajectory type
Come, and let us return unto the Lord:
For he hath torn, and he will heal us;
He hath smitten, and he will bind us up.
After two days will he revive us:
In the third day he will raise us up,
And we shall live in his sight.
His body shall not remain all night upon the tree, but thou shalt in any wise bury him that day; (for he that is hanged is accursed of God;) that thy land be not defiled, which the Lord thy God giveth thee for an inheritance.
And they drew nigh unto the village, whither they went: and he made as though he would have gone further.
But they constrained him, saying, Abide with us: for it is toward evening, and the day is far spent. And he went in to tarry with them.
And it came to pass, as he sat at meat with them, he took bread, and blessed it, and brake, and gave to them.
And their eyes were opened, and they knew him; and he vanished out of their sight.
They recognized Him in the Bible before they saw Him in their presence. We can see Him now, even though we do not see Him with our eyes.
He revealed Himself in intimacy and fellowship.
He could simply vanish! His new life could interact with this material world so much that He could break bread, but was so much above it that He could disappear.
And they said one to another, Did not our heart burn within us, while he talked with us by the way, and while he opened to us the scriptures?
And they rose up the same hour, and returned to Jerusalem, and found the eleven gathered together, and them that were with them,
Saying, The Lord is risen indeed, and hath appeared to Simon.
And they told what things were done in the way, and how he was known of them in breaking of bread.
And as they thus spake, Jesus himself stood in the midst of them, and saith unto them, Peace be unto you.
Other witnesses. Peter and apostles, testimony to death
But they were terrified and affrighted, and supposed that they had seen a spirit.
Jesus reappears in the middle of the room! They had to be wondering, is He a ghost?
And he said unto them, Why are ye troubled? and why do thoughts arise in your hearts?
Behold my hands and my feet, that it is I myself: handle me, and see; for a spirit hath not flesh and bones, as ye see me have.
And when he had thus spoken, he shewed them his hands and his feet.
A real body. His real body. Continuity, yet discontinuity.
This Jesus who now opened their eyes to reveal who He was had also opened the eyes of the blind. This Jesus who stood with them had been hung before them on a cross, and had the nailprints to prove it. Not a ghost, although He could vanish and reappear. But a real, physical body.
Our bodies in eternity will be like His. Real, physical, but somehow less bound by the material world.
But, Christians ought to understand being different and yet the same.
Acorn, oak tree
Salvation
We need hearts that burn - set aflame by the Word of God because we see Jesus there.