Resurrection 2020

Now this is strange. But, we are seeking to be faithful to our great God in very strange times. With a little extra time on our hands, like many of you, I’ve been able to watch some things that I ususally don’t have time to watch. Many of you may have picked up a new series on Netflix.

I must admit, I’m more of a nerd than most of you. This past week I watched a round table on YouTube of 5 Theoretical Physicists and a Philosopher debating whether our universe and everything in it (me and you) are actually not real, but a computer simulation programmed by an advanced race of beings.

As I listened to this 2 hour discussion from these highly credentialed scientists, I couldn’t help but think, “Wow! They really need a theologian on this panel!”

Because they were asking worldview questions that science in and of itself is not equipped to answer, like “Who are we? And, where did we come from?”

I thought it was really interesting to see how really smart scientist try to answer these questions when they refuse to consider that an Almighty, All-Knowing, Divine, Creator God is displaying his glory through his creative power.

When I heard their answers, I thought to myself, “I’m am never going to let an atheistic scientist get away with trying to belittle my faith. Because the best the brightest minds of our day can come up with is that since they see math everywhere they look in the universe and we use math to program computers. So one of the most plausible answers is that some advanced being 13 year old created us with his dads super computer for a science project.”

That’s the kind of nonsense you get out of these big questions when you ignore the the reality of the God that has been revealing himself from the beginning in creation and in his word.

One of the scientists actually made the statement, “We don’t get meaning from life, we give our own meaning to it.” I thought, “If we are a computer program, we don’t give meaning to anything.” I thought back to my video gaming days. Pacman didn’t give himself meaning. He just ate ghosts because that is what he was programmed to do. The meaning was to entertain kids back in the early 80’s!

Now, why am I bringing all of this up on Resurrection Sunday? It’s because we find the greatest understanding of Who we are, Why we are here, and Where we come from when we look at the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus Christ.

A righteous divine God created us to display his glory. Our disobedience required the righteous justice of a holy God that demands death. But God loved us so much that he sent his son to fulfill the righteous requirements of God for us. Then he bore our sin and the wrath of God on our sin and our eternal death. Then, on the third day, he rose again overcoming death and giving life to all those who turn from their sin and place faith in him.

So, if when you look at creation, and see a computer simulation and not a righteous God, you will miss the fact that at the cross we see, if God the Father did not spare his own Son from his wrath when he bore the sin of others, he certainly will not spare you from judgment, when you stand before him with your own sin.

Second, if when you look at creation, you see a computer simulation, you will miss the fact that at the cross we see, God the Father, loves his creation so much that he sent his Son, so that whoever believes on him, will not perish but have eternal life.

*Spurgeon had this great illustration, of seeing the love of God at the cross, in his devotional Morning and Evening this week. We have so many common mercies in which we hear the love of God. “Just as a sea-shell, when we put it to our ears, whispers of the deep sea whence it came; but if we desire to hear the ocean itself, we must look at every-day blessings, but at the transactions of the crucifixion.”

In other words, If you want to see the ocean, a sea-shell won’t do. And, if you want to see the real love of God, you can’t just look into creation, but to Christ on the cross dying for sinners. And look to his power to make sinners into saints and rebells into children of God forever.

What does the resurrection prove?

I. The Resurrection Grounds our Hope in God’s Promises Acts 2:23-24

As Peter preaches at Pentecost after the resurrection, Peter says,

Acts 2:23–24 ESV

23 this Jesus, delivered up according to the definite plan and foreknowledge of God, you crucified and killed by the hands of lawless men. 24 God raised him up, loosing the pangs of death, because it was not possible for him to be held by it.

Then, v. 25 says, “For David says concerning him,”

Peter then ties the resurrection to Psalm 16:8-11.

David is writing, but he’s actually speaking for the coming Messiah. What I want you to see is how the Father kept his promises to the Messiah via the resurrection.

Acts 2:25–28 ESV

25 For David says concerning him, “ ‘I saw the Lord always before me, for he is at my right hand that I may not be shaken; 26 therefore my heart was glad, and my tongue rejoiced; my flesh also will dwell in hope. 27 For you will not abandon my soul to Hades, or let your Holy One see corruption. 28 You have made known to me the paths of life; you will make me full of gladness with your presence.’

v. 25- The Messiah is confident that his future is secure in the Father. The Father would not leave his son. And, he certainly did not leave his son’s future unsecure.

v.26.- The Messiah finds joy even as he will face death because he has hope beyond death because of the promise and love of the Father.

v.27- What does the Messiah know of the Father? He can face death and conquer death because the Father will not abandon him to Hades, the place of the dead.

v.28-God gave Jesus the path to life when he brought him out of the grave resurrected in the bodily form. But, I want you also to see this. God not only gave Jesus the path to life. God made Jesus the path to life.

John 14:6 ESV

6 Jesus said to him, “I am the way, and the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me.

How important is the resurrection? It made Jesus our path to the Father.

And, by the way, this is exactly how Peter interprets Psalm 16.

Acts 2:30–32 ESV

30 Being therefore a prophet, and knowing that God had sworn with an oath to him that he would set one of his descendants on his throne, 31 he foresaw and spoke about the resurrection of the Christ, that he was not abandoned to Hades, nor did his flesh see corruption. 32 This Jesus God raised up, and of that we all are witnesses.

The Father kept his promises to Christ on the Cross and in the Tomb. And, the Father will Keep his promises to us through Crucifixion and resurrection of Christ.

II. The Resurrection Validates our Hope in Christ’s Identity.

The only way Christ’s death and resurrection has any power for us is that Jesus has to be fully God and fully man. He has to be fully man to die for men. And, he has to be fully God to bear the righteousness of God needed for heaven and to represent all of humanity.

Starting at the beginning of the NT and going forward we see an ascending arc of declaration that Jesus is God’s son ending in a crescendo of glory in the proof of his deity in the resurrection. Remember when the Angel Gabriel came to Mary to inform her of how God would use her.

Luke 1:31–32 ESV

31 And behold, you will conceive in your womb and bear a son, and you shall call his name Jesus. 32 He will be great and will be called the Son of the Most High. And the Lord God will give to him the throne of his father David,

Luke 1:35 ESV

35 And the angel answered her, “The Holy Spirit will come upon you, and the power of the Most High will overshadow you; therefore the child to be born will be called holy—the Son of God.

We see the declaration made by the Father at Jesus baptism:

Matthew 3:16–17 ESV

16 And when Jesus was baptized, immediately he went up from the water, and behold, the heavens were opened to him, and he saw the Spirit of God descending like a dove and coming to rest on him; 17 and behold, a voice from heaven said, “This is my beloved Son, with whom I am well pleased.”

Even demons understood who he was. In Mark 5, Jesus came to a place called the Gerasenes. There he met a man that was filled with a Legion of Demons. Here’s how those demons responded to Jesus.

Mark 5:6–7 ESV

6 And when he saw Jesus from afar, he ran and fell down before him. 7 And crying out with a loud voice, he said, “What have you to do with me, Jesus, Son of the Most High God? I adjure you by God, do not torment me.”

John writes in his gospel his summation of the person of Christ,

John 1:31 ESV

31 I myself did not know him, but for this purpose I came baptizing with water, that he might be revealed to Israel.”

Even the Roman Centurion that was a the cross saw Jesus die and said,

Matthew 27:54 ESV

54 When the centurion and those who were with him, keeping watch over Jesus, saw the earthquake and what took place, they were filled with awe and said, “Truly this was the Son of God!”

We can see the declarations of Christ’s sonship building. But in Romans 1, Paul shows us the conclusive proof that he is exactly who the NT declares him to be.

Romans 1:1–4 ESV

1 Paul, a servant of Christ Jesus, called to be an apostle, set apart for the gospel of God, 2 which he promised beforehand through his prophets in the holy Scriptures, 3 concerning his Son, who was descended from David according to the flesh 4 and was declared to be the Son of God in power according to the Spirit of holiness by his resurrection from the dead, Jesus Christ our Lord,

The final and loudest declaration of his sonship and deity was via God’s love and power to raise Christ from the dead!

The Son of God came and accomplished everything needed to save us from sin and give us eternal life, death conquering life. The Father kept his promises to the son. And we can trust Jesus as our way to to life, for Jesus is the beloved of God. And in Christ, so our we.

So about that simulation thing. The resurrection proves this is no simulation. The creator doesn’t die for Pacman. But, he did for you. And he lives so that you may live, really live forever. Will you trust him?