The victory of Christ's Sabbath

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He is risen           He is risen indeed

CHILDREN’S ADDRESS

Who likes Easter Eggs? Have you ever wondered why we have Easter Eggs?

The egg has a double meaning.

The first meaning is that it is new life. Inside the egg a baby chick is starting to grow. When it is ready it will break the egg from the inside and come out as a yellow little chick. That chick will grow up and lay an egg almost every day. If the chicken in this egg lived 4 years, it could have 1000 babies.

So when we look at an Easter egg, we remember that because of Jesus we have not only life in our bodies, but our spirits are alive too and even if we get old and our bodies die, we will live forever.

But the Easter Egg also reminds us that Jesus died for our naughtiness. Jesus died to take away the punishment. You know sometimes when you have been naughty you don’t want to talk to your mom or dad because you feel bad? Well Jesus died to take away the bad feeling too that we can be friends with Him. So when we look at an Easter Egg we remember that when Jesus had died, they took His body down off the cross and they put it in a tomb. A tomb is like a cave they make in the side of a hill to put bodies in. Then they use stones to close the door.

The Egg is like a tomb. It’s a hard shell that has the body of the chick lying inside it until it is born.

Should we break some eggs?

BREAK TWO EGGS INTO A BOWL.

Wouldn’t it be fun to break an egg holding it over someone’s head?

Break empty egg.

Wow, we broke open the tomb, and there was nothing inside!!!

After Jesus died, they put His body in a tomb. But when they came back to the tomb on the third day, they expected Jesus to be lying there, dead.

But the tomb was empty, His body was not there.

Can you imagine how surprised they were, and maybe even scared that robbers had come and taken his body.

Actually there were guards watching no-one took Jesus’ body.

Like these eggs, the tomb was empty, because Jesus had risen from the dead. He wasn’t dead any more, He is alive. And because He is alive, if we live our lives with Jesus as our friend, even if our bodies die we will live forever.

HAND OUT EASTER EGGS


ADULTS ADDRESS

Matthew’s resurrection narrative is filled with surprises.

The Sanhedrin were the religious leaders. And even though the Sanhedrin should have been preparing for the Sabbath, they had been hard at work plotting the death of Jesus.

By contrast two women, who must have so dearly wanted to be by Jesus, observed the Sabbath with baited breath, waiting for the moment they could go to His tomb.

Matthew says “after the Sabbath”. The Sabbath was from Friday sunset to Saturday sunset. For those 24 hours the Jews would rest.

The Sanhedrin had come to see the Sabbath as a religious duty, a chore that had to be done.

But the Sabbath was an act of faith in God.

Sometimes we think we need every possible moment to made things and do stuff. But to observe a Sabbath rest is to put everything into God’s hands and trust that God will carry us through the rest. The Sabbath is an acknowledgement that He is in control.

I find it fascination that after Jesus was crucified, His body rested on the Sabbath in the grave.

In John’s Gospel, Jesus had said to Pilate, “My Kingdom is not of this world, so my followers don’t need to go to war”.

Now we see Jesus conquering sin and death, by being at rest. He conquered the devil and all his cronies while His body was lifeless.

Maybe we never gain the victory over the skeletons that live in our closets, because we are forever busy. Maybe we never find true peace because we are always running away from something or running after something.

Have you ever been desperate to keep busy, so you don’t have time to think?

All too often we think it is by hyperactivity that we become successful, but again Jesus shows that in rest, God is glorified.

Jesus lay dead on the Sabbath, and the Spirit of God raised Him up and gave Him victory.

Even though the Sabbath ended at sunset on the Saturday, the two Mary’s needed to wait till dawn for it to be safe to go to the tomb.

·        The second surprise is that I would have expected Peter, James and John to be there, but they had run away in fear. These burly fishermen had given up hope. The Passover was over and they were leaving Jerusalem to go back to their homes in Galilee. They were probably thinking, “It was amazing believing in Jesus while it lasted. But now it’s over, we have to get back to reality.

Those who promised to stay by Jesus through everything betrayed and denied and deserted Him, but two women went to sit at the tomb at sunrise on that Sunday morning.

They were not family of Jesus, they were just two women whose lives were changed as He went from village to village.

Matthew says they went out at dawn to look at the tomb. He says nothing about opening the tomb to anoint Jesus’ body, because to Matthew’s mind Jesus had been anointed for death at Bethany. So they just went to look at the tomb.

They didn’t go to do some work, they probably just wanted to sit and be close to Jesus. They wanted to sit and remember all Jesus had said and done. Mary Magdalene had had 7 demons cast out of her, so she probably just wanted to sit and remember how Jesus had absolutely changed the course of her life from out of control destruction, to life in abundance.

Maybe they were remembering Jesus’ words that He would come back to life, and maybe they sat their praying, “Let it be”.

Then suddenly an earthquake shook the garden. This must have been a bad weekend for earthquakes, because when Jesus had died on Friday there had been an earthquake and tombs had broken open and Matthew says many holy people who had died were raised to life and walked around Jerusalem.

Now on Sunday morning at dawn, the earth shook again and an angel rolled Jesus’ tomb open. In Matthew 24 Jesus had described earthquakes as the beginning of birth pains. Romans 8 speaks of the whole of creation groaning in anticipation of childbirth.

As Jesus passed from life to death, and again from death to life, the whole of creation trembled and shook as a kingdom was born.

·        When the angel arrived the guards were so afraid they fainted asif dead. Funny how when we are out of relationship with God, we always think He wants to punish us. Strange how the angel never told them not to be afraid.

By contrast the women stood and listened to the angel say, “I know you are looking for Jesus. Don’t be afraid”.

Are you looking for Jesus or hiding from God?

When Jesus returns, or when we go meet Him, what will your response be?

When we are looking for Him, we need not fear Him.

The angel told the Mary’s to go and share the good news that Jesus has risen.

The first instruction to Christians came through two women, who told the 11 Apostles to go to Galilee. As they were on their way, I’m sure Mary and Mary couldn’t wait to see the risen Jesus. Maybe Jesus couldn’t wait to see them either, because while they were on their way He appeared to them.

They didn’t doubt like Thomas, they weren’t unsure like the two on the road to Emmaus. Immediately the two Mary’s fell at Jesus feet and worshipped Him.

·        The next thing that should surprise us is the response of the religious leaders when contrasted with the two Mary’s. I would think that when the Pharisees heard that Jesus had risen, they would fall on their faces and repent.

But instead they paid the guards to lie about Jesus.

Were they so out of touch with God, that even when they heard Jesus had been raised by the Spirit of God, they could not recognise God’s handiwork?

Did they trust their religious power so much that they would deny God to His face if He interfered with their plans?

We see the whole of Matthew’s Gospel come together on a hill in Galilee, away from the religious hustle and bustle of Jerusalem, the city of God that had become a running religious sewer.

The Sanhedrin thought they had all the religious authority as the representatives of God.

We usually read the Great Commission and think that before Jesus, all the authority had been in the hands of the devil.

But in Matthew, the devil can be denied and rebuked. The real threat is the religious leaders whom the devil has seduced and blinded, who know nothing of the nature of God, yet they wield immeasurable amounts of power and influence.

In the Great Commission, Jesus said “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me.”

He took back the power from the religious monsters, who abused those they were meant to serve, and having ALL authority in the hands of our good messiah, He told his Apostles to go into ALL the Earth, to All Nations, to baptise them in the Name of the complete Trinity, All three, Father Son and Holy Spirit. Jesus said they were to make disciples. Disciples are students of a rabbi. Jesus alone is our rabbi, so we are to teach people to be taught by Jesus. We are to teach people to be dependent on Him, and not on us. We are to teach people to fix their eyes on Jesus, not on us.

Then we are to teach these disciples everything Jesus commanded. We shouldn’t teach the parts of Scripture we like, and avoid the rest. We need to teach it all.

And then Jesus who was dead and is alive makes a promise. He said, “I will be with you ALL ways. Every day, every minute, every situation, He is there with you. Don’t be afraid.”

You will never be an empty EGG, because the living God has taken up residence in the centre of your being.

So may you trust in God enough to take a Sabbath.

May you have enough faith in God to keep things running.

May you trust the love of God enough to stop running and fighting, just rest in Him.

Come up for Communion, and place a flower in the cross to remember what Jesus has done in your life.

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