He is Risen
Notes
Transcript
What do I want them to know? He is Risen, death has been defeated
Why? It brings hope
What do I want them to do? Believe and trust in the death and resurrection of Jesus
Why? it brings hope
ME/WE
Have you ever had a dream or hope get crushed or perceived to be crushed?
Something you put all your effort time and pray into and yet it did not happen.
Maybe for you it was a job, you had this dream job, the perfect job and you worked really hard to get it, established the perfect resume, but they hired someone else, you were passed by
Maybe it was a relationship, you really hoped that your marriage would not end in divorce but here you are, you never thought, dreamed or imagined something like this could happen to you. ..others of you on the other side of things you are looking to start a relationship.
Others of us our dream is to have the Browns win the Super Bowl.
And for many us it is not only that our dream was crushed or perceived to be crushed....the failure of the dream or hope coming to pass has turned into our greatest nightmare
Not only did you not get the job is that we are working a job we hate that pays half of what the job we wanted was paying.
Not only did are you single you have been single for years with no apparent hope of a even a date.
Not only do the Browns never win the Super Bowl they have another is have another 0-16 Browns season.
TENSION
This dream/hope, crushed dream, turned into a nightmare dynamic is a reality that we see those follow Jesus face 2000 years ago on before the first Easter, to the point that if Easter did not happen, they probably would have called it the DARKEST DAY, ONE OF THE GREATEST NIGHTMARES in all of human history.
GOD
Why? What was going in Israel 2000 years ago a couple days before the first days of Easter?
What was happening 2000 years ago before Easter was when the Jewish people were celebrating Passover a 7 day feast where the whole nation (think what happened when Cavs won the Championship, crowded) would travel to Israel to celebrate God Passing over their house, not bringing death to their house but deliverance, in Egypt and delivering from the slavary and oppression of Israel.
It is during this time that we READ and HEARD PREACHED LAST last week that Jesus marches into Jerusalem declaring “He is King” “Jesus is King”
And they were shouting and praising Jesus saying
So they took branches of palm trees and went out to meet him, crying out, “Hosanna! Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord, even the King of Israel!”
But we had hoped that he was the one to redeem Israel. Yes, and besides all this, it is now the third day since these things happened.
What KIND OF SALVATION, REDEMPTION, KINGDOM WERE they thinking and what we would have been thinking??WHAT KIND OF KINGDOM WERE THEY HOPING FOR? WHAT WERE THEY ENVISIONING?
JESUS WOULD BE A KING LIKE OTHER KINGS, A KING LIKE DAVID, HE WOULD COME AND OVERTHROW THE ROMAN GOVERNMENT AND SET UP A HUGE KINGDOM DYNASTY....they political powers would be overthrown and they would be in POWER.
BUT what happens?
A couple days later on Thursday night one of Jesus’ own disciples betrays Jesus, a man named Judas and sells him out for 30 pieces of silver (4 months wages) officers of the chief priests and Pharisees…I will show you were Jesus is, He is in the Garden of Gethsemane. I will take you to Him.
He takes them there and they arrest Jesus
SHOW PHOTO of Jerusalem,
Then right from they send Jesus right to trial. Where he faces 6 trials in a matter of 7 hours. 3 religious trials (happen in the wee hours of the morning), 3 secular trials (that happen in the early morning).
Annas (2am) the former high priest and hears the case and declares Jesus guilty and send him to the current high priest.
Caiaphas (the current high priest)....people bring all these false charges against him and Jesus said nothing until Caiaphas says, “are you the Christ the Son of the Blessed, of God? JESUS “I AM”…AT THIS POINT THE HIGH PRIEST TARES HIS CLOSES AND DECLARES JESUS GUILTY, charged Jesus with blasphemy
Sanhedrin (the Jewish ruling authorities) and again they ask Jesus if He thinks He is son of God....Jesus says “You say that I am” guilty of blasphemy
Here’s the crux of the matter for the matter for religious authority, they had no legal authority to do anything legally, they could do things religiously.
They wanted Jesus eradicated…they knew Jesus would still be a threat to them if He was still around…he needed to be dealt with and gone so they send them to the secular authorities in the early morning.
4. Pilate the governor of Judaea and he hears Jesus case and finds no legal guilt, but it is just a religious squabble and he hears Jesus is from Galilee and that is Herod’s jurisdiction and Herod residence is in Jerusalem just a short walk from where they were with Pilate
Show Herod’s place
5. Herod…Herod was excited to meet Jesus because he thought Jesus would do a sign for Him....finally Jesus is here…BUT Herod found no guilt and send him back to Pilate.
6. Pilate again hear’s Jesus testimony where the only response He gives is that He is King of the Jews…which for Pilate is not a charge worthy of anything that he could do BUT HE WANTED to appease the crowd under political pressure. SO he flogged and beat Jesus and Jesus will stop and the people will be appeased
This was gruesome.
They would tie the person up either put hands over their head or tie them around a rock and beat them with these whips that would have bone and metal that would latch unto your skin and rip it off some historians have it recorded that during some of these floggings you could see people’s organs.
SHOW PICTURE
BUT THE BEATING WAS NOT ENOUGH
The people said this is not enough....We are invoking the custom where a prison was released ever year during Passover....
Let’s read
(Pilate gets the worst of the worst)
Now at the feast the governor was accustomed to release for the crowd any one prisoner whom they wanted.
And they had then a notorious prisoner called Barabbas.
So when they had gathered, Pilate said to them, “Whom do you want me to release for you: Barabbas, or Jesus who is called Christ?”
For he knew that it was out of envy that they had delivered him up.
Besides, while he was sitting on the judgment seat, his wife sent word to him, “Have nothing to do with that righteous man, for I have suffered much because of him today in a dream.”
Now the chief priests and the elders persuaded the crowd to ask for Barabbas and destroy Jesus.
The governor again said to them, “Which of the two do you want me to release for you?” And they said, “Barabbas.”
Pilate said to them, “Then what shall I do with Jesus who is called Christ?” They all said, “Let him be crucified!”
And he said, “Why? What evil has he done?” But they shouted all the more, “Let him be crucified!”
(Notorious man)
(His wife and his own conscience said don’t do it)
CRUCIFY THIS INNOCENT MAN??
This innocent man
Crucification is for murders and insurrectionists…crucification was for the worst of the worst…and it also sent a message this will happen to you too if you do the same thing....
To send this message even louder they, even greater they had people crucified on the highest hill, Golgotha “the place of the skull” a hill that is 777 meters above sea level.....
THIS IS TOOK PLACE ON GOOD FRIDAY
SHOW PICTURE
Do you know what fear this invoked in Jesus’ disciples and followers?
The ones who followed Him, the ones who were professing Jesus is the one
Their greatest HOPE of Jesus being the deliver has turned into their greatest nightmare...
They are seeing those who followed Jesus could also be crucified too.
We see Peter one of Jesus’ closest disciples filled with fear when people start to ask “Aren’t you one of Jesus’ disciples too???”
What Peter is probably thinking is crucification, crucification, crucification.
Peter says “I don’t know the man!” 3 times
BUT
There was a little bit of HOPE from those who follow Jesus, they have seen Jesus do miracles, amazing things....surely Jesus could do it again, surely He would do it.
PLUS On top of it this mountain called Golgotha that had seen a miracle happen 2000 years ago
In Gen 22…this time the it was not call Golgotha, it was called Mt Moriah.
What happens on Mt. Moriah?
God tells Abraham to take his one and only son that he loves and he is to go sacrifice Isaac on Mt. Moriah and Abraham is going through with it but at the last minute God provides a Ram that was caught in the thickets by his horn.
We have seen God deliver a Ram
BUT THERE IS NOT ANIMAL RAM or ANIMAL SACRIFICE THAT COMES OUT.
Jesus is hung at the cross at 9am and is dead by 12PM
ALL HOPE is GONE...
Not only is all hope Gone
Their greatest nightmare was happening…they are thinking crucification, crucification
HOW WOULD YOU HAVE FELT IF YOU WERE ONE OF JESUS’ DISCIPLES????
FEAR
I am leaving here
BUT WHAT THEY DIDN’T RELIZE AT THE TIME IS JESUS IS ENDING THEIR and OUR GREATEST NIGHTMARE..
What is our greatest nightmare?
God will not love us or accept us
God our creator will reject us and send us to hell, eternal damnation and seperation from God where there is weeping and gnashing of teeth.
Nobody wants to live with this nightmare nobody is ok with this nightmare....we want to resolve this nightmare
How have we tried to overcome this nightmare?
Good works…we think if I am good enough that will solve this nightmare, BUT HERE’S THE PROBLEM there is nothing we can do to rectify our situation.
For the wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.
Nothing you can do to make yourself alive
for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God,
All of us fall short of God’s standards.
All of us fall short of what God wants for us.
There is not a thing we can do to get out of this NIGHTMARE....
BUT THERE IS GOOD NEWS
THE Good News is …Jesus ends our NIGHTMARE
but God shows his love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us.
The next day he saw Jesus coming toward him, and said, “Behold, the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world!
On Goligath, on Mt. Moriah, God does provide a sacrifice…It is not the sacrifice of an animal but of Jesus.
For our sake he made him to be sin who knew no sin, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.
We see God communicating this right after Jesus dies on the cross.
What happens right after Jesus dies on the cross?
12-3PM utter darkness
and the veil of the temple was torn
Tears the veil SHOW PICTURE OF VEIL
The veil was the door 60’ x 30 an hand deep, torn from top to bottom. 300 priest took to hand it. that was the entrance to the Holy of Holies (were God resided) that only the high priest could enter once a year, but Jesus tears the veil as a symbolic action that signifies He is the great high priest and sacrificial lamb that makes payment for our sin that all who believe in Jesus can enter to meet with God.
Jesus said to him, “I am the way, and the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me.
And behold, the curtain of the temple was torn in two, from top to bottom. And the earth shook, and the rocks were split.
Hallelujah
JESUS ends part 1 of our greatest nightmare.
WE can are reconciled to God through Jesus
WE HAVE BEEN FORGIVEN
BUT IT DOES NOT END THERE....Jesus doesn’t just end one part of our nightmare.....that’s Friday but Sunday is coming.....what happens on Sunday? he ends the other part…eternal death and damnation.
What happens 3 days later after Jesus’ crucification?
Is this where they have a proper burial for Jesus?
That get everything set up right this time to honor Jesus?
NO
3 days later Jesus defeats death
Let’s read
But on the first day of the week, at early dawn, they went to the tomb, taking the spices they had prepared.
And they found the stone rolled away from the tomb,
but when they went in they did not find the body of the Lord Jesus.
While they were perplexed about this, behold, two men stood by them in dazzling apparel.
And as they were frightened and bowed their faces to the ground, the men said to them, “Why do you seek the living among the dead?
He is not here, but has risen. Remember how he told you, while he was still in Galilee,
that the Son of Man must be delivered into the hands of sinful men and be crucified and on the third day rise.”
And they remembered his words,
(they is woman from Galilee)
(huge 1-2 ton stone that was guarded by Roman soldiers)
The angels were saying this was all apart of the plan....He was going the cross on Good Friday to defeat SIN and on Sunday morning His raised to life to defeat DEATH.
The grave could not Hold Jesus
DEATH COULD NOT HOLD JESUS DOWN!!!!
When the perishable puts on the imperishable, and the mortal puts on immortality, then shall come to pass the saying that is written: “Death is swallowed up in victory.”
“O death, where is your victory? O death, where is your sting?”
The sting of death is sin, and the power of sin is the law.
But thanks be to God, who gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ.
Because He is defeated DEATH He has also given you resurrected life. ....You now have a new life, a resurrected life.
Death has no sting in your life, has not control over your life.
We are in the land of the dying onto the land of the living
And you were dead in the trespasses and sins
in which you once walked, following the course of this world, following the prince of the power of the air, the spirit that is now at work in the sons of disobedience—
among whom we all once lived in the passions of our flesh, carrying out the desires of the body and the mind, and were by nature children of wrath, like the rest of mankind.
But God, being rich in mercy, because of the great love with which he loved us,
even when we were dead in our trespasses, made us alive together with Christ—by grace you have been saved—
and raised us up with him and seated us with him in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus,
God has made you alive....
Do you believe that? God has made you alive....
Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation. The old has passed away; behold, the new has come.
THIS IS THE STORY OF EASTER
The story of Easter is God takes away our worst nightmare of
Rejection from God
and Eternal damnation and turns them into our greatest dream
RECONCILATION TO GOD
NEW RESURRECTED ETERNAL LIFE
Jesus takes our worst nightmare and turns into our BEST DREAM, a DREAM GREATER THAN WE CAN IMAGINE.
The only way the DREAM becomes a reality for you now after you hear the news is to
Accept
Believe
Confess
because, if you confess with your mouth that Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved.
For with the heart one believes and is justified, and with the mouth one confesses and is saved.
IT’S A FREE GIFT
The other encouragement I want to give to you in this room or online is
If Jesus can take care our greatest nightmares will He not take care our all other nightmares???
And we know that for those who love God all things work together for good, for those who are called according to his purpose.