The Appearances of Jesus -
1/26/03
OBC
The Appearances of Jesus
Where would we be without the resurrection of Jesus. Christianity and the resurrection of Jesus rise or fall together. You can’t say, “I am a Christian but I don’t believe in the resurrection. They are too tightly woven together.
Scot and Kim Bateman, Ken and Carol Hite lost loved ones this week. Our hearts are with you. The resurrection of Jesus Christ is the foundation of our hope. Where would we be without the resurrection?
As we begin John 20, Jesus has risen from the dead. He has conquered death. He has done what He said He would do. We are going to see in these paragraphs of the Bible, two individuals and one group of people who, between the three are represented all of us in our response to the resurrection.
After the resurrection Jesus never appeared to unbelievers. He never appeared to the scribes and Pharisees and said, “Hah, I told you. Here I am.” He appeared only to His own.
Why?
It was never Jesus’ plan to take the route of miracles as the only way to communicate who He was. He would not get on a circuit of celebrity appearances to try and drum up faith in His claims. In fact, He had said about the Jewish leaders who didn’t believe Moses and the prophets, “neither will they be persuaded, though one rose from the dead.” (Lk. 16:31)
His plan had always been that believers would be His witnesses. He appeared to them, energized them with the Spirit of God and sent them out to proclaim the gospel of resurrection.
I. TO MARY MAGDALENE: TO SHOW HIMSELF FAITHFUL (v.1-19)
A. Her Background:
a. Jesus appeared to a woman first who had been saved out of a life of horrible sin. Christ had cast seven demons out of her. She was a long way from home; Magdala. She had been forgiven much, she loved much.
b. Why Mary? She was not an apostle; she has no place of great significance in the ongoing ministry of the church or among the apostles. But He appears to her for the express purpose of showing His personal, loving faithfulness to just one disciple no matter how insignificant that one disciple may assume he or she is. This is a powerful picture here I don’t want us to miss.
v The Character of God
This is the kind of God we have; this is the kind of Christ we have, not One Who cannot be touched with the feeling of our infirmities, but One Who was in all points tempted like we are, and Who gets down and feels what we feel, One Who loves us on a personal, individual basis. That’s the thrilling thing about knowing Jesus Christ. Christianity is not a religious “system,” it is a loving relationship with a personal God.
B. Her Personal State of Mind (v.1-11)
- Her love was strong. She’d been forgiven much. Her faith, weak.
a. Peter and John had left the sepulcher. Mary stayed, weeping. She couldn’t figure out where His body was. She wanted Jesus there even if He was dead; He is still her Lord.
b. Jesus wouldn’t leave her in this sorrow. (Jn. 16:20 – “Truly, truly, I say unto you, that you will weep and lament, but the world will rejoice; you will be sorrowful, but your sorrow will be turned to joy.” )
C. The Significance of the two Angels at the Tomb. (v.12)
- The Old Testament Mercy Seat (where God met man)
a. “she…sees two angels in white sitting, the one at the head, and the other at the feet, where the body of Jesus had lain.” (v.12) She didn’t recognize that they were angels. (Mk. 16:5 indicates they’re in the form of young men. See also Lk 24:4.)
v The New Testament Mercy Seat: Christ’s Empty Tomb
At the empty tomb of Christ, one angel was at the head and the other at the feet, and Jesus had been in the middle. That suggests an amazing picture: Where did God meet man throughout the Old Testament? He met man between two angels on the Mercy seat on top of the Ark of the Covenant where the blood was sprinkled. (Ex. 25:17-22) Since Jesus Christ left the tomb, where does God meet men? He meets them between two angels; but the Mercy seat is no longer the Ark of the Covenant, it’s the resurrected Christ’s tomb. God meets men on the basis of the resurrected living Christ. There’s a picture of anew Mercy seat; and nobody needs to sprinkle blood there anymore because Jesus Christ has once and for all accomplished the sacrifice that took care of sin.
D. Her Lord and Her God (v. 14-18)
1. Why She didn’t recognize Him at first: (v. 14)
a. There was something different about Jesus that made it impossible for her to recognize Him apart from His disclosure of Who He was. Mark 16:12 tells us He had a glorified body. It was supernatural, yet He could eat fish and honeycomb. He could even pass through a wall.
b. It was only when Jesus Christ revealed Himself by divine revelation to their minds and hearts that they knew Who He was. That’s a truism if ever there is: No one can ever know God apart from divine revelation.
c. Paul says in I Cor. 12 that a man only knows Christ by the Spirit of Christ. Since the Holy Spirit had not yet come to dwell within them, that’s one of the reasons they couldn’t recognize Christ apart from His revelation directly to them.
2. Jesus said one Word to Her, “Mary.”
a. Her name is all He had to say. (The Aramaic form is “Miriam.”) She called Him “Rabboni” or “Master.” (v. 16)
b. That’s also an Aramaic word used infrequently of men, most frequently to speak of God. Mary says Jesus is God.
c. She knew His voice. (See Jn 10:3,27) The other Gospels say she fell to His feet clutching His legs in love.
3. He told her not to “cling to” Him physically.
a. He is saying, “Miriam, it’s not going to be like it was. The former mode of fellowship with Me here in a physical body is going to change. When I go to the Father, I’ll send the Spirit, and at that point I’ll be, not just with you, but in you.” Likewise, we don’t have a fleshly relationship with Christ; we have a spiritual one.
4. The significance of “brethren” (v. 17)
- He says, “I want you to go tell My brethren this: that I have to go to My Father and your Father, and My God and your God. This is only temporary until I finish what I have to do. (Commission His disciples.) Then I’ll ascend”
v “My Brethren”
That’s a whole new thing. Disciples have been called “servants,” “friends,” but never “brothers” until now. Here is something thrilling, something new. We can be brothers with Jesus Christ because we are, by virtue of His death and resurrection and our faith in Him, “in Christ.” Christ is the Son of God by perfect righteousness. When you and I receive Christ, His righteousness is imputed to us. Thus in the eyes of God we become perfectly righteous positionally. (Romans 8:29) We can’t get into God’s Presence on our own righteousness, but on Christ’s righteousness. There is a new relationship, “brothers”.
II. TO THE DISCIPLES: TO SEND THE FAITHFUL (V. 19-23)
A. He told them what to do. (their commission)
1. What Christ’s resurrected body was like:
a. “The doors were shut.” The Greek word is locked and barred. (v. 19) They were in there shivering in terror, expecting that any minute the temple police would knock on the door and get them. But then “came Jesus…”
b. How did He get there? Some people say that He climbed through a window. But that’s not too easy in the Upper Room. He walked through the wall. (If He could ascend out of His grave clothes, what’s a wall?)
c. That will tell you something about your glorified body because you’re going to have a body like His glorious body. So whatever He can do, you’ll be able to do.
2. What their reaction was:
a. Now they are panicked when He arrived. They said, “It’s a phantom! It’s a ghost!” (Luke 24) This doesn’t sound like a lot of disciples who are manufacturing a resurrection!
b. But to show them that He was no phantom, “He showed unto them His hands and His side. Then were the disciples glad, when they saw the Lord.”
3. He said, “Peace be unto you”
a. In verse 19 He granted them positional peace in a relationship with God. (See John 14:27) The rebellion is over; they’re at peace with God through His body.
b. He gives them peace in their own hearts in verse 21.
QUESTION: Does Christ have the wounds still even in His glorified body?
ANSWER: I believe so. Notice even in Rev. 5:6 the Bible says we see the Lamb (Christ) Who came to open the seals, and it was “a Lamb as though it had been slain.” I believe Jesus will have those marks throughout all eternity.
5. He commissions them. (v.21)
a. He is going to commission His disciples to carry the gospel.
b. Note: there were more than just the apostles here; there were perhaps even the women here and some other disciples.
B. He will give them the power to do what He commissions them to do. (v. 22)
1. The Resource will be the Holy Spirit.
a. Theologians have tried to figure verse 22 out. Did they receive the Holy Spirit here or not? Likely not.
b. The Greek is “He blew a puff of air.” (The “on them” is not in the text.) “…and saith unto them, receive ye the Holy Ghost (Spirit);” But the text does not say they did at that moment.
2. The Holy Spirit came on Pentecost. (Acts 2)
a. Then what’s this here in verse 22? I believe this is a pledge on Christ’s part that He’ll send the Spirit.
b. Verse 26 says that eight days later the disciples are still locked in that room; if they had received the Holy Spirit in verse 22, they wouldn’t have been locked in that room for eight days, because Jesus Himself said, “You shall receive power after the Spirit of God has come upon you. You shall be My witnesses.” Fear, not power, kept them huddled up in a room with the door locked eight days later.
c. Also John 21:4, 12 indicates that they didn’t recognize Him. But if they had received the Spirit, the Spirit would have shown them Christ because that’s the Spirit’s job!
d. So the Spirit has not yet come, for He said, “When I go to the Father, I will send the Spirit unto you.” He gives them that pledge right here.
C. He tells them what has been done. (v. 23)
1. Christ is speaking to the whole church in verse 23.
a. Is he saying then that we all have an arbitrary right to forgive sin? No. Mark 2:7 says, “who can forgive sins but God only?”
b. He isn’t just talking to the Apostles here; there were many disciples (including women) in the Upper Room. So this was a general thing for the whole church. However, that doesn’t mean that Christ is giving the whole church the right to grant absolution.
c. Yet it is obviously saying that we have the right to say to any man who, conscious of his sins, repents toward God and believes in the Lord Jesus Christ, you can say to that man, “Friend, your sins are forgiven by the promise of God.” To any man who willfully rejects and will not believe and refuses Christ, you can say, “Your sins are not forgiven. You must repent or you will die in your sins”
d. Praise God that Jesus not only told us what to do, and gave us the power to do it, He told us what has been done: forgiveness of sins through Christ.
III. TO THOMAS: TO SECURE THE FAITHLESS (v. 24-31)
- The Lord meets Thomas at the point of his faithlessness. (11 Tim. 2:13)
1. Doubting Thomas:
a. He was a skeptical guy. He wasn’t in the Upper Room in verse 24. (That’s what happens when you don’t go to church!)
b. He wouldn’t believe until He touched Christ’s wounds. (v. 25)
2. Thomas was an honest doubter. Christ secured his faith.
a. 8 days later Jesus appears and shows His wounds. (v. 27)
b. Thomas’ confession: “My Lord and My God.”
(That’s the greatest confession a man will ever make.)
c. Jesus says, “Blessed are they that have not seen, and yet have believed.” (v.29, See also Heb. 11:1; II Cor. 5:7)
In closing John says Jesus did many miracles not recorded in this book (v. 30), then restates why he wrote this book: that we might believe and have life through Him.