Questions from Jesus part 3

Welcome:

Glad you are here!

Happy Easter

Breakfast this morning

Pictures in the lobby

Kids are currently learning about the cross and resurrection

and are about to do a big egg hunt

No matter how you got here or why you are here, we are excited that you are and we believe it is not by accident

A few things before we get started.

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New series “Not Today Satan”

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Today we wrap up a 3 week series titled “Questions from Jesus.”

We’ve spent the last several weeks talking about different questions that Jesus poses throughout His lifetime.

Jesus asks over 300 questions throughout His ministry and all are with purpose and meaning and important

So I thought this morning we would try something.

Let’s see how well you know the Bible and the questions from Jesus

Or how well you know movie lines

So they are going to throw a question up on the screen and we are gonna try to decide if it’s a question that Jesus asks or a question from a movie

So....question number 1

Why are you trying to trap me?

this is Jesus.

this is from Matt 22:15 where the Pharisees come to Jesus and ask Him if it was right to pay the imperial tax of the day

Jesus responds with this question because He knew of their intent

Why’d it have to be snakes?

Indiana Jones - Raiders of the lost ark

This is Harrison Ford. When he gets to the ark of the Covenant and finds out it’s surrounded by snakes which he is terrified of.

Are you so dull?

This is Jesus

Mark 7:18. Jesus is talking about what defiles a person and he says that it’s not what comes in but what goes out that defiles a person

So the disciples pull him to the side and ask Him about what it means

And Jesus’ response is this one

Did you ever dance with the devil in the pale moonlight?

This is Batman. 1989 Michael Keaton batman

This line is from the joker played by jack nicholson.

He asks one of his victims this question when he is about to kill him

Is that everyone?

Avengers end game.

They are about to have their final battle sequence and warriors start showing up all over the place and right before they charge into battle Dr strange looks over at Wong and asks “is that everyone. He replies “what you wanted more?”

Why are you crying?

This is a question from Jesus and this is the question we are going to look at today.

This is the question we find in John 20:15.

As we’ve tackled all of these questions

Whether here Sunday morning or ones we’ve sent out throughout the weeks

what I hope you’ve learned is that “you may not have all of the answers, but are you asking the right questions?”

Jesus asks over 300 questions through His lifetime

And when it comes to our faith what better questions to look at then the ones Jesus ask

So, one more question for us. Why are you crying? This is the question in our text.

Now, I want to read all of this chapter leading up to this point because it helps us with some context.

But remember before this chapter what has transpired

All of holy week has taken place

Jesus has turned water to wine, healed people, preached to thousands, fed thousands, made dead people come back to life, along with countless others

And so people praised Him for His abilities.

He rides in on a donkey and people worship Him

He prepares for passover with his disciples and institutes the Lord’s supper

But Jesus also made claims to be the very Son of God, the Messiah, the Savior of the world, the one they had long been awaiting.

And this man born to Mary and Joseph, a carpenters son could not possibly be the one

So He must be accused of His crimes, stopped from His false teachings, killed for His claims

And so that’s what they did.

They hang him on a cross

Cursed for us

Our sins put on Him

The price we deserved but could not pay He payed for us

Jesus is dead and put in a tomb.

John 20:1–18 NIV

1 Early on the first day of the week, while it was still dark, Mary Magdalene went to the tomb and saw that the stone had been removed from the entrance. 2 So she came running to Simon Peter and the other disciple, the one Jesus loved, and said, “They have taken the Lord out of the tomb, and we don’t know where they have put him!” 3 So Peter and the other disciple started for the tomb. 4 Both were running, but the other disciple outran Peter and reached the tomb first. 5 He bent over and looked in at the strips of linen lying there but did not go in. 6 Then Simon Peter came along behind him and went straight into the tomb. He saw the strips of linen lying there, 7 as well as the cloth that had been wrapped around Jesus’ head. The cloth was still lying in its place, separate from the linen. 8 Finally the other disciple, who had reached the tomb first, also went inside. He saw and believed. 9 (They still did not understand from Scripture that Jesus had to rise from the dead.) 10 Then the disciples went back to where they were staying. 11 Now Mary stood outside the tomb crying. As she wept, she bent over to look into the tomb 12 and saw two angels in white, seated where Jesus’ body had been, one at the head and the other at the foot. 13 They asked her, “Woman, why are you crying?” “They have taken my Lord away,” she said, “and I don’t know where they have put him.” 14 At this, she turned around and saw Jesus standing there, but she did not realize that it was Jesus. 15 He asked her, “Woman, why are you crying? Who is it you are looking for?” Thinking he was the gardener, she said, “Sir, if you have carried him away, tell me where you have put him, and I will get him.” 16 Jesus said to her, “Mary.” She turned toward him and cried out in Aramaic, “Rabboni!” (which means “Teacher”). 17 Jesus said, “Do not hold on to me, for I have not yet ascended to the Father. Go instead to my brothers and tell them, ‘I am ascending to my Father and your Father, to my God and your God.’ ” 18 Mary Magdalene went to the disciples with the news: “I have seen the Lord!” And she told them that he had said these things to her.

pray

For a moment, put yourself into Mary Magdalene shoes

it’s over 2000 years ago and just 3 days ago they took Jesus, your friend Jesus, and they crucified Him

You watched as they drug him before the high priests and condemned Him, not for lying but for telling the truth.

You were there when the very crowd who praised him just days before is now screaming out “Crucify Him!”

Then began the real horror

You watched as they beat him and whipper him 39 times

You watched as they squeezed the crown of thorns into his brow and around His head

You watched them strike him, spit on him, ridicule him, mock him

And then the cross. You watched as they pierced his hands and feet and nailed him to the cross

You watched as he took his last breath and was put into a tomb

And now at that very tomb someone asks “why are you crying?”

Why are you crying?

Where do you even begin?

For one, Hope has just died.

It’s recorded in Mark 16:9 that Jesus drove out 7 demons from Mary.

Jesus gave her a new start

A fresh beginning

He to her was hope and now hope is gone

Purpose is gone

Jesus was the one that Mary could just sit at His feet for hours

While her sister, martha, was busy making preparations, Mary knew her purpose, knew her direction, knew where she needed to be

At the feet of Jesus, but now He is gone and so is her purpose

Her relationship lost

Just like Jesus stood outside of your brother, Lazarus’ tomb, and wept, now you stand outside of Jesus’ tomb and weep because He was your friend

And now you can’t even show your respects and visit His tomb because someone has stolen his body

They’ve taken Him and hid Him away somewhere and now there is no closure, no healing, no hope, no purpose, and no advocate.

Jesus is dead and He is gone.

Why are you crying?

What else is she to do? What else does she have? But to cry, to weep, to mourn.

But why are you crying?

You!

You see the funny thing about this is we are taught as Christians that we need to put on our best

You come to church and you wear your nicest clothes, you put on your Sunday best, you put on a smile and you act as if life couldn’t be any better but the truth is, that’s not the truth

If I’ve learned anything being in ministry it’s that every hurts

no matter how good they look on the outside

No matter how tough they may appear

no matter how things don’t seem to bother them

Everyone hurts and everyone cries

maybe for you Mary’s reality in this moment is your reality in this moment.

Maybe for you Hope is dead

I don’t know what you’re going through right now, I don’t know what you’ve been through

But i do know some common themes in us all

You think you’re alone

You think you’re without hope

And often times about the moment you think you may have a handle on things, you can finally take a deep breathe, life throws another thing at you and you just don’t if you can even go another day

Maybe you’re purpose is gone

At some point you’ve looked back on your life and don’t even remember how you got here

You don’t know why you do what you do

And often you struggle with the question of “Am i really even making a difference?”

You’ve lost all purpose and direction

Maybe you’ve lost relationships

We’ve all lost someone

Maybe it was expected and a long process

Maybe it was unexpected and a surprise

Maybe it’s not that someone is really gone it’s just that the relationship is broken and shattered and there’s been great pain and hurt and no hope of restoration

No matter what, it hurts!

And it’s a lingering hurt that always seem to be with you

So why are you crying?

Well because this life keeps throwing things at us.

Tears just seem to be part of being a human being.

So much so that it’s often difficult to find even slivers of joy.

a glimmer of hope, an ounce of purpose, or a good friend

Is this all that life is anymore?

Do we just wake up go through the motions and go to bed only to do it all again the next day?

Is this all there is?

If not, what is the solution? How do we get out of this spiral of tears?

The answer to that is found in the 2nd question Jesus asks Mary.

Who is it you are looking for?

I would play hide and seek with my girls sometimes. And when it was my turn to hide I would find my spot and peek out and wait for them to go by. When they did and got to a place I knew they couldn’t see me anymore, I would run out around the corner and yell for them and then run back to my spot. they would come look for me where they thought they heard the sound coming from and of course never find me. The next time they would go around the corner I would run out the other direction and yell and then run back to my spot. this time they would go where they thought they heard me and look high and low but never be able to find me.

We look in every spot we know to look.

We look to material things

We look to jobs

We look to people

We look and we look but we never find anything that can sustain us.

Anything that can fill that void

It’s all temporary and futile

It’s like my girls looking for me. for a moment they think they have me! but it’s almost as if the false hope makes it even worse

They get frustrated when they can’t find me where they were certain they heard me

We do the same.

So, what is the solution?

What/who is it you are looking for?

You won't find what you’re looking for until you find the one who is looking for you.

Jesus asks Mary “Why are you crying?”

He doesn’t say stop crying, He says why are you crying?

And the answer is obvious. The list is long. Where to even begin.

But then he asks

“who is it you are looking for?”

If she could answer the 2nd one she would answer the first

If we could answer the 2nd one then we will have our answer to the first

And it wasn’t until Jesus calls her by her name that all began to make sense again

It was Jesus! Jesus in the flesh, alive before her very eyes!

It was hope, it was purpose, it was her friend

Here he was alive again!

And with his life came life to her

She could breathe again, hope again, she could stop worrying, stop crying

Jesus is Alive!!!!!!

And it was He who she was seeking! And here he was

So let me ask you, who is it you are looking for?

Don’t let the familiarity of this story deter you from the power of it

And the fact that Jesus is alive does not just have a global affect but a personal one

The way that John tells of this account, he is very personal in his details

As much as a global affect the resurrection has, it could not be global if it was not first personal

It could not be global if it was not first personal to Mary and to Peter and to John and to the other disciples and all that were there

Sometimes we look at the resurrection from this 30,000 foot view and we forget that it’s implications deal with out heart.

So the danger is that we breeze through this story and moment in history because it is familiar and miss out on the invitation of it all

Why are you crying? Who is it you are looking for?

Because the one who is calling you by name is alive and inviting you to life

Life in Christ!

This day, over 2000 years ago was a day of transformation

and this day, today, could be a day of transformation for you

Jesus took on your sins, your curse, your penalty upon himself

And defeated death so that we can have life

Life here in this moment and life eternally with him.

And there may be pain in this life, there may be moments of tears

But when we answer Jesus’ 2nd question correctly we are promised something

When we begin seeking Jesus and we declare that He is Lord

We are promised

Revelation 21:1–7 NIV

1 Then I saw “a new heaven and a new earth,” for the first heaven and the first earth had passed away, and there was no longer any sea. 2 I saw the Holy City, the new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride beautifully dressed for her husband. 3 And I heard a loud voice from the throne saying, “Look! God’s dwelling place is now among the people, and he will dwell with them. They will be his people, and God himself will be with them and be their God. 4 ‘He will wipe every tear from their eyes. There will be no more death’ or mourning or crying or pain, for the old order of things has passed away.” 5 He who was seated on the throne said, “I am making everything new!” Then he said, “Write this down, for these words are trustworthy and true.” 6 He said to me: “It is done. I am the Alpha and the Omega, the Beginning and the End. To the thirsty I will give water without cost from the spring of the water of life. 7 Those who are victorious will inherit all this, and I will be their God and they will be my children.

There will be a day when Jesus, the one who defeated death, calls us home and we will spend an eternity with Him where there will be no more crying, no more pain, no more death.

This is our promise!

But what do we do until then? What are we to do?

it’s here we see the first commission before we see the great commission.

After Mary realizes its Jesus she begins to cling to Him

And He says, “you can let go, I’m not going anywhere for a while. It’s not my time to ascend to heaven.”

“Go instead to my brothers and tell them.”

Jesus commissions Mary to go and tell

I am alive, now go and tell everyone!

This is our commission as well

So here is what we see. It is through the resurrection that we are given hope

hope that we have a Savior who is calling our name

we have a messiah who is alive and calling us to life

Hope that there will be a day with no more pain, tears, hurt, death

We are given purpose

Until that day arrives we are to go. go tell the nations! Every tongue, every tribe, every person of the gospel of Jesus Christ

That Jesus went to the cross for the sins of the world and defeated death and is alive and longs to bring us from death to life

a purpose to spread the kingdom of God as we dwell with the King himself

We are given a friend

it’s relationship restored

A friend that sticks closer than a brother.

We are given Jesus because He is alive

The one who our soul longs for is seeking us and He calls us by name

So, Why are you crying?

And who is it you are looking for?

because you won’t find what you’re looking for until you find the one looking for you

and the one looking for you is alive and He’s calling you by name