Resurrection!

Intro

Social media has changed the way I understand the word “reaction”

How many people have reacted to my post? What type of reaction should I give?

Emojis are now a primary way of showing your reaction

*Supposed to show top emojis, I always have the thumbs up followed by facepalm and shoulder shrug*

As we look at the familiar and incredible story of Jesus’ resurrection, we see His followers react differently to the news

Their reactions - responses - often mirror our own, even all these many years later

Read Luke 24:1 - 12; and pray

The Story

After the death of Jesus, a group of women go to his tomb to anoint His body with spices

Luke identifies some of the women in v. 10: Mary Magdalene (in all 4 gospels), Joanna and Mary the mother of James

Likely other women with them as well

They are going early in the morning (hence the tradition of Easter sunrise services)

Spices were used for embalming, and the act would have been one of honour and reverance

In Mark’s gospel, they discuss the problem with their plan: How to roll away the stone?

Normal practice to seal a tomb with the stone to keep out wild animals or robbers

In this case, keep out the disciples

Too large for the women to move

Matthew adds the detail that it is guarded

Again, to keep out the disciples

When they arrived at the tomb, the problem of the stone had been taken care of

God Himself had rolled the stone away!

The tomb was empty… Jesus was not there!

And the women were perplexed

The Reaction of Confusion

For those first witnesses, confusion came from a lack of information

They didn’t know what had happened until the angels appeard to tell them

Could it have been grave robbers? The disciples? Any number of potential answers

For some, a lack of information still leads to confusion about the resurrected Christ

Theology is confusing enough!

*Talk about Barrett’s conversation*

We need to know Scripture to know the truth about Jesus

What do you mean, He was fully God and fully man? What do you mean He was perfect and sinless? What do you mean He died in the place of you and me? What do you mean that He was dead, but came back to life?

Unfortunately, biblical literacy is at an all-time low

Out of the church

“A survey from 2021 found that 11 percent of Americans read the Bible daily. Trends in reading habits over four years showed that the majority of Americans never read the Bible, however in 2021 this number dropped to 29 percent of respondents” (statista.com)

In the church

“In their recent 2021 study, Lifeway Research found that eleven percent of American evangelicals have read all of Scripture, nine percent have read all of Scripture more than once, ten percent none at all, thirteen percent only a few sentences, twelve percent almost all of it, fifteen percent at least half of it, and thirty percent several passages or stories.[1] The same study noted that thirty-two percent read the Bible every day, twenty-seven read it a few times a week, twelve percent read it once a week, eleven percent read it a few times a month, five percent once a month, and twelve percent rarely read it.” (Dave Jenkins)

The only way to combat confusion about the truth of Jesus is to get into Scripture

Sunday morning is a great start, but it is only the beginning

To understand God is to look at how He has chosen to reveal His nature

Two angels appear to the women and clear up their confusion with a message of hope

Not called angels in Luke; becomes obvious in how they are described (angels in other gospels)

“Why do you seek the living among the dead? He is not here, but has risen” (v. 5 - 6)

Of all the possible options of what could have happened to Jesus’ body, this was the best!

The angels remind the women of what Jesus had predicted about His death and resurrection (something they didn’t fully understand at the time)

Quoted from Luke 9:22 (re-read v. 21 - 22)

And they remembered His words; not just remembered, but trusted

Starts a trend after the resurrection of the disciples of Jesus being reminded of what He said (and what the Scriptures said) so they would fully understand

Clear up any confusion

The Reaction of Unbelief

Having seen the empty tomb and the message from the angels, the women believe

They rush to tell the eleven (no Judas) and other disciples in the area

What a message! What hope! Victory instead of defeat!

And the disciples do NOT believe them; they give a response of unbelief

Thomas gets a bad rap; all the disciples met the resurrection with doubt

Certainly, their grief contributed to their refusal to believe

“idle talk” = nonsense or futility

Why even bother? So many years following Jesus came to nothing

“did not believe” = refused to believe

Hope can hurt a wounded heart; too good to be true!

It was not until Jesus appeared to His disciples in His resurrected body where they would fully believe

We don’t have that luxury… cf. John 20:29.

It takes faith to believe in what we cannot see, which is why so many people respond to the resurrected Jesus with a response of unbelief

At the core, these reasons are similar to the disciples: I need to see it to believe it

*Tell story of poking fun at HO’s hole-in-one*

This is human nature!

While we don’t have the privilege of touching the resurrected Jesus, we see plenty of evidence of Him all around us

*Talk about my changed life; how my family and friends live out their faith; testimonies of people made new; a world hurting without Jesus*

He is risen, and our lives show the world the truth

Many other factors that lead to unbelief

Prevelance of scientific knowledge has led to extreme skepticism of all miracles

This isn’t possible

Lack of trust in the Bible has led to dismissal of the resurrection story

Disciples just stole the body and wrote a story that suited them

Hypocrisy in the church leads to dismissal of claims about Jesus

I don’t see the evidence of new life

In all cases, the BEST argument is to live out the love of Jesus

The Reaction of Wonder

While the disciples as a group choose not to believe, Peter is at least curious

So curious that he RUNS to the tomb to see if what the women said was true

He finds everything as they claimed; the stone was rolled away, the body was gone, only linen cloths remained

Bodies were routinely wrapped in linen cloths for burial

Peter’s response was not one of confusion or unbelief; “he went home marvelling at what had happened” (v. 12)

“marvel” = to be astonished; wonder

Peter shows us the reaction of wonder

While complete belief and understanding likely came later for him (when Jesus appeared), there is certainly an element of belief at play

Something big had happened; something miraculous had happened; something happened that changed everything

I imagine Peter coming up to the tomb, looking around in shock and saying, “Wow!”

This is marvelling in wonder

Dare we have such a response to a story as familiar as the resurrection?

If you are churched, you have heard it over and over

That familiarity can take away our sense of wonder

*Share about being up on the Jumbotron*

Have you lost your wonder for the resurrection of Jesus?

Make no mistake, there is no other story in the world that should be more capable of getting us to say, “Wow!”

We should marvel that God Himself would become flesh and endure the human experience

We should marvel that Jesus would be willing to suffer and die in our place

We should marvel at the fact that on the third day, the Spirit of God breathed new life into a body that was totally and completely dead

We should marvel that Jesus would deign to share this victory over death and His eternal inheritance with us, so that we too may live forever

Everything about this should make us shout, “Wow!”

Conclusion

How you react to the resurrection of Jesus Christ is incredibly important

Does it cause you confusion; lead you to unbelief; or make you shake your head in wonder?

Whatever your natural reaction is today, everyone has the opportunity to believe in the resurrected Christ and the hope that it brings

Faith in this fact matters beyond imagination

Cf. 1 Corinthians 15:12-22.

We are made alive; and that is amazing!

Pray