Easter Sermon 2022

Alleluia! Christ is risen!

The Lord is risen indeed. Alleluia!

Redeemer it is a gift to be here with you today as we celebrate our risen, exalted, and reigning Lord, Jesus Christ. Today we celebrate the most important day in history. That while our Savior Jesus Christ may have died on Good Friday to pay the penalty for our sins, our God and Father did not leave him in the grave. Rather, he sent God the Holy Spirit to breathe forth life back into Jesus - the second Adam - to bring us into everlasting life. And that is why we are celebrating today. There ain’t no party like an Easter party, because an Easter party don’t stop!

In case you haven’t noticed. I love Easter. Easter Collin has no inhibitions. Easter Collin is not concerned with how he looks or appears while he worships. The cultural norms that say that men should be stoic and detached fall by the wayside today, because today is the day! Today is Easter!

Today we remember that Jesus Christ is the firstborn from the dead. Today is the day of our salvation, because as life was breathed back into Jesus by the power of the Holy Spirit, when we put our trust in him we can have new resurrected life in him. Today we celebrate the good news of the gospel.

So today it is not appropriate to be stoic. It is not appropriate to be detached. Today we come before God with open hearts and open hands lifted up to our risen, reigning, ascendant Savior. Can I get an alleluia? Listen, I know that a lot of us were raised Presbyterian and you were taught that it is proper to worship God in your heart - and listen: that is accurate. You should worship God with your heart, but also with your bodies! And so today, we are going to come out of our shells and celebrate with our whole selves - hearts and bodies. Amen?

Today is the day that we celebrate. And here’s what I want to do with the sermon this morning. I want to give an apologetic for why we should celebrate. I want to give a defense for why it is right and good and proper for you and I to lose our minds today in celebration. We’re going to take a look at 1 Peter 1:3-5 and there we will see three reasons why we should celebrate. First, we celebrate because our God has caused us to be born again. Second, we celebrate because we have a living hope. And third, we celebrate because we have an imperishable inheritance.

So turn with me to 1 Peter 1:3-5.

1 Peter 1:3–5 (ESV)

3 Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ! According to his great mercy, he has caused us to be born again to a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead, 4 to an inheritance that is imperishable, undefiled, and unfading, kept in heaven for you, 5 who by God’s power are being guarded through faith for a salvation ready to be revealed in the last time.

I love how Peter begins this section:

Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ!”

Exclamation mark! Now, if you know ancient Greek, you know that there is no exclamation mark there - so why did the translators do that? Because it’s obvious that Peter is excited! If you know who Peter is, you know that he is an excitable person. So when Peter starts to talk about the resurrection, he can’t help but bust out in praise and worship.

And why does he bless God?

“According to his great mercy, he has caused us to be born again to a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead”

It’s interesting how Peter describes our new birth. How are we born again? Through God causing it. Now, can any of us be born through our own causation? No! You can’t demand that you are born. You don’t yet exist. In the same way, we can’t make ourselves be born again. We can’t resurrect ourselves from the dead. Just as we can’t make ourselves be born the first time, in our sin we cannot raise ourselves to new life. No matter how much you beat a dead body and say, “Rise up!” It can’t raise itself. It has to be resurrected by a power outside it side.

And Peter tells us that our Heavenly Father is the the one who has caused us to be born again. And it’s interesting how he connects the causation of our new birth with the resurrection of Jesus. What we see in Jesus is our Lord coming for us, dying for us, being laid in a tomb for us, and then three days later, bursting forth in resurrection for us. The only way that we can have new life is if we are united to Jesus in his death and united to Christ in his resurrection. The only way to be born again is if our old selves are a put to death and the Spirit bringing forth our new selves by uniting us to our risen Savior Jesus Christ. And today we celebrate the good news that God the Father has caused this. Today we celebrate that though we cannot resurrect ourselves, God chose in his love and mercy to raise us up to new life. This is the radical grace of our God - and it is worth celebrating.

The radical grace of God, how he has caused us to be born again, it comes to those who do not deserve it. This free gift is given to those who are dead in their sins, those who are enemies of God, and yet the Father shows his boundless love by sending his Son to die in our place and to rise again to bring us new life. The love of God is freely given to those who do not deserve it.

Some of you may have walked through those doors knowing full well that you do not deserve the love of the Father. In your life you have heard about Jesus, maybe you have Christian friends or colleagues, and you’ve heard the stories, you have heard the catchphrases: Jesus has died for our sins, God is love, whoever believes in Jesus will have eternal life, so on and so on. And it always sounded good. It’s sounded amazing. But a singular and powerful thought has held you back from embracing the Christian faith - and that pervasive thought can be summed up in this way: I’m not a good enough person to be a Christian.

Well listen, brother. Listen, sister. I’ve got good news for you. That’s what the gospel is! This gift of grace to raise us to new, resurrected life by the power of Jesus Christ is a gift that is given to people who do not deserve it, people who are not good enough to be worthy of it, people who are dead in their sins - and it is given by the one who loves in perfect freedom, with no obligation, he loves you and has caused you to be born again. Why should we celebrate today? First, because the Father has caused us to be born again.

Second, we celebrate today because we have a living hope. Look at verse 3 again:

3 Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ! According to his great mercy, he has caused us to be born again to a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead.

I love how the Scriptures describe hope as alive. It’s not a passive hope. It’s not a dormant hope. It’s not a dead hope. It’s a living hope! A hope that leads to action. A hope that is fueled up and ready to go - bursting with energy and movement. It is the hope that one day every tear will be wiped away. One day we will be ushered into the perfect and eternal kingdom of the Lord Jesus Christ when one day he raises us from the dead. And that gives us hope.

Our church is young. Our church is growing, but we are still a relatively small community. But even in our small community, we’ve had to say goodbye to two of our number since our last Easter celebration. We miss Jeff. We miss Novice. We miss talking with them, singing with them, serving with them, eating with them, laughing with them. We miss their presence. And I know that many of you have walked through the death of a loved one in this past year. A friends or relative who was a light in your life, but now they are gone. But listen to me: if they have placed their faith in Jesus, we have a living hope that one day we will have a reunion with them. While we rightfully mourn their deaths, we do not mourn as those who have no hope - because we have a living hope in the resurrection. When we face suffering and sorrow, are lifted by the hope that suffering and sorrow do not have the final word - but one day Christ will raise us to new life, and all of those who have put their faith in Jesus - we will see again.

But there is an even greater hope than that. Not only will we see one another again, but we will see the living God. With unveiled faces we will behold the glory of God shining in the face of Jesus Christ. As we say in our liturgy: one day we shall see the Lord face to face when the dead are raised.

And this is why that is good news. All of us have something in our heart that feels empty that we are trying to fill. Maybe you’ve heard the cliche that we all have a God shaped hole in our hearts - but it’s true. This is why you can never get enough information. This is why we can never get enough pleasure, you can’t get enough experiences, you can’t get enough of anything! This is why the internet is addictive. Why can’t you get enough? Because you were created to be in the presence of that which is infinite. And until you are in his presence, you will have an infinite desire that is unmet. And the good news that Jesus brings is that you will be in the presence of the God forever and you will be satisfied. You will be made whole. You will be made whole in your relationships. You will be made whole in your bodies. Your sin will be gone, and you will be in the presence of your risen, reigning and exalted Savior. It is our living hope that we will not have an eternal hunger; rather our incompleteness is temporary. We will have an eternal satisfaction - and that is why we celebrate today.

And this brings us to our final point, if you are not yet convinced: we celebrate today because we have an imperishable inheritance.

3 Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ! According to his great mercy, he has caused us to be born again to a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead, 4 to an inheritance that is imperishable, undefiled, and unfading, kept in heaven for you, 5 who by God’s power are being guarded through faith for a salvation ready to be revealed in the last time.

Do any of you have really, really rich friends? When I was in High School, I had some friends who came from really wealthy families - like I’m talking, when they get their inheritance, they will never have to work again. And if they manage that money well, their children will probably never have to work again. It’s a lot of money.

But here’s the deal. Their homes will fade and fall in disrepair. Their cars and boats will break down. Their wealth will fade. Want to know how I know? If you go to Europe today you will see castles and manor homes scattered about the countryside that at one point was someone’s glorious inheritance. And they are now either museums or ruins. In this life, any inheritance we might receive will fade. However, the inheritance that is given to Jesus Christ, as the Son of God, as he inherits the Kingdom of God from his Father, cannot fade. It will not go away. It is an everlasting inheritance, and an everlasting kingdom.

And if you have placed your faith in Jesus, the Holy Spirit has united you to him, and therefore you share in his Sonship - meaning you are a true Son of God, a true Daughter of God, and a inheritor of this Kingdom that will never fade. And through the resurrection, you will one day rise to an eternal inheritance that is absolutely imperishable.

But there’s more good news. Because this unfading inheritance is kept in heaven for you, you, who by God’s power are being guarded through faith for a salvation ready to be revealed in the last time. How incredible is it that our God not only redeems us, but he carries us to eternal life. Our inheritance is not placed in our hands, which is such good news, because you and I would squander it. We’ve fumble it. Thanks be to God that our inheritance is not placed in our hands, but it is kept in the unchanging, unshakable hands of our Father in Heaven.

We live in a world that is constantly changing - perpetually in flux. One day we are going about our lives, and the next we are quarantined in our homes! We have lost health. We have lost community. We have lost employment. Why? Because things change. The one thing that we can be sure of in life is that in this life we can’t be sure of anything. And so how good is it that our future is not held in our hands, but it is in the hands of our unchanging God - and because our future, our inheritance lies in his hands, we can trust his promise. We can trust that because he raised his Son from the dead, he will raise us up as well to an everlasting, unfading, and imperishable kingdom.

And so, Redeemer, today we celebrate. We celebrate the resurrection of our Lord, and in just a moment we’re going to celebrate nine baptisms. And so we ought to celebrate with gusto, amen? And so I say,:

Alleluia! Christ is risen!

The Lord is risen indeed. Alleluia!