He Is Risen

4-20-25

 

            Easter Sunday.  This is the day each year where we celebrate the greatest single event in the history of creation.  We read earlier what Paul had to say to the Corinthians about the importance of Christ's resurrection.  It's simple:  If He didn't rise, we won't rise; if He didn't rise from the dead on the third day we are lost in our sins and damned to hell for eternity.  That is not an overstatement about how important that first resurrection Sunday was and is.

            But it is not an isolated event.  There is more to our forgiveness and salvation than what happened on that Sunday morning thousands of years ago.  There is also the importance and the significance of the crucifixion.  We really can't separate the two events.  They work together to provide for us all that we need spiritually to be in a right relationship with God. 

            Before we get to either of those events, we need to back up just a little bit further.  Jesus was arrested in the garden, illegally tried by the Jewish religious leaders and found guilty and deserving of death.  But only Rome could do that so He was taken to Pontius Pilate.  After Pilate agreed to have Jesus put to death, the soldiers were ordered to scourge and then crucify the Lord.  Being hung on a cross was only part of the process.  Before Jesus was crucified, He was first scourged, or in other words, beaten very badly by the Roman soldiers.  This was something they did with every condemned victim, but with Jesus the soldiers showed their own wickedness by far exceeding what basic duty required.

            It wasn't just the Romans who beat the Lord.  By the time Jesus was in the hands of the Roman soldiers, He would have already been swollen and bloody from the slaps and beatings He received from the Temple police.  Things simply got worse from there.  The beating and whipping from the Romans would have left Jesus bleeding even more profusely.  There would have been terrible lacerations from His shoulders all the way down His back, exposing muscles, ligaments, blood vessels and perhaps even internal organs.

            Jesus was either naked or nearly naked during this time.  He started out possibly only wearing His seamless inner garment, which the soldiers would have torn off.  Then they put on Him a scarlet robe as a way of mocking Him.  That was a robe probably belonging to one of the soldiers who used it to keep warm while standing guard on cold nights.

            To add to the pain and the ridicule, the soldiers put a crown of thorns on His head.  We really don't know how long those thorns might have been, but it doesn't really matter does it?  Any length of thorn that was violently crammed onto His head would have gone into His skull and caused immense pain.  Blood from that would have flowed down and mingled with the blood that was already covering His body.  By this time, Jesus' face would have been unrecognizable and His pain very intense.

            The soldiers mocked the Lord all throughout this ordeal.  First they mocked Him by putting on the scarlet robe.  Then they mocked Him with the crown of thorns.  After that, they mocked Him by placing a reed in His right hand.  The reed was meant to represent royalty, mimicking a monarch's scepter.  To complete the sarcastic taunt, the soldiers knelt and hailed Him as King of the Jews.  Then they spit on Him and beat Him on the head with the reed.  All of that leads us to the passages that we're actually going to look at this morning.  Let's read Matt. 27:33-37; 45-50 and 28:1-7.

            The place chosen for Jesus' resurrection was a hill on the outskirts of Jerusalem called Golgotha, which means place of a skull.  The name Calvary is derived from the Latin word for skull.  It wasn't named that because it was some sort of burial place with a lot of exposed bones laying around, the Jews wouldn't have allowed that.  The name more likely refers to a site that had the appearance of a skull.

            Before the soldiers nailed Jesus to the cross and it was placed in the ground, they gave Him wine to drink that was mixed with gall.  The gall was offered to crucifixion victims to keep them from struggling violently as the nails were driven into their hands and feet.  But Jesus did not want His senses dulled, so after tasting the mixture He was unwilling to drink it.  As He had prayed in the garden, He was determined to drink the cup the Father had given Him.  He would endure the full measure of the physical, emotional and spiritual pain that He knew He would be experiencing. 

            The phrase "when they had crucified Him" does not refer to the finished execution.  It actually refers to raising Him upright and placing the vertical beam of the cross into the hole that had been prepared for it.  It was at that point that the actual crucifixion began.  As a final mockery of Jesus, and affront to the Jewish leaders, they put a sign over His head which read, "This is Jesus, the King of the Jews."

            Jesus' crucifixion began around 9 am.  After He had been on the cross for three hours, we are told that darkness fell on all the land.  The Greek word used here for land could mean a local area or the entire world.  We can't tell, therefore, how widespread the darkness was.  God could have made it to be dark just in that local area or He could have made it dark all over the earth.  Whatever the case was, we do know that it was dark where Jesus was for three hours. 

            There are a number of different interpretations regarding the meaning of the darkness.  But what makes the most sense and what fits with the rest of what was going on is that the darkness was a visible reaction to judgment.  The cross was a place of God's divine judgment, where the sins of the world were poured out vicariously on the sinless, perfect Son of God.  Therefore, it makes sense that the supernatural darkness was God's reaction to the judgment of sin. 

            Jesus Christ not only bore man's sin but actually became sin on man's behalf.  He did that in order that those who believe in Him might be saved from the penalty of their sin.  Because He took upon Himself the sins of the world, Jesus suffered in the worst possible way.  God hates sin and when Jesus had the world's sins placed on Him, God withdrew His presence from His Son for the only time in eternity.  

            When that happened, that's why Jesus cried out, "My God, my God, why have You forsaken Me?"  When Jesus was in the garden, He asked that God would take this cup from Him.  The cup He wanted removed was the separation from His Father that He experienced on the cross.  More than all of the physical pain He endured and more than all of the mocking He went through, it was the separation from the Father that was His greatest suffering. 

            Finally, the time came for Jesus to willingly sacrifice Himself for our forgiveness.  Matthew tells us that He cried with a loud voice and yielded up His Spirit.  Luke says that His last words were, "Father, into Your hands I commit My Spirit."  According to John, He said "It is finished."  One of the important truths about this is that Jesus' life was not taken from Him by men.  Rather, He surrendered His Spirit by the conscious act of His own sovereign will.

            That all took place on Friday of Jesus' passion week.  But that wasn't the end.  If Jesus had only died for our sin, and remained dead in the tomb, we would all be in a world of hurt right now.  There would be no forgiveness; there would be no salvation.  Jesus needed to die in order to pay for our sins, but He also needed to rise again.  The resurrection of Jesus Christ is the central event of God's redemptive history.  It is the coronation of our faith.  Everything that we are and have and hope is predicated on this reality.  There would be no Christianity if there was no resurrection. 

            The resurrection of Jesus Christ is so foundational to Christianity that no one who denies it can be a true believer.  We read these verses earlier in the service and I alluded to them earlier in the sermon, but they are worth looking at again.  1 Cor. 15:13-14.  If Christ did not rise from the grave, then no redemption was accomplished on the cross and as Paul says, we are still in our sins.

            Matthew chapter 28 begins with the phrase "after the Sabbath."  That term refers to a rather vague period of time.  No matter exactly how long it was, the time that elapsed was from sundown the previous evening when the Sabbath ended, until it began to dawn the following Sunday, the first day of the week.  Jews considered reference to a day as meaning any part of that day.  Sunday then was the third day of Jesus' internment, the day which He had repeatedly predicted would be His day of resurrection.  It is because of the resurrection that we worship on Sunday rather than on Saturday, the Sabbath. 

            At a predawn hour on Sunday morning, Mary Magdalene and the other Mary came to look at the grave.  The other gospels mention a few other women were also there.  Nicodemus and Joseph had hastily prepared Jesus' body for burial before putting it in the tomb.  But the women had bought their own spices so they could personally anoint His body properly.

            The women obviously thought Jesus would still be in the grave and would remain there, or else they would not have brought the spices with them.  They did not go to see Jesus risen; they went to look at the grave where they expected His body to still be laying.  Despite their lack of faith in Jesus' promises to rise on the third day, the women went to the tomb out of deep affection for their Lord.  What they lacked in faith they compensated for in loving compassion.  What they lacked in understanding, they made up for in courageous devotion.

            We know from the other gospels that as the women were on their way to the tomb that they were wondering how they were going to remove the stone.  No sooner had the women reached the tomb than they found the stone had already been removed.  A severe earthquake had occurred when an angel descended from heaven and caused the earth around the grave to tremble violently.  The angel had come to open the secured and sealed grave.

            The angel did not move the stone in order to let Jesus out of the tomb.  If Jesus had the power to raise Himself from the dead, which He did, He certainly had the relatively minor power to escape a sealed grave.  The angel moved the stone not to let Jesus out, but to let the women and the apostles in. 

            Apparently God transmitted some of His own Shekinah glory to the angel.  His appearance was like lightning and his garments white as snow.  The angel bore the appearance of the character of God in order to make clear to the observers not only that he was a supernatural messenger, but that he was an agent of God and not of Satan. 

            The guards who had been placed there to protect the grave and make sure that no one disturbed it, shook for fear and became like dead men because of what had happened.  They were completely traumatized and frightened by seeing the angel and experiencing the earthquake.  But they also had reason to be afraid because they failed to do their duty and could have lost their lives because of that.  The women were also afraid but had no reason to fear and the angel gave them comfort and assurance. 

            That comfort and assurance came in the form of the greatest news ever shared.  The angel told them that Jesus wasn't there but that He had risen.  Jesus had the power to give up His life like He did on the cross and He had the power to take it up again like He did in the tomb.  The angel reminded the women that Jesus' resurrection should not surprise them because it happened just as He said it would.  They then went into the tomb and observed that it was indeed empty. 

            After seeing the empty tomb, the angel told the women to go and tell His disciples that He has risen from the dead.  They didn't have time to revel in the marvelous reality of the good news they had just heard.  Instead they were given instructions and it was time to respond to that news.  They were to go immediately and announce to the cowering disciples who were still hiding in Jerusalem what they had seen and heard about the risen Christ.

            We have all heard the good news that Jesus Christ is alive.  His resurrection won the victory over death, over sin and over the grave.  The victory that He won is the victory that we get to experience as His followers.  Because He is alive, we can be spiritually alive.  Because He rose and ascended to be with the Father, we have the hope as Christians of joining Him in heaven and spending eternity with the Father, Son and Spirit.

            But it doesn't happen automatically.  Salvation is all a work of God in our lives.  We do not deserve it and we cannot earn it.  It is grace alone through faith alone in Christ alone.  But when God works in and through our lives to bring us into a right relationship with Himself, we need to respond.  We do that by trusting Christ alone for salvation and by repenting of our sins.

            Jesus Christ was born of a virgin, lived a perfect, sinless life and died a sacrificial death.  He rose the third day, ascended to be with the Father and is now seated at the right hand of God making intercession for us.  He will come again to the earth and set up His millennial Kingdom. 

            We are all sinners by nature and by choice.  Because of that sin we deserve to spend eternity in hell separated from the Father.  But Jesus came and paid the price for our sins that we couldn't pay so that we can have our sins forgiven and our souls saved.  Scripture tells us that whoever calls upon the name of the Lord will be saved.

            What about you this morning?  Are you a truly regenerate born again believer in the Lord Jesus Christ?  Are you trusting Christ alone for salvation?  Do you seek to repent of your sins?  Have you called upon the name of the Lord?  Maybe you're not saved or have questions about it.  As our singer and musician come, we invite you to respond to God's working in your life.  Walking the aisle doesn't save you; saying a prayer doesn't save you; being baptized or joining the church doesn't save you.  But we do those things because we are saved.  If you need to respond to God's working in your life, we encourage you to do that now as we stand and sing.

            Prayer.