I mentioned in yesterday’s post I was tired. I finally figured out that at 73 I am not going to recover as quickly as I used to. You guessed it, I’m still tired. 🙂 So I’m going to borrow some thoughts from my sermon Sunday morning.
“Jesus invited people to believe in Him. Not just in His teaching. Not just in His cause. Not just in His ideology. But in Him. He called people to a personal belief in Him. But that also means He must be who He said He was. That He was worthy of our belief. He was and is unique. He was and is one of a kind. And what TOTALLY sets Him apart is the event we celebrate today-His resurrection from the dead.”
My message was entitled The Surprising Savior. I called it that because no one expected the event we celebrated Sunday: His resurrection. No one expected it. Not the disciples. Not the ladies who went to the tomb that morning (remember: they were wondering how they were going to move the stone). Not the religious leaders (they thought He was dead and gone for good). Not Herod and the Romans (they only did the dirty deed because they were intimidated or told to). NO ONE!
The Easter message can be distilled into one simple sentence: Jesus came back to life after He died. We use the word resurrection to describe the event. That word comes from resurge or resurgence, in the sense of “coming back” or “rising up.”
Plain and simple: The resurrection of Jesus is the central tenet of the Christian faith. If someone can dismantle the resurrection, they would succeed in sinking the uniqueness of Jesus and the Christian faith. Without mentioning any names, no other religion can make the claim that their leader has risen from the dead and has been seen by hundreds of others. The resurrection is the anchor point for the cables that hold the Christian faith together.
That is why, if anyone wants to destroy Christianity, they must first start with dismantling the truth of the resurrection. People a whole lot smarter than me have tried to do that but all it comes to is EPIC FAIL. I’m not the smartest person on the block, but I will stake it all on this one truth: Jesus rose from the dead.
That is, in a nutshell, what Christianity is all about, Bill. Without the resurrection of Jesus, everything else is meaningless.
Blessings!
Paul certainly backs that up in I Cor. 15 Martha. He says, “We are of all men most to be pitied” if it is not true.
I definitely agree, The Christian Faith hinges on a Risen Savior. Without Jesus taking on our sin and being sacrificed to pay for that sin, we would be responsible for that debt. However, without Jesus rising from the tomb and ascending to His rightful place in heaven, the sacrifice would have been temporary, much like the OT sacrifices that had to be performed over and over again. His resurrection confirms that the payment was once and for all times, past, present, and future.
Well said my friend. We can never underestimate the influence and power of the resurrection.
I am most grateful and thankful, that Jesus did truly rise from the grave, and take away sin once and for all. That Jesus accepted my punishment my debt, paid in full, and anyone that accepts Jesus as their Savior can live a life assured that they will never be separated from God again. Praise God, and may all the glory be His forever and ever. AMEN
That whole “paid in full” stands huge to me. To know my sins have been forgiven speaks volumes.