Always on the winning team-serving Jesus Christ in Barnsley, England.: April 2012

Message at Gateway Church 8^th April 2012

Easter Sunday

Bible verse:

‘If Christ has not been raised, your faith is futile; you are still in your sins...But Christ has indeed been raised from the dead’. 1 Corinthians 15.17, 20.

Notable deaths in history:

There have been some notable deaths in history. The media in the last few weeks have reminded us of at least three events where death made history. 100 years ago (end of March 1912) Captain Scott and his team, tragically died, buried in the snow, on the way back from their famous expedition to the south pole. It was one of Scott’s colleagues who left the tent and famously said, “I am going out and may be some time”. He never returned. One by one they fell victim to the freezing cold and starvation. 100 years ago the Titanic, the ship that was claimed to be unsinkable on the 14^th April 1912 (Easter Sunday evening) hit an iceberg on its maiden voyage and sank the following day. 1,514 people drowned, buried in the deep Atlantic ocean. 30 years ago, on the 2^nd April 1982 the Falklands war began which claimed the lives of 907 people inc. 255 British servicemen. Most likely your death will not go down in history, except with the local council registry office, except to say that death is the winner on each of these occasions or is it???

Jesus’ death was distinctly different:

What is distinctively different about Jesus death, is not only why he died and the manner in which he died, but also what happened next. Yes he too was buried, but on the third day he was ‘raised from the dead’. The angel at the tomb of Jesus said to the women, “He is not here; he has risen” (Matthew 28.6). Now that’s different!

Is this the real thing? If so, it makes all the difference!:

If Jesus was resurrected to live forever more, it means that he can help you in your life and at the end of your life, so that death is not the winner. If Jesus did not rise from the dead, then surely he is just another good but dead person. What good is he to us today? If Jesus is still dead, then Christianity is dead. As the opening Bible verse says, ‘your faith is futile; you are still in your sins’. This means that you are still stuck with the problems of this world like disappointments, meaninglessness, sickness, evil and ultimately death even in the prime of life. Furthermore, if Jesus is still dead this means the 100’s of millions of people around the world, from all walks of life, who worship Jesus as God, have got it spectacularly wrong, trusting a dead man to give them hope. What good is a dead man? But if Jesus is alive, ‘indeed been raised from the dead’ then Christianity is alive, we have everything to live for and death is not the end.

What is resurrection?:

Resurrection is not resuscitation. Plenty of people have died and returned to life after being resuscitated and revived. Fabrice Muamba is the obvious example, the professional footballer who during a game for Bolton, dropped dead, his heart stopped for 78 minutes, but wonderfully, even miraculously was revived. The problem though with resuscitation is that one day you will still die, e.g. Muamba still has to face death. Whereas, resurrection is death’s reversal, that when someone dies and returns to physical life - it is forever. The Bible calls it eternal life. Jesus said, “I tell you the truth, whoever hears my word and believes him who sent me has eternal life and will not be condemned; he has crossed over from death to life” (John 5.24).

‘Christ has indeed been raised’:

Painstaking research has been done by notable historians, e.g. Tom Wright (former Bishop of Durham) about resurrection belief in the ancient pagan world (before and up to the time of Jesus). They concluded that resurrection was a non-starter in every religious or spiritual belief. The idea of resurrection was completely denied. Nobody believed it, apart from Judaism, and even then Judaism, (which of course was the cradle for Christianity), only believed in resurrection as an entire nation at the end of history. Nobody entertained the notion of an individual being resurrected at any point in history.

We all know that for a major belief or opinion to become a mindset in a society, it takes decades for the shift to happen. For example the campaign that smoking is harmful to your health has taken many years to make an impact, to the point that in recent years it’s actually banned in pubs. That would have been unthinkable 30 years ago.

So how is it, that overnight, when nobody believed in resurrection, that it became the major belief amongst many people, that suddenly this turn-around took place and people were prepared to be martyred for their belief that Christ was indeed raised from the dead? There is only one conclusion, it’s because he did rise from the dead, resurrected to live forever more, that the resurrection radically transformed the community of Jesus’ followers and the church was launched. The church never launched the resurrection, the resurrection launched the church! Anyone who denies that Jesus did not rise from the dead are rationally obligated to find a more plausible alternative that explains the birth and rapid rise of the Christian church.

However, the Bible teaches that there will be a resurrection at the end of time of all God’s people, based on the resurrection of one solitary individual in the middle of history, none other than Jesus Christ, the Son of God. The apostle Paul wrote ‘For since death came through a man, the resurrection of the dead comes also through a man. For as in Adam all die, so in Christ all will be made alive. But each in his own turn: Christ the firstfruits; then, when he comes, those who belong to him’ (1 Corinthians 15.21-23). So the resurrection of Jesus in the middle of history is the launch of the resurrection of the entire church of God at the end of history.

Some evidence for the resurrection:

The evidence for the resurrection is so compelling. Here’s just three... 1) Jesus predicted his resurrection on several occasions e.g. we read in Matthew 16.21, ‘Jesus began to explain to his disciples...that he must be killed and on the third day be raised to life’. The disciples just didn’t get it until it actually happened, until it came true. 2) It was women who discovered the empty tomb first and the first to meet the risen Jesus. Check out Matthew 28.1-10. In that culture, a woman’s testimony was regarded as second-class. So if the gospel accounts were fabricated, there’s no way the writers would say the women were first unless it was true. 3) The tomb of Jesus was not enshrined. The tombs of the founders of other religions are enshrined, or at least regarded as a holy site, and still visited by millions today. Why wasn’t Jesus’ tomb enshrined? It was empty. There were no remains, so the tomb does kind of lose its significance! Plus nobody ever produced the corpse to quash the rising proclamation that Jesus was alive, who indeed made numerous appearances to people. ‘Christ has indeed been raised from the dead’.

Here’s the big picture...here’s the meaning of Easter Sunday for you:

The resurrection of Jesus is proof that you can trust Jesus with your life and with your death, and with your eternity. The resurrection of Jesus is proof that you can trust his teachings and that his teaching is truth. When Jesus said a few weeks just before his death, “I am the resurrection and the life. He who believes in me will live, even though he dies” (John 11.25), it was true when he spoke it and he subsequently proved it to be true by rising from the dead. The resurrection is also proof that if you truly repent of your sins, turn from the life that is anti-God and put your faith in Jesus, you are forgiven and you are put right with God. A penalty has to be paid for your sin, but you don’t have to pay for it, for Jesus has paid it with his own death and separation from God instead of you. God’s holiness is kept intact, he hasn’t brushed sin ‘under the carpet’, because justice has been done at the cross. If Jesus never rose from the dead, what does that say about the penalty of sin that Jesus bore? He is still paying the price. But that the fact that he rose from the dead, means sin, death, hell and satan has been conquered. Jesus ‘was delivered over to death for our sins and was raised to life for our justification’ (Rom.4.25). So you don’t have to remain in your sins and therefore under God’s judgement. You can cross over from darkness to light, death to life, and hell to heaven.

Here’s something else, Jesus’ body was raised in complete, perfect and everlasting health (1 Corinthians 15.42, 1 John 3.2) and so on the day Jesus returns to this world, so you too shall rise and never to experience injury, pain, sickness or death ever again. Jesus has put death to death. That’s why we read in Revelation 21.4, ‘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’.

So trust Jesus and his teachings, know God’s forgiveness and be assured of this future hope even after death, to live happily ever after – and that’s no fairy tale!

In the meantime:

In between Jesus resurrection and the resurrection of all who belong to him, and we are between those two points - there’s a life to be lived. It won’t be an easy life, because we are still part of this sinful world including own weaknesses. But you cannot remain neutral about Jesus, you cannot sit on the fence. You must believe in him or reject him. To remain indifferent or undecided means to reject him, until you accept him! But there’s a warning, Jesus resurrection means there’s no second chance after death. It is what you believe and decide in this life that matters. Hebrews 9.27, ‘Everyone is destined to die once and after that to face judgement’. So resurrection is not reincarnation. Acts 17.30-31, the apostle Paul who used to murder Christians out of sheer hatred until he met the risen Jesus declared in the city of Athens, “In the past God overlooked such ignorance, but now he commands all people everywhere to repent. For he has set a day when he will judge the world with justice by the man he has appointed. He has given proof of this to all people by raising him from the dead”. When the Titanic sank a 100 years ago, the passengers on board were having a great time, but unaware of the reality. Likewise, don't be oblivious of the reality of life, death and resurrection.

Conclusion:

If you can’t believe in resurrection, surely you want it to be true? Is there a better alternative? Do you have a better plan or a better solution? There’s a life to be lived, and the best way to live it is in Jesus. That means you must turn from all sinful ways, you must accept Jesus as your Lord and your Saviour, he’s the gateway, and as 1 Corinthians 15 concludes, to ‘give yourselves fully to the work of the Lord’. Live your life for Jesus, he has a purpose for you and plans for you, in this life and the next.

Let me conclude with a story about a boy who ran away from home. It was the kind of thing you do when you are nine. And the boy left a note saying he couldn’t stand them, hated them all, and was never coming back – the usual rhetoric – and off he went with a packet of biscuits and the contents of his piggy bank. That was in the morning. In the evening, mum and dad got a phone call. Could he come home? “Yes!” Pause. Would they do anything to him if he did? “No! Just come home!”. Just to make sure, could they arrange a signal? If they really wanted him back, could they tie one of his white hankerchiefs in his bedroom. He walked down the street half an hour later and there was a white sheet flying from every window of the house.

That’s the message of Jesus. He once said, ‘Whoever comes to me I will never drive away’ (John 6.37).

Always on the winning team-serving Jesus Christ in Barnsley, England.

Tuesday, 10 April 2012

How does a local church reach new people?

Monday, 9 April 2012

Gateway Easter Message