Sermon Title: Don’t You Understand, "HE IS RISEN"!
Scripture: Luke 24 1-8
Wesleyan Community Church
Terry, Mississippi
Sunday Morning – March 31, 2002
Scripture Introduction:
We can all probably remember the words of being told to do something, then we can probably remember a period of time passing without any activity on our part in the direction of those guiding words, and then a reminder of what we were told. The gentleness of this reminder was usually based upon the demeanor of the person making the request. I am sure we all have memories of several accounts along this line, and if you think your response was always immediate, I remind you that we are in a church this morning.
This morning’s Scripture is recorded in Luke’s account of the resurrection morning and the discovery of the empty tomb by those that were going to prepare Jesus body. We need to remember that Jesus’ body was hastily placed into the tomb in order that the Sabbath be observed, there were preparations that were not completed. As we look at this Scripture this morning, allow your minds to absorb the wonders of what has taken place here.
Scripture Reading: Luke 24:1-8
1Now upon the first day of the week, very early in the morning, they came unto the sepulchre, bringing the spices which they had prepared, and certain others with them. 2And they found the stone rolled away from the sepulchre. 3And they entered in, and found not the body of the Lord Jesus. 4And it came to pass, as they were much perplexed thereabout, behold, two men stood by them in shining garments: 5And as they were afraid, and bowed down their faces to the earth, they said unto them, Why seek ye the living among the dead? 6He is not here, but is risen: remember how he spake unto you when he was yet in Galilee, 7Saying, The Son of man must be delivered into the hands of sinful men, and be crucified, and the third day rise again. 8And they remembered his words,
Sermon Introduction:
Why not look at the resurrection account on this, the morning that we celebrate the empty tomb and the fact that all has happened just as Christ foretold. This was foretold by the prophets, this was foretold by Jesus to his disciples prior to His entrance into Jerusalem, this was foretold by Jesus at the Garden when the soldiers came to arrest him, and what is the response. Clueless people who had no idea what was going on.
Our lives are filled with such warnings. I am going to pick on the habit of smoking, and I have to think of all the warnings that come along with it. We are told by the medical community about the dangers of that habit. We have probably seen the pictures in our health classes of the end results of the continuation of this habit, we see the blackened and useless lungs, we see the lips that are eaten with cancer. We have heard the first hand accounts by those that are caught up in the addiction to the drug nicotine and their pleading to those that are not yet ensnared by this powerful hold to avoid what they now find themselves held captive by. Now you will also notice that all that I have just relayed should be a powerful enough incentive not to smoke, and yet there are those that still succumb. I haven’t even mentioned the spiritual reasons behind the call to not get involved.
My point is not the problem of smoking, it is the problem of not listening to what we were told. We hear the warning but the thought never gets acted upon in our minds. We hear about things but fail to process them in our minds, minds that are more powerful and flexible then any computer known to man, and I venture that no computer will ever come close to matching the complexity and possibility of the human mind, a human mind that was ever so carefully created by the awesome abilities of our God.
It truly is a shame that to often, we must learn from mistakes, or even if what we are looking at is not a mistake, that we couldn’t have just accepted the wisdom that is often times lovingly laid out before us and accepted and gone forward with that, avoiding perhaps not so much as a mistake, but going forward and not loosing valuable time, time that we perhaps took learning on our own and not trusting in the experience of those that have walked that way before. We will all learn about the salvation that Jesus died on that cross to obtain, we will either know it and be a partaker of it or we will know it as a result from being exempt from it for all of eternity. The latter need not become a fact in our lives or the lives of others. We have God’s written Word at our disposal and we also have the empowering of His Holy Spirit if we so choose to allow Him free reign over our lives. The chorus explains it well -
Every knee shall bow, every tongue confess, that Jesus Christ is Lord!
He is Risen!
Let us pause for a moment of prayer!
Point 1: He is not here!
Let us begin this morning by examining the Scripture beginning in verse 2:
2And they found the stone rolled away from the sepulchre. 3And they entered in, and found not the body of the Lord Jesus.
We read in Luke’s account in 9:22 after Peter’s revelation of Jesus as the Son of God, where Jesus gives them an account of the events which have just taken place-
22 Saying The Son of man must suffer many things, and be rejected of the elders and chief priests and scribes, and be slain and be raised the third day.
Peter proclaims Jesus as the Messiah, Jesus performs a multitude of miracles in front of thousands upon thousands of people, not just those that are closest to Him, the prophecies are fulfilled one after the other, and the one that we see fulfilled here is exactly what Jesus Himself said, and on the third day, He would arise from the dead. He raised Lazarus and the people believed that Lazarus was alive, why not believe Jesus?
From the very moment of the death of Jesus on the cross, the doubt began to creep in. Had they truly believed in what Jesus had told them, they would not have come to the tomb in preparation to prepare the body after death, they would have been there awaiting His resurrection. They would have been waiting there to meet Him personally. They missed the point!
Point 2: Where did the body of Jesus go?
There is a question that is raised in this Scripture, “WHERE DID THE BODY OF JESUS GO?”
Let us look at the Scripture in verse 4:
4And it came to pass, as they were much perplexed thereabout.
The body of Jesus is not in the tomb, Just as He said would happen, and they find themselves perplexed. Where did the body of Jesus go? The stone was rolled away. The stone was huge enough so that it would not have been easily moved and it is said that there was somewhat a dug-out portion that allowed the stone to set itself in the ground and made for a better seal. The question is asked, where is Jesus’ body? The Roman soldiers that were to guard the body certainly wouldn’t have done anything with it, because the disappearance of a prisoner of such a nature would certainly mean death. The Apostles wouldn’t have hid the body, because all but John were martyred for Jesus, and what was the chance that so many would have died un-necessarily for a lie? The stone was simply to heavy for the women to move on their own. The only logical explanation was that Jesus was raised from the dead, just as had been prophesized.
We have this ability to be select in the things that we believe. You cannot believe in the resurrection without believing everything else that Jesus proclaimed.
There is a saying that tells us that the proof is in the pudding. When we claim Christianity, we are liable for all that this proclamation entails. We must act as Christians, not just during the few hours that we spend in church, but we must act as Christians, 24 hours a day and 7 days a week. There is no vacation from Christianity, there is no recess from our Christian ways. We must speak as Christians, now here there are many that disagree. We have certain words that are substitutions for what we would consider cuss-words. Jesus taught us that the thoughts were identical to the commission. We must walk in places where Christians should walk, actually we should look at the opposite of this, as one who claims Christianity, there are places that we must avoid.
As people who proclaim Christianity we are to forgive if we expect to be forgiven ourselves. Our forgiveness of others needs to go beyond simple lip service. If we haven’t forgiven then in our heart, then as the teaching of Jesus tells us, the internal becomes as fouls as the external. The standards have been raised, just as Jesus is raised from the dead. We that were dead spiritually because of the things that we have done can be raised from that spiritual death, the faith in Jesus, all of the things of Jesus will allow our spiritual resurrection as well. We are all in need of that resurrection at some time, because the Scripture makes it plain, in Romans 3:23 For all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God. Jesus had the plan and He had to go to the cross to fulfill its terms and had to be raised from the dead, just as according to all the things that were foretold.
Point 3: The followers are enlightened [again].
As clueless as the women are at that particular point, they find themselves gloriously enlightened once again. We pick up our Scripture reading with the latter portion of verse 4:
behold, two men stood by them in shining garments: 5And as they were afraid, and bowed down their faces to the earth, they said unto them, Why seek ye the living among the dead? 6He is not here, but is risen: remember how he spake unto you when he was yet in Galilee, 7Saying, The Son of man must be delivered into the hands of sinful men, and be crucified, and the third day rise again.
Now this was probably not like anything that they had planned to encounter as they went about their preparation to go to the tomb, early that morning. We need to remember, that at the time where they were at the tomb, the light of the morning was not yet fully upon them, and the fact that the men who spoke to them were in garments that shown. They were so in awe of the spectacle before them that they were afraid. Everything that they were in expectation of was not happening. They expected to come to a sealed tomb, the stone was rolled away. They entered into the tomb expecting to prepare the Lord’s body, the body was not there. They gazed around bewildered about the events and find themselves face to face with angels from above glowing with a heavenly glow and proclaiming the answers to the questions that they were thinking, they looked for the dead but were reminded that the living would not be found among the dead. The light suddenly comes on.
Point 4: He is not here, He has risen!
They come to the conclusion and the reason that we celebrate this very day – HE IS NOT HERE . . . HE IS RISEN!
Let us look at the last verse of this Scripture, we read in verse 8:
8And they remembered his words,
After the fact, only after seeing the stone moved from where it once was in order to seal the tomb, peering into an empty tomb, a tomb that was guarded by what was probably the elitist of the elite of the Roman soldiers, looking for a dead body that time and time again in the past they were told would come back to life. The proclamations of the heavenly hosts, and finally all that was told them previously begins to make sense. And they remembered His Words!
Conclusion:
It is so sad when we look at how skeptical we have become. The followers of Jesus, these devoted women, who witnessed and experienced some of the miracles themselves doubted and discounted the Words of their Lord and Master. Where do we find ourselves as a society today? The smarter we think we become, the dimmer our spiritual lights become. We are told to become the lights of this world, why? So that people can see us, or that we can illuminate those who fail to know about the awesome gift of Jesus that we so devotedly celebrate today. We oftentimes cheer the souls of others on Christmas by the gifts that we give, when the greatest gift of all should be celebrated today.
They came to the tomb for one purpose while all the while something even greater then what they were expecting has happened. We look around us this morning and see all of the smiling and shining faces, what do we expect when we set foot inside these sanctuary walls. Did we come here this morning seeking out a risen Savior? We need to realize that Jesus is alive and well and sitting at the right hand of the Father this very moment. We know that at some point He will return once again, and then anyone remaining or found skeptical will be lost.
We read in John 1:2 But as many as received Him, to them He gave the right to become children of God, even to those who believe in His name.
The key my brothers and sisters is allowing our faith in what we feel to be true to overcome the skepticism that this world has placed upon our hearts. Allow the miracle of Spiritual rebirth to take place deep within our souls.
The women asked Where did the body of Jesus go? We ask today, where is the Lord? Instead of expecting Him to be sealed from us, He is active upon His throne, working in each and everyone of our hearts through the power of the Holy Spirit. We oftentimes ask for the Holy Spirit to fill this place, He is already here and in fact has never left, it is we who fail to seek Him out.
We read how the The followers are enlightened [again]. Hearing perhaps many times from Jesus Himself and now from the heavenly hosts glowing in all their splendor, perhaps we also need that enlightenment. We read the story of Nicodemus in John’s Gospel chapter 3:
1There was a man of the Pharisees, named Nicodemus, a ruler of the Jews:2 The same came to Jesus by night, and said unto him, Rabbi, we know that thou art a teacher come from God: for no man can do these miracles that thou doest except God be with him.3 Jesus answered and said unto him, Verily, verily, I say unto thee, Except a man be born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God.
We also have that opportunity to be born again and enter into that eternity in heaven with our Lord Jesus. Had He remained where the women had expected we would have no hope of a future, but the battle cry is sounded
He is not here, He has risen!
Do we choose Jesus as our Savior today.
This is a time of celebration, where some see only morbid ness where we rejoice in a man’s death for our spiritual health. He allowed himself to be crucified, He willingly surrendered His own life, and as He said, He did exactly as He said, He Arose!
Praise His Holy Name!
