EASTER Because He is Risen. Matthew 28:1-10. By Pastor David A. Ritchie. Easter Sunday, March 27, 2016

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1 EASTER 2016 Because He is Risen Matthew 28:1-10 By Pastor David A. Ritchie Easter Sunday, March 27, 2016 Read: Mt. 28:1-10. This is God s Word. Thanks be to God! Prayer. Around the first century, there were actually many men who claimed to be the messiah. They all promised to deliver God s people from oppression. They all promised to bring about the Kingdom of God. They all had followers. But then, they were all crucified by the Roman Empire. And they were all forgotten, with one very major exception Jesus Christ of Nazareth. Of all the men who claimed to be messiahs, and of all the men who were crucified, only Jesus started a movement that has spread across every continent of the globe. Only Jesus tore a hole in the fabric of history so that it was split into two pieces. Only Jesus is right this very moment being worshipped and celebrated by people from every nation. And why is that? It s not because Jesus died on a cross. After all, everyone dies. It is because after he died, Jesus did something that made him utterly unique from every person who has ever lived. He didn t stay dead. To this very day you can go into Jerusalem and look into a tomb that is been empty for two thousand years. Because He Is Risen! Without the resurrection, the cross would have meant nothing. But because of the resurrection, the cross means everything! 1 So for the next few moments, on this Easter Sunday, I want to take a closer look at how Matthew, who was one of Jesus s twelve disciples tells the story of the most important event in all of Scripture. And from this text, I want to share with you four implications Jesus s resurrection. 1.) Because he is risen, God has conquered death. On Friday Jesus died a humiliating death on a cross. This wasn t just a death. It was a death of physical torture. It was a death filled with very most shame and indignation that humans could possibly conjure. His body was taken down from the cross, wrapped in linen, and placed into a tomb that was sealed with a heavy stone. And there in the grave the body of Jesus lay all of Saturday. At this point in the narrative, it would seem that Jesus was just another poor soul who had been 1 Without this reversal of the ignominy of the cross, Jesus death would have atoned for nothing. The resurrection demonstrates Christ s vindication by God, who reestablishes him as Lord of the cosmos. Blomberg, Craig L. The new American Commentary: Matthew. Vol. 22. (Nashville: B&H, 1992),

2 executed at the hands of the Roman Empire. It would seem like he was just another man who met the natural, inevitable end of death that we all face. It seems to be a sadly normal story. But then Sunday came. And two women who loved Jesus and followed Jesus came to visit his tomb. And suddenly the story isn t normal any more. An angel descends like a lighting strike, with blinding light. The earth quakes. The stone rolls away. And the guards decide that this job doesn t pay enough and flee the scene. This imagery is brief but it is saying something profound. The guards who are supposed to be guarding a dead man now become themselves like dead men (Mt. 28:4). 2 The ones who are supposed to represent the power of Man s Empire tremble before the power of the Kingdom of God. Heaven has invaded earth. The supernatural has overwhelmed the natural. I remember as a teenager growing very cynical toward religion. There was so much suffering and death in the world, and I didn t see how a good God could possibly exist. So even though I grew up in a Christian home and going to church, I rejected what I thought was Christianity. To me the gospel seemed like just another system of morality or religion about how we could try to be better people so that we could go to heaven. My story like the story of so many millennials was all too normal. But later when I went to college, due to the influence of some Christian friends who reached out to me, I began to read the Bible for myself. And one night, in my college dorm room at West Texas A&M as I was reading the book of Romans, suddenly my story wasn t normal anymore. Heaven invaded my dead heart. The Spirit of God illuminated my eyes to see something that I had never seen before. I saw that God hasn t ignored our suffering and death. In fact, through Jesus he has entered into creation so that he could take our suffering and death upon himself. Why? Because we could never be good enough to work ourselves to heaven. So instead, heaven came down. God came down and, not only endured death, he conquered death in dramatic fashion! And, you see, this actually sets the Christian gospel apart from every religion and philosophy in the world. Religion may be about what you can do, but the gospel is about what he has done! Through the resurrection, God has conquered death so that we too my have the hope of resurrection! We can t earn it. We can deserve it. We can only respond to it by believing. 2.) Because he is risen, Jesus is Lord. After the guards run way, the angel speaks to the women, who themselves are filled with terror. He tells them that Jesus who was crucified is not there anymore. The King has left the building. They look into the tomb for themselves, and then the angel tells them to leave and tell the disciples. On there way back to the city, I m sure their hearts are pounding. But then something happens that probably makes their hearts stop. They encounter the risen Lord 2 Wilkinson, Michael J. The NIV Application Commentary: Matthew. (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 2004),

3 themselves. And they respond the only way they could they fall down before his feet and worship him. Now here is the interesting thing. Whenever people in the Bible see something crazysupernatural, they will fall down and worship. When Paul and Barnabas performed miracles, people tried to worship them (Acts 14:11-16). When John saw an angel in the book of Revelation, he tried to worship him (Rev. 22:8-9). But in each of those instances, the apostles and the angel said, Don t do that. You shouldn t worship us. But that is not what happens here. Why? Because Jesus isn t an apostle or an angel. The resurrection has revealed that Jesus is something entirely different. The resurrection has revealed once and for all that Jesus is Lord and God. 3 People in the ancient world often misunderstood who Jesus really was. Some people thought he was a prophet from God, like one of the guys from the Old Testament. Some people thought that he was political revolutionary. We do this today too. Most of the time our culture wants to make Jesus into nothing more than a wise spiritual teacher who never really claimed to be God. Often times when this happens, instead of actually listening to Jesus s words, we tend to remake Jesus into our own image. We re like Ricky Bobby in Talladega Nights, praying to sweet little baby Jesus. We come up with the version of Jesus we like best. Because that way we can choose to ignore the things that Jesus said or did that we may not like. But the resurrection changes all of that. If Jesus didn t rise from the dead, then there is no reason to worry about his moral teachings or the teachings of the rest of Scripture. 4 God s words can be inspirational or thought provoking, but they are not binding to any sense and can be they bent and broken when it is convenient. But if Jesus did rise from the dead, he is the rightful Lord of our lives. The only response to him is the response that these women gave humble worship. Submit your life to him completely. Don t respond with indifference. Don t make him just an optional hobby or category of your life. Plus, the whole Jesus as a moral teacher argument doesn t really hold up when you actually read about Jesus in the Bible. The great scholar C.S. Lewis says it best: I am trying here to prevent anyone saying the really foolish thing that people often say about Him: I'm ready to accept Jesus as a great moral teacher, but I don't accept His claim to be God. That is the one thing we must not say. A man who was merely a man and said the sort of things Jesus said would not be a great moral teacher. He would either be a lunatic on the level with the man who says he is a poached egg or else he would be the Devil of Hell. You must make your choice. Either this man was, and is, the Son of God: or else a madman or something worse. You can shut Him up for a fool, you can spit at Him and kill Him as a demon; or you can fall at His feet and call Him Lord and God. But let us not come with any patronizing nonsense about His being a great human teacher. He has not left that open to us. He did not intend to. 5 3 Ibid., Keller, Timothy. The Reason for God: Belief in an Age of Skepticism. (New York: Riverhead, 2008), Lewis, C.S. Mere Christianity. (New York: HarperCollins, 2001),

4 3.) Because he is risen, the church has a mission It is interesting that, after the resurrection, both the angel and the Lord immediately give the women a mission. Many commentators have noticed the significance that the first people who are given the privilege of announcing the resurrection of Jesus Christ are women. Now today, this wouldn t surprise anyone. But in the ancient world this was almost scandalous, because in this period of history, often women were viewed so poorly that their testimony wasn t even admissible as reliable evidence in a court of law. So if the disciples were going to just steal the body of Jesus and then make up the story of the resurrection this is not the way you would do it. 6 But this is how God would do it. He chooses humble women and ignorant fishermen to proclaim the news of the greatest event in history to the whole world. God chose the unworthy and the unlikely, and he still chooses the unworthy and unlikely. And this missionary group of unworthy and unlikely people has a name; it s name is the church. If you are a believer in the resurrection of Jesus, you have not just been saved from the power of death. You have been invited to participate in the greatest movement in history! We have all been called to declare the gospel with our words and to display the gospel with our lives. And in a world that is filled with global terrorism, political turmoil, racial division, and hatred, believe me the hope of the resurrection is just what this world needs. New Testament theologian N.T. Wright says this about the missionary call of every Christian: The point of following Jesus isn t simply so that we can be sure of going to a better place than this after we die. Our future beyond death is enormously important, but the nature of the Christian hope is such that it plays back into the present life. We re called here and now, to be instruments of God s new creation, the world-put-to-rights, which has already been launched in Jesus and of which Jesus followers are supposed to be not simply beneficiaries but also agents. 7 So if you are not part of a local church, join with Jesus s people. Become a part of the mission! 4.) Because he is risen, you and I can know the hope of resurrection too. These words were written by Matthew, who was one of Jesus twelve disciples. And Matthew was an evangelist. The reason Matthew wrote this story was to invite his readers to invite us into the story. When this message was first publically preached in Jerusalem 2000 years ago, the crowds asked a very good question, What must we do to be saved? (Acts 2:38). And the answer that was given was to Repent and be baptized everyone of you in the name of the Jesus Christ. So I want to give you the invitation today: repent and be baptized in the name of Jesus Christ. 6 Platt, David. Christ-Centered Exposition: Exalting Jesus in Matthew. (Nashville: B&H, 2013), Wright, N.T. Simply Christian: Why Christianity Makes Sense. (New York, HarperCollins, 2006), xi. 4

5 Now the word repent may sound like a really religious word. But here is what it means: it means change your way of thinking and your way of living; turn away from your sin and selfishness, and turn toward Jesus. Believe in Jesus. Believe in righteous life that he lived. Believe in the death he died. Believe in his resurrection. And as you repent, be baptized. Baptism is an act when one who believes in Jesus is immersed into water. Baptism is a spiritually charged sacrament that represents our union with Christ s death and resurrection through faith. Baptism tells and retells the gospel story. This is what Romans 6:3-5 says, Do you not know that all of us who have been baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into his death? We were buried therefore with him by baptism into death, in order that, just as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, we too might walk in newness of life. For if we have been united with him in a death like his, we shall certainly be united with him in a resurrection like his (Rom. 6:3-5). So today, if you have never done so I want to invite you to do repent and be baptized on this special day. Maybe God has been moving on your heart these last few days, weeks, or months. Maybe you would even say you feel like he has been calling you and reaching out to you. Now is the time to respond to his Spirit. Now is the time to publically commit to become a follower of Christ! And for every Christian that is in this place, I want to encourage you to continue to immerse yourself in the glorious truth of resurrection hope. If God can bring life out of death, he can certainly bring the power of resurrection life into your depression, into your marriage, into your children, and into your pain. Let your heart continue to be baptized into this reality! Today on this Easter Sunday, we worship a God who has conquered death, a Christ who is Lord, a Holy Spirit who has given us a mission and a hope because he is risen! Amen. 5