The Hope of the Resurrection

Amen. This morning, I will be turning not to the book of Acts, but to 1 Corinthians 15.

Chapter 15, I'll be reading verses 1 through 28.

I apologize in advance for a bit of a scratchy throat.

Had I not had to preach on Good Friday service, I wouldn't have even gone because

I wasn't feeling so great.

But the Lord has given me a breath and a cup of water, so I'll try to,

and do give attention as we remind you every Sunday that this is the holy and inspired Word of God.

Now I would remind you, brothers, of the gospel I preached to you,

which you received, in which you stand, and by which you are saved,

if you hold fast to the word I preached to you, unless you believed in vain.

For I delivered to you, as of first importance, what I also received.

That Christ died for our sins in accordance with the Scriptures, that He was buried,

and that He was raised on the third day in accordance with the Scriptures,

and that He appeared to Cephas, and then to twelve, and then he appeared to

more than five hundred brothers at one time, most of whom are still alive,

though some have fallen asleep.

Then he appeared to James, then to all the apostles.

Last of all, as to one untimely born, he also appeared to me.

For I am the least of the apostles, unworthy to be called an apostle,

because I persecuted the church of God.

But by the grace of God, I am what I am, and his word towards me was not in vain.

On the contrary, I worked harder than any of them, though it was not I,

but the grace of God that is with me, whether then it was I or they,

so we preached, and so you believed.

Now, if Christ is proclaimed as raised from the dead, how can some of you say

that there is no resurrection of the dead?

But if there is no resurrection of the dead, then not even Christ has been raised.

And if Christ has not been raised, then our preaching is in vain,

and your faith is in vain.

We are even found to be misrepresenting God because we testified about God that

He raised Christ, whom He did not raise. If it is true, the dead are not raised.

For if the dead are not raised, not even Christ has been raised.

And if Christ has not been raised, your faith is futile, and you are still in your sins.

Then those also who have fallen asleep in Christ have perished If in Christ

we have hope in this life only We are of all people most to be pitied.

But in fact, Christ has been raised from the dead, the firstfruits of those who have fallen asleep.

For as by a man came death, by a man has also come the resurrection of the dead.

For as in Adam all die, so in Christ shall all be made alive.

But each in his own order, Christ the firstfruits, then it is coming those who belong to Christ.

Then comes the end when he delivers the kingdom of God the Father after destroying

every rule and every authority and power. For he must reign until he has put

all his enemies under his feet.

The last enemy to be destroyed is death.

For God has put all things in subjection under his feet.

But when it says all things are put in subjection, it is play that he has accepted

who put all things in subjection under him.

When all things are subjected to him, then the Son himself will also be subjected

to him who put all things in subjection under him, that God may be all in all.

This is the word of the Lord.

You can be seated.

Let's pray together. Be with us now, Holy Spirit, that we might be reminded

of this great doctrine that is more than a doctrine to us.

It is our life, that Christ Jesus was raised from the dead on the third day

according to the scriptures. Amen.

The sermon title this morning is the hope of the resurrection.

And even yesterday, we had our family over together. My kids are still young

in their 20s, most of them.

And in talking to them and talking to many others in our culture,

there seems to be this theme that recurs over and over. Everyone's lying.

Everyone, everywhere is lying about everything.

Heard this from a young man shortly after the whole COVID nightmare that we

faced. He was frustrated because medical experts lied.

They lied about the COVID virus itself. They lied about the vaccines.

They lied about the mask.

Everything that was used to force us to change our lives were primarily lies.

He said both parties, Republicans, Democrats, they're all liars.

Decades of supreme court justices fabricating

gay merit they're liars this is not me

saying all this although congress lies

the president lies teachers at schools lie all the time universities lie those

professors with their phds they're liars the whole of the media lies all the

time about everything again this is this is just a a cynical kind of cultural

perspective especially among our young people.

News outlets, not just by what they say, but by what they don't say,

not just about the questions they ask, but about the ones they never ask.

From every conceivable direction, young people in our culture are convinced

everyone's lying all the time.

It's very discouraging. Yeah, I'll vote, they say, but my vote won't even count.

Why go vote? Why does it matter? Everyone's lying about everything and the elites

are controlling everything. And so what difference does it make?

There's a great deal of discouragement, actually, in our culture.

And even, as we'll say later, marriages that fall apart after 40 years, 40 years. What happens?

What happens is people lose hope. They just lose hope.

I remember sitting in Uganda years and years ago. It was a presidential election.

Our driver was there with me. My wife was getting her hair cut.

And I said, who are you voting for? He said, it doesn't matter.

Won't make a difference. The president always wins, which he does.

You think 2020 was bad. It happens every presidential election in many, many nations.

He said, it doesn't matter. I don't care. I don't have any hope that anything will change.

The one thing that I want to encourage you with this morning is that even though

you may feel like the rest of us, that there's lies flying at us from every different direction.

Change, cultural change, political change, economic, doesn't seem very likely,

but Jesus Christ has been raised from the dead.

Amen? And that gives us hope.

Whatever lies we're hearing, whatever marriages are falling apart,

whatever political disaster is looming, whatever war is happening,

we're all being discouraged from almost every direction. But this morning,

we should be encouraged by the hope of the resurrection of Jesus Christ.

In our passage, it says he was not only resurrected, but he ascended.

And in his resurrection power, all these things have been put under his feet.

And he will rule and reign until they've all been defeated. And there's great hope in that.

Paul wants us to remind us of how important it is to believe in the resurrection

and to find hope in the resurrection, without which he says,

there is no hope. You realize that.

Without the resurrection, we don't have hope.

In fact, without the resurrection, you could say, no resurrection, no Christianity.

Nothing matters, either in this life or the one to come. Paul makes a very potent

argument. Listen to what he says.

If Christ is not risen, our preaching is empty, vain, and your faith is also

empty. Your faith is vain.

If Christ is not risen, your faith is futile and you're still in your sins. No hope.

And also those who have fallen asleep, hopeless, hopeless, hopeless.

Your life is hopeless. The gospel is hopeless.

Your death is hopeless. There's no hope, period.

Paul makes it very clear that this doctrine is central. It's the linchpin,

if you will, on everything that the scriptures have preached and taught up to

the coming of Christ and everything that comes afterwards.

It is the fulcrum of our faith is the resurrection of the Lord Jesus Christ.

It may have been also, and even up until this day, one of the deepest divides in all of Christianity.

It's not that whether you're a Baptist or Methodist or Presbyterian,

but one of the deepest divides that has destroyed the church in our country

is multiple numbers of churches simply denying the resurrection.

Vast numbers of mainline churches simply don't believe it or teach it anymore.

By the way, what's left to teach? Oh yeah, the Sermon on the Mount, right?

Be nice, be fair, be a peacemaker, be good, but no hope in it.

Nothing to preach, nothing to proclaim, nothing to say there's good things in

the future now and in the future.

In 1923, I marvel at this because just in 2023 was the 50th anniversary.

1923, J. Gresham Machen, our

founder, yay, our founder wrote a book called Christianity and Liberalism.

And he argued so persuasively that when liberalism and

liberal churches denied the authority of the scripture denied the

the necessity of believing in the bodily historic resurrection of jesus christ

they didn't just create a different kind of christianity they created a different

religion altogether that's not christianity no church that denies the resurrection

of jesus christ is a true church of jesus christ.

He says this, he writes, the present time is a time of conflict.

The great redemptive religion, which has always been known as Christianity,

is battling against a totally diversive type of religious belief,

which is the only more destructive of the Christian faith because it makes use

of traditional Christian terminology.

They wear robes, they have pulpits, they have churches, they have ministers,

but they deny the resurrection of Jesus Christ. They are not Christians.

And you don't have Christianity.

In those days, it was primarily because of naturalism. The liberals denied miracles

and the supernatural and affirmed the naturalism.

In these days, it's both that as well as weird and strange, mysterious kinds

of supernaturalism, even as we said in Sunday school, aliens and other UFOs and other such things.

Nonetheless, there's still this lack of credibility in the historical reality

of the resurrection of Jesus Christ,

without which Paul says there is no Christianity. It's that important.

If Christ is not risen, preaching is vain. Your faith is vain.

In fact, we're the most to be pitied and mocked.

But thanks be to God, Christ is risen. Amen? And it makes a difference for us. It's our religion.

Our religion is different than any other religion in the whole world.

Because we have a historic religion, things that were said in the scriptures

actually really did happen, including, and most importantly,

the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead.

If you're a Buddhist, you believe in a collection of Buddhist sayings and beliefs

and meditation, Hindus, all other religions.

But this religion, our religion, depends historically on Jesus Christ,

his real true historic life, his real true historic resurrection.

I want to look at a couple of reasons why it's so powerful for us as believers,

why we can have hope, why the resurrection matters so much.

First of all, it's an image of our salvation.

Think about that. Paul said, if it didn't happen, you don't have salvation. But it did happen.

And then Paul himself uses this image of the resurrection as the very image

of how we became born again, regenerated and saved.

Listen to what he says. It's resurrection language.

In college, everyone used to argue, what's Paul's central doctrine?

What's the organizing doctrine of Pauline theology?

And in those days, good Protestant young man that I was, it's,

well, justification of my faith alone. That's it.

The more I've read Paul, the more I realize I'm not a Pauline scholar,

but the more I've read Paul, the more I realize that it's not just justification by faith.

One could even argue that resurrection, resurrection is tangled up in everything

that Paul teaches about justification by faith alone, about eschatology and

end times, about everything.

The resurrection is central to Pauline theology.

Listen to what he says about our salvation. And listen to the resurrection language.

Ephesians chapter 2, and you he made alive.

Ephesians 2 · chapter mention

Why? Because you were dead in your trespasses and sins in which you once walk

in the course of this world according to the prince of the power of the world,

Satan, the devil, who ruled as a dark death-like force.

Death was his last instrument.

That now works, he says, in the sons of disobedience, among whom also some of

you, yourselves, conducted your lives after the lust of the flesh,

fulfilling the desires of the flesh and of the mind, and were by nature children

of wrath, just as the others.

But God, who is rich in mercy because of his great love with which he loved

us, even when you were dead in your trespasses, made us alive together with Christ.

Resurrection is central image to our salvation.

Colossians 2, Paul says again, you were buried with him in baptism in which

you were also raised with him through faith and the working of God who raised him from the dead.

Resurrection central to the theology, not just as a doctrine, central to who we are.

We are a people who without Christ are dead, but in Christ we're resurrected, we're made alive.

He has made alive together with him, having forgiven all your trespasses,

having wiped out the handwriting of requirements that was against us,

which was contrary to us, and having taken it out of the way,

having nailed it to the cross,

having disarmed principalities and powers, he made a public spectacle of them, triumphing over them.

And when he was raised from the dead and when he ascended into heaven, he's ruling over them.

It says all principalities and all powers everywhere in heaven and on earth

are under the rule of our resurrected Lord.

This passage has been used multiple times in multiple ways for us to remember

not just that the resurrection happened, that it's a good doctrine,

it's a central doctrine, but it's my salvation depends on it.

And the image that we saw in John chapter 11 has been used.

John 11 · chapter mention

If you look at, if you read sermons from John chapter 11, it's constantly used

John 11 · chapter mention

as reference to an image of our salvation.

The great preacher George Whitefield used this sermon once, used this illustration.

Whitfield was a famous preacher who was one of the most doctrinally sound preachers,

but also whose preaching was so alive with vivid illustrations.

When he stood on the side of a ship, you know, he used illustrations from sailors

and the ocean and the seas.

When he was in the business district, he used financial illustrations.

Listen to the section of one of Whitfield's sermons. When he looks at the passage

we read about Lazarus, he's speaking to us.

There's a little bit of an old, old English. There's a few ye's and they's and

this's and thou's, but listen to it.

It says, come ye dead, Christless, unconverted sinners. Come and see the place

where they laid the body of the deceased Lazarus. He's a good preacher.

He's inviting you into this illustration.

Behold him laid out, bound hand and foot with grave clothes,

locked up and stinking in a cave, dark cave with a great stone placed on top

of it. View him again and again.

Go nearer to him. Don't be afraid. Smell him, he says. Oh, how he stinketh.

Oh how he stinketh you'll notice the bible by the way doesn't shy away from these,

grotesque and difficult images good friday

service i preached on the humiliation of christ and it

still sort of shocks you again of all the brutal language have happened to our

to our god he says stop there and pause a moment and whilst you are gay that

whilst thou art gazing upon the corpse of lazarus give me leave to tell thee

with great plainness but greater love that this dead bound entombed,

and stinking carcass is but a faint representation of thy poor soul.

Isn't that amazing? Your natural state, he says, for whether thou believest

or not, thy spirit, which thou bearest with thee,

sepulchreed in flesh and blood, is as literally dead to God and as truly dead

in trespasses and sins as the body of Lazarus was in that grave.

Was he bound hand and foot with grave clothes? So thou are also bound foot and

hand by thy corruptions.

And as the stone was laid on the sepulcher, so there was a stone of unbelief

upon thy stupid heart. No, you're not supposed to use that word these days, but...

Whitfield did, so. On thy stupid heart, perhaps thou hast lain in this state

not only for days, but for many years, stinking in the nostrils of God.

And what is still more affecting, thou art as able to raise thyself out of this

lonesome dead state to life of righteousness and true holiness as ever Lazarus

was to raise himself from the cave in which he laid so long.

Thou mayst try for the power of thy own boasted free will and will and the force

of energy of moral persuasion or rational arguments, all of which without doubt

have the proper place in religion.

But all thy efforts exerted with never so much vigor will prove quite fruitless

and abortive till that same Jesus who said, take away the stone and cried,

Lazarus comes forth, also quickens you.

That's good stuff. Some might say it's Calvinism, all that boasted free will, that nonsense.

I love the way Whitefield weaves this into it without questioning the free will

and predestination. He just, look, you're dead.

Dead men don't take medicine. He didn't ply the mouth open. He was dead.

Dead people don't breathe. Dead people don't eat. They don't take medicine. No, he's dead.

And the only way to bring him back to life was the resurrection voice of Jesus

Christ that spoke into the darkness of that dead tomb and called him out.

It's an image this morning that should give us good hope. If you're saved,

if you believe in the Lord Jesus Christ, it's not because of anything you've done or could do.

You can't raise yourself from the dead.

But God, who is rich in mercy, has made us alive in Christ. We're powerless otherwise.

Without the resurrection of Lord Jesus Christ, we're powerless.

Resurrection change, what about from there on? Well, I was raised from the dead,

okay, fine, but now it's all my job to, no, even beyond that,

after salvation, after regeneration, after faith in Christ, now what?

How do we make it? How do we live well?

Resurrection power. It's the resurrection of Jesus Christ that gave us our life.

It's the resurrection of Jesus

Christ that continues to give us the power necessary to live a holy life.

Nothing can ever be the same for you if you're a believer.

You don't get to say, well, I, no, if you're resurrected from the dead and have

life in Christ, he will keep you with his powerful resurrection power,

giving you life. Notice what Paul says.

Romans chapter 6, he asked the question, well, once you're saved, can you continue in sin?

Romans 6 · chapter mention

People love this, especially people who have stumbled into sin. Well, I say stumbled.

Most people treat sin as if they did stumble, slipped on a carpet,

slipped on ice, fell down the stairs. Oops.

Now, if you've actually committed a sin and you wonder, now what?

And Paul says, should you continue? Should you just keep doing it and say,

well, I've made a decision. I'm saved. No.

He said, shall we continue in sin that grace may abound? It's a good deal if

you're a stubborn sinner, right?

Well, I'm just gonna keep on sinning and then very close to the end, I'll say, oops, sorry.

Well, Paul says, certainly not. How shall we who died to sin live any longer in it?

Or do you not know that as many as us as were baptized into Jesus were baptized

into his death? Therefore, we were buried with him through baptism into death.

Listen, just as Christ was raised from the dead to the glory of the father,

even so we now should walk in newness of life.

Not only the life we've been given, but the life that we live in newness of life.

For if we have been united together in the likeness of his death,

certainly we are united in the likeness of his resurrection.

Knowing this, that our old man was crucified with him and the body of sin that

I might be done away with, that we should no longer be slaves to sin.

And I know some of you are struggling with these things. There are sins we have

in our lives that feel like they just have gotten ahold of us and we can't get rid of them.

Paul even describes the sexual sin as like a trap. It snaps shut on you.

You can't shake it off. You can't get rid of it.

But in the power of the resurrection of Jesus Christ, we're reminded we can,

through Christ and his resurrection power, break free, not our own power,

but the resurrection working in us.

Paul even says, because of the resurrection, you should reckon yourselves dead to sin, but what?

But alive in Christ, in God, through Christ Jesus our Lord.

We do not let sin reign in our mortal bodies. Why?

Because the principle of resurrection that gave us life is the same principle

and power of the resurrection that continues us in a holy living.

Sins are removed. Sins are taken away. Sins are defeated. Sins are covered.

And holiness comes to us through the power of the resurrection.

You've been made alive by the power of the endless life of Jesus Christ.

And too many people miss this. Too many people, if you look at that story,

think of the resurrection like Martha and Mary both did.

You always hear the Martha and Mary story, like one stayed in the kitchen.

But in this story, central to this,

are both people, both women asking the question, why weren't you here?

If you would have been here, it wouldn't have happened, but it's okay.

Someday, someday, yes, there's going to be a resurrection.

You'll notice that Jesus is redirecting their attention away from this question

of thinking that, yes, there's resurrection, and yes, it will happen at the end.

Verse 27 of John 11 says, she said to him, yes, Lord, I believe that you are

the Christ, He's the son of God who is to come in the world.

I believe that your Messiah, I believe if you had been here,

you could have healed him.

And the dual lament of both these women heightens the sense of mourning, the lament for Jesus.

When he sees them mourning, it moves him deeply.

And Jesus identifies himself with us as he weeps here in this passage.

I love this passage. You know, when I was a little boy, I'll tell another story about my granny Burns.

She has more illustrations than any other person in human history for me.

She always used to make us memorize the Bible. As a kid, you're like, come on.

The granny was memorized. So one summer, I'd already planned ahead for granny's little trick.

What's your Bible verse for vacation in Bible school? John 11, 32.

Jesus wept. I was like, yes, shortest verse in the Bible.

I was like, done. I had no memorization to do. I'm done. Go play.

I can go to vacation Bible school, cruise along and have fun.

But that verse, as tiny as it is, is one of the most power-packed little verses.

He laments with us. He weeps with us. He understands us.

He's a sympathetic high priest to those who suffer. In the resurrection power

that we receive from him, it's a sympathetic power.

He understands our weakness. He has been tempted in every way.

There's nothing you face.

There's nothing you're suffering under that Christ hasn't already also faced yet without sin.

And he reminds them that this power of the resurrection is not something we

have to wait for to the end of the world.

Because she said, yes, Lord, I know there's going to be a resurrection.

Yes, Lord, I know. Both of them say the same sort of thing.

But they're both looking at the resurrection in a way that's different from

what Jesus, because in Jesus' answer, he said, I am the resurrection and the life.

He who believes in me, present tense, though he may die, he shall live.

And whoever lives and believes in me shall never die.

The resurrection that Jesus was talking about coming through him wasn't something

that we wait for off at the end of the world. It's right here and right now.

We live in that power. He said, I am the resurrection. Resurrection has come

through Christ. It's in Christ.

And a new principle of life was intruding into the world.

The principle of death had been set in motion by the fall and the principle

of life and resurrection now comes to us through Jesus Christ.

You might say, well, yeah, but why are we at war with Iran? And why hasn't Trump

prosecuted anybody on the Epstein file or whatever?

Well, it's not yet complete. I love this. I discovered this in seminary. I love that.

Theologians who talk about this principle of the intrusion and introduction

of the nowness of the resurrection do have to say, well, it's already, ready, but not yet.

There's a lot of theologians. They call themselves already, but not yet guys.

It's true though The resurrection has already come But it's not yet here in

its fullest And the not yetness will be completed at the final resurrection

But don't miss the alreadyness of it It's already here And we have a sympathetic high priest,

like I said Who understands our weaknesses Who has walked where we have walked

Who suffered as we have suffered Who was betrayed as we are betrayed.

Still in the presence here of the stench of death.

Whitefield mentions that odious sense of death and darkness,

very morbid, and that reminds us of what death brings into the world.

I actually had an experience once in Africa where I went to do a burial in the

mountains, in the village, deep up in the mountain, a couple hours' drive.

I got there, there was an old man that had died and had been in his hut for

three days before they found him.

And they don't have morticians up in the mountains in eastern Uganda.

They don't have funeral homes up there. Everyone gets buried in their backyard.

And I remember thinking about the story of Lazarus, because when I went up to

the coffin, it was overwhelming.

We've had a mouse die in our house before, and you're like, you know,

what's that? What is that? What?

You look it up, you find a little skeleton. But a human life,

very startlingly different. And I remember even walking up with my Bible,

going to get ready to preach a little resurrection sermon, and I almost...

Reacted. But sometimes when you come across an odor like that,

a stench like that, it literally just turns your stomach.

I had to keep looking away, pretending I was moving and gesturing somehow just

to get a breath and hold my breath.

And it was horrible, absolutely horrible.

And Jesus stood there looking into that grave with that odor coming out,

the odor and the stench of his own friend.

And it says he was agitated and he wept and he was overwhelmed.

But I don't think it was merely just a human emotion either,

just about Martha and Mary and his friend Lazarus.

It was partly, I think, what he looked into that tomb to see.

It wasn't just Lazarus' death, but also what he was facing, what he was about to face for us.

He was entering into the arena of death. I think that's what Calvin calls it.

Almost like a wrestler goes into the arena and faces this final wrestling match.

Calvin says Christ didn't come as a spectator to the sepulchre,

not as an idle spectator, but like a wrestler, preparing for the contest.

Therefore, no wonder that he groans under again.

For the violent tyranny of death that he had to overcome stands right there before his eyes.

And nothing could be the same for him. And because he followed through and walked

from that grave into his own grave, nothing can be the same for us as well.

Nothing. The good shepherd would be devoured by the wolves here.

The light of the world would be shut up in darkness.

The fountain of living waters will cry out on the cross that he thirsts.

The list goes on and on of the ironies of what Christ faced when he stood there

in front of that grave, knowing that he was going to enter it for us,

so that we would not have to face what we so rightly deserve to face.

Don't ever disconnect the resurrection from the cross.

You can't make sense of the resurrection without what Christ was certainly wrestling

with as he looked into the tomb of his friend Lazarus.

And there's such great encouragement in that for us, because as we go out of

this building, we will wrestle with things we can't change.

Will wrestle with suffering that will be our suffering, perhaps the rest of our lives.

And when we do so, we look to Christ who has wrestled as we have wrestled and yet has overcome it.

We do not have, Hebrews 4 says, a high priest who cannot sympathize with our

weaknesses, but in all points has been tempted as we are, yet without sin.

Therefore, I love this, come boldly to the throne of grace that we may obtain

mercy and find grace in our time of need.

The human experiences of our Savior more than just doctrine.

It's indeed absolutely necessary as a part of our theological system.

He had to be both God, he had to be man, and all of that's true.

But as the one who suffered in this world, he understands us.

He placed himself under the power of death for a time so that he could do for

us what we just can't and never could do for ourselves.

He was despised and rejected by men, acquainted with grief.

He was despised, and we did not esteem him. Surely he has borne our griefs and

carried our sorrows, yet we esteemed him stricken, smitten by God, and afflicted.

All of this was for us, the whole scene of Lazarus, the whole preparation of

Christ for entering not just the tomb of Lazarus and calling him forth,

but preparation for his entering his own grave and his own sorrow.

And the aloneness of death and the pain of the cross could not have been deeper

for anyone as it was for Jesus.

No one has ever faced it alone. No one.

And the great thing is he faced it alone so that we would never have to face it alone.

We don't need to avoid death. It's not that we should be, as I said in Acts,

not starving to die somehow in some strange way, but we don't need to be afraid of death.

Christians don't need to avoid death, but live in the face of death as those

who are not afraid because the same power that regenerates you,

saves you and gives you life is the same power that is keeping you alive.

Jesus said, I am the resurrection and the life. And nothing in history can ever

be the same from the point of resurrection.

I'm going to preach. I'm already thinking about a sermon from Acts chapter 17.

Acts 17 · chapter mention

Acts chapter 17, where Paul uses the resurrection as the very most important

Acts 17 · chapter mention

historical hinge in all of history.

Nothing can be the same for anyone in the whole world since then.

And we need that hope, by the way. We need the hope.

Without hope, there's really nothing worth living life for. There's not.

And some of you right now, and some of you will, and all of us most certainly

somehow will face the kind of suffering that requires us to hope beyond that suffering.

Intractable difficulties. As I said earlier, I've marveled over the years as

a pastor and as family members and friends of mine, they announced to us,

we're getting divorced,

but you have seven kids and you've been married 39, 40 years. What?

In my mind, I'm thinking, just hang on for the kid's sake, you know,

kind of separate in your retirement and keep it quiet.

I'm not, I'm just kidding. But I'm practically, how do you live 40 years with

someone and then towards the sunset years of your life, just say, I'm done.

It's because they lost hope. In every single case, that's exactly,

he's never going to change. She's never going to change. I'm never going to have this.

It's going to be suffering forever. And they give up because they have no hope.

When you don't have hope, it destroys everything.

Sometimes even at the beginning of marriage counseling for me Just to prep you

if you come in I often ask the person who says I don't feel like I can live

with this person anymore unless they change Ask yourself the central question

What if they never change,

No, I'm here for you to, usually it's one or the other, wanting me to change

the other one, by the way. I want you to change him so I can live.

I want you to make her a better, whatever.

But what if there is no change?

The rest of your life, you will live in this.

What if there's a situation that you can't change?

Suffering, disease, sickness, whatever. It's not going to get better.

We know it scientifically, we know it. It's not getting better and it's not

going to get better. Then what?

No hope of a miracle, no hope of change. Where do you go from there?

Many of us can spend our whole lives pushing down the reality of these kinds

of situations and living as if everything will get better. Things don't get better all the time.

You might think, whoa, whoa, I thought this was an Easter sermon. You're depressing me.

The good news, and there is good news, is that in spite of your husband,

in spite of your wife, in spite of your family, in spite of disease,

in spite of cancer, in spite of incurable diseases and things that will cause

us suffering our whole lives long, in spite of that,

Jesus Christ has been raised from the dead and there is always hope.

There's always hope to live a life in reference to the resurrection of Christ

who made you alive and through his resurrection power will keep you alive.

And finally, as you make it through the suffering of this life,

yes, that's a great way, sooner or later, you will be raised from the dead and

all things will be made right.

Every disease cured Every tear wiped away No more tears No more sorrow Everything

will be put right This has been the principle by which I'm convinced Christianity

has Continued to live its whole existence G.K.

Chesterton I think Is the one that said Christianity has died Many times in history.

Do you feel like that about the culture? We're dead. We're done.

Rome has fallen. Okay. But Christ has been raised from the dead.

And the church will never fail. And the power of God to save his people will never end.

And the resurrection power of Jesus Christ lives on, even in the face of death,

even standing smack dab in front of the cave of a stenching corpse.

And that's how Christianity has grown. I have a book in my office.

I can't wait to put it on my new bookshelves when my bookshelves are done.

It's called The Rise of Christianity by Rodney Stark, and he gives a lot of

reasons for it, but most of it comes down to the resurrection.

The church throughout its history has been persecuted, as we see in the book

of Acts. People flee. They go different places.

Empires have come and empires have gone. Nations have risen and nations have

fallen. But the church of Jesus Christ just steadily marches on. Why?

They believe in the resurrection power of Christ.

Chesterton's answer, by the way, to that, the church has died many times,

but there's good news that the church believes in the resurrection.

It always seems to be raised up again from the dead, and it is.

And religious leaders in the ancient world, when diseases came and when famines

came and when wars came and when everyone else despaired and lost hope,

the church remained tightly knit together with the hope of the resurrection of Jesus Christ.

And it gives us a sense of courage and a sense of hope in the midst of so many struggles.

One theologian says this, and I'll begin to end with this.

He says, I have found myself discovering that mostly I do not need more advice.

Hopefully I'm not giving you advice today on the resurrection.

Do you believe it? Yay. He says what I need is strength.

Don't need new information. I need courage, freedom and authorization to act

when I already have in the gospel.

The deep places in our lives, places of resistance and embrace are not ultimately

reached by instruction only.

Those places of resistance and embrace are reached only by stories,

by images, by metaphors, by phrases that line out the world differently apart

from our fear and hurt. The resurrection gives us that hope.

It gives us the strength. It gives us the courage that we can resist and embrace

the resurrection of Jesus Christ no matter what we're going through,

no matter what we will face.

Again, good news, bad news. Many of you will face these kinds of things.

Maybe some of you already are.

It's not going to change. But the good news is the resurrection of Jesus Christ

gives you the faith, the hope, and the courage to embrace the power and life

of the resurrection of Jesus Christ. Let's pray.

Father in heaven, we love you so, so much. We thank you that your love was given

to us at the cross, but also, Lord, the power of your resurrection,

that you not only faced death with your friend Lazarus, but you faced death yourself.

You faced the torment and the scourging and the humiliation,

the mockery of the cross, and you bore that cross for us.

And three days under the power of death, you rose from the dead, and now we have hope.

Oh Lord, we thank you for the hope of the resurrection. We pray that you would

send us out with that hope as we eat and drink this morning the body and blood of our Savior.

Give us the hope that in spite of whatever our circumstances,

whatever cynicism that hangs over our culture like a dark cloud,

those clouds are removed by the sunshine of the resurrection of jesus christ

pray that you would remind us of how we were saved,

and how we are sanctified and where we are going in the hope of the resurrection

i pray this in jesus name amen.