Light | Easter Sunday(Apr 9) Myles Holmes

Hello and welcome to the Redemption Church Podcast.

We're a church in Newmarket, Ontario, Canada that exists to glorify God through the fulfillment of the Great Commission and the spirit of the Great Commandment.

Thanks for joining us today.

When evening had come, since it was the day of preparation, that is, the day before the Sabbath, Joseph of Arimathea, a respected member of the council, who was also himself looking for the kingdom of God, took courage and went to Pilate and asked for the body of Jesus.

Pilate was surprised to hear that he should have already died.

And summoning the centurion, he asked him whether he was already dead.

And when he learned from the centurion that he was dead, he granted the corpse to Joseph.

And Joseph brought a linen shroud, and taking him down, wrapped him in the linen shroud and laid him in a tomb that had been cut out of the rock, and he rolled a stone against the entrance of the tomb.

Let's pray together, church.

Father, God, we thank you.

We thank you that we can celebrate this weekend the most important moment that ever occurred in the history of humanity.

Lord, the day that the body of Christ was laid in a tomb.

And God, as we have celebrated, as we have witnessed, symbolized through baptism, God, that wasn't the end.

God, that body would breathe.

He would be risen again, and with him would rise our only hope in this world and in the life to come.

And so, God, we thank you for all that we celebrate this morning.

And God, as we continue to celebrate it by submitting our hearts to your word, Lord, would you continue to speak to us and fill us with an awe of all that you have done?

God, thank you.

And we pray this all in the name of your Son.

Amen.

If you have your Bibles, and I hope that you do, you can open them up to 1 Peter chapter 2.

1 Peter 2 · chapter mention

And we're gonna be in 1 Peter chapter 2, verse 9 this morning.

1 Peter 2:9

I read for you just then the text of Jesus' body being laid at the entrance of the tomb.

And on Friday, this past Friday, we spent time considering the darkness of our world, the darkness that is over us, a darkness that hung over Jesus.

And now we consider a new darkness.

Now we consider the darkness of a tomb in which the body of Jesus was laid.

See, this tomb with the body of Jesus inside was a symbol of hopelessness.

It was a symbol of despair, it was a symbol of grief.

The body now laid in the darkness of this tomb, sealed by a large stone, was the same body that had cried out to the masses, I am the light of the world.

And now we ask this question: how could the light of the world be laid in a darkness of a tomb whose entrance was covered in stone?

As the light of the world lay in this tomb, it could shine as brightly as it may, and yet the walls of the tomb would block all the light.

No light could be seen outside.

How could the words of the Apostle John be true of this man?

When John said in John 1.5 that the light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it.

In this moment, was the light overcome?

As Jesus' body was laid in the tomb, where would victory be?

Where would hope reside?

Where would assurance come from?

I wonder if for a moment you could feel the overwhelming physical darkness and get a sense of the small glimpse into the overwhelming spiritual darkness of Jesus' disciples.

As they would look at that tomb and the shoulders, their shoulders would slump under the weight of the world, their eyes once bright and full of light, now lifeless.

They had given up all to see the one who said he was the light of the world shine brightly in the light, but now he's in darkness.

And for three days they would dwell with this heavy presence hanging around them.

Until Luke tells us.

But on the first day, at early dawn, they went to the tomb, taking the spices they had prepared.

And they found the stone rolled away from the tomb.

And when they went in, they did not find the body of the Lord Jesus.

While they were perplexed about this, behold, two men stood by them in dazzling apparel.

And as they were frightened and bowed their faces to the ground, the med said to them, Why do you seek the living among the dead?

He is not here but has risen.

Remember how he told you while he was still in Galilee that the Son of Man must be delivered into the hands of sinful men and be crucified on the third day, and on the third day rise.

And they remembered the words, and returning from the tomb, they told all these things to the eleven and the rest.

These women went to the tomb, and what they expected to find was continued darkness.

But what did they find?

Instead, they found two men in dazzling apparel, we're told.

And here we read that the light had broken through.

As we read these words, truly we consider the greatest defeat in history, when the light of the world defeated the darkness of the world.

There's never been a bigger victory.

There's never been a bigger accomplishment.

And yet, here's my question for you this morning.

My question is, so what?

What does that matter to your life?

What does it matter that the light of the world went into the tomb of darkness and defeated darkness finally and forever?

Isn't it true that there are all sorts of victories and defeats all around us that don't really make any difference to us?

You think about the sports teams that win and lose, and whether you care or not, it really doesn't make a difference to you.

You think about the individuals in this very room and the individuals that we rub shoulders with day to day, they experience certain victories and defeat day in and day out, and yet it doesn't really make a difference to you.

Nations experience victory and defeat, and then so then the question is: what is it about this man, Jesus Christ of Nazareth?

What is it about his victory over the darkness that makes it the most significant victory of all human history, and certainly the most significant for us?

Well, I want you to see this in 1 Peter chapter 2, verse 9.

1 Peter 2:9

Look what Peter writes to the church.

It says these words, but you are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people for his own possession, that you may proclaim the excellencies of him who called you out of darkness into his marvelous light.

I want you to see this morning that the reason why this victory matters for you is because Jesus marched from darkness to light in order that he might lead you this very morning in that procession from darkness to marvelous light.

This is what Easter is all about.

That Christ was not resurrected so that simply he could have victory over death and darkness.

He was resurrected so that you and I could experience that victory over death and darkness and live in a marvelous light.

And so I want to consider 1 Peter 2, verse 9 together, and I want you to recognize this truth first: that Easter delivers me from darkness.

1 Peter 2:9

First thing I want you to consider here is that Easter delivers me from darkness.

Notice first that in the second half of verse 9, Peter tells us exactly what we were called out of.

He says, you were called out of darkness.

But what exactly is that darkness that we live in apart from the resurrection of Christ happening?

See, if we don't understand the darkness that we were in, we can't really understand the light that Peter tells us, this marvelous light that we're being saved to, that we're being called to.

And I want you to understand that part of God's love for you this morning is to call you according to his word to peer into the darkness, to look into the evil of which we once walked, and to consider it in all of its destructive, evil, ugly nature, in order that then you might know to a greater degree the glory of what he calls you to, and calling you from darkness to glorious and marvelous light.

And so our question is then, what is this darkness?

What is this darkness that we were called from?

I want you to notice first that Scripture tells us that this was the darkness of ignorance.

Paul says this in 2 Corinthians 4, chapter, chapter 4, verse 4.

Let me read this for you.

He says, in their case, he's speaking of those who are unbelievers who live in darkness.

He says, in their case, the God of this world has blinded the minds of unbelievers to keep them from seeing the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ.

To be blind is to be unable to see the things that are in front of you.

And what Paul tells us is to walk in darkness is to be ignorant to the very things that are truly glorious, the very things that are truly marvelous, the very things that can truly satisfy you.

Think about it.

A person who is in a pitch black room, who cannot see their hand in front of their face, no matter how thirsty that person is, they will not even know that they're in the presence of water.

No matter how hungry that person is, they would not even know if they were in the presence of food.

You could be in the most beautiful room filled with the most beautiful paintings ever, but if you are blind to it, if you're in darkness, you cannot see that beauty.

And what Scripture wants us to understand is that in our darkness, the darkness from which the resurrection can save us is a darkness of ignorance where we cannot see the very thing that could truly satisfy us, the very thing that could truly fulfill us.

The glory of Jesus Christ.

But I want you to notice also that this is not only a darkness of ignorance, it's also a darkness of enity.

You see, the issue is not just that we are ignorant of the things that we need, the issue of darkness and the darkness that we walk in is that we participate in an all-out fight against the kingdom of Christ.

The issue with being in darkness is that in darkness our allegiance is to works of evil.

This is why Jesus says in the Gospel of John, he says, the light has come into the world, that being Jesus Christ himself, and and people love the darkness rather than the light because their works were evil.

See, in the darkness we do not see light.

Instead, we work to stay in darkness.

This is what Jesus says, that light has come into the world, and we have shielded our eyes from the light, we've shielded our hearts from the glory of Christ, and we have said that we would rather live in the darkness.

We do this practically by placing things on the throne of our heart that are not Christ.

See, you and I, we were worship, we were created to worship Christ above all.

And you can imagine that if you were to go into the room of a maybe the president of a nation or the prime minister or a king, and if you were to go into that room and tell that ruler, get off the throne, I've got something better to put there.

Well, those are words of enity.

Those are fighting words.

And this is exactly what we have done with Christ by allowing other things to be the first love of our heart, where when Christ should be, we've launched an all-out attack on his kingdom.

And so we've walked in the darkness of enity.

That's our darkness, that by our works, by the way that we have lived, we have lived according to the prince of the power of the air.

And that's the next thing that I want you to see about our darkness.

Our darkness was a darkness of ignorance, our darkness was a darkness of enity, but I also want you to see that our darkness was the darkness of Satan.

See, to dwell in the darkness, Satan Scripture tells us, is to dwell in the domain of Christ's enemy.

So we were told, as we read in 2 Corinthians, that it was the God of this world who is blinding us so that we are ignorant to the glory of Christ.

And in Acts, Paul tells us that his mission was given to him by Jesus, and he was told to go to the Gentiles and to open their eyes so that they may turn from darkness to light, and listen to this, from the power of Satan to God.

This is what God is calling us from this morning.

God is calling us from the power of Satan.

There is a domain of existence in this world that is under the control of Satan.

Where Satan's greatest desires is for you to do anything but to follow Jesus Christ.

Consider this for a moment.

Consider the fact that often when we think of people who are living in the domain of Satan, don't we kind of think of like Satanists?

You know, you're thinking of uh, you know, here is a preacher telling me that I live for Satan.

Well, listen, I don't have in my basement a little star for figuration of candles, and I'm not worshiping Satan, okay?

That's just not how I live.

And yet I want you to understand that that is not what Satan desires in your life.

You remember in the garden as a church, we've been working through the book of Genesis, and you'll remember that when Satan first tempted Adam and Eve, what did he do in their life?

He lied to them, he lured them away from God's promise.

And then as soon as they were lured away, what does Satan do?

He leaves.

Satan lies, he lures, and he leaves.

And Satan does not desire to have a number of people worshiping him.

What Satan desires is that you would not worship Christ.

That means that Satan will put every small hindrance in your way in order that your heart's affection and allegiance will be taken off Christ and not put on to him, but to put to be put on to other things.

He wins when you worship anything other than God.

I love how C.S.

Lewis illustrates this in his book, The Screwtape Letters.

C.

S.

Lewis writes in the screw tape letters as though he were a senior demon named Screwtape, writing to a protege, teaching them how to tempt Christians.

And in this passage, he's teaching this younger protege demon the best way to destroy a Christian's life, the best way to take a Christian's allegiance off of Christ and on to him.

And there he's encouraging this demon to tempt the Christian to very small things.

To what he would call small sins.

And Screwtape says this.

He says, You will say that these things are very small sins.

And doubtless, like all young tempters, you are anxious to be able to report spectacular wickedness.

But do remember, the only thing that matters is the extent to which you separate the man from the enemy.

It does not matter how small the sins are, provided that their cumulative effect is to edge the man away from the light and out into the nothing.

Indeed, the safest road to hell is the gradual one, the gentle slope, soft underfoot, without sudden turnings, without milestones, without signposts.

Listen, as we consider that the darkness that we were once in, that we are in, apart from the resurrection, is the domain of Satan.

I want you to recognize that you may not be a murderer here.

I'm trusting that probably you're not.

You may never have committed sins that you feel to be a very big deal, and you probably look around yourself and see a whole lot of people who are worse off than you.

And yet I want you to see that because you have not made Christ your first love, you have lived with allegiance to the domain of darkness.

Well, Easter delivers us from this darkness.

And I want you to see, secondly, that Easter delivers me to a marvelous light.

You notice that Peter said that we are called from darkness to marvelous light.

We are delivered from darkness into the light that Peter calls marvelous.

And so then my question is, what is this marvelous light?

What does it mean to be called from this darkness that we understand is a darkness of ignorance and enmity and that is Satan's domain?

What does it mean to be called from this darkness into marvelous light?

Well, first we can need to consider what it means for something to be marvelous.

And I think that in this scenario, understanding what is marvelous is best done by experience.

If I were to tell you, try to describe to you what the experience of tasting something sweet is, the best way I could describe that to you is by giving you something sweet.

Whether it's candy or honey, the experience of it is the best way to understand it.

And so the best way for us to understand marvel is to consider the feeling of things that are marvelous.

Consider for a moment with me, church, the marvel of love.

Consider the incredible feeling of being unconditionally cared for.

Consider that incredible feeling of unconditionally caring for someone else to such a great degree that you feel like there's just like there's no room that could totally encapture all of the love that I have for this person.

It just beats out of my chest.

I love this person so much, I cannot contain it.

Think about the marvel of accomplishment.

Think about that pride and satisfaction when you step back from something that you have worked on, and it has been your abilities and your effort that has caused this kind of dopamine rush to go through your brain because you've accomplished something great.

This is marvelous, amazing feeling in that moment of seeing this wonderful thing that you've created.

What about the marvel of awe?

I've got to experience for the first time my children to be at an age where they read a story, and you ever get that feeling where it's like you're reading a story, but you're really sad because you know it's coming to an end, and you won't get to experience that story again for a first time?

It's this marvel of awe, like this incredible feeling of being so caught up into a story that you just wish this feeling could go on forever and ever.

You see, we know Marvel, we know what's marvelous, and in our life we chase what is marvelous, each and every one of us.

No matter whether you are a believer here or an unbeliever, the one thing that is true of us is that each of us are chasing what is marvelous according to our definition of what that is.

But what Scripture says is that all these things that are marvelous that we have experienced, they're pointing to something.

They're pointing to something that is truly marvelous.

And Peter here says that that thing that is truly marvelous is light.

And so what is that light?

Well, scripture is clear what the light is.

In 2 Corinthians 4, verse 4, we read it that Satan blinded us from seeing the light of the gospel of the glory of Jesus Christ.

2 Corinthians 4:4

Two verses down in chapter 4, verse 6, Paul will say, For God who let who said, Let light shine out of darkness, has shone in our hearts to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ.

You see, that marvelous light that Peter says that through the resurrection we are called to from darkness to light.

That marvelous light is Jesus Himself.

That's why Jesus said to his closest followers and to those that had gathered around him in John 8.12, he said, I am the light of the world.

Whoever follows me will not walk in darkness, but will have the light of life.

Have you ever considered those words?

Those are very shocking words.

And if we don't experience the shock, I think it's because we've heard it so many times that we've kind of dulled our sense ourselves to it.

Imagine Jesus saying to these people, I'm the light of the world.

Jesus doesn't say, Hey, hey, I know a light that can show you a way.

Jesus doesn't say, hey, I can shine light on a way that can show you how to live.

Jesus says, I am the light of the world.

This is really important for us to understand.

That the thing that is necessary for you, the thing that you need most, is a person.

It's Jesus Christ Himself.

Doesn't this differ from so many other world religions?

There are so many religions that are telling you exactly what you need.

Hey, hey, this is what you need.

You need a set of religious ceremonies to walk through.

In order to get to God, you know what you need?

You just need to do X and Y and Z.

Just do these things and you can get to close to God.

What I'm offering you is a way to live, a set of religious ceremonies.

And there are countless other religions that offer you a package of morality.

And some people are even willing to take the Bible and make it this, or they say, hey, I'll just show you how to live.

I'll show you how to be a good person.

And yet, Christianity, what it offers you, is something far better.

It offers you a person.

And Jesus comes into this world to say, I am the light of the world.

See, Jesus and knowing him, it was the very thing that your soul was created for.

You were created to know and to worship Him.

Isn't it amazing that God would create this world with the express purpose of sharing His most beloved son with you?

Isn't it true of being a human that when you find something you love, you just need to share it?

We have those friends, right?

Usually the friends who do CrossFit or they're like vegans, where they just always have to share the thing that they love with you.

Hey, you've got to try this thing.

We also experience that when we maybe taste amazing food or see an amazing movie.

Like there's something incomplete when we find something praiseworthy, when we find something marvelous, there's something incomplete in us until we are allowed to share that with someone else and tell them to experience it too.

Countless times we've reached with our arm, with the fork across the table to invite someone to taste what we are experiencing.

And that is what God has done in creating the world.

He has invited you to behold and delight in the very thing that God the Father has been delighting in for all of eternity.

This is God the creator who creates this world to say that the most glorious thing in it is his son.

And yet all of us, all of us have turned away to say to God that we can find something better.

That's why nothing in this world can never really satisfy us.

I love what William Bridge says.

He says, So now take a man that hath all the fullness of the earth.

Because that soul was never made for the fullness of earth, therefore he is said to be empty.

And in the midst of all his fullness, the man is an empty man, because his heart is not full of that for which he was made, and that is Christ.

See, what God is calling us to is a person.

And it's only when you see Jesus in all of his marvelous beauty that you will find what your heart is truly looking for, the very thing that God has been delighting in for all of eternity, Jesus Christ His Son.

The last thing I want you to see here is how we are delivered.

We're delivered from darkness, we're delivered to light.

But if that's where the message ended and we didn't know how to get into that light, then this would be a waste.

And I want you to see thirdly that we are, that Easter delivers us by resurrection hope.

Easter delivers me by resurrection hope.

And so here's my question: who's delivered into that marvelous light?

I want to experience that.

I want to experience what is truly marvelous.

Notice that Peter, the beginning of verse 9, he says that those people who were called out of darkness into marvelous light, he tells us exactly with the word you.

He says, but you are a chosen race.

And so the question then is, who is that?

And in order to answer that question, we need to go back to the very beginning of 1 Peter chapter 1 and verse 3, where Peter tells us exactly who it is that he's writing to in this letter.

1 Peter 1 · chapter mention

And look at what Peter says in chapter 1 of 1 Peter verse 3.

He says, Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ.

According to his great mercy, he has caused us to be born again to a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead.

Do you see this?

Do you see that the ones who are called from darkness to marvelous light, the ones who are called from ignorance to a knowledge of what can truly satisfy, the ones who are called from enmity with Christ to true friendship, fulfilling friendship with Christ, they are the ones who have been born again, we are told, to a living hope.

This is a spiritual birth that Peter is talking about, that God must accomplish.

It's not the first physical birth that each of us have experienced.

What Peter's talking about here is a second spiritual birth that must happen to us.

It's the spiritual birth that really is signified in the waters of baptism.

We're so blessed this morning to be able to witness and celebrate alongside Mark his baptism.

And yet, exactly what baptism symbolizes is what Peter is being talking about here.

There, Mark stood.

And it was representative of Mark standing in his old flesh, in his old nature.

And then Mark was put under the water.

And I promised Mark I would do this before the baptism.

I told him, I will not hold you there.

I'll bring it up.

That's part of becoming a pastor.

You gotta train, you gotta train the muscles to make sure you get him back up.

Very important part of the baptism.

But if I were to hold him there, that would signify death.

It would signify the darkness of being under water.

And there, it symbolized, Mark's death with Christ.

And then being brought up out of the water, he was brought up as a new creation, symbolizing a new person, symbolizing the resurrection that was, the very resurrection that brought him to life.

See, just as Jesus entered into that tomb, as a dead body, he was raised to new life.

And so we celebrate alongside Mark that he entered in the waters of baptism and was raised to new life.

And so it is with each of us who have placed our faith in Jesus Christ.

What Peter says is that we are born again.

Notice what he says too, to a living hope.

But notice how?

How do I get born again?

I want to be born again.

I want hope.

I want to be in this marvelous light.

I want to experience what is truly satisfying.

See these words.

Through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead.

If you want to experience that, you need to be united to Christ.

Well, this is God's side of our new birth.

This is a work that God has to do.

But what does our side look like?

Well, Peter tells us that as well.

Look at what he says, starting in verse 18.

Speaking about the same people, he says, Knowing that you were ransomed from the futile ways inherited from your forefathers, not with perishable things such as silver or gold, but with the precious blood of Christ, like that of a lamb, without blemish or spot.

He was foreknown before the foundation of the world, but was made manifest in the last times for the sake of you, who through him, listen to this, who through him are believers in God, who raised him from the dead and gave him glory, so that your faith and hope are in God.

See, God's work is to do the work of new birth.

It is a spiritual work that can only be done by the Holy Spirit.

But your work is that as that work is being done in your heart, you are believing in him.

You're believing in the resurrection.

You're believing that Christ died and was raised for you.

Well, it's very important that we understand what that belief practically looks like.

What does that belief practically look like?

Well, I want you to notice first that that belief looks like a belief that the resurrection is a fact of hope.

It's a fact of hope.

This is so necessary for us as we follow Christ.

It's necessary that we believe the resurrection is a fact.

The whole Christian faith rests on this truth, that Christ indeed was resurrected, that this was a historical moment when the dead body of Jesus began to breathe again.

Paul says in the book of Corinthians that if you were able to disprove that Christ was raised, if you could disprove that reality, well then we're all fools for being here this morning.

If Christ was not raised, we're fools for giving our life to him.

See, the fact of the resurrection is what the whole weight of Christianity stands on.

Our hope is grounded in this historical fact that Jesus' heart had stopped but began to beat again.

That is why we could spend a whole, not only a whole sermon, a whole study, there are long, long books that are dedicated to answering the question of the fact of the resurrection.

And yet, as we read through the Gospels, as we read through the New Testament, you know what the gospel writers and the New Testament writers are at pains to do?

They're at pains to prove to a skeptical generation that Jesus was raised.

You know, some of the people that throughout all the history of humanity that believed the least in the ability for someone to be resurrected from the dead, it was the Jewish people to whom the New Testament, much of it was written to.

And so the gospel writers, what they do is they make every effort in many ways to verify the fact that Jesus was raised.

If you read, we've read through this over Easter week in the Gospel of Mark, three times in a few short sentences.

Mark lists the names of the women who saw the tomb of Jesus with his body put in it.

It's like, all right.

And listen, Mark is like one of those writers where he really likes to get to the point.

Mark's the shortest gospel, and yet he takes the space to write these women's names three times.

Why?

Because he wants those who read his gospel to have real historical people they can go to to verify the story.

Paul talks again in 1 Corinthians.

He makes a list of people who had witnessed the resurrected Jesus, and he mentions names, but he also says that there were over 500 people who saw him.

See, the gospel writers are building this historical case for the resurrection as a fact.

And the question for us is what do we do with that?

Do we believe this as a fact?

What do we do with the explosion?

This described to us in the New Testament of people converting to Christianity who never in their life would have believed that someone could have been resurrected.

Well, I believe that it, the only thing that we can do is believe that the resurrection of Christ was a fact.

To believe that it actually happened.

But I also want you to recognize that the resurrection of Christ needs to be a fountain of hope.

To believe in the resurrection is to believe in the resurrection as a fountain of hope.

See, the resurrection becomes a source of hope that you turn to time and time again through your life.

Why?

Why should the resurrection be a daily comfort to you?

Not just the death of Christ, but the fact that Christ was raised to new life.

Well, it's because when Christ was resurrected, he defeated your greatest enemy.

And it becomes a daily fountain of hope to you because the thing that you're facing in life is so much smaller than the enemy that God has already defeated.

That child that you have been praying for, for them to know the Lord, and their heart is just continually hardened, God has defeated such a greater enemy.

He's overcome such a greater obstacle in defeating death and darkness through the resurrection of Christ.

That sickness that you're enduring, that suffering that you're walking through, all of these things are so small in comparison to the enemy that God has already defeated in death.

He has defeated your greatest enemy.

And so we, like Peter tells us to, we turn time and time again our eyes to Jesus, who is ascended and now in heaven, who has defeated death itself, and we turn there as the source, the fountain of hope for our souls.

He's the only source of hope.

Lastly, I want you to see that this resurrection is a future of hope.

It's a future of hope because Jesus was the firstborn of the resurrection, of the resurrected, and he was resurrected so that he might point forward to a day in which we will be resurrected alongside with him.

Christian, do you understand that because of the resurrection, this life is such a small, tiny shred of your eternity.

It changes everything.

She was paralyzed and bound to a wheelchair for the rest of her life at a young age.

And she was a Christian and she grew up in the Episcopalian church.

And a part of the Episcopalian church is that during the service you kneel down and you pray.

And because she was in a wheelchair, she could not now do this.

Now you can imagine that that would be hard not to be able to participate.

But now imagine a room filled with 500 other people who are all kneeling, and you're the only one who is not able to kneel.

There is an especially awkward weight there.

And so she would often during that time cry and mourn the inability for her to move until one day during that time she was considering the resurrection and the fact that there'll be a day where she is in heaven and everything is made right.

Her physical infirmities are restored.

Every tear is wiped away, every sin is taken away.

And she said these words, you know, I realized that in heaven I'll have the chance then to jump and dance and walk and run.

It will be my privilege.

A new body that can move will be a blessing for a job well done on earth.

But I think that kneeling very still on bended knees, glorified knees, I think that when I get to heaven, that'll be my sacrifice of praise to not move.

When I'll be able to move, will be one of my one last chance to show the Lord how thankful I really am.

And you know the things that you are facing in life, the things that are a crushing weight of despair and darkness and hopelessness to you, there is a day coming where Christ will return and you will be resurrected to eternal life if your faith is in him.

And all of your enemies, finally and forever, will be wiped away.

Every tear that you have shed will be dealt with forever.

Every problem that you have faced, every pain that you have endured for all time, it will be wiped away.

Why?

Because in heaven we're told, Revelations 21, 23, that the city has no need of sun or moon to shine on it.

For the glory of God gives its light, and its lamp is the lamp.

Because we are going to a place where the glory of God will be the light that shines day and night, where we will know Jesus, and nothing will hinder us from knowing him and working him, but working and living, worshiping him, and stepping into that marvelous light that is Jesus Christ.

Let's pray together.

Father, God, we thank you for Jesus.

And Lord, we give you all the praise for resurrecting him, for raising him from death to life, and for that not just being a moment that happened in history, a really astounding thing that happened to a person who we do not know.

Lord, thank you for doing that as a victory procession.

And Lord, thank you for calling us this morning to join in that victory by faith, Lord, to believe that the resurrection of Christ was a fact of hope for us, that it is a fountain of hope for us that we can turn to time and time again.

And Lord, that it is our future, that there is a day coming where through faith, through belief, Lord, we will be raised from death to life, raised to eternal life with your Son Jesus Christ, where we will know him and increasingly for all of our days, for all of eternity, grow in our knowledge of him.

God, we look forward to that day, and I pray, Lord, that as we look forward to that day, would you give us hope in a world that is dark?

Give us hope in a world that is hopeless, Lord.

And God, we worship you now, Lord, because you are our one living hope.

And God, we pray this all in the name of your Son.

Amen.