Easter season is a time when both church-goer and non-church person should go to church. Jesus-followers should be there to remember the heart of their faith. Those who never go to church should go at Easter to find out what the Christian faith is all about. The reason is that nothing is more central to the Bible than Jesus’ death and resurrection. The entire message of the Bible pivots on one weekend in Jerusalem about two thousand years ago. Attempts to make sense of the Bible that do not give prolonged thought to understanding the message of the crucifixion and resurrection of Jesus are doomed to failure. As Tim Keller wrote, “If Jesus rose from the dead, then you have to accept all that he said; if he didn’t rise from the dead, then why worry about any of what he said? The issue on which everything hangs is not whether or not you like his teaching but whether or not he rose from the dead.”
There would be no Christian church apart from the fact that people deeply believed that Jesus rose from the dead. We’ll see today that this was the message his followers proclaimed wherever they went. Ironically, Jesus’ own disciples did not expect him to be crucified; they certainly did not expect him to rise again. Yet after these events, their thinking and attitudes were completely transformed. They could not deny what they had experienced. One day, Jesus died on a cross. Then, they saw him risen and alive. This was so undeniable to them that absolutely everything in their lives changed. This reality led Chuck Colson to say, “I know the resurrection is a fact, and Watergate proved it to me. How? Because 12 men testified they had seen Jesus raised from the dead. Then they proclaimed that truth for 40 years, never once denying it. Every one was beaten, tortured, and put in prison. They would not have endured that if it weren’t true. Watergate embroiled 12 of the most powerful men in the world—and they couldn’t keep a lie for three weeks. You’re telling me 12 apostles could keep a lie for 40 years? Absolutely impossible.”
So, we’ll take time to hear again this Easter 2014 about what happened that first Easter season:
- * The man who was mocked one day as a bogus king—is King over all kings.
- * The man who was considered utterly powerless—is more powerful than death.
- * The man who cried out in despair on a cross—is the eternal Son of God.
- * The man who was scorned as unable to save himself—saves all who believe in him.
To His Glory,
Dr. Greg Waybright
Senior Pastor
