Easter Sunday

Preached by Jaren Singh on 3/31/24

Transcript

0:09

Hello, and welcome to the Kalamazoo church of Christ podcast. Thank you so much for listening. We're startup church. We just planted in September, 2020 and at the Kalamazoo church, we believe that Christianity is done best when it is done together. And so if you live in the Kalamazoo area, we would love to connect be it coming to a Sunday service, one of our small groups, or even just grabbing coffee with a member to learn more. You can visit kalamazoo.church in order to do that. We pray that you are inspired by what you hear today. You guys can open up to Luke 24. We'll be there in a moment. This last Friday was a little bit more of a somber time. We spent time probably about an hour, some a little bit more, some a little bit less looking at the cross and sin and the nature of it. And we tried to go to spots where we could really embrace and understand what the significance of the cross is and what Jesus really did for us. And so if you are wondering, what is that? I want to do it myself. You can just talk to me. There's a little program that was set up, but you can see some of the relics from it. We wrote, I don't know him, representing Peter as he was approached. You must know the guy. He said, I don't even know him. And we ended on a relatively somber note on Friday, but today's not Friday. This is an encouraging note, right? We're celebrating not only the death, we're celebrating though the resurrection of Jesus. We're in Luke 24. I don't know what state of mind you're in this morning. I don't want to pretend that everybody's in a spot where you feel overjoyed and excited and you feel like I've got to go to a spot where I'm just outwardly excited and over. I don't know if you're there. If you're not, that's okay. We're going to learn how some of the disciples were not actually in a spot after seeing the resurrected Lord. They weren't at a spot of feeling confident or of full assurance and they didn't end that way. And so wherever you're at is okay. What I would say is don't, don't fake it. If you're not at a spot where you feel overjoyed or excited, if you're in a spot where you're working through doubts, that's okay. We're going to look at what Jesus, what Jesus says to his disciples and because he's the resurrected Lord, he can do the same things and quell the same fears for all of us. Amen. We're in Luke 24. This is a longer passage. We're going to read it and then we're going to break it down. It says, while they were still talking about this. So this is Jesus. He died and he's risen again. Jesus himself stood among them and said to them, peace be with you. They were startled and frightened thinking they'd saw a ghost. He said to them, why are you troubled? And why do doubts rise in your minds? Look at my hands and my feet. It is I myself touch and see a ghost does not have flesh and bones. As you see, I have. When he said this, he showed them his hands and his feet and they still did not believe it because of joy and amazement. And so he asked them, do you have anything here to eat? They gave him a piece of broiled fish and he took it and ate it in their presence, said to them, this is what I told you while I was still with you. Everything must be fulfilled that is written about me in the law of Moses, the prophets and the Psalms. Then he opened their minds so they could understand the scriptures. He told them this is what is written. The Messiah will suffer and rise from the dead on the third day and repentance for the forgiveness of sins will be preached in his name to all nations beginning at Jerusalem. You are witnesses of these things. I am going to send you what my father has promised, but stay in the city until you've been clothed with power from on high. You know, Jesus does, does many things. We're looking at four and, uh, and work with me here. We'll, some of them we're going to go through a little, it'll take a little bit longer. Some will just speed through. The first thing that he does is he answers their doubts. Why are you troubled? Why do doubts rise in your minds? Look at my hands and feet. It's I myself touch and see what does he do? He communicates that he actually rose from the dead. This wasn't some type of hypothetical raising from the dead. This wasn't some type of simply spiritual experience. It wasn't a fever dream that they all had and then decided, okay, let's create this religion. Uh, no, this, this actually occurred. This actually happened. Um, no people, people will say, uh, certainly even, even just tens or just decades after Jesus rose from the dead, people pointed to, uh, this being a fictional occurrence and we'll read, uh, a couple of accounts that talk about, or at least one account that, that is really in direct opposition to that in first John. But even before the Bible was, uh, the New Testament was fully formalized. There were people saying Jesus didn't physically raised from the dead. It was a spiritual occurrence. Uh, now today this is the, this is the marker of, of, of the Christian faith. And so many people say the same thing that Jesus didn't physically raised from the dead because anyone who says he rose from the dead, if I say that I kind of got to follow Christianity then because nobody else did that and didn't die again. A few things that, that are, that are important when people say that, uh, the, these claims are fictional. Uh, it's, it's important to note that in that day, no one was expecting the resurrection of a physical body. Uh, so this was something that certainly they were pointing to. There's going to be a resurrection on the last day when a space and time kind of joined together and there's, there's all, but we're all going to be resurrected. This is the Jewish, uh, the, the traditional Jewish belief. And so for Jesus to, to be physical in his body, if you're going to just make that up, that wouldn't be the place that you would go because it would be directly against many of the, the, the commonplace thought of that day. Another thing, there are some details in here that seem just mundane, right? What does it say? He says, I, you know, when he came here, you know, we were dreaming up what would happen if we rose from the dead. I think, uh, man, I go to a big place and I'd show myself and I'd be loud and boisterous. And what does it say? He does, it says he kind of sneaks into place with his closest friends and they don't believe him. And so they don't believe him. And so he doesn't like do some kind of amazing miracle. He doesn't, he says, okay, give me some fish and he, and he eats fish. This is a mundane occurrence that doesn't make sense unless it actually happened. If you're writing this, the disciples, if you read, what do they do when Jesus dies prior to his resurrecting, they go back to what they were doing there. There's certainly, they're together, they're connected, but they go, they go back to fishing. If you're writing this, they're, they're discouraged. They're despondent. Even if you're writing this and you want, uh, if you want to be a follower, if you want to convince people to be followers of this guy that he didn't actually raise from the dead, then you probably wouldn't say, well, we had disbelief as well, or we went to some dark places as well. Uh, we are so flawed as well, but follow us because we're telling you what happened. They wouldn't do that unless he actually did raise from the dead. Perhaps greatest of all, the Bible is extremely clear that we're going to, we're going to end on, on this, this note in about 25 minutes that even after all of this, the Bible's clear that of the 11, there are still some who doubt it. If you are writing a book and you're trying to convince people to follow this guy and you're saying you did all these amazing things and you say he rose from the dead, but not all of us believe it, that's, that's not where you would go unless it actually happened. I want to read a quote. Uh, there's some big words here. So listen closely and it's a little bit longer of a quote. It's by a theologian N.T. Wright. He's written numerous books on Christianity. He's, he's one of the big, one of the big thought leaders of Christianity in our day. It says, it cannot be stressed too strongly that first century Jews were not expecting people to rise from the dead as isolated individuals. Resurrection for them was something that might happen for all on that great future occasion when God brought history to an end and a whole new world was renewed. It will not do therefore to say that Jesus's disciples were so stunned and shocked by his death so unable to come to terms with it that they projected their shattered hopes onto the screen of fantasy and invented the idea of Jesus's resurrection as a way of coping with their cruelly, cruelly broken dream that has an initial apparent psychological plausibility to the 21st century people, but it will not work as a serious for a serious first century history. There were lots of other messianic and similar movements in the Jewish world, roughly contemporary to Jesus. There were many situations in which a messianic leader died a violent death at the hands of authorities. In not one single case do we see the slightest mention of the disappointed followers claiming their hero had been raised from the dead. They knew better. In the Jewish worldview, an individual could not be resurrected in the middle of history and history just continue going. It was not something that was possible in their worldview. So Jewish revolutionaries whose leaders had been executed by the authorities had only two options. Give up the revolution or find another leader claiming that your original leader had been resurrected was not an option. Unless of course he was. This resurrection is, is the marker and the point that, that all of Christianity is based on, but it also seems to be the marker and the point that Jesus is closest followers and his, his apostles pointed to as well. We're not going to, to read these. This is just my incomplete Bible knowledge of, of, of these. And there's so many other scriptures, but Peter, one of his, the guy who said, I don't know him also writes, it saves you by the resurrection of Jesus Christ. He's referring to baptism and he says, this is what happened. Jesus did raise from the dead. And then in, in you know, the apostle John who wrote the book of John it says those who don't acknowledge Jesus as coming in the flesh are a deceiver and an antichrist. And then, and then this is Paul who is he identifies as being an apostle abnormally born post Jesus's resurrection. Jesus appears to him and it says that Christ died for our sins. According to the scriptures, he was buried and he raised on the third day. I bring this up to say that, that the apostles, those closest to Jesus, the, the, the people who are charged with spreading the, the religion, it seems that their message is clear. Either call us crazy or believe us, but don't pacify our message. Another thing he does is he satisfies the desires of their hearts. So then while they did not believe it because of joy and amazement, he asked them, do you have anything here to eat? They gave him a piece of broiled fish and he took it and ate it in their presence. You know, when, when we eat, you know, we're, we're, we're celebrating. Most of us are virtually all, if you don't have a place to go talk to us, we'll find you a place, but we'll, we're going to go end up eating food together and we're going to talk about things and there's, it's going to be light and it's going to be a joyous time and it's going to be fun. But, but from what I understand, this was a relatively normal occurrence in, in that day and age. If you were invited to eat and if you were eating with somebody, it meant that there's relationship and there's friendship and there's connection. Jesus is saying that I'm not just some distant God that is far from you. I did this thing one time in history and now I'm going to go back to heaven and, and you're always going to be in search for me and I'm far enough away that there's hope, but you can't get to me. That's not what he's saying. He's saying you can eat with me. You can, you can, you can commune with me. You can be close with me. You can be near to me. Yeah, Jesus, uh, you know, when, when, when someone dies, uh, everything that you have left of them, it, it, it grows in importance, doesn't it? Their clothes are so important. The last thing they wore, maybe that special occasion, uh, the shoes, what even, even their, their scent or their smell, their cologne or perfume. That stuff matters. You know, it's, it's, uh, it's an interesting, it's an interesting thing. It's an interesting, you know, uniquely human thing, I believe, but, you know, there's even from time to time, my mom passed when I was seven years old and there's, there's times it doesn't happen frequently, um, anymore. It'll happen maybe a few times a year where I'll have just dreams about my mom and, uh, and I almost all of those dreams you'd think, well, if I'm dreaming about my mother, that that's cool. We're connected. We're together. Almost all of those dreams end with me waking up in tears. Inevitably at some point I realize I'm dreaming and then the, the, the dream, it be, it just, it escapes me entirely. And you end up, and you end up waking up when we, when we think about these, these people, it, it, it leads us to, to want them more, but we, we just can't get close to them again. It's not so with Jesus. That's not the truth with Jesus. It's, it's, it's amazing. My mom, she, she had this necklace that she gave me. Um, when I understand it, I don't know if it was born prior to her passing or rather if it was bought prior to her passing or post, but it just said it was this little, uh, locket that just said, Jaron love mom. And I remember, uh, I remember exactly the day that I lost that locket and, uh, and it just, it still frustrates me. I was writing this down and I just felt like, man, that is, I'm, I'm such a lame, like, why didn't I talk to the janitor and go through it? I'm sure it was somewhere. And it says my name on it. I was the only Jaron in the school. This means so much to me. And, uh, it, it means so much, but if she was alive, I, I, I don't think I'd, I'd care about it an awful lot. I just lost a little locket, right? Jesus is eating with his disciples. He's creating connection with, with, with his closest followers. And, and what he's saying is I'm not going to be some distant memory for you. I'm not going to be someone who you, you hold on to. And then you aren't going to be able to see again. I'm going to be here with you all along the way. How do we know that? Well, where was Jesus? Where, where did Jesus die? Nobody knows. You know, we, uh, decades after Jesus was dead, there's no, there's no memorial. There's no shrine there. They don't wear the grave clothes. They don't have the grave clothes. That's how this is. These are the clothes. Why? Because it wasn't important. He rose from the dead. He's connected. He's walking with us. It doesn't, it doesn't matter. You know, the same way the clothes are, are, are, you know, disgusting and not fun. And you, man, I got to do the laundry or the shoes. I feel like these are, these are just, just things. They don't matter. If somebody's alive, shrines and memorials, they were commonplace in Jesus's day. And even hundreds of years afterwards, from what I understand, there's even, uh, there's locations for a lot of these, uh, that the bishops or some of the first leaders of the church, you know, hundreds of years after, uh, you know, Jesus was resurrected and they know this is, this is where this person was buried. We've got a record of it. And we, we have this memorial there. They don't have that with Jesus because the, the, the grave wasn't the most important part about it. Jesus eats with his disciples and he'll eat with us and says, I'm near, I can be, I can be near to you. I don't have to be a distant God. Another thing he does, he, he reorients their purpose by sending them out. It says, then he opened their minds so they could understand the scriptures. He told them, this is what is written. The Messiah will suffer and rise from the dead on the third day. And repentance for the forgiveness of sins will be preached in his name to all nations beginning at Jerusalem. You are witnesses of these things. I am going to send you what my father has promised. Peter, we said he goes back to fishing. He brings a, he brings a couple along with them too. He goes back to fishing after, after Jesus dies. This was, uh, this was three years of my life. I looked like a fool. I gave up three years of my income, but some of the stuff he did was incredible. I, I don't know if I can, I don't know. I got to stay close to the people who I'm close with, I guess. And then Jesus appears and he gives them this, this, this mission, the, the, the Bible, uh, in the Bible, Jesus is called, uh, it's in Colossians one. Uh, you don't have to turn there. Jesus is called the firstborn from among the dead, uh, meaning that there's hope for us. Uh, and, and when he's reorienting their purpose, he's saying there's hope for, for you, but then you have to spread that hope. That is, that is why I did all of this so that many people could follow me. Jesus being the firstborn from among the dead, then gives us hope and gives us mission that we can go and go out in our lives and spread Jesus to the world. This means this, this means a couple of things. And it was brought up. It was, it was brought up really tactfully, uh, by, by Timothy Keller. As he since passed, one of the preachers I listened to a lot, he says, on one hand, you are free from the material world. Okay. Uh, the material world does not have control over you. Uh, it doesn't have to order your days. You don't have to live in spaces of regret or spaces of wanting more or spaces of desire. I want this thing. And this is what I'm searching for. And then when you get the thing, it's not as cool as it was, or when you, when you're searching for that, and there's a point when you realize I'm not gonna, I'm not gonna get it. You know, I'm not gonna make, uh, I'm not gonna make the team. I'm not, I'm not gonna get that promotion. I'm not, it, it doesn't have to affect you how it would affect somebody else. And so on one hand, you are free from the material world. On the other hand, you are free for the material world. Resurrection gives us freedom for, and from the material, the material world. And what does, what does that mean? Or the material universe? That means that if we don't have to be burdened by what the world is telling us is appropriate, and what the world is telling us to do, that means that we can spread a bunch of change when we are in the world. It also, it also means that this, this, the, the Christian worldview says that when, when we die, there's this thought, I die. And when this new creation comes, the new creation must be somewhere else in heaven. From everything that we understand, the new creation is just making everything that's messed up in this world, making it perfect. And so in the same way, you know, we started in the garden. We're going to end in, in a gardener, in this space of perfection on this earth though. There's, there's a quote that I find, um, find it challenging. Uh, Martin Luther, when, when someone asked him, uh, what, what would you do if you knew Jesus was coming back tomorrow? He said, if I knew that tomorrow was the end of the world, I would plant a tree today. What is he saying? If I knew the world's ending tomorrow, Jesus is coming back tomorrow. I'm going to plant the tree today. What he's saying is I realize that think about what Jesus is going to do to that tree. Think about what perfection is going to do to that tree that I get to be a part of it. I understand. I'm not going somewhere. He's coming back here. He's going to be right with us. And this is our purpose and mission. And the, the perfection that we are searching for is found in Christ alone. And we have the opportunity to help as many as possible. Learn about it. What else does he do? He shows them his hands and his feet. When he had said this, he showed them his hands and his feet and Jesus. Jesus came back in a perfect body. It would never experience decay or brokenness or pain again. But why are the nail holes still in them? His body's glorified. It's a perfect body. Why the nail holes? He deals with, he, he, this is my take is he deals with our sorrows. He, he, he deals with what we're going through and he, and he makes it, he makes it great. You know, everybody, everybody loves a rags to riches story. You get knocked down and you pull yourself up by your bootstraps. You think about any, I bet you, if you would look. And I didn't do a, I didn't, I didn't do a study. But if you look at some of the most popular movies or books or anything in the media, you would see that the ones that are most successful is not this guy was great. And he stayed great. It was a couple of things. One, this guy was great. And then he, it was this rapid fall. Or more than likely, you see, this guy was struggling. Things were bad. This, and then they, they made it to this mountaintop high. They struggled. They got knocked down, but they made it all the way back. No, it's more powerful than those stories though, is, is one that can take what happened that was bad and turn it into something good and be able to look at all of the negatives that occurred as being things that helped us get to the spot that, that we're in. Just, I, I'm just referencing it here, but it's in Genesis 45 and it's in, it's in starts in verse five, but it's a story of, of Joseph. And you'd understand Joseph was the guy, you know, in whatever the media, that Technicolor dream coat, or this, this, this, this coat that, you know, he was loved by his father, but not his brothers. And so he got sold into slavery. They were about to kill him, sold into slavery. And then you get this, this Genesis of what occurs, and then he gets put in prison wrongfully and said, and then he helped somebody and says, when you, when you get out, remember me and they forget about him. And then years later, they remember him. And there's this, this story and this up and down and you read it and you're like, wow, what is happening? What, what a horrible thing that would happen to this individual. And, and then he ends up being second in command to Pharaoh. And there's this famine in all of the land because of, of Joseph's wisdom, he stored up a lot. And then his brothers, the same ones who essentially left him for dead and communicated to his father that he had died. There's, there's this interaction that he has where he is able to see them face to face. And this is what Joseph says. It's, it says, and now do not be distressed and do not be angry with yourselves for selling me here because it was to save lives that God sent me ahead of you for two years. Now there has been famine in the land. And for the next five years, there will be no plowing and reaping, but God sent me ahead of you to preserve for you a remnant on earth and to save your lives by a great deliverance. So then it was not you who sent me here, but God story taking the worst of the worst and pointing to God as being the one who delivered me and sent me out. And so I can look at what happened in the past as stuff that helped me get to where I'm at right now. You know, I don't know. I don't know for sure. You know, nobody can say, but as I think about that for my life, I'm sure there's stuff in your life where you look at where you are at. And perhaps you can point to negative occurrences that have led you to this great spot. And if you can't, well, then they are coming. But I look at my mom passing as, uh, nobody, nobody wishes that on anybody, but I do look at that and I think, I don't know that I would be, uh, as competent a leader as I am today. If she wouldn't have passed, I think I probably would have, uh, I think I probably would have skated by as much as I could. I'm still liable to skate by as much as I can, but even more so, uh, if I, if I grew up with two parents, um, I think about my, uh, I just, I think I'd be lazy in my like awareness of a mother and son relationship. And I don't feel like I'm lazy with that anymore. When I see that, uh, man, I get so much joy from that. And I'm, it's, it's, um, maybe, maybe you look at your life and maybe you can't look and identify it yet. You're in the middle of whatever difficult, uh, struggle that you, you are in. The amazing part about the cross is, is once you make it on the other side, you will be able to point to all these negatives as being stuff that God worked for the good, all the things that ruined your life will actually save it. So we said at the beginning, uh, to be authentic with where we're at, where, where are you at with God this, this morning, the disciples saw the resurrected Lord. They walked with them for three years. They saw all of the miracles. They, they, they, they counted them dead and they saw him risen again. They, they, with their hands, touch the holes in his hands and his feet. This is right before Jesus gives what we identify as being the great commission, go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them and teaching them to obey everything. I've commanded you. He says, surely I'm with you before that glorious statement. This is what Matthew 28 says. It says, then the 11 disciples went to Galilee, to the mountain where Jesus had told them to go. When they saw him, they worshiped him, but some doubt it. They saw him do miracles. They saw him do amazing things. And, and yet some doubt it. And we can question, why would you doubt? We can look down on people. Like, why would they doubt? If I was walking with Jesus, I wouldn't be among those who doubt it. Well, some of us would. I don't know if all of us, it would, it would have said all of us. Some of us would be among those who doubt it. You can look down on them. You can question them, or you can realize that you, you, you aren't much different. God's reaching out for you. There are evidences all around you. If you would sit and consider that God is saying, come close to me, come near to me. Trust me, try it out. I'm right here. I'm not far. I want to be close with you. I've shown you all of this so that you can walk with me. And we turned a blind eye all the time. We have the inspired written word of God, and we don't read it. We have the opportunity to call out to God in prayer and actually understand he listens to us. We don't need an intercessor or somebody that goes before us or does this thing. We don't need to sacrifice any kind of animal. We can walk with God and we can go to the most holy of holy places. And yet we don't, we don't do it. You pray, he hears you and he answers you. And yet you still doubt. And what's amazing about this, uh, this, this scripture is that these, the doubts of these disciples, we understand that they didn't live in those doubts. You can, you can look back at church history and you would find all but one die a martyr's death and all of them lived lives that they started. You, you read and it's inspiring. He started the church here. He's attributed for going to India, you know, he went to that. And he's, he, this guy went to Persia and this, you can, you can read about that in, in church history. And so just because they had doubts, uh, they didn't live in those doubts, wherever you're at right now, whatever doubts you have. And when we say doubts, maybe you say, I know Jesus rose from the dead, but that doesn't mean I'm going to live my life like him every day. I know Jesus rose from the dead. I believe it. I believe in, I believe in it. But whatever, wherever that butt is, is where your doubt level is at. It's okay to have them. Don't live in them. Seek out the truth. I believe that I believe God's calling out, reaching out to every one of us right now, we are going to, uh, we're going to pray. And then we're going to take communion together. And as, as we take communion, the, the purpose of it is to remember Jesus's, uh, death and remember, uh, the, the bread that represents his body, the juice that represents the bloody shed. And as, as we do it though, uh, identify doubts in your heart and make decisions today, not to live in them because he did raise from the dead. Amen. Let's pray. Dear God, Lord, we're grateful for you, uh, Jesus. We, we are undeserving. What a, what a powerful weekend that we've had, uh, truly worshiping you and connecting with you and connecting with your people. We are so grateful for what you've, you've done for us. We're so grateful for what you've done to us, Lord. And what you've, how you've allowed us to change and how you've given us the opportunity to live different lives. Lord, I pray that, that, that you will, uh, I know you'll continue to move Lord. I pray that we'll hear you and see you and listen to you when you do, uh, Jesus, thank you for your, uh, sacrifice on the cross. This is in Jesus's name that we pray. Amen. Thank you so much for listening to the Kalamazoo church of Christ podcast. If you're in the Kalamazoo area, we'd love to get connected. Please go to kalamazoo.church and fill in your information to come to a Sunday service or any other event that we have going on. In any case, you'll be hearing from us next week.