Do You Believe In Easter? Luke 24:1-12
What a thrill it is to be a preacher on Easter morning! It’s better than being Irish on St. Patrick’s Day or a child on Christmas morning or Tom Brady at the Super Bowl. One Biblical commentator said, "The resurrection is the epicenter of belief. It is not a belief that grew up within the church. It is the belief around which the church itself grew up." Billy Graham has declared, "If I were an enemy of Christianity, I would aim right at the resurrection, because that’s the heart of Christianity."
Why is Easter so big? What makes the resurrection of Jesus so significant?
First, it announced victory over sin and death. Someone has been to the other side of death and returned to tell us that there is a way through it. Jesus arose from the grave and assured his followers that they would also. When Jesus arose, he blazed a path into eternity for us.
The second reason resurrection is so important is that it was God’s confirmation of Jesus’ saving activity on the cross. Easter morning was God’s stamp of approval on Jesus’ sacrificial death on the cross. Now we know that when we reach the doors to eternity, our sin record will be sealed and stamped "Paid in full at Calvary".
The third reason resurrection is so important is that it gives us a preview of how world history is going to end. The winner was revealed on Easter morning. When the curtain of world history falls, no ideology, no weapons system, no economic system will reign supreme. Jesus alone will be revealed high and lifted up. Then "every knee shall bow…and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord." (Phil. 2:11)
Let’s look at what Luke has to say about Easter morning. Jesus died at about 3:00 PM on a Friday afternoon. He was buried hurriedly because the Jewish Sabbath began at sundown. No burial or any kind of work was permitted on the Sabbath. In fact, the burial was so hurried that there was no time to anoint the body with spices as was the custom. The first opportunity to do that was the following Sunday morning. Anointing the dead was usually women’s work. Therefore, early on Sunday morning, certain women from Galilee who had supported Jesus’ ministry came to the tomb. Mary Magdalene was the leader. It is interesting that God allowed Mary Magdalene to be the first person on earth to tell the good news of Jesus’ resurrection. Women were considered little more than property in the First Century. By the way, this is a powerful argument for the authenticity of the gospel record. In the First Century, a woman’s testimony was usually unacceptable. So, if the resurrection story had been a made-up story by the early church, they would never have placed a woman as the star witness.
The four gospel accounts of the resurrection differ slightly concerning the details. But that should not concern us. Ask any reporter who covers criminal trials. If four witnesses offer identical testimony, the four are suspected of conspiracy or collusion. All four gospels agree on the one vitally important fact of Easter morning: the tomb was empty. Jesus’ dead body was literally, physically revived! The tombs of Confucius, Buddha, and Mohammed are all occupied. But the tomb of Jesus Christ is empty!
Our scriptural accounts of resurrection show us the four-step process by which the Easter good news continues to spread. I want you to ask yourself, "Where am I in the process? Am I at step one or perhaps step four.
Here is step one: SOMEONE TELLS US ABOUT JESUS.
Two angels first told Mary Magdalene the good news. "He is not here. He has risen!" (Luke 24:6) Then she in turn went to the disciples with the news: "I have seen the Lord." (John 20:18). Who first told you the good news of resurrection?
The second step in spreading the Easter good news is this: WE INQUIRE FOR OURSELVES.
When Simon Peter heard the news from Mary Magdalene, he decided to go check it out for himself. He ran to the tomb. You might say, "Preacher, dead people don’t usually come out of graves. It’s hard for a modern person trained in scientific methodologies to believe it. How can you be so sure it happened?"
Let me give you the three best evidences for resurrection.
First, the disciples died for their belief when a simple denial of resurrection would have saved them. Sometimes people will die for their religious convictions if they sincerely believe they’re true, but people won’t die for religious beliefs that they know are false. Thousands of First Century Christians suffered and died in agony rather than deny the truth of resurrection.
The second proof of resurrection is the change of the Sabbath Day to Sunday. For 1500 years the Jews had faithfully adhered to Sabbath observance from sundown on Friday until sundown on Saturday. It was a biblical commandment, one of the top ten! Yet in a matter of a few weeks, at least 10,000 Jews had begun celebrating the Sabbath on Sunday, the day of resurrection. Something mighty powerful had to cause that change.
The third proof of resurrection is the birth of the church. At the time of Jesus’ crucifixion, the church consisted of a few hundred depressed, fearful, defeated persons. Yet within five weeks after the crucifixion, some 10,000 Christians were boldly taking the message of Christ to the whole world. After only twenty years the Christian faith had reached Caesar’s palace in Rome. In just two hundred years the movement had overwhelmed the entire Roman Empire. Nothing short of a resurrection could have given such momentum to the movement. Now let’s return to that four-step process by which the Easter good news spreads
The third step is this: JESUS FINDS US!
Jesus touches our life in some significant way, leaving his fingerprint on us. Then it’s no longer ancient history; it’s current events. If the Christ-Spirit is active and personal with us now, he must be alive. Resurrection became real for the early disciples when they saw the risen Christ. "Suddenly Jesus met them (the disciples). ‘Greetings,’ he said." (Matthew 28:9) At least one of the disciples, Thomas, had been extremely skeptical of the resurrection. Then Jesus met him face to face. "...he said to Thomas, ‘Put your finger here; see my hands...Stop doubting and believe.’" (John 20:27)
Jesus meets us in many ways at our points of need. Perhaps he becomes very real to us in a worship service or in our daily devotion, or a Christian book maybe in the middle of our grief or struggles.
The fourth and final step in spreading the good news of resurrection is: WE TELL OTHERS! Then the cycle is complete and the news of resurrection spreads exponentially by personal conversation. In the year 2022 we find ourselves sitting in front of our computers or the TV reading new story after new story how our society has fallen further and further away from Almighty God and His Word. We may even find ourselves asking “what happened?”
Perhaps it is not so much what happened it is what hasn’t happened. And that is YOU not telling anyone about the resurrection. Who is going to discover the risen Christ because of you simply speaking the truth in love to them about what YOU believe?
Bobby Bowden, the former and now deceased football coach of Florida State University, told a story about a man in Kansas who said to his pastor, "I’m going to Oregon to work among the loggers for a year. They pay all your expenses and the pay is fantastic." The pastor said, "I’ve heard about those logging camps with all their drinking, carousing, and profanity. When they find out that you’re a Christian, they will harass you unmercifully." "Well," said the man, "I’m going anyway."
A year later the man was back in Kansas. His pastor welcomed him back. He asked, "How did you survive after those loggers found out that you’re a Christian?" The man said, "They never found out." What a shame!
Do the people in you’re the people around you know you are a Christian? How about your family? Grandchildren? If not, why not? That’s part of your mission field. The most important thing you can say to another person is this: "I believe that Jesus Christ is alive because he has touched my life." God can touch someone’s life because of you with life-changing power. He is not here, “Christ is Risen, He is Risen indeed!” Amen