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The Gospel of Matthew Bible Studies
The Gospel of Mark Bible Studies
The Book of Acts Bible Studies
January 2009
February 2009
March 2009
April 2009
May 2009
June 2009
July 2009
August 2009
September 2009
October 2009
November 2009
December 2009
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The Resurrection of our Lord - Easter Day (B) Text: John 20:1-18 April 12, 2009 In the Name of our Risen Savior, Jesus Christ our Lord! Amen! Today on this most glorious of all days we are gathered to celebrate Jesus' resurrection from the dead. And because of that resurrection, we believe that we shall live also! We do not need to be afraid of death anymore. That's why we're here to celebrate! Because of Jesus' resurrection, death has been defeated. Death has no power over us! Even though we may die, yet we know that we shall live again forever! That's the essence, the "bottom line" of our Christian faith! That is why we are here to praise God and worship Him with unrestrained joy! On this Easter day we remember that our Lord Jesus is victorious over all things that oppose Him, even death itself - and that we shall share in His victory! Alleluia! Christ is risen! He is risen indeed! Alleluia! But how do we know that this is true? How can we believe in such a story? Some people believe in it because of outward, circumstantial evidence. John himself in the first part of today's gospel points to that. He beckons us to look into the empty tomb, whose stone has been mysteriously rolled away from the opening. In this tomb, he points to the burial cloths which caught his eye. They consisted of a long shroud that was wrapped around Jesus' body in an almost mummy style and a smaller shroud or napkin wrapped about his head. John points and says, "Look! These clothes are not in any disarray!" Or, as the original Greek language puts it, "They are still in their FOLDS!" It was as if the body encased by these folds had evaporated up and went right through them! The fact that the burial cloths were so perfectly arranged indicates that something extraordinary must have happened! John points out these details to show that Jesus' missing body was obviously not the work of grave robbers who would have stolen a body without bothering to remove and arrange the grave cloths it was wrapped in. Then, as our gospel lesson tells us, the other disciple who was with Peter (probably John) started to remember Jesus' resurrection predications, and he believed! He believed because of the outward, circumstantial evidence AND because there was no other way to satisfactorily explain what had happened! As far as John was concerned, the neatly folded grave cloths proved that Jesus obviously did rise from the dead! Case closed! But after coming to that conclusion, there was nothing more for him to do than to go home. You see, John's "intellectual method" of deducing the reality of Jesus' resurrection has some good points, but it also has some serious deficiencies. People who believe in Jesus only because of the "proofs" of outward evidence will never truly experience the power and the love of God in their lives. Like John, they will just "believe" and then "return home" with nothing in their lives having changed very much. Are any of us like John, "believing" in Jesus but never really encountering him? I have a feeling that this may describe many of us who are here today. We "believe" that Jesus rose from the dead on Easter, but many of us have not yet encountered our risen and living Lord in a way that powerfully changes our lives! But contrast John's method of "proving" Jesus' resurrection with that of Mary Magdalene. It is obvious that all of the outward physical evidences did not make that much of an impression upon her. Even after seeing everything that Peter and John had seen, she still stayed outside the tomb weeping. She STILL thought that robbers must have stolen Jesus' body away. Even seeing a vision of angels in the tomb did not comfort her. For Mary, nothing less than meeting Jesus himself would cause her to believe that he was alive! Nothing less than that would turn her sorrow into joy! And of course, that is precisely what happened! Jesus came to her and called, "MARY!" And after that encounter, she went and announced to the disciples, "I have seen the Lord!" Mary reminds us that faith is not so much knowing about Jesus as it is about knowing Jesus! Believing in Jesus' resurrection like John did as good as that was, was not nearly the same as Marys personally meeting her risen Lord! What about us today? Many people know ABOUT Jesus Christ what he did while here on earth and his teachings but they do not really KNOW and experience him as their living Lord and Savior. Outward props to our faith may be of some value, but they are no substitute for having a personal encounter with Jesus! I personally can attest to that. As most of you may know, two months ago 14 of us from Pella had the wonderful privilege of traveling to the Holy Land. One of the many high points of the tour was visiting the Garden Tomb, which if not the actual tomb where Jesus was buried and then rose again from was certainly within a mile or two of the site. Going into that tomb was a very powerful and meaningful experience for me, as I am sure that it would be for all of us. BUT the empty tomb is really not what Easter is about. Even more powerful and meaningful for me was encountering Jesus personally immediately afterwards during the Communion Service our group had immediately afterward at that site! Through the bread and the wine in a way that defies logical explanation we saw and experienced the risen Jesus. Not physically, of course, but in our hearts as we knew that he was truly with us. Our meeting Jesus in Holy Communion is what the Easter story is really all about! In its essence, our celebration of Easter is not about an empty tomb or even the folded burial cloths. It is about a living Lord who still continues to come to us today and who calls us by name. "Mary", he says - and John and James, Carol and Dorothy, Brian and George, Shirley, and Pat, Dave and Scott, Linda and Sue, Peter, Josh, Janis, Doris and I can go on and on and on. Put you own name into that list, for Jesus calls each of us here by name. And on this Easter day he bids us to not be sad, for he is no longer dead but living. And he lives for us so that we can be with him forever. Jesus is with us now and he always shall be! And when it comes time for each of us to close our eyes in the sleep of death, Jesus also promises that he will be there to wake us up! And when we wake up, we will be seeing him face to face and hear him lovingly call, "Mary!" "Mark!" "Michelle" "Michael"! (Or put your own name in there!) People of God, may we experience the loving presence of the risen Jesus who is calling to us even as he did to Mary Magdalene. He is truly here with us today, closer than even the air that we breathe filling us with his love and power and life. Feel his forgiveness and his joy as we commune with him. Know that he is with us now and will be at our side wherever we go. Know that he will bring us even through death itself! Jesus is alive and he loves us! And nothing absolutely nothing will be able to separate us from him. That is the glorious message that we celebrate on this Easter day. For Christ is risen! He is risen indeed! Alleluia! Alleluia! Amen! -------------------- Pastor George Karres 418 W. Main St. Sidney, MT 59270
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