According to English author G.K. Chesterton, “Hope means hoping when things are hopeless, or it is no virtue at all…As long as matters are really hopeful, hope is mere flattery or platitude; it is only when everything is hopeless that hope begins to be a strength.”
HOPE, folks, is the gift of Easter! It was for the earliest of disciples … and it still is for us! It’s the ‘sign of Jonah’ that Jesus spoke of, isn’t it? Jonah spent how many days in the belly of the whale (3)? And, then he was resurrected (spewed out) … to live a life of obedience to God! In a similar sense, just think of the events of these past 3 days, especially in terms of what Jesus went through during that first Holy Week, and how it turned out…
The First Day … FRIDAY – With the death of Jesus on Calvary, we witness, amid the dissonance of soldiers and criminals, gawkers and passers-by, what looks like the final triumph of evil. All the ugliness and violence we can imagine was embodied in the events that had as their climax the six hours during which God in human form hung on a cross on a hillside outside the city walls of Jerusalem…
We cannot appreciate Easter until we’ve been to the cross!
- Here’s Jesus, betrayed by one of his own, jailed, sentenced, convicted, then beaten & crucified at the hands of his enemies…
- Here’s Jesus, a friend to so many who claimed to be his followers, yet on this occasion, he found only desertion—those followers, for the most part, nowhere to be seen (most likely, in hiding)…
- Here’s the hope of a messiah suddenly dashed—the one whom they praised a week ago, on that first Palm Sunday, as he rode triumphantly into Jerusalem through the Eastern Gate … as a king!
- At 9 AM, he was hung up on the cross; at Noon, the skies became very, very dark; at 3 PM, he said, ‘It is finished!’ and breathed his last…
The Second Day … SATURDAY – This was … ‘the day after.’ We have no official record of what occurred on Friday night following the crucifixion and burial or throughout the day on Saturday—the Sabbath. We are left to our imaginations, based of course on what we read in the Gospels. This was the day—for Jesus’ disciples—when it probably seemed that all HOPE was gone … What would it be like to be one of Jesus’ disciples on that day? Think of this second day … or ‘the day after’ like this: It is the day that we’ve ALL known; it is the day after…
- The diagnosis of terminal cancer…
- A spouse walks out, leaving your life, your future, your hopes, & your heart … in tatters…
- The lawsuit is filed against you & the day after the verdict…
- 9/11—the day the news is sinking in & you realize your life will never be the same again…
- The loss of someone you love…
It is the day when the world seems so dark that HOPE is nowhere to be found… Can you sense what the disciples were feeling on that day—‘the day after?’ Then, comes…
The Third Day … SUNDAY. It began at sundown on Saturday, but it wasn’t until morning that Mary Magdalene discovered that the stone had been rolled away and the tomb was empty. This is the day we celebrate TODAY! This, folks, is the day when HOPE was restored … and victory was ours! Listen to today’s scripture from Mark 16: Folks, here’s the story of Easter, as it applies to US…
When the Sabbath was over, Mary Magdalene, Mary the mother of James, and Salome bought spices so they could embalm him. 2 Very early on Sunday morning, as the sun rose, they went to the tomb. 3 They worried out loud to each other, "Who will roll back the stone from the tomb for us?" 4 Then they looked up, saw that it had been rolled back—it was a huge stone—and walked right in. 5 They saw a young man sitting on the right side, dressed all in white. They were completely taken aback, astonished. 6 He said, "Don’t be afraid. I know you’re looking for Jesus the Nazarene, the One they nailed on the cross. He’s been raised up; he’s here no longer. You can see for yourselves that the place is empty. – Mark 16:1-6 (MSG)
IF THERE WERE NO RESURRECTION, WE’D HAVE NO HOPE… Just listen to the tone of these first verses that were read today: Verses 1-3 read, “When the Sabbath was over, Mary Magdalene, Mary the mother of James, and Salome bought spices so they could embalm him. Very early on Sunday morning, as the sun rose, they went to the tomb. They worried out loud to each other, ‘Who will roll back the stone from the tomb for us?’”
Preparations for those we’ve loved & lost are rarely enjoyable times… I watched from a distance as my father, my cousins, my aunt & others prepared this past week for the funeral services & burial of my Aunt Sis… Yes, there were good memories being shared, but it was a bitter-sweet time at best. My aunt had touched the lives of many … and now she’s gone. Do you know when I’ll miss her the most? My birthday! This was the aunt who never missed anyone’s birthday; you could always count on her for remembering those special days in your life (like no other in our family). Our hope, during days like this, comes from this: my Aunt Sis was a believer—a faithful disciple of Jesus Christ … and there laid her HOPE … and there lies our HOPE…
Matthew Henry, of biblical commentary fame, once said this:
“‘All who believe in Christ have hope in Him; all who believe in Him as Redeemer hope for redemption and salvation by Him; but if there be no resurrection, their hope in Him must be limited to this life. And if all their hopes in Christ lie within the compass of this life, they are in a much worse condition than the rest of humanity… Better to be anything than a Christian under these terms! It is a gross absurdity in a Christian to admit the supposition of no resurrection or future state. It would leave no hope beyond this world, and would frequently make his condition the worst in the world.”
Folks, what happened on the Third Day … is our HOPE; without that Third Day, there is none…
BUT BECAUSE OF THE RESURRECTION, WE HAVE HOPE … AND, EVEN VICTORY! Listen to how the tone of that first Easter changes in the next verses (4-6): “Then they looked up, saw that it had been rolled back—it was a huge stone—and walked right in. They saw a young man sitting on the right side, dressed all in white. They were completely taken aback, astonished. He said, ‘Don’t be afraid. I know you’re looking for Jesus the Nazarene, the One they nailed on the cross. He’s been raised up; he’s here no longer. You can see for yourselves that the place is empty.’” It happened … just as he said it would! I love it when things work out that way … and my experience has been this: Most people desire this kind of HOPE…
Folks, even if some people’s faith in this life isn’t as obvious as others, when it comes to the end of this life … most people are praying that the resurrection was real—that Jesus’ words were truth! They need that HOPE … and Jesus’ gave it to us…
In one of his lighter moments, Benjamin Franklin penned his own epitaph. (Have you ever done that before?) He didn’t profess to be a born-again Christian, but it seems he must have been influenced by Paul’s teaching of the resurrection of the body. Here’s what he wrote:
The Body of B. Franklin, Printer: Like the Cover of an old book, its contents torn out, and stripped of its lettering and gilding, lies here, food for worms, But the work shall not be wholly lost; for it will, as he believed, appear once more in a new & more perfect edition–corrected and amended by the Author.
In faith, folks, this can be all of our epitaphs… Because of Jesus’ resurrection, we too will ‘appear once more in a new & more perfect edition—corrected and amended by the Author…
The Apostle Paul summarized the role of the Resurrection in the gospel message in this way: “If you confess with your lips that Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved” (Romans 10:9).
That leads me to the last of the theories of the Atonement that we’ll consider this season: Christus Victor. This view of what happened on the cross … and throughout that first Easter weekend … was popularized by a Swedish theologian and bishop: Gustaf Aulén (OWL-én)—a one-time neighbor of church members Sven & Louise Eliasson (1954-56), according to Sven…
Anyway, Aulén’s view of the atonement (and we all know what at-one-ment is after last Sunday) is this: the suffering, death, and resurrection of Christ must be taken together as a powerful word from God … announcing God’s victory over the powers of evil and over the sin that alienates us from God. The events of this whole Easter weekend, in other words, are God’s triumph over death, which we, by faith, share.
So, the final GOOD NEWS for today is this:
- Christ’s VICTORY … is now ours, by faith!
- He is THE RISEN ONE;
- He is CHRIST THE VICTOR;
- and, by putting our faith in him, all HOPE is now ours … that we too will someday be resurrected to eternal life…
- and Jesus’ victory over death … is our victory over death, too!
Praise God for this truth; praise God that this truth is now the reality of our lives by faith…