Peace Of Resurrection

Peace of Resurrection

Then, the same day at evening, being the first day of the week, when the doors were shut where the disciples were assembled, for fear of the Jews, Jesus came and stood in the midst, and said to them, “Peace be with you.” - John 20:19

Three teenage children were making all kinds of noise. They were yelling, throwing things, and running around the car in front of their house. The father of these children told his neighbor we just came from the hospital where their mother died about an hour ago. I don't know what to do, and I guess they don't know how to handle it either."

This similarly illustrates the disciples from Friday afternoon all the way up to Sunday morning. They were at a complete loss. Everything they had bet their lives on for over the last three years. They had put all their hopes on Jesus, but, through their human eyes, they saw Jesus defeated. But then the morning came, and the morning brought the light of a new day. Ans ever since that morning, nothing has ever been the same.

On this Resurrected Sunday morning -- behold the man who took the victory.

All Jesus of Nazareth was, all he said, all he represented, all he came to do was focused toward this moment of Easter. The resurrection of Jesus is His defining moment. More than anything else he said, or did, or accomplished, the resurrection made Him who He is in the eyes of the world, in the eyes of His enemies, in the eyes of His followers, and in the eyes of millions of untold people across 21 centuries. This was His defining moment.

"When the final history of mankind has been written, its proudest glory would be that there once walked into ancient Jerusalem and into the hearts of mankind a simple peasant named Jesus of Nazareth." - Dr. Charles Allen. (Historian, and United Methodist Minister).

Because of God and because of what happened early in the morning that spring day in old Jerusalem, the entire world and the history of humankind has never been the same.

We all remember the story well. It was early that morning that the women went out to the garden tomb. They intended to anoint the body of Jesus with spices. But when they arrived, no one was there. As they wondered about what this meant, the angel of the Lord said to them, "Why do you seek the living among the dead? He is not here but is risen."

The women went immediately to tell the disciples. The disciples came running out to the tomb, and they also found it was empty. They all began to realize the things Jesus had told them were true.

We are not sure how they spent that day, but Luke and John both tell us that late in the evening, when they were all together in the upper room, Jesus came into the room. He said to them, "Peace to you." Sensing that they were afraid, He said, "Why are you troubled? Why do doubts arise in your hearts? Behold, look in my hands and my feet, that it is I myself. Handle me and see, for a spirit does not have flesh and bones as you see I have." Then He shared a meal with them.

Nothing will ever be the same. In the midst of defeat, Jesus took the victory. He had been defeated, but He became victorious. He had been put to death, but He won victory over death. They had put him in a tomb, but He walked out of the tomb. In the face of death, defeat, and despair, Jesus took the victory.

And because Jesus took the victory, there have been several things added unto us.

I. There is a marvelous peace greater than despair.

On that first Resurrection day, when Jesus came into the room to see His disciples. He found them wanting to believe. They had been out to the tomb that morning. They saw that it was empty. Mary and the other women had told them what the angel of the Lord had said to them.

John, in his gospel, tells us that Jesus even appeared to Mary in the garden. John 20:15-16.

Still the disciples were unsure, still hoping, still caught up in sorrow and despair. Yet they had a glimmer of hope. Then Jesus came into the room and said to them, "Peace to you." It was the same word they had heard from him before in the calming of the storm, "Peace, be still." On their last night together he said, "My peace I leave with you." Now he assures them, "Peace to you."

That is part of the good news of Easter for us today. There is a marvelous peace greater than despair. It is "the peace of God which passes all understanding." - Phil. 4:7.