There are just some times in our day where things make a difference. Take them out, things go wrong. Add things in, and things go wrong. There are just certain things needed to make a day a good day. Like the correct ingredients in baking a cake or cookies or a roast—the correct ingredients and the correct combination of those ingredients makes all the difference.
You can serve me a ginger ale, it may sparkle, be dark yellow in color, have bubbles, but if it isn’t Vernor’s Ginger Ale something is missing!
Take meat as an example and put it in a low grade marinade--it is still meat, but the flavor of that meat won’t be released unless the marinade does its job by breaking down the meat, releasing the flavor deep within and the right marinade makes all the difference.
You can kiss all different kinds of people. I’ve kissed my mother, my father, my aunts and cousins. I kiss my children too. But get all of the people in the whole world in a line, when it comes for it to be my wife’s turn to kiss, there is something about her that makes all the difference. Something would be missing in all of the others.
Death is the same way. I may go to a hundred funerals, but there is something about being at a person’s funeral who had a living faith in God that makes all the difference. Something is missing in the others.
When it comes to Easter, there are certain ingredients that make all the difference. Take them out or add too much and Easter is all wrong. So I want us to take a look at the necessary ingredients to make Easter right by asking the question, “What Difference Does Easter Make?” What made that Easter different than any other day?
The first ingredient that makes all difference for Easter is the CROSS. Take the cross out of Easter and you mess with an essential ingredient that makes Easter Easter.
The Bible says Jesus endured that shameful cross scorned its shame for the joy that would be his on the other side.
Paul couldn’t shake the message of the cross for it transformed him from an ignorant persecuting zealot into a man who was persecuted for the very cross he tried tear down! But he couldn’t tear down THAT powerful cross! Paul learned how to boast in that cross and said, “by that cross the world has been crucified to me and I to the world.”
Christ’s act on that Cross canceled the record of debt for the sins we we’ve committed that stood against us with all of its legal demands--Jesus nailed the record there!
To people who are dying and living life in the fast lane and heading for destruction, the preaching of the cross is foolishness. It is an offense to them, revealing their need they’d rather not be shown.
But in contrast, for those who have found life in Jesus Christ, have also found the power from God for daily living—through the cross is the power of God!
Preaching around the cross doesn’t do any good—it’s empty. Preaching in front of the Cross doesn’t change lives—it robs the cross and makes of it no effect.
But holding forth the message of the Cross of Jesus Christ reconciles all equally to God, it tears away any hostility between people and God and because God used the cross, an instrument of death, as an instrument to make peace through His Son’s blood. The Cross bridges the gap between us and God!
The Apostle Paul, writer of 13 books in the Bible, was consumed with the Cross as a necessary ingredient in not only Easter, but in his every day life. Paul made this statement: “I determined to know nothing among you except Jesus Christ, and Him crucified.” (1 Cor. 2:2)
He didn’t say, “When I came and preached to you I wanted to be sure you knew all the things you need to be doing and all of things you need to not be doing.” He didn’t say, “Now listen, this is how you are to worship God and this isn’t how you are to worship God.” Paul wasn’t concerned about morality and religion when he went preaching from city to city. His concern was communicating Jesus Christ as accurately as he could and preaching about the Cross.
When Paul preached, he decided in advance to make his priority to preach the person of Jesus Christ and the work of Jesus Christ on the Cross.
And you know what my first priority as a Pastor is too? To be sure you know who Jesus is and what He did for you. And do you know what your first priority is? As a parent, grandparent, spouse, guardian, friend, and as a Christ-follower, a Christian—it is to speak about who Jesus is and what he did for your children, grandchildren, spouse, friends and everyone you know and love.
The cross is literally the crux of the matter.
There are three ways to look at the cross according to the Apostle Paul. 1 Corinthians 1:22-25 gives us three different sorts of people who look at the cross and come to a conclusion. Two are wrong. One is right.
“Jews ask for signs, and Greeks search for wisdom; but WE PREACH CHRIST CRUCIFIED, to the Jews a stumbling block, and to Gentiles foolishness, but to those who are the called, both Jews and Greeks, Christ the power of God and the wisdom of God.”
A. The Jewish Perspective
1. The Jews saw that the cross was Jesus getting what he deserved
You just don’t claim to be God or His Son and get away with it.
You don’t come and say you are the Messiah and are going to deliver God’s people, flash a few miracles here and there to make a point and expect that if you didn’t check in with the big guys first…the self-imposed Jewish legal system of the day made up of fancy Pharisees and self-righteous Sadducees, that you are going to be around for long!
What just boggles my mind is how the religious leaders of the day could try to sweep under the carpet the resurrection! They wanted a sign! Talk about a sign! An empty tomb! But we aren’t there yet… we have to go through the cross first! And when you sweep things under the carpet it becomes something you stumbling over!
You don’t play God or even His Son. You don’t play Messiah either. But you especially don’t say those things and hang out with the un-holies! Jesus offended the religious leaders, denouncing them by siding with “sinners”. He hung out with the low-lifes, the nobodies, the 2nd-rate people of the day. He made a few public showings at some upper echelon individuals, but Jesus parted from those meetings with a story of how the upper people were being evil to the lower people. Not very friendly dinner conversation!
Jesus wasn’t who they wanted. They rejected what God sent to save them…AND PEOPLE ARE STILL DOING IT TODAY!
Maybe you have a similar Jewish perspective. Maybe you have been looking for a sign. If you are, may I make a suggestion? Stop looking! A sign has already been given and “X” marks the spot…it is the cross of Christ that speaks of God’s love for you! And that makes all the difference!
Well, a crucified Messiah defied all Jewish expectations…and was dismissed as absurd by the Gentile world. The second perspective:
B. The Rest of the Gentile World’s Perspective
“…Greeks search for wisdom; but we preach Christ crucified…to Gentiles [that’s] foolishness…
When something doesn’t make sense to us it is foolishness.
Too the Romans who knew what power and force could do, saw Jesus as a pathetic figure of weakness. Romans worshiped strength and a man who was without position and rejected by his own people is seen of no account. Pilate made Jesus an object of ridicule when he posted over him: “King of the Jews.”
Is our society so different today? Do all you can to get all you can as quickly as you can and can all you get so you can sit on your can all your days—amen, is the American prayer!
But God doesn’t work that way! He used this foolish Cross to mess with the minds of the so-called “wise”; He raised a weak man up on a Cross to deflate the strength of the so-called strong.
At the cross, the ground is level! The ground is level! There is no one higher at the foot of the cross, no one lower! For all have sinned and have fallen short of God’s requirements. All of us are sinners in need of mercy and grace regardless of how evil or how moral we have been in our life. And whether you know it or not, one day all of us will bow, no matter how strong you think you are, you will bow your knee before Jesus Christ and confess him as Lord. You can do that willingly as one he has touched and changed, or ashamedly as one who rejected Him.
3. The 3rd Perspective is the Believer:
The year was 1992. A man was on parole for child molesting. His fellow apartment renters complained of odors and chainsaw noises. When the police searched his apartment, they found it full of skulls, headless torsos and body parts. He would murder, mutilate and sometimes cannibalized boys and men. Police believed he was doing this for over 10 years. His name was Jeffrey Dahmer.
Jeffrey Dahmer committed more than the 17 murders, which he confessed to. Dhamer was characterized as the necrophiliac who had cannibalized young men in his Milwaukee apartment. Dahmer was sentenced to serve 941 years in prison = 15 life sentences. If he lived he would be dismissed no earlier than March 2934. As it turned out, he served less than three years.
But in May of 1994, six months before his death he was baptized in the prison whirlpool. One story goes something like this. In his weekly Bible study, Jeffrey Dahmer pondered the Book of Revelation. Chapter 9 prophesied about scorpions that would so torture sinners that they would beg for death. Dahmer reflected on his previous request at his trial that he die for his crimes. The option was denied by Wisconsin law.
The Rev. Roy Ratcliff, the one who baptized Jeffrey Dahmer, shared: “Sometimes people ask me if Jeff was sincere about his faith. I’m not sure what they’re looking for, but I get the impression they’re hoping I’ll say he was not sincere, and thus all this talk about his conversion is just talk, but has no basis in truth. To answer that question, I often tell the story where Jeff once confided to me that he felt very remorseful for his crimes. He said he thought the state should have put him to death for what he’d done. I agreed with him. I told him I thought his crimes deserved his death also. He followed that thought up with this question, “If that is the case, then am I sinning against God by living?” I don’t think anyone could ask that question without a sincere heart. The question posed other questions about suicide or doing something to get someone to kill him, but I thought he was very sincere about his sins and his desire to be right with God. If that meant his own death, then he was willing to accept that. No one can get more sincere than that.”
You may say, “Pastor, what does that have to do with Easter?” EVERYTHING! Because, if Jeffrey Dahmer isn’t in heaven, then none of us are going to make it!
Jesus Christ’s death on the cross was enough! The CROSS makes all the difference! Faith in CHRIST is what qualifies you, not the things you have done. When it comes to your Sin, His blood paid for it all! When it comes to God’s anger, wrath and justice, God’s mercy is shown through the cross--”X” marks the spot for forgiveness of sin, “X” marks the spot for salvation, “X” marks the spot where God says, “ENOUGH!” That, the Cross of my Son, satisfies My anger, My wrath, My justice.
At the foot of the cross, the ground is level. No one is higher that anyone else, no one is lower than anyone else. Even one who has committed the crimes of Jeffrey Dahmer? Even for crimes WORSE than Jeffrey Dahmer’s! For to God, one soul to slip off into eternity without the blood of His Son upon it --THAT’S the worse crime of all!
The cross means something so powerful, only God could do it something so wise, only God could think it! And that’s the 3rd perspective, the one of the believer who has been changed by the work at the Cross!
The Cross resolves the problem of guilt? You can try to forgive yourself but that won’t resolve it, because your guilt is toward another—against God! Forgiveness must come from the offended party—they are the one who has the authority to forgive you. And when Jesus said on the Cross, “It is finished!” that meant that at that moment he canceled out the certificate of debt, the one passed on to the eternal affairs collections agency sent out against you—and Jesus took it out of the way by nailing it to his cross.”
The cross was not man’s verdict against God; it is God’s verdict on man. The cross is a legal transaction only God could make. The cross is fully adequate. The cross brings reconciliation—it brings you and God back together. Your sin separated you long enough and God made the way for you to get back to Him. Your sin continues to separate you and God; your sins hide His face from you. Christ brings your two faces back together through the Cross!
Remember when I spoke of the marinade? It is suppose to bring out the best in the meat. But it doesn’t matter how much you marinade yourself in church, or God’s Word or around holy people, if you have bad tasting sin your life, it spoils the whole pan of meat! SIN SPOILS! But the Cross can “X” it out!
So now what? What can be done about what we’ve heard to day? If the Cross makes all the difference to Paul, to Jesus, to God…then shouldn’t it make all the difference to you?
The Bible says, “He was in the world, and the world was made through Him, and the world did not know Him. He came to His own, and they did not receive Him. But as many as did receive Him, He gave the right to become children of God, even to those who believe in His name.” John 1:10-12
That grace is still available today for those who will trust in God’s act in Christ—and in Christ alone! No one else can lead you to God. No one else has opened the way to heaven through his death on a cross. Nothing but the cross provides the flavor of mercy and grace to Easter like the Cross of Jesus Christ. Nothing else displays God’s cost so greatly!
A man worked in a small town as the operator of a drawbridge on the river. A train track ran across the bridge, and it was his job to keep the bridge up when no train was coming so that the boats could pass underneath. But when a train approached, he’d blow a whistle and then let down the bridge.
It was a sunny Saturday morning and the man decided to bring his seven-year-old son along to work with him to show his son what his daddy did. He showed him the big gears which raised and lowered the bridge and how to pull the levers here and there. The boy later played along the river skipping rocks on the water, chased some butterflies, and even tried to catch some fish.
Just before noon, a passenger train was due to come through the area. So the man began to make preparations to let the bridge down so the train could pass safely across the river. As he examined the bridge, he noticed that someone—a small child—must have crawled over the guardrail next to the bridge and had gotten his foot stuck in one of the gears. As he looked closer, he was horrified to discover that it was his own son. He heard the train’s first whistle blow. The child was too far away for him to run to his rescue and get back to lower the bridge. He knew he had to make a quick decision. If he lowered the bridge now, his son would die, crushed by the mammoth gears. But if he didn’t, all the people on the train would die as the train plunged into the river. He barely had time to think.
As he screamed in agony, the man thrust forward the lever to lower the bridge just as the train arrived. His son died instantly. As the train glided by, the man noticed people in the boxcars reading their papers and magazines, sipping their drinks, some laughing and some waved—all were oblivious to what had just taken place. The man could take it no longer. He screamed after the train in heaves: "Don’t you understand? Don’t you know what I did for you? I gave my son’s life for you! Don’t you care?"
And that is the story of the Cross. Without the cross, there would be no Easter. That’s why the Cross makes all the difference.
