The Resurrection Changes Everything!
Jeffery Anselmi
Resurrection Sunday / Easter; Resurrection / 2 Corinthians 5:14–21
Resurrection brings salvation, and with salvation comes a new identity in Christ and a hope that surpasses everything.
INTRODUCTION
• WOW! it is Resurrection Sunday!
• This is a day that we place special emphasis on the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead!
• Why would we take the time to place special emphasis on the resurrection?
• In other words, what difference does the resurrection make in your life today?
• What difference has the resurrection made in the world since this event took place?
• Many think the resurrection never took place and was a hoax.
• Yet if that were the truth, then nothing would really change; if Jesus stayed dead and rotted in a tomb somewhere in Jerusalem, then why are we here?
• Maybe you are sitting here with us today or watching online, and you do not believe in the resurrection of Jesus from the dead. If you are in that spot right now, so was I at one time. I am glad you are with us.
• All I ask is that you approach Jesus with an open mind.
• We need Jesus, and the only way that Jesus can do anything for us is if He is alive.
• According to the Apostle Paul in 1 Corinthians 15, if we are worshipping a dead Jesus, we are the most pitied of people along with the fact that we are making false claims about God.
• We need Jesus to have defeated death because we all have a serious problem that we cannot fix on our own no matter how hard we try.
• Human beings were made to be in communion with God, yet our original purpose and identity were lost because of sin.
• Author Thomas Merton in his 1955 book entitled “No Man is an Island, states:
“Sin strikes at the very depth of our personality. It destroys the one reality on which our true character, identity, and happiness depend: our fundamental orientation to God.
We are created to will what God wills, to know what He knows, to love what He loves.
Sin is … to love what He does not love.
Therefore, every sin is a sin against truth, a sin against obedience, and against love.
But in all these three things sin proves itself to be a supreme injustice not only against God but, above all, against ourselves”
• The resurrection of Jesus makes all the difference in the world, both this world and the next, eternity!
• Today we will focus on three things that the resurrection changes in our life when we embrace this truth by being baptized and becoming a new creation in Jesus!
• What I want to do today is simple, if you believe in the resurrection, I will show you some things that should change in your life due to the belief in the resurrection.
• We all know folks who do not believe in Jesus, God, or the resurrection.
• One of the most difficult things in life can be convincing someone of the truth concerning God, Jesus, and the resurrection.
• However, one thing that will help is to convince people of the truth is that we believe in that truth enough to change our lives.
• A changed life is one of the greatest testimonies of the truth about the resurrection we can offer.
• Let’s turn to 2 Corinthians 5:14-21 to see that the resurrection changes everything.
• We will examine three areas in our life that belief in the resurrection should change.
Our BIG IDEA today is: The resurrection brings salvation, and with salvation comes a new identity in Christ, a new life in Christ, and a hope that surpasses everything!
2 Corinthians 5:14–15 CSB
14 For the love of Christ compels us, since we have reached this conclusion, that one died for all, and therefore all died.
15 And he died for all so that those who live should no longer live for themselves, but for the one who died for them and was raised.
The resurrection invokes...
SERMON
I. A new motivation for life.
• What drives you in life?
• What motivates you to get up and take on the day?
• We all have something that drives us.
• For the Apostle Paul, he was driven by the LAW before he came to Jesus.
• Paul was a leading persecutor of the Way, as it was known.
• Paul was driven to follow the Law to perfection and stomp out anyone he perceived threatened the Law he so faithfully sought to follow.
• What motivates us says a lot about us.
• Some are motivated or driven by power, money, lust, selfishness, fame, success, or vengeance.
• This list barely scratches the surface; there are a ton of things that drive us to live life the way we do.
• If you were to examine yourself and ask what motivated you honestly, what would the real answer be?
• For Paul, there was no doubt about what motivated his life, the LAW; that is until something happened to him.
• On the road to Damascus, Paul was introduced to the resurrected Jesus!
• Once Paul came to Jesus, as a new creation in Christ, Paul developed a new motivation for life, a new thing that motivated all he did in life, from his ministry, to how he viewed and dealt with other people.
• Paul states that the LOVE of CHRIST compels or MOTIVATES him in life now.
• Paul is motivated by Christ’s love for us.
• Christ’s love for mankind was made known to us most clearly at Calvary!
Romans 5:8 CSB
8 But God proves his own love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us.
• The thought of what Jesus did for him on the cross is what now controls or compels him!
• The word translated COMPELS denotes that which restrains or urges on.
• Paul felt like he had no other choice than to be motivated by the love of Jesus since Jesus died for him on the cross.
• When you believe in the resurrection of Jesus and are baptized into Christ, your life should have new meaning, your motivation for life should change since you are a new creation!
• Paul explains why he concluded that his life needed a new motivation; he died for all so that ALL could have the chance to be saved!
• He also knew that the new life we have in Christ, part of the reason the love of Jesus compelled Him to go to the cross was so that we would no longer live for ourselves, but rather for Christ who died for us!
Galatians 2:20 CSB
20 I have been crucified with Christ, and I no longer live, but Christ lives in me. The life I now live in the body, I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me.
• Before Jesus, sin caused us to be spiritually dead; because of Jesus, our spirit can be brought back to life!
• When we are in Christ, we rise and walk in the newness of life!
Romans 6:3–7 CSB
3 Or are you unaware that all of us who were baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into his death?
4 Therefore we were buried with him by baptism into death, in order that, just as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, so we too may walk in newness of life.
5 For if we have been united with him in the likeness of his death, we will certainly also be in the likeness of his resurrection.
6 For we know that our old self was crucified with him so that the body ruled by sin might be rendered powerless so that we may no longer be enslaved to sin,
7 since a person who has died is freed from sin.
• Your belief in the resurrection should give you a new motivation for life!
• Let’s turn to verses 16-19!
2 Corinthians 5:16–19 CSB
16 From now on, then, we do not know anyone from a worldly perspective. Even if we have known Christ from a worldly perspective, yet now we no longer know him in this way.
17 Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; the old has passed away, and see, the new has come!
18 Everything is from God, who has reconciled us to himself through Christ and has given us the ministry of reconciliation.
19 That is, in Christ, God was reconciling the world to himself, not counting their trespasses against them, and he has committed the message of reconciliation to us.
The resurrection invokes...
II. A new perspective on life.
• The beginning of verse 16 ties the thoughts in this section back to verses 14-15.
• Since we are to have a new motivation for life, naturally, we must gain a new perspective on life.
• How do we tend to judge other people? We usually use worldly standards to judge and value other people?
• The old way of life led us to judge other people by their usefulness to us. In other words, what can I gain from allowing you into my life?
• The word WE is emphatic in the original text, denoting that at the time of conversion, Paul no longer judges others by a worldly perspective.
I am reading a book called Potsdam. It is a book that covers the period when Germany surrendered to the allied forces and Roosevelt, Stalin, and Churchhill were to determine what the post-war world would look like.
Well, as things got started, President Roosevelt died of heart disease, and little-known Harry Truman from Missouri was thrust into the Presidency.
Truman served in WW1 (my mother’s great uncle Chris served with Truman in that war). Roosevelt and many around him were Eastern aristocrats, and Roosevelt as well as the rest of his cabinet had little regard for Truman was only possessed a high school education.
It was so bad that they would not let Vice President Truman have ANY information on anything so when he was thrust into the job, he was at a severe disadvantage.
However, Truman was well-read and smart and over time he proved his abilities and won over any people who wrote him off because he was not from one of their fancy Ivy League schools.
• The world will look and judge people from all kinds of standards they set; however, once we are in Christ, we MUST gain a new perspective on life.
• Paul even judged Jesus from a worldly perspective before his encounter with Jesus!
• We need to know that the person we are passing judgment on, the person we are yelling and screaming and cursing at, are important enough for Jesus to have died for them.
• When we encounter people in our lives, we need to know that Jesus loves them, right, poor, black, white, American, or whatever country they reside in.
• Verse 17 starts with, THEREFORE, telling us that what is about to be said also connects with verses 14-15, the new motivation for life that we have in Christ.
• Because we have a new motivation for living, we need this new perspective on life.
• We need to look at others through the eyes of Jesus.
• When verse 17 tells us that the old has passed away. What is the old?
• The selfish motives of the past that once drove us, the estimating people according to the worldly standards and values, and the judging Jesus according to worldly standards.
• The new that comes is the NEW LIFE we have in Christ!
• It is a new motivation that drives us, it is the new perspective on life, and it will include what we will touch on in a moment, a new mission for life!
• Paul’s conversion changed him; the resurrection of Jesus changed everything about Paul!
• He has new goals, new purposes, new views of God, new views concerning truth and duty.
• His whole soul, mind, spirit, and body belong to Jesus!
• When you are in Christ, you need to allow yourself to enjoy and embrace the new perspective on life; it will change how you see people, even people who hurt you, when you can see them through the eyes and heart of Jesus.
• They are the way they are for a reason, and Jesus can change them!
• Let’s finish with verses 20-21
2 Corinthians 5:20–21 CSB
20 Therefore, we are ambassadors for Christ, since God is making his appeal through us. We plead on Christ’s behalf, “Be reconciled to God.”
21 He made the one who did not know sin to be sin for us, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.
The resurrection invokes...
III. A new mission for life.
• I was 18 when I started my career at Square D Company.
• I had goals, ambition, and drive, and I had a plan.
• Then I gave my life to Jesus when I was 20 years old.
• Up to that point, my mission was to make a good living and be a good husband and father.
• I worked many hours, and I did all I could to get promoted to move up the ranks.
• Now, there is nothing wrong with that. I was driven.
• My Dad always said if I set my mind to something, I would do it.
• Well, Jesus changed things.
• The journey will be a little different for all of us, yet it should be the same.
• My wife married an ambitious young man who had aspirations of climbing the corporate ladder.
• She ended up married to a Minister of the Gospel of Jesus Christ!
• Not all will be called into vocational ministry as I was, but we all have been called to a new mission for life!
• We are ALL called to be ambassadors for Jesus!
• We are all called to appeal to others to come to Jesus and experience His saving grace.
• We are all called to appeal to people to be reconciled to God through Jesus.
• We are all called to appeal to people to put their faith in Jesus, to confess Him as their Lord.
• To repent of their sins, and to be clothed with Christ through baptism, so they too can experience a newness of life and eternal salvation!
• Jesus became sin on our behalf so that we could be saved!
• I believe our first ministry is to our own home.
• Show your new motivation for life, your new perspective on life, and live out your new mission for life in your home!
• Then take those same things to your job and everywhere you go!
• Church family, no one will take us seriously until we take Jesus seriously enough to live the life!
• We are called to be an ambassador for Jesus no matter what others do to us, say about us or treat us.
• Christians, we have to show the love of Jesus to others.
• I have been treated worse by those who call themselves by the name of Christ than I have ever been treated by the lost.
• Family, that has to stop.
• If you are in Christ, learn to love one another no matter what!
• Be an ambassador all the time!
CONCLUSION
• When we accept Christ’s death and resurrection, when we accept that we are sinners needing to be saved, only then can we be become children of God.
• When we become children of God, we are given a new name and a new identity.
• This identity is spoken over us by Jesus. He determines who we are. Our new identities are meant to be so caught up in Christ that we are now “heirs of God and fellow heirs with Christ” (Romans 8:17).
• Our application for this message is life-changing!
Live into the hope of the resurrection by proclaiming “Christ is risen!” and allowing him to restore your soul through salvation.
