Dying Was His Reason for Living
The Sequel: Where Is Jesus Now?
Brad Crocker
Landmark Christian Church, Chippewa Falls, WI
3/10/2004
It was December 1997, the Christmas season, when a fire started in the home of Luzaida Cuevas. She made it to safety, but she was not able to rescue her 10-day-old daughter, Delimar, from the terrible flames and smoke. As she stood watching the fire consume her home, how she must have wept at the crushing blow of losing the daughter to whom she had just given birth. Strangely, although the authorities pronounced her dead, no remains of Delimar’s tiny body were ever found near her crib.
January 24, 2004, just over 6 years later, Luzaida Cuevas attends a birthday for a child, and there she sees a 6-year-old girl, who looks surprisingly like Luzaida herself. This girl, Aaliyah Hernandez, is said to be the daughter of her former boyfriend’s cousin, but as soon as Luzaida sees her, she is convinced that there, before her marveling eyes, stands her precious daughter. She manages to get a few strands of the girls’ hair, which she brings to her local representative. DNA tests soon confirm her suspicions. Ten-day-old Delimar did not die in that fire. She was kidnapped and the house was set on fire to cover the kidnapping.
On March 2, 2004 Carolyn Correa was arrested and charged with arson, kidnapping and 13 other crimes. On March 8, Luzaida Cuevas’ daughter came home.
When my oldest son, Kyle, was a baby, I had a strong fear that someone would break into our house and take him away from us. Strangely, I lost that fear after having two other boys. And when Kyle is 15, I expect to be offering to pay people to take him away. But when it was just little Kyle, every night I would double check the windows and doors and worry that something might happen to him while we slept.
And if he had been kidnapped, like every other parent in this room, I would have torn apart the city looking for him - would not have rested until I had found him and he was restored to our home, his home.
When you saw Jesus shoulder his cross, you were witnessing a love-desperate father relentlessly pursuing his lost children. We weren’t exactly kidnapped from God; we intentionally walked away from Him. But that doesn’t matter to our Father. He still wants us restored to our rightful home, and from the moment we left Him, He set out to bring us back.
Since sin and death were the major barriers to our return, Jesus eliminated those barriers. Because He paid the price for our sin and rose from the dead, those two enemies no longer stand between us and life forever in our true home with God.
But not everyone is yet at home. Billions still live far away from God, estranged from the Father.
So, Jesus is, at this time, pressing forward with the child-rescue-mission that began as soon as we turned our backs on God. The key victories have been won, but the mission is not yet accomplished. Two more stages have yet to be completed before God’s family is fully restored.
I want to describe today the mission that Jesus is on right now and then describe the final victory that Jesus will achieve.
1. Ongoing Mission - The Restoration to the Father
Jesus is alive and active in our world achieving the mission of God. What is this mission?
[Read Matthew 28:18-20]
Jesus says His mission, which we are His partners in carrying out, is to make disciples. First, I want to be clear about what making disciples is not.
Jesus’ goal is not:
To get a lot of people to go to church
For the world to be a little nicer, or even a lot nicer
To give some rules that help some people.
An Ohio newspaper printed the following news story.
Mr. Jenkins, it is claimed, was driving at a high rate of speed and swerving from side to side. As he approached the crossing he started directly towards it and crashed into Miss Miller’s rear end, which was sticking out into the road about a foot. Luckily she escaped injury and the damage can be easily remedied with a new coat of paint.
(taken from the 365 Stupidest Things Ever Said calendar)
The damage done to us when we rebelled against God cannot be remedied with a coat of paint. Mere surface change won’t cut it. Religious rules and moral regulations are like new coats of paint - they change the exterior but inward flaws remain. We need far more than that. We need transformation from the inside out if we are to be fully functioning children of God.
We need to be disciples.
A disciple is like an apprentice, someone who is with a master to learn from that master how to perform the skill of the master. To be a disciple of Jesus is to be closely connected with Him and be learning from Him how to be like Him. We are to unite with Christ so that we can become fully functioning children of God. This involves a complete renovation of our character, so that all the bad stuff is rooted out of us and all of Christ’s good stuff takes over and makes us who we were created by God to be.
Jesus’ ongoing mission is calling people into relationship with Him, then being with them on a daily basis to transform them from the inside out, enabling them to live as children of the Father, living as members of their true home in heaven.
That sounds nice, but let us make no mistake about it, what Jesus is doing is utterly revolutionary. Bypassing human methods of change by coercion and control, of superficial conformity, He is going straight to the human heart to bring about a permanent change in the only place where permanent change can be achieved. Only when the beliefs, feelings, motivations and habits of individuals are transformed from me-centered selfishness to God-guided love can real and lasting change take place.
When the Statue of Liberty has remodeled, it was discovered that the outside copper skin of the stature was okay; it only had to be cleaned. But rust and corrosion had ruined the inner iron supports, so the entire inside support system had to be replaced. If repairs had not been made, the statue in 20 years would have fallen over. The iron supports were replaced with stainless steel, and now the statue can withstand great winds and should last a long time.
Jesus’ ongoing mission is to restore each person to God. This involves far more than a mere external washing. He wants to "remodel" us in a way that will last forever, which involves replacing the entire inside support system. He will give us a thorough renovation from the inside out.
Jesus’ job is clearly not yet completed. Countless people have yet to connect with Jesus to let them do His work in them, and those of us who have come on board as His disciples still have much work yet to be done in our lives. But as far from completion as Jesus’ mission seems, we know that in the end, mission impossible will be mission accomplished.
2. Mission Accomplished - The Return of the King
God is our Father, diligently seeking to bring us home. He is also our King, the ruler of all. And the King will return to establish His throne.
In the Lord of the Rings, the great city of Gondor had been without a king for centuries. One of the main characters in the trilogy is Aragorn, who was descended from the last rulers of Gondor and thus is the rightful, but unknown king of Gondor. The final book and movie is The Return of the King, and it describe how Aragorn takes his place as king. But the movie omits a very important part of Aragorn’s ascension to the throne. After he wins a critical battle, Aragorn deems it too early to ride in on a warhorse and claim the throne. He does make an appearance in the city and is recognized as king, but it comes about in a very different way.
The people of Gondor are familiar with a prophecy about their future king: "The hands of the king are the hands of a healer, and so shall the rightful king be known."
In other words, not by conquest, not by his ability to fight and kill, not by being the greatest warrior will the true king be known, but by his ability to heal wounds that others cannot.
After a great battle, while very few know his true identity, Aragorn slips into the houses of healing and he is able to mend the wounds of those beyond the healing powers of the physicians. Soon the word spreads through the city like fire that the king has returned. How do they know? The hands of the king are the hands of a healer.
Jesus is the rightful king of this world. Right now He extends His reign in Spirit, but He has promised that someday He will come back again physically to establish His rule utterly and completely.
He will return to earth in splendor, in the clouds with a trumpet blast by which no one will be able to doubt that Jesus is King of kings and Lord of lords. But when He comes, He will not just rule over us. His hands will be the hands of a healer. The partial healing He did when He first came and that He does now will be full and complete healing.
Jesus will heal the natural world - Romans 8:19-22
Jesus will heal society - Revelation 21:24-25; 22:2
Jesus will heal each person: body, heart, and soul - 1 Corinthians 15:51-53; Revelation 21:4; 1 John 3:2
The hands of the king are the hands of a healer, and so shall the rightful king be known.
On the rugged wooden board posted above Jesus as He hung on the cross were the words "The King of the Jews." That description was put there as a mockery - what a joke, the King powerlessly executed on a cross - a slap at Jesus and a slap at any who would claim to be His followers. But on that cross and from that grave the King claimed His eternal throne. His hands never wielded a sword but were instead themselves pierced with a nail. Because of the nails, those hands became the hands of healing. And thus the rightful King is known.
Because, you see, He is not just our King. He is our King and our Father. As our Father, His driving passion is our return to Him, that we be whole and well at home with Him.
"I have my daughter back," said Luzaida Cuevas. "I’m very happy … that I’m finally going to have her in my arms."
Her representative said about Luzaida’s reunion with her daughter, "She got a hug and a kiss, her daughter sat in her lap. The moment she expected six years ago, she got it last night."
You wonder what Jesus’ mission is? That is it - You, His beloved child, again held by him, at home with Him, never to wander anymore.
He has waited thousands of years, given the best He could give, His own body and blood - so that someday the reunion between you and Your Father would happen. He gave His life for your hug and kiss, to have you in His arms.
Maybe you think you are not worth that much. God thinks you are worth hunting the cosmos for. He thinks you are worth waiting thousands of years for. He thinks you are worth traversing the universe for. He thinks you are worth saving, worth healing, worth transforming, worth restoring - worth giving His life for. You are His mission, and the King will return and complete His mission.
How will you respond? Will you run away from Him, ignore His efforts and His sacrifice? Will His mission be completed for you in judgment? Or will you run to your daddy, and enjoy Him forever? Will His mission be completed for you in reunion?
