IF JESUS DIDN’T RISE
1 Corinthians 15:
Intro: Among the people from Eastern Europe, the Easter basket had nothing to do with candy and rabbits. Baskets were filled with symbolic things and taken to church to be blessed. There was bread in the basket to recall how Israel relied on God in the wilderness and to symbolize life. Horseradish was there to suggest the bitterness of Egyptian bondage and the bitterness of Jesus death. Salt was there as a symbol of our common humanity. Ham was there as a reminder that we are not under the old law, which forbade so much, but under the new. Eggs were in the basket, too. They stood for hope and resurrection and life! Whatever our customs, whatever our symbols, Easter always stands for new life, for resurrection, for hope!
Transition: Easter often seems to be more about “Cadbury Bunnies, and new clothes” The events surrounding an itinerant teacher from Bethlehem are buried somehow by many in the celebration of spring and Easter dinners. Thoughts of his winning over death and being alive are kept in the back of many minds this time of year!
Is the resurrection really that important for the celebration of Easter? Are the events of Jesus life, relevant to me today? Millions of people throughout history have asked those questions. Before coming to faith in Christ perhaps you asked these questions. Maybe you’re setting here today and those questions are even now filling your mind!
Why all the fuss about Easter, why does it matter whether or not Jesus arose bodily from the tomb? I try to live a good life; I am a responsible member of this community and an ethical person. Why get overly excited about an event that is centuries old?
If it does matter, if it’s essential to my faith then what is it about the resurrection that offers me purpose hope and a future?
"Why is this night different from all other nights?" This is the question which is asked in every Jewish home at Passover. It is always asked by the youngest child; and it offers an opportunity to explain the rescue of Israel from Egypt. So we may ask of the day of Christ’s resurrection, why is this day different from all other days? The answer is the most important ever given!
The resurrection of Jesus is without question the most pivotal truth to the Christian faith! Paul makes it clear in 1st Corinthians 15:16-20
1 Now, brothers, I want to remind you of the gospel I preached to you, which you received and on which you have taken your stand. 2 By this gospel you are saved, if you hold firmly to the word I preached to you. Otherwise, you have believed in vain. 3 For what I received I passed on to you as of first importance: that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures, 4 that he was buried, that he was raised on the third day according to the Scriptures, 5 and that he appeared to Peter, and then to the Twelve. 6 After that, he appeared to more than five hundred of the brothers at the same time, most of whom are still living, though some have fallen asleep. 7 Then he appeared to James, then to all the apostles, 8 and last of all he appeared to me also, as to one abnormally born.
12 But if it is preached that Christ has been raised from the dead, how can some of you say that there is no resurrection of the dead? 13 If there is no resurrection of the dead, then not even Christ has been raised. 14 And if Christ has not been raised, our preaching is useless and so is your faith. 15 More than that, we are then found to be false witnesses about God, for we have testified about God that he raised Christ from the dead. But he did not raise him if in fact the dead are not raised. 16 For if the dead are not raised, then Christ has not been raised either. 17 And if Christ has not been raised, your faith is futile; you are still in your sins. 18 Then those also who have fallen asleep in Christ are lost. 19 If only for this life we have hope in Christ, we are to be pitied more than all men.
20 But Christ has indeed been raised from the dead, the firstfruits of those who have fallen asleep.
I A Reminder to Keep ON Following the Resurrected Jesus 1-2
You initial faith in Jesus was the first step in becoming a fully devoted follower of Jesus
Until you are ready to hand over the reigns of your Life to God and live a different way, you aren’t ready to put your faith in him.
In the Nascar racing circles a DNF is about the worse thing that can follow your name. It means you Did not finish the race. Forty three cars begin the race but only those that finish have a chance of winning. It doesn’t matter how many start for Christ, but how many finish.
II A Recounting of the Resurrection Events in a nut shell 3-8
a. Christ died for our sins -not his he was sinless
b. He was buried -He was really dead
c. He rose again the third day
d. He had many post resurrection appearances
III A Rebuttal of False Ideas Creeping into the Church 12-
a. If Jesus raised from the dead there must be a resurrection v12
b. If no resurrection and Jesus did not rise....
Have you ever been taken in? Feeling the pressure to do something or buy something? Then after you gave in…you feel regret? Some feel that after they buy a high ticket item, like a car…they feel buyer’s regret. We are all bombarded with sales pitches that come to us via the mail in person and of course through…the phone! I am now in the habit of asking immediately when I get a one of “those” calls…is this a sales call? Telemarketers must be aware of this because they often say no, and then go right into their pitch. One time I asked if this was a sales call…and the guy said what do you think! Wow! I said sounds like……click!
On this bright Easter morning make no mistake the Apostle Paul is saying…if Jesus didn’t bodily come out of that grave 2000 yrs ago, you have been duped, you have handed over your credit card…your on the hook! You my friend have been swindled! Your week by week journey to the well appointed brick building with a steeple on top has been a colossal waste of time!
1. If no resurrection for us, Jesus didn’t either (You can’t separate them)
2. Our Preaching is Useless (And all across the world today)
3. Your Faith is worthless
4. We are false witnesses
If the resurrection did not take place then the faith you have is groundless! If Christ has not been raised, every preacher, teacher, missionary… in the world is - willfully or ignorantly - perpetrating a hoax, and misleading people to trust in a delusion, not simply with respect to the resurrection as a fact of history, but with regard to the gospel that depends on it.
Without the resurrection of Christ as an historical fact, the Christian gospel is merely "the opiate of the people", a sort of "pie in the sky when you die" that keeps you contented but has no substance.
The faith of your grandparents and parents uncle’s aunts is just so much wishful thinking, if Christ has not been raised!
That is…if Jesus is still in a Jerusalem grave.
5. You are still in your sins because your faith is worthless
-unforgiven -still guilty -awaiting punishment at the Judgement
6. Those who died in Christ are gone forever
7. Christian only living for now would be the most miserable.
-because we live for heaven, rewards
-we sacrifice and suffering here for rewards there
Prophesy: I believe the time will come when a false tomb of Jesus will be found with a body still inside.
Conclusion:
Just in Time for Easter a False Idea has arose this year
a. The Gospel of Judas
Traitor or ally: gospel sheds new light on Judas
April 7, 2006
WASHINGTON -- Lost for almost 1,700 years, a manuscript entitled "Gospel of Judas" is putting a new spin on the case of the biblical bad guy, maintaining that Jesus actually asked disciple Judas to betray him.
The third- or fourth-century ancient Coptic manuscript - authenticated, translated and displayed on Thursday at National Geographic headquarters here - paints a different picture of Judas and Jesus.
The only known surviving copy of the Gospel of Judas, contained in a papyrus manuscript known as a codex, maintains, as the Bible does not, that Jesus requested that Judas "betray" him by handing him to authorities for execution, something that it says pained Judas greatly.
The 66-page leather-bound papyrus text, believed to have been copied down in Coptic from an original Greek text around AD 300, was found in the 1970s in the desert near Minya, Egypt. It then moved among antiquities traders from Egypt to Europe and the United States.
In a documentary aired in the US last weekend and a related book, The Lost Gospel,
04/06/2006 04:30 p.m.
The Gospel of Judas debuted Thursday in Washington, D.C. What’s the Gospel of Judas, you ask? Well, it’s not a gospel. And it’s not written by Judas. But it’s still important, if not the most important nonbiblical text discovered during the last 60 years, as a National Geographic Society executive told The New York Times.
Not only did Judas not betray Jesus for 30 pieces of silver, according to this manuscript, but he was actually following his master’s orders in handing him over to his executioners. In doing so, Judas helped Christ fulfil the biblical prophecies of saving mankind.
The heresy-fighting bishop Irenaeus of Lyon, France, mentioned the Gospel of Judas about 180 AD, linking the writing to a Gnostic sect. Some two centuries later, Epiphanius, bishop of Cyprus, criticized the Gospel of Judas for treating the betrayer of Jesus as commendable, one who "performed a good work for our salvation."
Until recent years, no copy of the text was generally known to exist. It was not among, for instance, the 46 different apocryphal texts of the Nag Hammadi Library discovered 60 years ago this month in Egypt. Other fragmentary texts, such as the Gospel of Mary, were discovered well before that.
In fact it is just another example of the phenomenon known as pseudonymity--- documents with falsely attributed authors--- other such examples are the Gospel of Thomas, the Gospel of Peter, The Gospel of Mary, the Gospel of Philip and so on.
Pseudonymity was a practice of those who did not have enough authority themselves to create sacred texts and so borrowed the name of an earlier illustrious or in this case notorious figure to create the air of an authentic eyewitness document. It needs to be said that this practice was very clearly denounced not only by church fathers like Tertullian and Ireneaus and Hippolytus who tell us about monks and priests being defrocked for dreaming up such documents,
b. The Da Vinci Code book and movie (out in May 06)
The Da Vinci Code is full of fabrications, ranging from silly interpretations of Leonardo Da Vinci’s paintings to unsupported charges that Constantine brutally repressed competing gospels. In addition, Brown’s book alleges that:
Mary Magdalene and Jesus got married and had a daughter, and that they settled in the south of France and became the progenitors of the Merovingian kings;
The real Holy Grail that bore Jesus’ blood was not a chalice but Mary Magdalene’s womb;
The Catholic church has harshly suppressed this truth that would en-danger ecclesiastical power by proving that Jesus was merely human;
A secret organization called the Priory of Sion guarded the truth about the Magdalene and the evidence to prove it (documents once thought to prove the Priory’s existence are now known to be forgeries);
The church suppressed "the divine feminine" in order to keep sex dirty and the church masculine.
c. The Jesus Papers
The mystery of ’The Jesus Papers’
The Jesus Papers: Exposing the Greatest Cover-Up in History
What if everything you think you know about Jesus is wrong? Author Michael Baigent makes controversial assertions in his new book
This report aired Dateline Sunday, April 2, 2006
Previously, Baigent has captured readers’ imaginations with his provocative non-fiction work "Holy Blood, Holy Grail," in which he claimed Jesus was married.
Baigent has an even more controversial premise that challenges much of what we know about Jesus: What if Jesus survived the crucifixion? He claims Jesus was married and had a family, and was seen in AD 45. No evidence of course.
JESUS DID RISE
Pollster George Gallup said even 84 percent of people who never go to church believe Jesus rose from the dead. It is historical fact; it wasn’t done in secret. The whole city of Jerusalem and the whole Roman Empire knew about it. It was news. If CNN had been there, they would have had it live.
There are at least 15 historical references to Jesus meeting people, touching people, and talking with people after he had been crucified. One time he cooked breakfast for some people. One time he talked to about 500 people after he had risen from the dead. A lot of people saw him.
How can we be sure? All but one of the original twelve were martyred. Surely others of the disciples were martyred too. It’s not reasonable that dozens (or hundreds!) of people would die for what they knew was a lie.
Christianity would have been the easiest religion to disprove in the first few years. Just produce the body of Christ. Yet no such body has turned up.
Now, I don’t know anybody who has come back from the dead. Better than that, Jesus said he would come back from the dead, and then he did.
Harry Houdini said he’d come back, but he didn’t. Overcoming death is a big deal. It can’t be ignored. If someone tells you they’re going to die, be dead for three days, then come back to life, and they proceed to do it, I suggest you listen to whatever they say next!
Jesus said he would return! 16For the Lord himself will come down from heaven, with a loud command, with the voice of the archangel and with the trumpet call of God, and the dead in Christ will rise first. 1 Thessalonians 4:16
Why don’t these other people hear Him? Why don’t the unbelievers hear His voice and the sound of the trumpet? How is it just these that love Jesus hear that voice and that sound?
*Well, one day I came across something that explained that to me. In the wintertime as you know, these great mallard ducks fly from the north down to the south. And they winter in the south.
Then when summertime, springtime comes, why, they go back up to the north. Well, when those great mallards came down into southern Louisiana, there was a farmer who caught one.
And staked him out, tied a string on his leg. And put him on the pond there with his domestic ducks.
And that great mallard from the north just swam around, swam around, swam around. Spent the wintertime with those domestic ducks.
But when the springtime came, those great mallards rose out of those swamps and lakes of southern Louisiana.
And one of that band of great mallards flying back home looked down from the sky and saw that mallard down there on the pond swimming around with those domestic ducks.
And they called from the sky. And that great mallard lifted up his head. And lifted up his eyes. And when they called from heaven, he gave a great lurch but was pulled back down by the stake and the string.
They called again from the sky. They called again from heaven. And that great mallard spread his wings and once again lurched to join them in the heavens and broke the stake and broke the string and rose up to meet them in the sky.
When I heard that, I said that’s exactly what it will be at the time of the consummation. These who die without Christ don’t hear. They don’t move. Their hearts are not stirred like those domestic ducks. They just circle around in the earth and the pond.
But that great mallard, that great mallard. When they called from the sky, his heart was stirred. And he lifted up his head and his eyes and joined them in heaven.
That’s the way it’s going to be with us. If we fall asleep before the Lord comes, when the trumpet sounds and the archangel cries, we shall hear His voice. And we shall rise to meet our Lord. And the saints of God in the sky, in the sky. *Dr. W.A. Criswell
It looked like Saturday morning TV time at the Van Pelt household. Lucy and Linus were sitting in front of the television set when Lucy said to Linus, "Go get me a glass of water."
Linus looked surprised, "Why should I do anything for you? You never do anything for me."
"On you 75th birthday," Lucy promised, "I’ll bake you a cake."
Linus got up, headed to the kitchen and said, "Life is more pleasant when you have something to look forward to."
