The Resurrection: How Will You Respond?

The Resurrection: How Will You Respond?

Matthew 27:27—28:10

He is risen! He is risen indeed!

So Christ is risen!

But I want to ask you a question this morning. Do you think of Christ's resurrection as just an interesting and unique fact of history—that God intended it just as a point of knowledge, for us to wonder about or speculate about?

Or do you think he had a more specific purpose in raising Jesus from the dead? Do you ever wonder what His specific purpose was for us, and in particular for you? Do you ever wonder what specific response God wants from you as a result of your knowing that Jesus came back from the dead?

And do you ever wonder whether you have responded to the resurrection of Christ in the way that God intended?

If you're not sure, or even if you are, I want to invite you to pray with me this morning that God will make it evident from this message this morning precisely how He wants you to respond to the resurrection of Jesus Christ. So pray with me, silently, as I pray out loud: Father, I invite you right now to speak to me, and to reveal to me by your Holy Spirit and Your Holy Word, precisely how you want me to respond to you and Jesus as a result of your having raised Jesus from the dead. Lord, what do you want from me, how do you want me to respond, to this incredibly unique event in history—Jesus the Christ's resurrection from the dead? In Jesus' name, Amen.

Now as we seek an answer, we're going to check out how the very first people to witness the resurrection of Jesus responded, and learned to respond—the female followers, or disciples of Jesus Christ. Did you know, that it wasn't the male followers of Jesus, the 12 disciples who first saw the resurrected Jesus Christ, but rather a select group of women who were exceptionally devoted to Jesus? Or did you know that they were the first to tell the disciples about Jesus' resurrection before they ever witnessed the resurrected Christ for themselves?

Yes, specifically three women, and perhaps others, show us precisely how God wants us to respond to the greatest event in all of history: the resurrection of the Lord Jesus Christ.

How did they respond? Before I tell you the story, I’m going to give you the answer in a nutshell. They turned from unbelief and apathy to a repentant & obedient faith in Jesus. Want to respond to Jesus Resurrection as God wants you to—want to get it. Then this will be your response: Turn from unbelief, or a dead faith and apathy, to a repentant & obedient faith.

Jesus had just given up His Spirit—He had just died at about 3 in the afternoon on Good Friday, 33 A.D. Matthew 27:55-56 has told us that many women were there at the cross looking on from a distance as Jesus died—these were women who had followed Jesus from Galilee, the northern province of Israel, to Judea, where He was crucified in the southern province of Israel, and had ministered to Jesus over the course of His ministry. In other words, these women were very devoted followers of Jesus. They had devoted their lives for these past several years to ministering to Jesus, and I suspect, His male disciples as well. And now their devotion and love for Jesus was being demonstrated as they remained with Him even to and now beyond His death on that cruel Roman cross.

Verse 56 focuses on the identity of three of these women. The first was Mary Magdalene. Mary's name tells us a little about her. She was from Magdala, a village on the southwest shore of the Sea of Galilee, which today is still in existence, only as a bustling city. Luke 8:2 tells us that she had been greatly blessed by Jesus' ministry—that she had been delivered from seven demons. And she had expressed her gratitude to Jesus by becoming a devoted follower, even a leader among the women who ministered to Jesus.

The second woman is also a Mary. She's identified as the mother of James and Joses. As you might know, there were two disciples by the name of James. There was James the brother of John, the first of the apostles to die by martyrdom in Acts 12. However, the James mentioned here is the other James, also known as James the less.

And then there is a woman who is identified by Matthew only as being the mother of the Sons of Zebedee, that is the other James and John. We know from other Gospels that her name was Salome. These three women were steadfastly devoted to Jesus while He was dying at the cross, and now after His death, they were still so devoted, they remained there with His body. In other words, they so loved and were so devoted to Jesus that they stuck with Jesus both in life, and death, and beyond death, and it becomes evident shortly that their motive was to see that Jesus received an honorable and respectful burial.