Sermon Tone Analysis

John 20:1-18

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Stephen Caswell © 2005

He's Dead Now, but He'll Be Back

 

A Church held their annual Easter pageant.

A 5 year-old boy was enthralled with the drama.

When the crucifixion scene took place, he got real quiet.

But then Jesus came back from the grave and there was a song of celebration and his eyes lit up.

He looked at his mother and said, He's alive, Mom.

He's alive! and began to clap.

And he hugged her around the neck.

It was fun to see somebody understand the resurrection for the first time.

/A youth minister from a near by church heard of this and related his own experience./

He said, I want to tell you what happened in our church.

We showed an animated video of the crucifixion and resurrection to our kindergarten students.

When Jesus was buried, one little boy who knew the story pretty well turned to his buddy and said, */He's dead now, but he'll be back.

/*

 

Introduction

 

*/He Is Risen!/*

The Congregation’s response is, */He Is Risen Indeed.

/*Today is /Resurrection Sunday/; On which we remember Christ’s victory over the grave.

About 2,000 years ago, our Lord Jesus Christ became the /Firstborn from the Dead./

Because He lives we will live also.

It affected human history so significantly that we changed our calendar to line up with His birth day.

We say in the Year of our Lord, or 2005AD.

The resurrection of Jesus Christ has changed human history more than any other event.

Today we will see 3 things from *John 20*.

*/1.

The Empty Tomb, 2. The Exalted Christ, 3. The Extended Family.

/*

 

1.

The Empty Tomb

 

/a.

The Ministry of Care /

 

*John 20:1:* /Now the first day of the week Mary Magdalene went to the tomb early, while it was still dark, and saw that the stone had been taken away from the tomb./

The */tomb/* is mentioned */8 times/* in the first 13 verses.

This */empty tomb/* was a real bee hive of activity.

*John 20:2* and the other Gospel accounts tell us that other women accompanied Mary Magdalene to the tomb early that morning.

*Mark 16:1-2:* /Now when the Sabbath was past, Mary Magdalene, Mary the mother of James, and Salome bought spices, that they might come and anoint Him.

Very early in the morning, on the first day of the week, they came to the tomb when the sun had risen.

/These ladies loved the Lord and wanted to anoint Christ’s body with perfume and aloes.

Mary and the women found the tomb open and Christ’s body missing.

If they had remembered Jesus’ words concerning His death and resurrection, they’d have been rejoicing instead of weeping.

/The angel of the Lord rolled the stone away to show that Christ had risen from the dead.

/

 

/b.

The Missing Christ  /

 

*John 20:2:* /Then she ran and came to Simon Peter, and to the other disciple, whom Jesus loved, and said to them, they have taken away the Lord out of the tomb, and we do not know where they have laid Him./

/Mary tells someone that Christ’s body is missing on 3 different occasions./

It has left her sad and troubled.

After the women left the tomb, Mary Magdalene went to see Peter and John and told them what happened.

Mary was troubled because she couldn’t perform the ministry she wanted to do.

She was fearful that grave robbers had stolen the Lord’s body.

Mary was upset that Jesus body was missing.

She continued to search for Christ, asking different ones if they knew where He was.

*/Her persistent search will soon be rewarded.

/*

 

*/The empty tomb is one reason we that rejoice today./*

I love to read biographies, and I notice that almost all of them conclude with the death and burial of the subject.

I have yet to read one that describes the subject’s resurrection from the dead!

The fact that John continued his account and shared the excitement of the Resurrection miracle is proof that Jesus Christ is not like any other man.

/The chief priests and the Pharisees were determined that Jesus was going to stay in his grave./

They used every resource and power available to see to that.

*/The soldiers were the elite guard not regular forces./*

He is, indeed, the Son of God.

Only our Lord has conquered death and brought life and immortality to light through the Gospel.

Garden Tomb’s Soil Analyzed

 

When the Garden Tomb was discovered in 1885, the godly General Gordon was convinced that this was the place where the body of Jesus had lain.

There is a traditional tomb inside the wall of modern Jerusalem, but no certainty attaches to the site.

The Garden Tomb, hidden for centuries, was covered with rubbish twenty feet high.

*/When they first cleared the spot, with great caution they gathered all the dust and debris within the tomb and carefully shipped it to the Scientific Association of Great Britain.

Every part of it was analyzed, but there was no trace of human remains.

If this is the real tomb of Christ, then Jesus was the first to be laid there and he was also the last./*

/c.

The Mystery of the Grave Clothes/

 

*John 20:3-9:* /Peter therefore went out, and the other disciple, and were going to the tomb.

So they both ran together, and the other disciple outran Peter and came to the tomb first.

And he, stooping down and looking in, saw the linen cloths lying there; yet he did not go in.

Then Simon Peter came, following him, and went into the tomb; and he saw the linen cloths lying there, and the handkerchief that had been around His head, not lying with the linen cloths, but folded together in a place by itself.

Then the other disciple, who came to the tomb first, went in also; and he saw and believed.

For as yet they did not know the Scripture, that He must rise again from the dead./

John was younger or fitter than Peter because he arrived at the tomb first.

He cautiously remained outside and looked in.

Perhaps he wanted Peter to be with him when he went into the burial chamber.

/What did John see?/

The graveclothes lying on the stone shelf without any evidence of violence or crime.

/But the graveclothes were empty!/ */They lay there like an empty cocoon, still retaining the shape of Jesus’ body.

/*Christ didn’t need these grave clothes so He left them behind and clothed Himself with glorious robes.

Peter arrived and impulsively went into the tomb, just as we would expect him to do.

He also saw the linen clothes lying there empty and the cloth for the head carefully rolled and lying by itself.

Grave robbers do not carefully unwrap the corpse and then leave the grave clothes neatly behind.

When John wrote this account, he used three different Greek words for /seeing./

In *John 20:5,* the verb simply */means to glance in, look in/*.

In *John 20:6*, the word means */to look carefully/*, */to observe./*

The word */saw/* in *John 20:8* means */to perceive with intelligent comprehension./*

/The only way those linen clothes could be left in that condition would be if Jesus passed through them as He arose from the dead.

/

 

The Living One

 

A Mohammedan and a Christian were discussing their religions and had agreed that both Mohammed and Christ were prophets.

*/Where, then, lay the difference?/*

The Christian illustrated it this way: I came to a crossroads and I saw a dead man and a living man.

*/Which one did I ask for directions?

/*The response came quickly, The living one, of course.

/Why, then, asked his friend, do you send me to Mohammed who is dead, instead of Christ who is alive?/

*/Jesus knows the way; No He is the Way./*

This is the basic difference between Christ and every other religious leader.

All the others came into the world, lived, and died - but none of them lived again.

The resurrection of Christ was the one event that persuaded His disciples once for all that He was the Christ, God’s Son.