The Resurrection is Freedom
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· 1,115 viewsIf the cross and Good Friday are about forgiveness and redemption than Easter Sunday and the empty tomb are all about freedom. Freedom from the past present and future.
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Well this morning we wrap up what is the greatest weekend in all of the Christian calendar…My Birthday
What you thought that it was because it is Easter?
Well of course it’s because it is Easter
Today hundreds of millions of Christians around the world celebrate the resurrection of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ only 3 days after His atoning death on the cross of Calvary
On Good Friday Jesus willingly gave up His own life as a substitutionary sacrifice so that through Him we can be forgiven and reconciled to God
Ephesians
In him we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of sins, in accordance with the riches of God’s grace
Those were some of Paul’s opening words in his letter to the church in Ephesus, “Through His blood, shed on the cross, we have redemption and forgiveness!”
But if all of that was accomplished on Good Friday, then what is all the hype about Easter Sunday?
Well I think that I can answer that with one word...”Freedom”
Okay now that that’s done let’s close and go home
And if you believe that I have some really nice property in Florida that I’d like to sell to you
Let’s take a look at what I mean when I say that resurrection Sunday is all about freedom
To do that we have to first understand what took place after the crucifixion and death of Jesus
Matthew records the following events,
Matthew 27:57-66
As evening approached, there came a rich man from Arimathea, named Joseph, who had himself become a disciple of Jesus. Going to Pilate, he asked for Jesus’ body, and Pilate ordered that it be given to him. Joseph took the body, wrapped it in a clean linen cloth, and placed it in his own new tomb that he had cut out of the rock. He rolled a big stone in front of the entrance to the tomb and went away. Mary Magdalene and the other Mary were sitting there opposite the tomb.
The next day, the one after Preparation Day, the chief priests and the Pharisees went to Pilate. “Sir,” they said, “we remember that while he was still alive that deceiver said, ‘After three days I will rise again.’ So give the order for the tomb to be made secure until the third day. Otherwise, his disciples may come and steal the body and tell the people that he has been raised from the dead. This last deception will be worse than the first.”
“Take a guard,” Pilate answered. “Go, make the tomb as secure as you know how.” So they went and made the tomb secure by putting a seal on the stone and posting the guard.
Now I think that it’s important for you to know that I am not one of those preachers that believe that Satan was celebrating over the death of Jesus
In fact I believe that the enemy was doing everything within his power to prevent Calvary from ever happening
While I don’t have time this morning to get into all the reasons I believe that suffice it to say that Satan knows the scriptures better than we do and he knew exactly what would happen if Jesus were to become the Lamb of God
However, “everything in his power” still doesn’t come close to being able to stop the declared purpose of God from being done and so Jesus was crucified and now it was time to mitigate the damage as it were
So Jesus was wrapped up, Jesus was placed below the earth in a tomb and for good measure the tomb was covered with a “big stone” which was then sealed and guarded
Yes the lamb had been sacrificed and redemption for mankind had been purchased but none of that would matter if Satan could just keep Christ wrapped up, and in the tomb
After all death was still his domain, at least for now, let’s read what happened next
After the Sabbath, at dawn on the first day of the week, Mary Magdalene and the other Mary went to look at the tomb.
There was a violent earthquake, for an angel of the Lord came down from heaven and, going to the tomb, rolled back the stone and sat on it. His appearance was like lightning, and his clothes were white as snow. The guards were so afraid of him that they shook and became like dead men.
The angel said to the women, “Do not be afraid, for I know that you are looking for Jesus, who was crucified. He is not here; he has risen, just as he said. Come and see the place where he lay. Then go quickly and tell his disciples: ‘He has risen from the dead and is going ahead of you into Galilee. There you will see him.’ Now I have told you.”
So the women hurried away from the tomb, afraid yet filled with joy, and ran to tell his disciples.
This morning I want to give you three ways in which this story of the resurrection of Christ represents freedom for you and for me
The first form of freedom that I want to look at is freedom from your past which is represented in this account by the grave clothes that Jesus had been wrapped in
After Jesus had died, in accordance with Jewish customs his body was wrapped with spices and tightly bound with strips of cloth
Do you remember the story of Lazarus whom Jesus raised after he had been dead for 4 days? John records,
John
The dead man came out, his hands and feet wrapped with strips of linen, and a cloth around his face.
Jesus said to them, “Take off the grave clothes and let him go.”
When he had said this, Jesus called in a loud voice, “Lazarus, come out!” The dead man came out, his hands and feet wrapped with strips of linen, and a cloth around his face.
Jesus said to them, “Take off the grave clothes and let him go.”
Like these “grave clothes” the enemy wants to use our past to immobilize us to bind us up so that we can’t move
He does this using things like guilt and shame which keep our hands and our feet tied
things that we’ve said, things that we’ve done, things that we should have said or done but didn’t, sure they were all covered under the forgiveness of the cross but the memories of those things haunt us and hold us and so we never truly find the ability to serve God with all of our heart and soul and mind because we are all bound up by the past
Well let me read for you the account of what happened after the women left the tomb afraid but excited,
Luke
When they came back from the tomb, they told all these things to the Eleven and to all the others. It was Mary Magdalene, Joanna, Mary the mother of James, and the others with them who told this to the apostles. But they did not believe the women, because their words seemed to them like nonsense. Peter, however, got up and ran to the tomb. Bending over, he saw the strips of linen lying by themselves, and he went away, wondering to himself what had happened.
I’ll tell you what happened, Jesus had resurrected and had cast off the grave clothes demonstrating for all the world that the resurrection can set us free from our past and the bondage that comes with it
Therefore, there is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus,
Not some condemnation, not a little condemnation, there is NOW NO condemnation and the reason is that Jesus rose
If He never rose our past was forgiven but not necessarily dealt with for who would be able to stand against our accuser and defend us
But BECAUSE He rose He is the one who pleads our case both to the Father and in the face of our accuser
Don’t believe me? Take the time to read and reread and reread and reread
Because of the resurrection you have been set free from your past, you’ve also been set free from your present which is represented by way of the tomb which they laid Him in
You see all of us were in the same predicament the day that we came to Jesus
As for you, you were dead in your transgressions and sins, in which you used to live when you followed the ways of this world and of the ruler of the kingdom of the air, the spirit who is now at work in those who are disobedient. All of us also lived among them at one time, gratifying the cravings of our flesh and following its desires and thoughts. Like the rest, we were by nature deserving of wrath.
We were dead, dead because we were in sin and the wages of sin IS death
Yes it’s true that Jesus purchased our forgiveness on the cross but here’s a question for you, ‘What good is forgiveness to a dead man?’
You have to understand that each of us was in bondage to sin, leaving Easter out of the equation just for a moment, that is our present condition
Sin owns us, in every way shape and form and while it sure is nice to be forgiven, the empty tomb shows us that the resurrection also provided us freedom from our predicament as it sets us free from the bondage of sin
If you declare with your mouth, “Jesus is Lord,” and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved.
Another fantastic passage of scripture that you should commit yourself to reading and rereading is Romans chapter 6, the entire chapter
Let me just read for you how it begins
Romans 6:1-4
What shall we say, then? Shall we go on sinning so that grace may increase? By no means! We are those who have died to sin; how can we live in it any longer? Or don’t you know that all of us who were baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into his death? We were therefore buried with him through baptism into death in order that, just as Christ was raised from the dead through the glory of the Father, we too may live a new life.
And if Christ has not been raised, your faith is futile; you are still in your sins.
Good Friday gave us forgiveness of sins but Resurrection Sunday gives us freedom from sin, the power to walk away and not serve it anymore and instead to live in righteousness the way that God desires us to
The tomb is empty, we don’t reside there anymore, that’s not who we are, the old has passed away and all things have been made brand new (2nd Corinthians 5:17)
Oh there is just so much more I want to say about this but I promised you 3 points and so just as you may have guessed, the resurrection provides freedom from our past, freedom in our present, and of course freedom for the future which is represented by the stone, the seal and the guards
Because they have been unable to deny that Easter happened, different people have developed different theories as to what happened that spring weekend 2000+ years ago
One of my favourites is the swoon theory which suggests that Jesus didn’t really die on the cross, that He just passed out from the heat, dehydration and beatings and that after a couple of days in the cool damp tomb He revived and made His escape
Now forgetting the fact that the Romans were extremely efficient at killing people by crucifixion and that Luke says that Pilot himself verified that Jesus was dead, what I want to know is how a guy who had gone through what Jesus went through, who had no nourishment for several days and was emancipated in almost every way was able to get up and under His own strength move the stone out of the way breaking the heavy seal and then overpower a couple of heavily trained and heavily armed Roman soldiers
You see all of those things represent an impossible scenario, there was no way that anyone was getting in or out of that tomb, it was impossible!
tells us that it is our destiny to die, that this mortality that we live in will one day cease
That is our stone, it has been sealed by royal decree by God Himself back in and it is guarded by the enemy of our soul, or at least it WAS all of those things
You see the resurrection sets us free from that impossible scenario and makes possible for us a new scenario
I just read for you but I want to read it again along with the verses that follow
And if Christ has not been raised, your faith is futile; you are still in your sins. Then those also who have fallen asleep in Christ are lost. If only for this life we have hope in Christ, we are of all people most to be pitied.
But Christ has indeed been raised from the dead, the firstfruits of those who have fallen asleep. For since death came through a man, the resurrection of the dead comes also through a man. For as in Adam all die, so in Christ all will be made alive. But each in turn: Christ, the firstfruits; then, when he comes, those who belong to him. Then the end will come, when he hands over the kingdom to God the Father after he has destroyed all dominion, authority and power. For he must reign until he has put all his enemies under his feet. The last enemy to be destroyed is death.
And let me add to that Paul’s words of encouragement in his second letter to Timothy,
but it has now been revealed through the appearing of our Savior, Christ Jesus, who has destroyed death and has brought life and immortality to light through the gospel.
2 Timothy
So do not be ashamed of the testimony about our Lord or of me his prisoner. Rather, join with me in suffering for the gospel, by the power of God. He has saved us and called us to a holy life—not because of anything we have done but because of his own purpose and grace. This grace was given us in Christ Jesus before the beginning of time, but it has now been revealed through the appearing of our Savior, Christ Jesus, who has destroyed death and has brought life and immortality to light through the gospel.
Let’s go back to the story of Lazarus once again only this time let’s go back to when Jesus first arrives on the scene and Martha, Lazarus’ sister gives it to Jesus for not being there before the death took place but waiting instead until death had taken it’s “final” toll
Jesus said to her, “Your brother will rise again.”
Martha answered, “I know he will rise again in the resurrection at the last day.”
Jesus said to her, “I am the resurrection and the life. The one who believes in me will live, even though they die;
John 11:
The final enemy has been destroyed
As I bring this message to a close let me ask you this question, “Why was the stone rolled away from the tomb?”
If you continue reading the story of what takes place after the resurrection happens it becomes obvious that Jesus didn’t need it moved in order to get out
The stone was rolled out of the way because the world needed it to be so that we could see and know that the resurrection is all about our freedom
The freedom from our past with all the baggage it holds represented by the grave clothes left behind
Freedom in our present because by virtue of the tomb being empty we know that we have crossed from death over to life in Christ
Freedom for our future because the sting of death has been destroyed by the resurrection of Christ and in Him we have eternal life
“Who is he, sir?” the man asked. “Tell me so that I may believe in him.”
So if the Son sets you free, you will be free indeed.
John 9:36
John
Let’s pray
Let’s pray
I Am Free