Come, See the Place Where He Lay (Easter 2019, Jeff Kliewer)

All right, let's pray. Father, this day is different than all the others,

Lord, because this is the day that we remember that Jesus rose from the dead. He is alive. He is the true and living

God. And this morning, we pray that he would be lifted up high in this place. I pray for all of us that our hearts would be open and that you would give us eyes to see him high and lifted up.

Lord, I want to pray for myself. Lord, I know that I feel pressure to do a good job.

I feel like this is my job, Lord, but I pray in Jesus' name that you would lift any spirit of timidity and replace that with the spirit of power, the same power that raised

Jesus from the dead. Now come anoint me, Lord, to speak, to preach the good news that he is risen.

Lord God, we pray for each one of us to have ears to hear. As we open the Bible, open our hearts in Jesus' name.

Amen. There are some famous celebrity grave sites around the world where people will still trek to go and see.

One of the most famous is in Rome, and the English poet named John Keats is buried there.

And I like what is written on his tombstone. In Rome, it says, here lies one whose name was writ in water.

Writ in water. The poet, only 25 years old, was dying, and he requested before he died that his epitaph, that his tombstone would read, here lies one whose name is writ in water.

In other words, as soon as you write in water, it disappears. Like a mist, a life comes and goes.

Princess Diana, buried in Northampshire. Elvis Presley, some of you probably have visited

Graceland, Memphis. Jim Morrison is buried in Paris.

Sir Isaac Newton at Westminster Abbey in London. And Bruce Lee is buried in Seattle at Lakeview Cemetery, alongside

Brandon Lee, who died during the filming of The Crow in the 90s. Remember that? And he also is buried by his father.

People will travel distances to see these grave sites. Bob Marley, Nine Mile, Jamaica.

Even the biggest names, the most famous people who have ever lived, their names are writ in water.

But Philippians 2 tells us about one who humbled himself and became obedient unto death, even death on a cross.

Therefore, God exalted him to the highest place and gave him the name that is above every name, that at the name of Jesus, every knee shall bow and every tongue confess that Jesus is

Lord. The name of Jesus is very different than all other names. When we get to heaven, nobody will be wearing a tattoo of Jim Morrison on their forehead.

But according to Revelation 22, verse 4, our Savior, Jesus Christ, who we are with in heaven, we will bear his name on our foreheads.

The names of all of us written in water. The name of Jesus, above every name, is written on our foreheads.

If you go to Grant's tomb, who's buried there? Grant! The old riddle, a simple one.

You go to Keats' tomb, you find Keats. You go to Diana's tomb, you find Diana. You go to Jesus' tomb, you find

Joseph. One of these is not like the other. Jesus borrowed a tomb.

He didn't need a tomb to live in. He was there for but three days.

On the third day, in fact, he rose from the dead. That's what makes him different. So I want to say this morning, come and see the place where Jesus lay.

Come this morning and see the place where Jesus lay. You say, well, don't we have to travel to Jerusalem to do that?

No. We see by hearing. With spiritual eyes, we see that Jesus, in fact, was laid in the grave and that he rose from the dead.

If you went to Jerusalem, you would be escorted by the bus driver and all the touristy people to the

Church of the Holy Sepulchre. Now, I find that word to be the hardest word to pronounce in the

English language. Everybody turn to your neighbor and say, Church of the Holy Sepulchre. Good luck with that.

Church of the Holy Sepulchre, where he was buried, allegedly. That's the traditional site.

But it's not even certain that that's, in fact, where Jesus was laid. There is another one called

Gordon's Golgotha, which I lean towards this being the true site where Jesus was buried. It was discovered in the 1800s.

There were a number of people who noticed that there is a cliff just on the north side of Jerusalem that, if you look like it, it looks like a skull.

Golgotha, the place of the skull. The rock face is rounded. And there are two sunken, what look like eye sockets in that cliff and a protruding nose.

It looks like the place of the skull. And sure enough, just a few hundred yards away, there is a tomb carved into the rock.

So many visitors now will go there to look to see the place where Jesus lay. But brothers and sisters, whether you're in Jerusalem this morning or whether you're here in Mount Laurel, New Jersey, you're like believers in 193 countries on Earth.

193 countries on Earth. All of us this morning are able to see the place where He lay.

Because seeing the place where He lay is spiritual. And it comes by hearing.

Faith comes by hearing and hearing by the word of Christ. We're going to go to the text this morning.

And I pray that the Lord will open eyes to see that the place where He lay is no longer holding a body.

Except for maybe Joseph, who got his tomb back after Jesus used it. But turn with me to Matthew 27, verse 57 and following.

The main idea. The place where Jesus lay still speaks.

And I'm not talking about the noise of a tourist attraction. But the simple telling of the death, burial, resurrection story.

And the lives of those of us who are willing to die for this message. We're gonna camp out this morning between verses 57 and 61.

And then we'll move quickly from verse 62 through chapter 28, verse 10. But if you have a

Bible, turn to Matthew 27, 57. Or if you don't, you probably have a smartphone. You can just put that right in there.

It'll pop right up. Matthew 27, verse 57. The willingness of disciples to bank on the resurrection speaks volumes.

Let's read it. When it was evening, there came a rich man from Arimathea named

Joseph, who was also a disciple of Jesus. He went to Pilate and asked for the body of Jesus.

Then Pilate ordered it to be given to him. And Joseph took the body and wrapped it in a clean linen shroud and laid it in his own new tomb, which he had cut in the rock.

And he rolled a great stone to the entrance of the tomb and went away. Mary Magdalene and the other

Mary were there, sitting opposite the tomb. So a casual reader of this will just look at it and say, okay,

Joseph came along. Some guy named Joseph. Who's that? We don't know. He says in verse 57, there came a rich man.

So do -do -do -do -do, here comes this rich guy. And he asked for the body and Pilate gives him the body and he puts it in a tomb.

Nothing to see here, folks. Move right along. Or if you have eyes to see, is there reason here in these verses to believe that Jesus is in fact the

Messiah, that he rose from the dead? Not as a matter of religious tradition like what your parents taught you is what you believe, but as a matter of fact, that Jesus really rose from the dead.

Let's look more carefully now at verse 57. When it was evening, there came a rich man from Arimathea.

If you don't mind marking in your Bible, just circle that word rich. Because that word rich means something.

It's rich with meaning. Joseph of Arimathea was a rich man.

And he is the first person to entrust himself to the resurrection of Jesus Christ.

He was a secret disciple, one of the Sanhedrin, one of the rulers in Israel.

But it's notable that he was rich. Why is it such a big deal that he was rich?

Well, the Bible tells us in Isaiah chapter 53, an

Old Testament prophecy written 700 years before Jesus came, tells us details about the death of Jesus Christ.

And one of the things it says in Isaiah 53, they made his grave with the wicked and with a rich man in his death,

Isaiah 53, nine. With the wicked and with a rich man in his death.

Although he had done no violence and there was no deceit in his mouth, yet it was the will of the

Lord to crush him. He has put him to grief. When his soul makes an offering for guilt, he shall see his offspring, he shall prolong his days.

The will of the Lord shall prosper in his hand. Out of the anguish of his soul, he shall see and be satisfied.

Joseph of Arimathea was prophesied hundreds of years before he showed up on the scene.

Very much the way that Daniel prophesied the coming of Alexander the Great. They say when

Alexander the Great rode into Jerusalem, one of the rabbis met him and showed him the place in Daniel where he had been prophesied.

And that's why Alexander the Great was favorable toward the Jews. Because he saw that he himself was prophesied ahead of time.

Here is the first great reason. And it blows my mind that this doesn't just bowl us over.

I was sharing the gospel with some guy in the gym yesterday. If you're watching on YouTube, hello.

And we talked about these prophecies. And I expected to share what

I was saying and it should just knock him over. Because that's how I see it.

I've been reading these prophecies for 20 something years now. And the more

I look, the more I see. Not because I'm making things fit, but because it's there.

It's here in the text. In Matthew 27, verse 57, there came a rich man.

Isaiah foretold that Jesus would be buried with a rich man, by a rich man.

In fact, the very language says in the Hebrew, he was assigned a grave with the wicked, yet with the rich in his death.

While Joseph of Arimathea was going to see Pontius Pilate, Jesus was already dead on the cross.

He was about to be thrown with the wicked in Gehenna. That trash heap on the southern side of Jerusalem, in the

Valley of Hanom, the bodies of criminals, of mere criminals, murderers and thieves who were crucified almost on a daily basis in Jerusalem.

Anybody who crossed the Roman Empire would be crucified. Their bodies were not given a royal burial.

Their bodies were taken down from crosses. Normally they'd suffer for about 36 hours, but when that body was taken down from the cross, they were discarded into the valley, into Gehenna, where wild dogs and animals would tear at their flesh and where some would be consumed by the trash heap, the burning fire that was perpetually on fire to take care of trash.

Jesus was assigned to that place and yet intervenes this man named

Joseph of Arimathea, just going about his business, goes to Pilate and says, can

I have his body? And Pilate says, sure, take it. I've had, I've washed my hands of him.

I've had enough of this Jesus. He takes his body and puts it in his own tomb, hewn into a rock just a few hundred yards away from the place where he died.

Do you know when Jesus died, it was three o 'clock in the afternoon? He had already been mocked by Roman soldiers.

They put a purple robe on him. They twisted together a crown of thorns and pressed it on his head.

They put a reed in his hand and they bowed down to him and said, oh, the King of the Jews, they bowed, they bowed.

Then they took his reed and hit him in the head and they spit on him. And they led him to Golgotha and he hung and he died.

And everything that happened in those moments was prophesied ahead of time. Psalm 22, that he would be mocked and surrounded by these wild dogs as they were called.

That his tongue would stick to the roof of his mouth and pierce through his hand. That he would count his bones, himself exposed, stretched out on a cross.

All of these things foretold by Psalm 22. He goes to Golgotha. He dies on the cross.

At three o 'clock in the afternoon, he cries out a couple of things. My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?

The first words of Psalm 22, pointing us in that direction. Go read it, read it, it's there.

The prophecies are written a thousand years before they happened. Go and read it, he says.

And then dying on the cross, he yells, it is finished. Which means the work is done.

Christ has paid the penalty of sin. There's nothing left for you to do. You can't earn righteousness from God.

You can't be good enough to make it to heaven. No, Christ has come to die in your place.

It is finished. At three o 'clock in the afternoon, he breathed his last.

It says he dismissed his spirit. He let it go. According to Psalm chapter 69, his heart burst.

When he released his spirit, his heart, so burdened by the weight of sin, burst inside of his chest.

That's why when the soldier put a spear in his side, he was already dead. Blood and water from the pericardium around his heart burst out.

The centurion saw that. Every one of these things was fulfilling prophecy.

Normally, when they needed to kill someone on the cross who was languishing for too long, the Sabbath was coming.

They had to get him off the cross before the Sabbath. Normally, what they would do is they would break the legs of the criminals. That's what happened to the person on the right of Jesus and on the left of Jesus.

They broke his legs. But Psalm 34 said, not one of his bones shall be broken.

So in fulfillment of prophecy, they never broke Jesus's bones. He was already hanging dead.

But they did pierce him because Zechariah 12 .10 says, he was pierced. He was pierced.

Isaiah 53, pierced for our transgressions. They will look on the one who was pierced.

Normally, the death thrust, as it was called, when the Romans would pierce the side of the crucified victim, that would be done right after the breaking of his legs.

But strangely, they did not break his legs. They did pierce his side. Each of these details fulfilling prophecy.

But Jesus himself prophesied. Now hear this. He was very clear. In Mark chapter eight, verse 31, he says the

Son of Man would be betrayed and dealt with harshly by the leaders.

He would be crucified, buried, and rise on the third day. Now the Pharisees, they didn't like this, did they?

They said, give us a sign. Do a miracle for us. Like some kind of dog and pony show.

Do a miracle, and then we'll believe in you. And so what Jesus said to them was what? No sign shall be given except the sign of Jonah.

For as Jonah was three days and three nights in the belly of the earth, so must the Son of Man be three days and three nights in the earth.

Jonah, I'm sorry, in the fish, Jesus in the earth. That's a parallel. Three days and three nights.

According to the Jewish reckoning, if you had any part of a day, that was called a day and a night.

You see this in Esther. You see it elsewhere in the Gospels. So in order for Jesus to fulfill his own prophecy that he would be like Jonah, three days, three nights, he had to be in the ground, buried, before six o 'clock.

You get that? He died at three o 'clock. He had to be buried before six o 'clock.

So Friday would be day one. Saturday would be day two. Break of dawn, Sunday, day three.

And he rises on the third as he said he would. So now we have three hours from three o 'clock in the afternoon until six o 'clock to get

Jesus buried in a rich man's tomb. Along comes Joseph of Arimathea, verse 57.

A rich man from Arimathea. Get that, he's just a rich man who has a tomb.

You guys, anybody here have just a tomb handy carved into a rock? He just so happens to have fulfilling prophecy.

Named Joseph, he was a disciple of Jesus. So today I have one goal.

I'm just gonna be transparent. I wanna preach Jesus crucified and risen to the point where you will believe that he is the son of God.

If you say that's not my religion, I have something else, guess what? I'm trying to convince you that this is true. I am doing that.

That's my goal is to lift up Christ that you would see that his name is above every other name and that you would fall down with us and worship him.

And the first reason that I think you should do that is that God foretold all of these things in the scripture.

Every detail of Jesus' death was written ahead of time. Everything about his life, who he would come from,

Adam and Abraham and Isaac and Jacob and Judah and David, all of these in his genealogy were listed for us.

And then he came and did exactly what God said he would do. The first reason is prophecy.

But I wanna point out one other thing about our friend Joseph of Arimathea in verse 58.

Equally powerful in my opinion. It says he went to Pilate and asked for the body of Jesus.

Now you need to know something about Joseph of Arimathea for that to register as anything significant. Joseph, we're told, in Mark, Luke and John, was one of the 70.

He was part of this Jewish ruling class that had just condemned Jesus to die.

He was part of the Sanhedrin. In fact, he was one of the counselors, we're told. So one of the leading men among them.

He had either abstained from the vote or he had cast his vote to preserve Jesus' life.

But we're told that he was a secret disciple. He had been following and believing

Jesus secretly for fear of the Jews. Now here's something

I wanna communicate that just blows my mind. The people who claimed to see

Jesus rise from the dead were willing to die for that testimony.

You know a witness is credible if they're willing to lay down their life for the thing that they're saying.

There was a woman last summer who gave very prominent testimony about something she claimed to see 30 years ago.

Some people believed her, some didn't. Matter of fact, I forget this person's name. Her name is written in water to me.

I can't remember. But all of the country watched her testimony. And after it was done, there was no consequence for what she said.

She just said it, take it or leave it. Some people believed it, others did not. But notice in verse 61,

Mary Magdalene and the other Mary were there sitting opposite the tomb. These women,

God chose to be the first to see the resurrected Christ. Believe these women because they're credible.

Now listen, how do you know if a witness is credible or not? I think the most profound credibility test, if you will, is if somebody is willing to die for what they say.

Not just what they believe, but what they say they saw. A witness who claims to have seen the resurrected

Christ. If that person is willing to put their own blood on the line, is telling the truth.

Verse 58, you have to understand, Joseph of Arimathea here comes out of hiding.

He's no longer a secret disciple, part of the Sanhedrin. He goes to Pilate and puts his neck on the line.

Remember what Peter did when he saw this all go down. He denied Christ and ran for his life.

The other disciples ran. This is the first person to stake his life on the resurrection of Christ.

If you look ahead just for a moment, at verse 64. The Pharisees say, make the tomb secure until the third day lest his disciples go and steal him away and tell the people he has risen from the dead and the last fraud will be worse than the first.

Everybody heard Jesus say that he would rise from the dead. This was no secret.

The things that Jesus did were done in the open. He said, nothing I have done has been done in a corner. So Joseph had a choice to make.

To believe that Jesus's word was true, that he would rise from the dead or else to continue in hiding.

He chose to put his neck on the line. In Psalm 110 verse three, it says, your people will offer themselves freely on the day of your power.

The first great reason to believe that Jesus rose from the dead is because everything about him was prophesied ahead of time.

But the second great reason is that the witnesses who saw him rise with physical eyes and touched his hands where the nails went through and touched his side where the spear entered.

These people believed what they saw, not just what they heard their parents say, but believed what they saw so passionately that they were willing to die for the testimony that they were giving.

Joseph, when he went to Pilate was putting his neck on the line. And one after another, the disciples who came back to Jesus after he was crucified, after he rose from the dead, one after another, they put their neck on the line and their own blood was spilled for the testimony that they gave.

You know the story of Peter in Rome. Deny him, never.

He had done that three times before. But having seen Jesus rise from the dead, he says,

I will die with him. In fact, crucify me upside down because I'm not worthy to die in the same way that my

Lord was killed. And he died for the testimony he gave. Paul in Rome as well, beheaded.

And as Paul was being beheaded, just before that happened, the emperor had sent two men,

Pharaoh and Parthenius, to bring word back to the emperor when

Paul was dead. And as they were there, the way Paul died spoke so powerfully to them, those two men became

Christians and were baptized that same day. Went back to report to the emperor that Paul was dead.

Andrew, crucified. Peter, Jerome tells us about how he died upside down.

Matthew, killed with a battle ax in Nabodah. Thomas went to India, was run through with spears.

John was thrown into a boiling pot of oil. But it didn't kill him.

John was the only one that didn't die among the 12 followers. Judas had betrayed him and hung himself.

The first person to die for his righteous testimony in the history of the world was

Abel, killed by his own brother. Abel had obeyed

God and brought the sacrifice that God required, an animal sacrifice, blood on the altar, which points to the blood of Jesus.

Cain brought a vegetable sacrifice. God approved of Abel's sacrifice. Cain's was not acceptable to God.

Cain was filled with jealousy and killed his own brother. And we're told that that testimony still speaks today.

Listen to the testimony of the martyrs. Their blood still speaks.

Moses could have enjoyed the comforts of Egypt, but he chose the reproach of Christ to leave

Egypt and all the comforts of being raised in the pharaoh's house to identify with God, to meet him at the burning bush, to come and put his life on the line and stand up to the pharaoh.

That's how you can believe a man. And still to this day, just when

I was growing up, I grew up hearing the story of Jim Elliot. Anybody else heard of him? Jim Elliot and Nate Saint, Roger Udarian, ordinary guys like us and their wives get on a plane and move to Ecuador and they go to a tribe that had never been reached to preach the gospel.

And the five men end up speared to death by the Curare River. And the wives come home for a time.

You'd figure they'd be home morning. And that would be the end of that story. But no, the wives go back, preaching the gospel to the same tribe that killed their husbands.

The children grew up there. And that entire tribe comes to believe in Jesus Christ. That tribe was won, first of all, by the blood of Christ, but confirmed through the blood of the martyrs.

John Chow, just last year, a few months ago, went to a place called the

North Sentinel Island, where an unreached tribe met him on the beach.

He brought Bibles, he brought the gospel, and he met with death, speared to death.

In his journal, he wrote, Lord, is this island Satan's last stronghold, where none have heard or even had the chance to hear your name?

That's a powerful testimony. That's a credible witness. Someone knowing that he was laying down his life would get in a kayak and cross to a forbidden island for the sake of the name and give his life on that shore.

And you'll be mistaken if you think nobody else will go back, because they will, until this mission is done, until Christ is known to the ends of the earth.

So there's two reasons so far, and we have one more. Two reasons. Number one, everything about Christ, his suffering, his resurrection,

Isaiah 53, everything was written ahead of time by prophets who foretold the things to come.

Only God knows the future. Number two, the witnesses who saw him rise from the dead, they went to the ends of the earth proclaiming

Christ, and they were willing to die for what they claimed they saw. Credible witnesses.

Believe them. Believe their blood, it speaks louder than their words. Now third, notice the opposition of the enemy raises the stakes, raises the stakes.

The resistance of opponents raises the stakes on resurrection hope. In other words, if Jesus claimed to be

God, claimed that about himself, he was either who he claimed to be, or else he was some kind of lunatic and liar that nobody should accept.

Notice, nobody who heard him took some middle road and called him a great moral teacher, or a good philosopher, or another great leader.

No, look at the reaction, verse 62. They called him a fraud and an imposter.

Verse 62 and following, the next day, that is after the day of preparation, the chief priests and the

Pharisees gathered before Pilate and said, sir, we remember how that imposter said while he was still alive, after three days

I will rise. Therefore, order the tomb to be made secure until the third day.

Lest his disciples go and steal him away and tell the people he has risen from the dead. And the last fraud will be worse than the first.

Pilate said to them, you have a guard of soldiers, go. Make it as secure as you can.

So they went and made the tomb secure by sealing the stone and setting a guard.

Did you catch the way the religious leaders viewed Jesus? A fraud, an imposter?

C .S. Lewis puts it like this, we may note in passing that Jesus was never regarded as a mere moral teacher.

He did not produce that effect on any of the people who actually met him.

He produced mainly three effects, hatred, terror, or adoration. There was no trace of people expressing mild approval.

There was no mild approval. There was either accepting his bold, earth -shaking, incomparable claims about himself, or there was rejection of him.

He was either Lord or some kind of lying lunatic. So Pilate, listening to the religious leaders said, okay, you have a guard.

What's a guard? A guard was 16 Roman soldiers.

Think of them as like a Navy SEAL unit. These guys, each one of them had a sling that they could hit somebody 70 feet away.

So they're like David and Goliath. Each one of these guys with one flip could hit somebody 70 feet away.

They each had a shield with five javelins on the inside so they could spear people from a distance.

They had daggers. They had a long sword as well. These were the Navy SEALs of Rome.

These were the strong ones. And they could move together. They worked together.

It was mastered by the Greeks and then by the Romans. They would move kind of as a unit. So this was like a tank, destroying anything that got in its path and able to defend itself against almost anything.

This Roman guard goes to seal the tomb. And I say, thank you, God, that you and your providence allowed these soldiers to go camp out at the tomb because it gives a lie to any other explanation.

The disciples did not overpower a Roman guard and steal a body. You can trust that Jesus in fact rose from the dead.

They underestimate Jesus. But notice also they overestimate the disciples.

The disciples were nowhere to be found. They did not have the wherewithal to come steal the body.

So the stakes are raised. How so? If Jesus rises from the dead, then

Joseph is vindicated. It's true. The prophecies are fulfilled. Jesus is the son of God.

If he does not rise from the dead, this is all a fraud. He's an imposter. And the

Roman soldiers are standing guard to make sure nobody spoils the deal. 28, one through 10, and we'll be done.

Now, after the Sabbath, toward the dawn of the first day of the week, Mary Magdalene and the other

Mary went to see the tomb. And behold, there was a great earthquake for an angel of the

Lord descended from heaven and came and rolled back the stone and sat on it. His appearance was like lightning and his clothing white as snow.

And for fear of him, the guards trembled and became like dead men.

Notice when the angel comes, there's an earthquake. There's power.

His clothes are shining. I like the way he just kind of sits on the stone. I like this angel's style.

He moves the stone and he just sits there. Just his power. I admire his style.

Verse five and following though, the angel said to the women, do not be afraid, for I know that you seek

Jesus who was crucified. He is not here, for he is risen.

As he said, come see the place where he lay. And now in the next few verses,

I want you to notice that God has entrusted this seeing, the ability to see the place where Jesus lay, not to going to Jerusalem to the tourist attraction, but to spiritual sight through preaching, through telling.

Notice with the rest of this text, the angel tells, he says, Jesus rose from the dead.

And now to the women, go tell the message. Then go quickly and tell his disciples that he has risen from the dead.

And behold, he is going before you to Galilee. There you will see him. See, I have told you.

So they departed quickly from the tomb with fear and great joy and ran to tell his disciples.

And behold, Jesus met them and said, greetings. That's the Greek word kaireto.

It's just the simple, ordinary greeting. And I love this about Jesus. He's risen from the dead.

He's accomplished redemption. And these women are running from the tomb. And he basically just says, hey, what's up?

It's just the most ordinary of all the greetings in the Greek tongue. Just grace be with you is the etymology of it, grace.

And they're just stunned. And they came up and they took hold of his feet and worshiped him.

Then Jesus said to them, do not be afraid. But what? Go and tell.

Go and tell my brothers to go to Galilee and there they will see me.

Okay, so the last point. We've already said the prophets foretold all of the details from Jesus riding in on a donkey according to Zechariah 9 .9

to being betrayed for 30 pieces of silver, which were thrown to the potter to buy the field of blood, the betrayal of Judas Iscariot in Zechariah 11, 12 and 13.

In Zechariah 12, 10, pierced, they mourn for the one they pierced. All of these things were foretold.

The prophets foretold all the details of Jesus's life. That's the first thing. Number two, the witnesses who saw with their own eyes.

These witnesses gave their life for the testimony of Jesus risen from the dead.

Not the stuff made of liars, not what liars are made of, I should say.

Believable testimony. The stakes are raised by the opponents.

You can't have this middle road, either he rose or he didn't. And so this is the final thing. How is faith born in the heart?

Through the simple telling of the death, burial and resurrection story.

The women were there when the stone was rolled away. They were coming through the woods, but they got there just in time to see that the tomb was empty.

And the angel proclaimed. And then they were told to proclaim. And as the disciples met with Jesus on the mountain, they were commissioned to go preach this news to the ends of the earth.

Here's what I'm trying to say. God has so ordained in his providence that the burial of Jesus and his resurrection from the dead would be communicated to the entire world through preaching.

It is the grace of God that brings you to a place where you can hear with physical ears this message,

Jesus is alive. But that message is carried forth with the power of God's Holy Spirit.

This is something I can't do. That's why I pray, God, give me your words.

I cannot do this. What I'm trying to do right now, I can't do it in my strength. I can only tell you

Jesus is risen. God then takes this word, this simple telling, which has been told for 2 ,000 years, and he applies it to hearts to make you believe.

He gives you a new heart. He gives you the ears to hear spiritually, eyes to see. It comes through telling.

Faith comes by hearing and hearing by the word of Christ. We're told in Romans 10. How shall they believe unless somebody preaches?

How shall they preach unless someone is sent? Faith comes by hearing and hearing by the word of Christ.

The Galatians never saw Jesus, but an apostle came to them and preached

Christ crucified. And when Paul writes to them in the third chapter, he says, before your eyes,

Christ was clearly portrayed as crucified. Don't miss this.

When some jar of clay came bouncing in to Galatia, I say a jar of clay because we have this treasure in jars of clay.

Simple human flesh, just a man. Strange looking man at that. Somebody told me today

I look like an Easter egg. And I said, oh, it's the color, right? He said, no, you look kind of round. Sure, it's a little poofy,

I don't know. Jars of clay, just ordinary people to show that the all surpassing power comes from God and not from us.

Do you see God's plan? We have this treasure in jars of clay.

What's the treasure? Christ and him crucified. He sends ordinary people like us to proclaim it so that you can believe.

Through preaching. Nothing I can do. It's just the power of God's word.

So in closing, let's just wrap it up now. Application. Without traveling to Jerusalem, look at the place where Jesus lay.

I tell you to look, I'm telling you to look, to see not just words on a page, but to see that this is true.

This is not just some guy telling you something. This is God's truth confirmed to you.

Look at the place where Jesus lay. In other words, believe. Believe that Jesus died for sinners.

He was buried in a borrowed tomb and he rose from the dead on the third day. Join Joseph of Arimathea and billions of others in the generations that have followed in the hope of being resurrected from the dead.

And I'll say this, stake everything on it. Stake everything on it.

Some of you guys have financial planners that you go and visit. What do they tell you to do? Diversify.

Put a little in this mutual fund, a little in this stock, some bonds, buy some gold. Diversify. And that's probably a good advice for you financial investors.

But Jesus told this parable. He said there was a man who went and he found a treasure hidden in a field.

And so he went and he sold everything he had and came back with that money and bought that field.

Because if you get that field, you get the treasure. It's worth selling everything to have this.

This is the bottom line. Jesus rose from the dead. If he rose, he is

Lord and King and he deserves all of you, even your lifeblood. If you lay down your life, whoever tries to hold onto his life will lose it.

But whoever loses his life for Christ's sake will find it. That's what it means to be a disciple, to say he rose from the dead and to give your life to him, to follow him.

He is worth that. So don't diversify, sell out. Stake everything on the crucified, buried and risen

Jesus Christ. Jesus had the borrowed tomb. Every other tomb is holding dust and ashes, right?

Bodies are put there, ashes to ashes, dust to dust. Jesus has the highest name.

Every other name is written water. Don't live to make a name for yourself.

Don't live for yourself. Live for the name that is above every name, to have his name written on your forehead.

Let's close in a word of prayer. And worship team, come on up as I pray. I realized that hearing this, maybe some of you for the first time are believing.

Maybe you're seeing with spiritual eyes. I wanna give you a chance right now. I want everybody else to close your eyes because this is between you and God.

But if you would like Jesus to come into your life right now, you believe that he died on a cross, he rose from the dead, but you're not sure.

You haven't staked everything on it. But this morning, Easter morning, 2019, you want

Jesus to come into your life. I can't tell him to do that. You can't even tell him to do that, but you can ask him.

You can say, save me. So if you wanna do that, in fact, before you do, everybody keep your eyes closed.

If you wanna do that, slip your hand in the air so I can see, just me. Awesome, awesome. Anybody else?

Praise the Lord, awesome. A few more, somebody else needs to do this. I see all these hands, that's awesome.

Praise the Lord. I want you to pray these words. You can put your hand down. Just in your own head.

You don't even have to talk out loud. Just tell him, I am a sinner, but I believe in Jesus Christ.

I believe he died on a cross. They laid him in Joseph's tomb, but I believe he rose from the dead.

I believe in Jesus. So Jesus, I call on you to come save me.

Write your name on my forehead. Save me from my sins.

I stake everything on you. I turn away from sin and I believe.

Jesus, you are the Christ, the son of the living

God. Save me,

I am yours, in Jesus' name, amen. Amen, guys, let's give a hand clap just for what the

Lord did this morning. I praise the Lord for every person that just prayed to accept

Christ. We wanna get you a Bible. Talk to the person who brought you. Talk to myself or one of the elders, we'll give you a

Bible. We wanna disciple you. Being born again, that's the beginning. The beginning of a pilgrim's progress.

We need to join with him and then walk with him until we die, until he resurrects us again to eternal life.