Resurrection Day Worship Service

Good morning. Thank you for joining us. I wanted to read a few pieces of scripture this morning to get us started, but before I do, I wanted to mention that we are really excited that you invited us into your living room.

We would like to connect with you, so we want to make sure that you are aware of our forum online, just letting us know that you're visiting with us. You can go to contact .cornerstoneSJ .org. Just ask for your name and address, email address.

It allows us to send you a thank-you card, and no strings attached, just thanking you for your visit and just letting you know the ministries that we have at Cornerstone. Let's get started this morning with Philippians 4, 6 through 7.

Do not be anxious about anything, but in every situation, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your requests to God, and the peace of God, which transcends all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus.

Another one that I love is Isaiah 41, 10. So do not fear, for I am with you. Do not be dismayed, for I am your God. I will strengthen you, and I will help you. I will uphold you with my righteous right hand.

Let's sing this morning. None loved if our God is for us, then known by sin. Lord, we come before you free, because you died, because you rose from the dead, because you ascended into heaven, are free.

Lord, I pray for those that are listening this morning. If they do not know or have a relationship with you, they will today put their faith in you, because they can believe that they are free, and they can believe that you have a purpose and a plan for everything that you do.

If we're dying on the cross for us, for me, from raising from the dead, that we can celebrate a living Savior.

Good morning, and welcome to Cornerstone. This Sunday is Resurrection Day. What an amazing and glorious day this is as we celebrate the resurrection of our Lord and Savior from the grave in victory over death.

What an amazing day this is for us. I want to start out this morning by looking at Psalm 20, specifically verse 6. Psalm 20, a psalm of David, is a psalm of confidence, where David expresses his confidence in the Lord, and in verse 6 he says, now I know that the Lord saves His anointed.

He has such confidence that whenever in a point of need, whenever in a period of darkness, whatever the circumstances, his confidence is that the Lord saves His anointed. Two thousand years ago, give or take, the Lord was in an upper room with His followers.

They were celebrating a meal, and He was teaching them about many, many things. He washes their feet, and He tells them about, you see the Father, you see Me. One of the things that He teaches them, and He encourages them with, is let not your heart be troubled.

Believe in God. Believe also in Me. It's almost like He's giving them a heads up that there are going to be times where your heart will feel troubled, tested, tried. And He says, don't let your heart be troubled.

Believe in God. Believe also in Me. Well, they went from that room to the garden, and our Lord prayed. And He prayed intensely. He prayed with drops of blood. He prayed, Lord, if there is any way, let this cup pass from Me.

But yet not My will, but Thine be done. And then He was arrested. He was taken on trial. He was scourged. He was walked up the hill. He was put on a cross. He was crucified. He died. And for His followers, that had to be the darkest of all moments.

That had to be the ultimate of despair and of gloom. These promises, the one from David, where He had said, I know the Lord saves His anointed. The promise from Jesus that says, let not your heart be troubled.

Yet their Lord hung on a cross, dead, was placed in a tomb. But the great news is that on Resurrection Day, Jesus came forth from the grave in victory over sin, in victory over death. Our Lord and Savior arose.

And so today, we celebrate the fulfillment of all of these promises. God had promised 6 ,000 years ago, after the fall, that He would crush the head of Satan. And so although Satan had bit His heel on the cross, God had victory.

Our God, sovereignly, had victory. It's because of the love of the Father that today is a day of victory and celebration. It's because of the obedience of His Son that today is a day of victory and celebration.

It's because of the indwelling power and indwelling illumination of the Holy Spirit that we can understand that today is a day of rejoicing. Jesus hung on the cross, but today He came out of the grave.

So we at Cornerstone have a tradition, many churches have this tradition, an antiphonal response. If I say, He is risen, the response is, He is risen indeed. I'd like us to do that virtually together right now.

He is risen. He is risen indeed. He is risen. He is risen indeed. He is risen. He is risen indeed. Amen and amen. I'd like to share a few announcements with you. First one is a commitment on the part of Pastor Jeff, on the part of Ben, on the part of the rest of the staff, a commitment from your board, a commitment from your care group leaders, a commitment from all the ministry leaders in this church to be remaining in prayer for you now and continually now.

Which leads to the next announcement. If there are items that you would like us to be in prayer for, it can be a need, it can be a rejoicing, please forward an email to Pastor Jeff. We will know better how to pray for you.

Was Friday an amazing time? Our Friday prayer service by Zoom, what an amazing time to be gathered together. We rejoice that God has given us these kinds of opportunities. They had a great blood drive just a little bit ago and we're considering and early stages of planning for another one, so be watching for that.

Word will come out for that. And look for opportunities to be in fellowship. It could be in a care group, it could be in a women's ABF, other opportunities by Zoom. Look for ways to be in fellowship with one another and look for ways to be spreading the good news.

Jesus is risen out and about in your neighborhood to people on phone. Be in looking for ways to be a light to a world that needs it. So now let's pray. Father, we do continue to lift up those who are ill, those in our congregation who have illnesses, those in the country, those around the world that this terrible virus that we have.

You are the great physician. We continue, Lord, to lift them up. And for their families who need your encouragement, Lord, we continue to lift them. And the frontline workers, the health care workers that are on the line every day, protect them, keep them safe from the virus.

Give them the strength over the long hours that they have. Be with them, Lord. Give us as a church wisdom as we come out of this quarantine, as we come back. Give us wisdom on how best to do it, how to be honoring to you, and where you would have us go from here.

And so, Lord, we pray that all of us, as believers, we would realize and live in the hope that we have, that we celebrate today, and that we have, that we would, that would be our, that comes from God, that comes from the reality that Jesus came out of the grave.

We are victorious in Christ. Now, Lord, be with Pastor Jeff as he gives us a message of hope, a message of salvation, a message of truth from your scriptures. Open his heart and open the hearts of each of us to receive,.

In Jesus' name. Amen. Good morning. My name is Eleanor Webster. I am a nurse at one of the.

Local hospitals, and currently I am working on a COVID -19 floor, which means that everyone on our unit is either positive for COVID -19 or is being tested for it. Pastor Jeff asked me to say a few words about what the challenges are with that and what the solutions are.

There are many challenges. You've heard on the news that we don't have enough protective equipment, and that's true. Each day when we go into the hospital, we're given one mask. That mask has to last us for an entire 12-hour shift.

We're given one face shield. The same thing applies to that. And then when we go into rooms to care for patients, we're given one N95 mask, and that has to last us for a week. In addition, we don't have enough staff members.

The number of patients on our unit is increasing every day. It takes longer to care for these patients because we have to be very careful not to infect ourselves or the environment when we take our protective equipment off.

More challenging for me is the emotional toll on families and on the patients. The patients are isolated. They're behind closed doors all day. The only human contact they have is with the staff members when the staff members care for them.

The family members, to me, it's heart-wrenching. They call. They're desperate for information about their family member. They're not allowed to come in and visit them. They can't see them. They can't even be with them.

They're not allowed to be with them when it might be possibly their final moments. So these people cry. They're calling. They're angry. They're frustrated. It's a very difficult situation to deal with emotionally for the caregivers.

We're tired. But I have felt and seen God's blessings through all of this. Each morning before I go into work, I pray Ephesians 6 .11. I try to put on the full armor of God because I realize this is not just a physical battle.

It's a spiritual battle as well. And I pray for peace that passes all understanding. And God has been very faithful to provide that. I appreciate so much the prayers of the people in the church. And people have even dropped off meals, and that's very helpful.

So I've asked myself, what more can I do besides just caring for people physically? And 2 Chronicles 7 keeps coming back to me. And I'm really struck by the fact that God has called His people first to humble ourselves and to pray and to seek His face.

So I think it starts with I ask that you would join me in praying for our leaders, for our country, that we would see that there is really nothing we can do to stop this plague. The only one who can stop it is God.

And what I keep coming back to are these things that God is good, that God sees, that God cares, and that God is in control. And He can use this horrible situation to bring many to Him. I heard on the news last night that every two and a half minutes there's a patient dying from COVID in New York.

Those numbers are staggering. That means there are many souls who are going into eternity without Christ, and they will be eternally separated from God. So the suffering that they're enduring here on earth is minimal compared to what they potentially will be forever.

So my challenge to myself and to you is that we keep praying, that we just keep praying that God will use this for His good and for His glory, that He'll use this to get our attention, to humble us as a country, to see that we need Him, that we cannot do this on our own, that we need Him.

And even when times get better, that we still need Him and that He is able to humble us in a minute. So I just ask that you would pray with me, pray that we will have boldness to share Christ with others, that we will reach out to others now in their time of need, because this is when people are open.

So please join me with that. Thank you. Bye.

Let's pray. So Father, we thank You this Resurrection Day for sending Your one and only Son, that He died the death that we deserve, that He rose from the dead. It's in the name of Jesus we pray as we turn now to Your Word, asking that You speak to us, enlighten us, give us Your ears to hear, give us eyes to see wonderful things from Your Word.

In Jesus' name. Amen. I'm laughing a bit as I come up here because this is a second take. I had to cut there because the first take, I had been praying, seeking God here in the empty sanctuary, just praying that God would give me the same kind of zeal and spirit that comes when we're in the assembly.

This isn't the assembly. This is an empty room. And yet the same Spirit who lives in you and is in me is with us wherever we go. So I know He's able to do it. So I was praying, God, fill me with Your Holy Spirit.

Give me passion. Give me zeal. Give me Your Word and send it forth in power. And as I prayed, began to preach, the place where I was gathered shook like a mighty wind in Acts chapter 2. I began to feel the vibrations and the whole building seemed to be shaking.

No, it was not the coming of the Holy Spirit. It was a pressure washer operated by Brother Stan. Stan was pressure washing the building outside and I just didn't know what was going on. Finally, but you know what?

Going out to talk to Stan, I was encouraged on so many levels. Number one, to see a brother who behind the scenes not knowing anything is going on in here and not nobody else knowing what he's doing is serving behind the scenes.

That's the kind of church that this is. This is a church of brothers who love the Lord. Brothers and sisters who are willing to serve one another. So keep doing that in the midst of this coronavirus. Make phone calls.

Call each other. Check on one another. Love one another. The love of Stan encouraged me. The second thing about Stan the man is it just gave me that little bit of human interaction that I needed in order to stand here and picture you in the audience and not an audience in the congregation as we're gathered together so that I don't feel like I'm just preaching to an empty room.

So it helped me and I thank you for that, Stan. So I'm excited. He has risen. The Lord Jesus has risen from the dead and we are here on Resurrection Day to celebrate that truth. Now we proclaim it and all of you who believe it, you believe it in the depths of your heart.

You can't explain why you're so sure. You weren't there 2 ,000 years ago to see him risen from the dead and yet you know it and you bank your life on it. If you were wrong, you should be pitied more than all men because all of your life is wound up in this central truth that Jesus is alive.

How do we know? That's the question. According to who? That's the question that we seek to answer today. The answer is that the good news that we preach is not according to any man. It is not the opinion of man.

It is not a tradition handed down. It is the truth of Almighty God and we'll see it in 1 Corinthians chapter 15. So turn with me there but I want you to think about this issue. Now in the providence of God, we're not gathered but I think God has made us uncomfortable for a purpose.

For the gospel through video to go not only to our homes but to the homes to which we send it. That the gospel would go to the ends of the earth. We love the fellowship that we have here and it's going to be so sweet when we get that back.

Having been deprived of it, we will enjoy one another's company. We'll enjoy the assembly like never before but during these days while we are apart on Sundays, it's for the purpose of sending the gospel out and so many of you who are hearing, it's one of the purposes, many of you who are hearing this word come to you.

Maybe you've never been here before. You've never been to Cornerstone Church in Mount Laurel and you're just sitting in your living room looking on your cell phone or your computer or your TV screen on YouTube watching a sermon.

You're listening. You're here by the providence of God and it's in order to to believe the good news about Jesus Christ that he rose from the dead and yet you say, wait a minute, how can anybody know?

I mean Pastor Jeff, you were born in America so you're likely to be a Christian because most people in America claim to be Christians but if you were born in India, you would be more likely and probably would be a Hindu.

If you were born in China, you would be a Buddhist and if you were born in Saudi Arabia, you would be a Muslim and so because there's these geographical concentrations of different ideas, many people have come to believe that you can't know objectively anything.

It's really just a private matter. Metaphysical things, things that aren't visible to the eyes, things you can't touch with your hands and physically, scientifically prove, those things can't be known with the same kind of certainty and so our culture has created a whole nother realm of quote-unquote truth, personal truth, privatized truth.

You have your truth and I have my truth and so Pastor Jeff, when you say Jesus has risen from the dead, you weren't there. You didn't see him walking after being crucified. How do you know in the depths of your being to your bones that Jesus rose from the dead?

How do you know this? The answer will be found in 1 Corinthians chapter 15. This is not a gospel that's according to man. It is a gospel that's according to God. It can be known and he has made it known.

So first, in 1 Corinthians 15, we're going to see what this message is, the content of the gospel. Secondly, that it was attested by eyewitnesses who did see and hear and touch, who attest not to an ideology that they have but to something that they witnessed.

They are giving testimony. And then thirdly, that this testimony began in the scriptures from the foundation of the world when the first book of scripture was written, Genesis, all the way through Revelation.

It's God who attests to the truth of these things in his word objectively. The faith that we have is not blind. It's not the blind leap of faith that Indiana Jones had to make off of the cliff just hoping that something, some invisible bridge would catch him.

No, the faith that we have is made visible through the scriptures. God has given us his word and it holds secure. So let's go to it now. 1 Corinthians 15. First, in the first first, in the first four verses, we are looking for the content of the gospel.

Now, I would remind you brothers of the gospel I preached to you, which you received, in which you stand, and by which you are being saved, if you hold fast to the word I preached to you, unless you believed in vain.

For I delivered to you as of first importance what I also received, that Christ died for our sins in accordance with the scriptures, that he was buried, and that he was raised on the third day in accordance with the scriptures.

So Paul begins this chapter of 1 Corinthians. He's already talked about a number of issues that were happening in the church at Corinth, but he brings it back to the starting point, back to the most important thing.

And here on resurrection day, the conviction in my heart is that it's my job to bring this back around to the one thing, the most important thing, the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead. So he says, I will remind you brothers of the gospel I preached to you.

The word gospel means good news. A herald would come into the city and announce good news. And so the gospel is preached, which you received, in which you stand, by which you are being saved, if you hold fast to the word I preached to you, unless you believed in vain.

For I delivered to you as a first importance, this is the most important thing, brothers and sisters, or you who are listening in for the first time perhaps, you don't know about Jesus, or whether you believe this message that Christians preach, this is the most important thing that you will ever hear.

Could be that all the circumstances of this crazy month, the strange times in which we've been living, could be that all of these circumstances were for such a time as this, that you would hear this one thing, that Christ died for our sins in accordance with the scriptures, that he was buried, that he was raised on the third day in accordance with the scriptures.

There's some content there. There's a proposition that needs to be understood. Number one is Christ, who he is. This is the long-promised Messiah, the anointed one sent from heaven, the Christ. Number two, he died.

Something happened. He was killed on a Roman cross, but he wasn't murdered in the traditional sense. He says, no one takes my life, I give it willingly. He was led like a lamb to the slaughter, having all power.

Remember the miracles that he did. He had the power to resist the arrest. He had the power to call on angels to rescue him from the hands of the Romans, and yet being led like a lamb to the slaughter, he went and laid down upon that rude cross and gave his life for his friends.

He died for our sins. He died a death that he didn't deserve, the death that I deserve, because I'm a sinner and the wages of sin is death. He stepped in. He took that penalty upon himself, wore it like a crown of thorns, being the king of kings, he wore my sin in his body.

He who had no sin became sin so that I would receive his righteousness. He took on my sin and died the death that I deserve. Having been buried in the tomb of a rich man, according to the prophecy of Isaiah 53, Joseph of Arimathea gave his tomb away, one that he had bought and paid for.

He gave that tomb for this crucified Messiah, but it was only a borrowed tomb because on the third day Jesus rose from the dead and he lives. This is the content of the gospel, who he is and what he's done.

He died the death we deserve and then rose from the dead so that those who believe in him will have forgiveness of sins. Notice he dies for our sins, that those sins can be forgiven, wiped away, taken away from us.

Who's the us? It's those who believe and continue to believe. Chapter 15, verse 1 and 2, you hear this preaching. Someone comes into your living room with the message of Jesus Christ. You listen, you believe, you receive, it says, which you received and you stand.

You continue there. You continue believing by which you are being saved if you hold fast to the word I preach to you. You believe it and that circles us back to the central proposition today that the gospel is according to God.

I don't come to you with this message on my own authority. I don't come with my own experience. I don't come telling you that I'm anybody good. In fact, I am the chief of sinners. I bring no righteousness to the table, no reason that you would believe me.

I don't preach myself. I'm here to say that God commends his own gospel and there's two ways he does it here in this text. One is through eyewitness testimony and the second will be my last point through the scriptures.

Eyewitness testimony, verse 5 and following. After rising from the dead, Jesus factually, historically appeared to witnesses who then wrote down what they saw. It says in verse 5, he appeared to Cephas, that's Peter, then to the twelve.

Then he appeared to more than 500 brothers at one time. 500 witnesses of the resurrected Christ. That's a lot of witnesses, most of whom are still alive. The time of the writing of first Corinthians, which is about 45 AD, Jesus rises from the dead, possibly in 33 AD.

There's some scholars that say 30 AD, but within that 12 to 15 year window, Paul is writing these words and saying you can check with the people who saw him. Witnesses, most of whom are still alive, though some have fallen asleep, which is a metaphor for died.

Verse 7, then he appeared to James, then to all the apostles. Last of all, as to one untimely born, he appeared also to me. And then Paul says he's the least of the apostles because he was a persecutor of the church.

And you can trust Paul in this testimony because someone who was once on the other side, being sent out with orders from the Jewish leaders to capture those who are preaching Christ and throw them in prison.

The encounter that he had on the road to Damascus, where Jesus came in a bright light and blinded him and said, Saul, Saul, why are you persecuting me? Paul answered, who are you, Lord? Jesus said, I am Jesus whom you are persecuting.

That encounter with the risen Christ was so profound that the persecutor of the church became the apostle Paul, who writes 13 books of the New Testament of the Bible. This is a trustworthy testimony. In fact, he seals that testimony with his own blood, continuing to preach from city to city.

Wherever he goes, he's beaten with rods. He's stoned and left for dead. He receives the 40 lashes minus one on his back, the Roman custom of 39 lashes. He receives this harsh, harsh persecution for preaching what he saw.

He goes on preaching and ultimately, in Rome, he loses his head for it. He is killed, a martyr. He becomes a martyr for the sake of the name of Jesus. I think anybody who is willing to die, not just for a religious idea, but for what they claim to have seen and heard, is a trustworthy witness.

Now, in this world, it's hard to trust people. I think of three little girls who recently were woken up early in the morning, and their dad said, guys, the quarantine is lifted. You're going back to school.

Get your stuff. Get ready. Finally, the day has come. And they scurried about the house, and they clamored, and they were so excited. They packed their school bag. They packed their lunch. They got their best outfit on.

They put their backpack on, and they scurried down to the street and began to look for the bus. They waited. The bus must be running late. You can see them looking at their watches, looking at their cell phone.

The bus doesn't seem to come, until finally, the dad, who's been filming this whole thing from the front door, says, oh girls, it's April 1st, and the light bulbs come on. It's April Fool's Day, and this dad has pranked them.

And they, first of all, scream, and they're shocked, and they chase him into the house, and then the film cuts off. I don't know if you think that that's a funny story, or a good prank, or if you would consider that just over the top, and that's just bad dad kind of material there.

But the point is, it's hard to trust people. It's hard to trust testimony. How do I know that Peter and Paul, James and John are telling the truth, that they saw the resurrected Christ? It helps me to know that they sealed that testimony with their blood.

They kept preaching, not what they just believed, but what they saw. Let's look at the words of 2 Peter chapter 1. Peter writes about his experience. 2 Peter chapter 1, verse 16 through 18. For we did not follow cleverly devised myths when we made known to you the power and coming of our Lord Jesus Christ, but we were eyewitnesses of his majesty.

He goes on to explain an experience where he saw Jesus transfigured before him on the mountain, and the majestic voice comes from heaven saying, this is my beloved Son. He heard it with his own ears. He says, I didn't make this stuff up.

It's not a cleverly devised myth. I'm telling you what I saw. John uses these words in 1 John chapter 1, describing not just a theology, although he does that. He preaches a theology of Jesus being life, the eternal life, but he says this is a life who is a person.

A person who we touched, a person who we saw, and who we heard. That which was from the beginning. This is 1 John chapter 1. That which was from the beginning, which we have heard, which we have seen with our eyes, which we have looked upon, and have touched with our hands concerning the word of life.

And he goes on and reiterates that point again and again. We saw him. We touched him. Even after he rose from the dead, we ate meals with him. And Thomas was told that he could come and touch where the nails went through his hands.

The apostles are eyewitnesses of the resurrection of Jesus Christ. You can trust that. You can trust that, but ultimately this is not the good news of Peter, the good news of John, the good news of Paul.

They're trustworthy eyewitnesses, but this is something so much greater. This is the good news of God. In 2 Peter chapter 1, after Peter makes that claim of what he has seen and touched and heard, he goes on to say that this makes the prophetic word more sure.

There's a third, and this is my final point, a third reason. Well, let's go to the scripture and look at it. In 2 Peter chapter 1 verse 16 and following, we've already addressed up through verse 18 where he's talking about what he saw on the holy mountain, but he goes on to say this, and we have the prophetic word more fully confirmed.

It's not just the word of Peter. When Peter goes and writes these letters, he's carried along by the Holy Spirit. He's bringing the New Testament of scripture. Here, one of the 27 books that will become the New Testament, but he says we have the prophetic word made more sure.

When I say faith is not blind, when I say that it's God himself who testifies, that the gospel we preach is not according to a preacher, not according to a man, but according to God, it's because of this.

We have the prophetic word more fully confirmed to which you will do well to pay attention as to a lamp shining in a dark place until the day dawns and the morning star rises in your hearts. Knowing this, first of all, that no prophecy of scripture comes from someone's own interpretation.

For no prophecy was ever produced by the will of man, but men spoke from God as they were carried along by the Holy Spirit. Peter is saying there is a thing called prophecy, and it doesn't come from man.

It's not the will of man that produces what they're going to write. So there is a human instrumentation where Moses sits down, and by his own mind and thinking, writes down Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, and Deuteronomy, those first five books of the Old Testament.

But this writing is different from any other kind of writing. This writing is carried along by the Holy Spirit. It doesn't come by a private interpretation. It comes from God. Men spoke from God. And so before Jesus came, 39 books of prophecy were already complete.

These 39 books from Genesis to Malachi are the testimony of God in order that when Christ comes and dwells among us, we would recognize him as the Son of God. And when he dies and rises, we would know that this is not just the stories of men, but this is objectively true.

He told us before it happened. In fact, the last book of the Old Testament was complete 400 years before Christ came. The scriptures were already written concerning him. And the record from Genesis to Malachi is not only complete, but it is the most compelling testimony that any person could give to the deity of Jesus Christ and his work as the Messiah, dying for sins and rising from the dead.

These things were foretold. God said it before he did it. And so the gospel is God's gospel. It's according to him. It's according to the scriptures. Time would fail us to go through and look at each of these prophecies.

But the point is that from Genesis 1 -1, where in the beginning God creates the heavens and the earth, you see the Spirit of God is present. And God speaks in Genesis chapter 1, the 26th verse, saying, let us make man in our image.

Even from the beginning, he existed as Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. The Father says to the Son and to the Holy Spirit, let us make man in our image. Progressing from there, we see that mankind falls into sin.

The fall of man, Adam and Eve sinning in the garden. But right away in Genesis 3 -15, a promise is made that one who comes from the woman will crush the head of the devil who tempted Eve in the garden, and God will make things right.

This promised head-crushing Messiah is Jesus the Christ, foretold in Genesis 3 -15. Genesis 4, Cain kills Abel. And it's a horrible story of murder, but it shows that sin is in the. But Abel is looking to God in faith.

God has told Abel to make a sacrifice. That sacrifice is an animal sacrifice. And so Abel, obediently, not understanding the full picture of what we're talking about, makes an animal sacrifice and sheds blood in offering that animal sacrifice to God.

God accepts that act. But that act of killing an animal in offering to God is not able in itself to take away sin. Rather, it is an animal sacrifice that points us to the one coming sacrifice that truly takes away sin.

Jesus. It's impossible for the blood of bulls and goats to take away sin. But each time that God commanded the sacrifice of an animal, that was a placeholder that pointed us forward to the sacrifice of Christ.

And so the animal sacrifice that Abel brings points us to Christ. But then his brother comes, filled with sin, filled with jealousy and rage, and strikes him on the back of the head, we presume, with a stone.

And Abel dies. And his blood pours out into the ground. But we are told in the New Testament, Hebrews chapter 11 and then in chapter 12 verse 24, that the blood of Abel speaks a message. His blood still speaks.

What does it say? It cries out from the ground that God would vindicate him. This isn't right. There's murder in the earth. It's not fair. It's not right. God, make things right. I was unjustly killed by my own brother.

How will God make things right to bring judgment? The blood of Abel calls out from the ground that God would make things right and bring justice. It cries for judgment. But that only points forward to an innocent sacrifice, one killed, whose name is Jesus, whose blood cries out, not for judgment, but a better message, a message of mercy.

The blood of Jesus poured out from his body, falling to the ground, soaking the ground beneath him, poured out on that centurion who stabbed him. That blood speaks a better message than the message of the blood of Abel.

This sacrifice long ago that Abel made and the death that he died, the innocent one dying at the hands of his brother, Jesus is a fulfillment of all of that. And he is the one that makes it right. For he is the coming judge who will judge the wicked.

But he is also the savior whose blood is able to cleanse, whose blood brings mercy on the perpetrator. Bloodshed in Genesis 4. Hebrews chapter 11 and 12 teaches us that all of that points us to Christ.

And then we can go on and on from Abraham leaving the place that he was born to go to a place that he would show, that God would show him, that God would make him a great nation and that all the families of the earth would be blessed through his seed, the seed of Abraham, the descendant of Abraham is Christ.