WWUTT 2521 Resurrection Morning (Luke 24:1-3)

The Gospel of Luke records for us that on the first day of the week after Jesus had died, the women came to the tomb where he was buried.

They found the stone rolled away, and they were told he is risen. When we understand the text.

This is When We Understand the Text, a daily Bible study in the Word of Christ. For he is before all things, and in him all things hold together.

Tell your friends about our ministry at www .wutt .com. Hey, once again, it's Pastor Gabe.

Thank you, Becky. In our study of the Gospel of Luke, folks, we have finally come to the end.

The last chapter in the Gospel of Luke, the longest book of the New Testament, by the way.

Even though Matthew is 28 chapters, Luke is 24, but Luke has more words in it.

So we've done a long study here of the Gospel of Luke, and we've come to the close, beginning this chapter with the resurrection of Jesus.

Let me read verses 1 through 12 to start off. Hear the word of the Lord. But on the first day of the week, at early dawn, the women went to the tomb, taking the spices they had prepared, and they found the stone rolled away from the tomb.

But when they went in, they did not find the body of the Lord Jesus. While they were perplexed about this, behold, two men stood by them in dazzling apparel, and as they were frightened and bowed their faces to the ground, the men said to them,

Why do you seek the living among the dead? He is not here, but has risen.

Remember how he told you while he was still in Galilee, the Son of Man must be delivered into the hands of sinful men and be crucified and on the third day rise.

And they remembered his words, and returning from the tomb, they told all these things to the eleven and to all the rest.

Now it was Mary Magdalene and Joanna and Mary the mother of James and the other women with them who told these things to the apostles.

But these words seemed to them an idle tale, and they did not believe them.

But Peter rose and ran to the tomb. Stooping and looking in, he saw the linen cloths by themselves, and he went home marveling at what had happened.

So here we are, Resurrection Sunday, and all four Gospels record that the resurrection occurred on Sunday morning.

Now there has been some debate with regards to when Jesus was crucified.

Traditionally, we believe that the crucifixion happened on Friday. I've made an argument before that the crucifixion could have been on Thursday.

But if you're following the narrative the way that Luke lays it out, it seems pretty difficult to argue against the crucifixion happening on Friday.

Like you would have to know some very precise details about the way certain

Jewish feasts were celebrated in that day to know that there could be high Sabbaths or special Sabbaths, that the

Sabbath was not always exclusively Saturday. And if during Passover week there was this special Sabbath that fell on a

Friday so that there's kind of a double Sabbath, then Jesus being crucified on Thursday, he's in the tomb

Friday and Saturday, and then rises from the dead on Sunday. Now the reason why people would try to argue for that would be to be consistent with Jesus' words when he said that no sign will be given to this generation but the sign of Jonah.

For as Jonah was in the belly of the fish for three days and three nights, so will the Son of Man be in the heart of the earth.

Well, if Jesus is just in the tomb Friday, Saturday, and then rises

Sunday, there are some that will argue, well, that wasn't really three days, so Jesus was wrong about his prophecy.

So thus you have an argument being made for the crucifixion happening on Thursday, that way he's in the tomb

Friday and Saturday, and then rises Sunday, and that way we can preserve what Jesus meant by the

Son of Man being in the heart of the earth for three days and three nights. So there is some evidence of that.

John MacArthur has made that argument, in fact, for Jesus being crucified on Thursday rather than Friday.

It's not necessary, though, to have to split hairs over that because the way that Jews counted days was different than the way that we count days anyway.

Friday, Saturday, and Sunday is three days according to a Jew. So it's not necessary to have to be so precise to the letter on that or else something in the

Gospels was wrong. We can differ on our opinions of that. So what day Jesus was crucified sometimes can be in contention.

That's simply the argument that I'm making here, is that not everybody agrees on which day he was crucified.

But we are certain that he rose on Sunday because all four Gospels testify to it being

Sunday, the first day of the week. It's after the Sabbath. It's on Sunday morning that Jesus rises.

And this is why we, as the church, traditionally gather on Sunday. We have evidence even in the

New Testament that the church was gathering on Sunday. And this was the day that was committed to service to the

Lord. It's called the Lord's Day because it was the day that Jesus rose from the dead.

In many Reformed traditions and statements of faith, the Sabbath has been moved from Saturday to Sunday.

So it's not just that we don't have a Sabbath, but that Sunday is our

Sabbath. That is our day of rest. That's the day that belongs to the Lord that we commit to him for worship.

Now, again, even with that, it's not necessary to have to be rigidly to the letter of the law, because as Paul talks about in Romans 14, some are going to say this day is holy and some are going to say that day is holy.

Paul says each one must be fully convinced in his own mind. In other words, it's good that you have a day, but if you're arguing over which day it is, the

Jews were still holding to Saturday, the Christians were celebrating on Sunday. But if that's your contention, if that's what you're arguing over, let each one be fully convinced himself.

If your conscience says it's this day, then let it be that day. And don't dismiss over one another over varying opinions, which

Paul says in Romans 14, 1. So we are sure that Jesus rose from the dead on Sunday.

Differences of opinion as to which day he was crucified, differences of opinion as to which day can rightly be called the

Sabbath, those are worthy discussions, but we're settled on Jesus rising Sunday morning.

On the first day of the week at early dawn, the women went to the tomb.

They're going as soon as the Sabbath is over. Now, the

Sabbath really ends at sundown. Remember that the Sabbath begins at sundown and it ends at sundown the next day.

So the Sabbath began at sundown Friday.

For the sake of the argument, we're just sticking with Christ being crucified on Friday. In the tomb, Saturday rises again

Sunday morning. So the Sabbath begins at the end of Friday with sundown.

That was why the bodies had to be taken off of the cross. It was a holy day. The Pharisees didn't want the bodies to still be hanging there right outside of Jerusalem.

So the bodies were taken down. Joseph of Arimathea wraps the body, puts Jesus in his own tomb.

By the way, something that I forgot to mention on Wednesday, I had said that Jesus being buried in the tomb of Joseph of Arimathea was in fulfillment of Scripture, but I forgot to say which

Scripture. It's actually in Isaiah 53. We've talked about this before. Surely you're aware of this, right?

So it is said in Isaiah 53 .9, They made his grave 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.

So his grave is made with a rich man in his death, and that was

Joseph of Arimathea, the man who stepped forward and wanted the body of Jesus and had it buried in his own tomb.

And, you know, we can ask these questions about, did Joseph know that he was fulfilling prophecy?

My guess is that he didn't. He didn't know that. I'm going to go ask for the body of Jesus so that Isaiah 53 .9

could be fulfilled. They didn't have chapters and verses marked back then anyway, but I don't think that's what

Joseph of Arimathea had in mind. He just loved Jesus. And as Luke recorded in chapter 23, he was looking for the kingdom of God.

And so in honor of the Lord, he took the body of Jesus, prepared it, and laid it in his tomb.

And that fulfilled what had been prophesied about the Messiah, about what would happen with the

Messiah when he died. His grave was a rich man's tomb. And it's that tomb that the women go to on Sunday morning.

So again, the Sabbath begins Friday at sundown. It ends

Saturday at sundown. But now it's dark. So the women can't go at dark

Saturday night to take the spices to Jesus. They wait until first light on Sunday morning.

As soon as there is enough light for us to see, we're going to go. We're going to go to the tomb, and we're going to take the spices that have been prepared so that they could anoint the body of Jesus, which there had not been enough time to do when he was buried

Friday evening. So they're coming to the tomb. It's Sunday morning.

And the tomb, as I had mentioned last week, was on the north side of Jerusalem.

If you look at a map of Jerusalem today, you will notice, at least some maps that I have seen, will show where certain portions of Jerusalem belong to certain people.

So there is the Muslim quarter, the Christian quarter, the Armenian quarter, and the

Jewish quarter. The Muslim quarter is in the northeast side of Jerusalem, of old

Jerusalem. And it's there they have the Temple Mount and the Dome of the Rock. Now, the

Temple Mount actually crosses over from the Muslim quarter into the Jewish quarter. So part of the

Temple Mount, the Jews can claim for themselves as well. But in the Muslim quarter portion of the

Temple Mount, that's where the Dome of the Rock is. The Dome of the Rock is a 7th century

Islamic shrine that is in Jerusalem. And it's the oldest surviving

Islamic monument. It is believed that that was the place where the Prophet Muhammad ascended to heaven during his night journey.

So they have this shrine that has been erected on the Temple Mount. So that as long as that Islamic structure is there, the temple can't be rebuilt.

In order for the temple to be rebuilt, the Dome of the Rock would have to be destroyed. So God, by his providence, has allowed that to be there so that the temple has never been able to be rebuilt.

So you have the Muslim quarter in the northwest portion of Jerusalem. The Jewish quarter is in the northeast.

The Jewish quarter is in the southeast. The Armenian quarter, those are the

Eastern Orthodox. They claim to be the oldest church. And they are in that southwest corner of Jerusalem.

And then you have the Christian quarter. And it's up in the Christian quarter, that northwest portion of Old Jerusalem, which is where things like the

Church of the Holy Sepulchre are. And there's the Garden Tomb that's a little bit north of there.

So as I had mentioned back on Wednesday of last week, there are two potential locations for the tomb.

And people debate over which one is actually the tomb of Jesus. But the Church of the

Holy Sepulchre has been erected around that place they believe to have been the tomb of Joseph of Arimathea.

There was a time, for like hundreds of years, we knew exactly where that tomb was.

And you could still point to it for hundreds of years. People could still say that was the tomb of Joseph of Arimathea.

And people would go in it and see it's empty. And the body of Jesus was not there. But over the years, because of various occupations around Jerusalem and centuries that have passed, we've kind of lost the certainty as to which tomb belonged to Christ.

But we know for hundreds of years that was recorded. And it was known for sure. This was the tomb where Jesus was laid.

Come and see. He is no longer here, for he has risen. Now, the

Church of the Holy Sepulchre is actually in Jerusalem. But at the time that Jesus would have been buried by Joseph of Arimathea, that tomb itself would have been outside the city limits.

None of the tombs, none of the graves would have been within Jerusalem. But that's where Jesus was buried.

And it was noted at the end of Luke 23 that the women saw.

They saw exactly where the tomb was. So this was Luke 23, verse 55.

The women who had come with him from Galilee followed and saw the tomb and how his body was laid.

So they saw all of that that they could have in their minds. This was where Jesus was.

So they knew where to come back to when it was time for them, when they had the time now to be able to anoint his body.

In the meantime, they went back to their homes and prepared the spices and the ointments. They mixed them and had them in the jars, the vessels that they would carry to the body of Jesus to anoint his body.

So here it is, early Sunday morning, enough daylight now that they can come and anoint the body of Jesus.

They probably started out before there was light. So they begin with lamps and torches, probably just lamps.

But they come there to the tomb with the spices they've prepared. And what do they find?

Verse 2, they find the stone was rolled away from the tomb. Now, what we know from other tombs that date back to first century

Jerusalem, other tombs that are around Jerusalem, we know the doorway into the tomb, it would have been built on kind of a hillside and the doorway would have been fairly small.

It's not like a full size door that a person can just walk through standing up like your typical.

What are our standard doors here in America? Six feet, eight inches, I think is what they are.

So it wasn't like that. It wasn't that big. It would have been small enough for a person to crouch down and walk through, not necessarily crawl through, but just kind of step through crouching down.

And the stone that would have been in front of the door, it could have been round or it could have been square.

Just because it was square, that doesn't mean that there's a contradiction here with the stone being rolled away.

It could still be rolled to the side, even if it's square or had rounded edges on it.

It doesn't automatically mean that this was a round stone, but it could have been. It could have been cut in a round shape, but it was also in like a cork shape.

So not just a round disc of a stone, which is a lot of the ways that you've seen the depictions of the tomb and the stone rolled away.

It's just this big round stone, right? Rolled away from the tomb. But it would have been more cork like.

So it had these rounded edges on it so that when the stone set on the entrance to the tomb, it sealed it.

The tombs were meant to be, they were intended to be airtight. So those stones were cut in such a way that when it was over the door of the tomb, it did seal the tomb so that no air could get out.

Why? Because bodies stank and you didn't want these dead rotting corpses to be stinking up the whole place.

So they rolled those stones over the mouths of the tombs and they were cut in such a way that they would completely fit the doorway.

But since they're kind of cork shaped in that sense, since they had those tapered edges on them, then they were difficult to pull out.

You could wedge it out and then roll it to the side, but it would take some heft in order to do that.

And some had to have tools in order to do that because you had to get something of like a crowbar back in that day, wedge down into that gap to pull the stone out and then roll it off to the side.

And how are the women going to do this? They were going to try to do it together or maybe find one of the gardeners that were in the area because there were also people that kept that place, kept it tidy and kept it neat.

Remember that when Jesus appeared before Mary Magdalene, she thought he was the gardener.

That's what we have recorded in the Gospel of Luke, or sorry, in John. And so anyway, maybe that's what the women had in mind.

Somebody else would be there and they would help them roll the stone away. There was also the Roman guard that was there.

Remember that? That's according to Matthew chapter 28. So maybe one of those Roman soldiers are going to help us roll this stone out of the way.

Maybe the women didn't know that the guard was there. Maybe the guard was placed there later.

And remember, according to Matthew's account, that the tomb had even been sealed with a with a royal seal so that no one can break in.

And nobody could get into this tomb. And there was the Roman guard that had been stationed there. But however the women were anticipating the stone be rolled away, they come there to find that it's not there.

They found the stone rolled away from the tomb. And when they went in, they did not find the body of Jesus.

The tomb was empty. Maybe there's guards laying around because of the appearance of the angel. We don't know.

But the women were not able to find the body of Jesus. They're startled by this discovery. Jesus has already risen at dawn.

And now he's not there. And while they were perplexed about this, an angel appeared to them.

Two men stood by them in dazzling apparel. We have in verse 4. And that's what we're going to come back to tomorrow.

This is a historically confirmed event. I had somebody online say to me sometime last week.

They said, how do you know that Jesus really existed and all these miracles actually took place? And I said, because I read this book that was written by eyewitnesses during the time of other eyewitnesses who testified to these things taking place.

What more evidence could you have than that? We can't bring artifacts from the ancient times and study them to see that a miracle actually happened.

There's no wine left over where Jesus turned the water into wine. And we can sample that wine and say, oh, yeah, well, sure enough.

This used to be water. Now it's been turned to wine. We don't have anything like that. And would you even believe it if that sort of evidence could be presented to you?

But in the word of God, in the scriptures, we have, as led by the Holy Spirit, these eyewitness accounts of these things that really took place so that we can know

Jesus really lived. He really died. He really rose again. And by the testimony of these things that are written here, all who believe in him will not perish, but will have everlasting life.

Our sins are forgiven. We have everlasting life with God. Knowing he who died and rose again reigns in heaven forever.

Heavenly Father, we know from what we have read that you are faithful and true.

You sent your son to die for us. You received that sacrifice, raising him from the dead.

So now all who believe in him, we likewise will receive resurrection from the dead.

We have been raised with him now to walk in newness of life. So guide us in our steps as we go today, living lives of holiness unto the

Lord our God. It's in his name that we pray. Amen. Thank you for listening to When We Understand the

Text with Pastor Gabe Hughes. If you'd like to support this ministry, visit our website, www .wutt

.com, and click on the Give tab in the top right corner of the page. Join us again tomorrow as we continue our