Who Is the Historical Jesus? John 20

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I've often heard it said that Christianity is worth living because it is a good way to live.
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It's a clean way of living that keeps people out of trouble. There are many benefits to living a
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Christian life and things that people enjoy about it. While this is true that there are many benefits,
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I am troubled by those who are okay with Christianity not going past this point.
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What do I mean by this? Sometimes when you ask people, what if Christianity is false?
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Does it matter? Sometimes people give the answer it would still be worth it because it led to a clean life.
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It led to a better life than one would otherwise have lived. My old pastor used to ask people when he met with them, if the body of Jesus could be produced, would it matter?
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How would you view your life? Would it have counted?
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Would it have been worth living? Many people answered it still would have been worth it.
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What is interesting is that Paul answers this question about how we should view
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Christianity and ourselves if it is false. In 1 Corinthians 15 -19 he writes,
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If in Christ we have hope in this life only, we are of all people most to be pitied.
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Did you get that? If Christianity is false, then don't be a
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Christian. If we're believing a bunch of fairy tales, then don't play the game.
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Go do something else with your life. A life not lived for the truth is a wasted life.
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About ten years ago I became a pastor. My life is to lead people to follow
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Christ and to lead people to grow in Christ. And if Christianity is false, then
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I'm wasting my life. I should be doing something else. You don't just do
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Christianity because it is a clean way of life or it makes you feel good or it's good for society.
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You follow Jesus because it's true. There is no other reason to follow
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Him. You don't follow Him because it's a crutch, because you don't know any better.
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The reason and the only reason anyone should follow Jesus is because it's true.
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Today we gather to celebrate the bodily resurrection of Jesus. The sad reality about today is that fictitious characters compete with the true story about today.
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Most people in the world think Resurrection Sunday is about the Easter Bunny. Similar to Christmas, when everyone thinks
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Christmas is about Santa Claus. Skeptics, what they want to do is put these together.
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When talking about Jesus, it's like talking about the fictitious Santa Claus, Easter Bunny, Tooth Fairy.
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Most secular historians will say that Jesus existed historically.
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What they say is that He lived in Israel, He was baptized by John the Baptist, and He was crucified.
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They're willing to say that. They say these facts, but most historians will not go further because this will put them at odds with what is acceptable according to the world.
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Good luck to any historian who wants to be hired by an Ivy League school who also believes everything the
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New Testament says about Jesus. The Bible says things about Jesus that are ascribed to no other man in history.
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Was He born of a virgin? Did He heal the lame and crippled and demon -possessed?
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Did He feed thousands from only a few loaves of bread? Did He stop a raging storm with the sound of His voice?
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Did He walk on water? Was He transfigured on a mountain before three of His disciples where a voice came from heaven, this thundering voice that says, this is my
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Son with whom I am well pleased? Is Jesus God as the
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New Testament says He is? Did He create the universe as the New Testament says
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He did? Very few historians will say that the biblical
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Jesus, what the New Testament says in whole about Him, is the historical
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Jesus. The one who really walked the earth. Most historians who are full of unbelief and have an agenda say the biblical
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Jesus is in line with the manufactured characters like the Easter Bunny and Santa Claus.
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Sure, there was a Saint Nick, a real human who helped a lot of people. But of course, there isn't a man who delivers presents to all the children in the world.
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And so they say, of course, there isn't a man who did all these things in Palestine in the first century.
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Of course, there isn't a man who is so much different from any other human who has ever lived.
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If most of the secular historians are right that Jesus really is a historical man who was made fictitious by His followers, then we are of all people most to be pitied.
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We're the laughing stock of the world. Today, we're a laughing stock.
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Look at all these people who are gathering and pretending like this is true. There's no point in reading the
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Bible. There's no point in praying. There's no point in going to church. There's no confidence in believing there's an afterlife.
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There's no way to have a sure and unshakable hope. If the biblical story of Jesus is false, then don't waste your time.
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The only reason to follow Jesus is if it's true. If the biblical
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Jesus is the Jesus of history, the one who really walked the earth, then
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He is the most important person who has ever lived. And the story about Him is the meaning of life.
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If the story of Jesus is true, then every other philosophy and religion is false.
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If the story of Jesus is true, then no one can be indifferent toward Christianity because Christianity claims to tell reality as it really is.
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One of the ways we know the truth of Christianity is by looking at the evidence that Jesus really did rise bodily from the dead in Jerusalem 2 ,000 years ago.
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Because if the resurrection is true, it's all true. The creation. Moses leading the
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Israelites through the Red Sea. A global flood. Daniel in the lion's den.
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Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego in the fiery furnace. The fact that Christ is coming back in the future.
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It's all true. If the bodily resurrection is true. So today we're going to look at the evidence.
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On a normal Sunday we're going through our sermon series through Matthew, but today we're going to look at another gospel, the Gospel of John, where we will see the evidence of His bodily resurrection.
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So this time I encourage you to turn in a Bible with me to Matthew 20.
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And if you're using a red Bible, it's on page 1077. This sermon is titled,
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Who is the Historical Jesus? And here's our big idea.
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The internal evidence from Scripture shows that the bodily resurrection of Jesus is a historical fact.
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The internal evidence from Scripture shows that the bodily resurrection of Jesus is a historical fact.
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And we will see four reasons why in this text. The first reason why is this.
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And you'll see this in the bulletin. In the outline. The first reason is that grave robbers did not take the body.
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Let's begin by looking at the first 10 verses of John 20. Now on the first day of the week,
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Mary Magdalene came to the tomb early while it was still dark and saw that the stone had been taken away from the tomb.
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So she ran and went to Simon Peter and the other disciple, the one whom
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Jesus loved, and said to them, They have taken the Lord out of the tomb and we do not know where they have laid
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Him. So Peter went out with the other disciple and they were going towards the tomb. Both of them were running together.
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But the other disciple outran Peter and reached the tomb first. And stooping to look in, he saw the linen cloths lying there, but he did not go in.
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Then Simon Peter came following him and went into the tomb. He saw the linen cloths lying there and the face cloth, which had been on Jesus' head, not lined with the linen cloths, but folded up into place by itself.
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Then the other disciple, who had reached the tomb first, also went in and he saw and believed.
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For as yet they did not understand the Scripture, that He must rise from the dead. Then the disciples went back to their homes.
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For 2 ,000 years, people have speculated as to what happened to the body of Jesus.
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One popular view is that grave robbers came and took the body away. In order to determine if this is true, you need to look at the evidence.
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True events will always have a large amount of evidence to show that an event happened.
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For example, when John Kennedy was shot, we have visual evidence. And we also have many eyewitnesses that said that this really happened on November 22, 1963.
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By the same token, lies lack evidence. If someone claims a crime was committed, but there is no evidence, the claim should be quickly dismissed.
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Many have speculated that random grave robbers came and took the body, and support for this is greatly lacking as we will see.
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While some have said grave robbers took the body, an even more popular view is that the disciples themselves took the body.
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What is interesting is that the Bible addresses this faulty view. The view that the disciples stole the body originated with some of the chief villains of the
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New Testament, the Jewish leaders. The very ones who would deliver up Jesus to be crucified.
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We learn this from Matthew 28, 11 -15. While they were going, behold, some of the guard went into the city and told the chief priests all that had taken place.
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And when they had assembled with the elders and taken counsel, they gave a sufficient sum of money to the soldiers and said,
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Tell people his disciples came by night and stole him away while we were asleep. And if this comes to the governor's ears, we will satisfy him and keep you out of trouble.
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So they took the money and did as they were directed. And this story has been spread among the
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Jews to this day. As you can see, the Jewish leaders lied.
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And this became a myth that spread among the Jews. Many Jews and non -Jews still believe it.
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A few years back, we sent a message to one of my relatives that he is risen. He responded back,
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No, the disciples stole the body. So it's a myth that is still alive and well.
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And as we look at this, it's hard to fathom how hard were the hearts of the Jewish leaders.
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They were eyewitnesses to Jesus' miracles. They saw Him do things that no one else had done. At this moment, deep down, they probably realized that He was resurrected from the dead.
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So why didn't they just believe? Just look at the evidence and believe. The answer is they hated
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Him and their hearts were so hard, they spread this bogus story. We have seen this in our sermon series through Matthew.
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If Jesus is who the people are saying that He is, the Christ, the Son of the living
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God, the long -awaited Messiah predicted by the Old Testament, then the
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Jewish leaders are wrong. Then they're not for God.
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They're against Him. Their hard hearts would not let them come to this place. So let's look at the evidence about how we know the body was not stolen.
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In verses 2 -5, we see this. In verse 5, it says that the linen claws were lying there.
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Now that's interesting. If a grave robber were stealing the body, do you think they would take the time to take off his clothes?
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A grave robber would take the body as is. When thieves steal, they do it quickly.
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This is the first piece of evidence. But verses 6 -7 say something even more convincing.
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In verses 6 -7, it says that when they saw the linen claws lying there and the face cloth which had been at Jesus' head not lying with the linen claws, but folded up in a place by itself.
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Jesus had a face cloth on His head when He was buried. Did you notice this detail in verse 7?
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The face cloth was folded. Do grave robbers fold a face cloth before they leave?
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Of course not. Grave robbers are not going to fold a face cloth as they steal the body.
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And the apostle John, who wrote this, deliberately included this detail to emphasize that the body could not have been stolen.
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Jesus took off His burial clothes, neatly folded the face cloth to show that He was the one who took off the grave clothes.
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After He came alive. God does this. He shows us enough evidence to believe.
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We do not have video footage of that day. Video cameras, of course, were not invented way back then.
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But many years later. But He shows enough evidence that we are to show faith with what
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He gives us. Now John, who was running to the tomb with Peter, was persuaded by what he saw as verse 8 says.
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Then the other disciple who had reached the tomb first also went in and he saw and he believed.
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Peter may also have believed at this point by what Luke 24 .12 says. Luke wrote that Peter marveled at what he saw.
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They believed even though at this point they were a bit confused about how a resurrected
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Messiah fit in with what the Old Testament said concerning the Messiah.
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This is what verse 9 tells us. For as yet they did not understand the Scripture that He must rise from the dead.
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We have seen this many times in our sermon series through Matthew. We have seen that the Jews largely had a wrong understanding about who the
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Messiah was going to be. They thought He was going to come and deliver Israel from their enemies and Israel would be the superpower of the world.
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As they reigned with the Messiah, they did not understand that the
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Messiah needed to suffer first. During Jesus' ministry, the disciples were perplexed when
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He predicted His death and resurrection. They failed to understand that the death and resurrection of the
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Messiah was a part of the plan. It was predicted in the
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Old Testament. Isaiah 53 describes in detail the suffering of the Messiah.
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Psalm 16 .10 describes the resurrection of the Messiah. So as we see in these verses, the internal evidence from Scripture shows that the bodily resurrection of Jesus is a historical fact.
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And the first reason why is that clearly grave robbers did not take the body. The second reason why the internal evidence from Scripture shows that the resurrection is a fact...
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By the way, you notice I say the bodily resurrection. We're not talking about a spiritual resurrection like liberals like to say.
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The bodily resurrection is a fact. The second reason is this. Women played a prominent role in the events of that morning.
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So Mary Magdalene did not see a stranger, but she saw the man she knew well.
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And let's look at this in verses 11 -18. But Mary stood weeping outside the tomb, and as she wept, she stooped to look into the tomb.
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And she saw two angels in white sitting where the body of Jesus had lain, one at the head and one at the feet.
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They said to her, Woman, why are you weeping? She said to them, They have taken away my
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Lord, and I do not know where they have laid Him. Having said this, she turned around and saw
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Jesus standing, but she did not know that it was Jesus. Jesus said to her,
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Woman, why are you weeping? Whom are you seeking? Supposing Him to be the gardener, she said to Him, Sir, if you have carried
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Him away, tell me where you have laid Him and I will take Him away. Jesus said to her,
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Mary. She turned and said to Him in Aramaic, Rabboni, which means teacher.
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Jesus said to her, Do not cling to Me, for I have not yet ascended to the
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Father, but go to My brothers and say to them, I am ascending to My Father and your Father, to My God and your
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God. Mary Magdalene went and announced to the disciples, I have seen the
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Lord. And that He had sent these things to her. The narrator
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John, the Apostle John, the disciple whom Jesus loved, states that Jesus was standing near Mary, but she did not know immediately that it was
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Him. And this suggests that while it was indeed Jesus, He did look different than before His resurrection.
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And this is so because before He died, Jesus had an earthly body. A body like ours.
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A body that gets sick. A body that eventually dies. But after He was raised from the dead,
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He had a glorified body. An indestructible body. The same body that all believers will have at the final resurrection.
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Isn't that amazing? Think of this body you have. It's hard to get up some days, right?
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It gets tired. You go for a run. You feel tired. You get sick.
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I know there's people today who called me and said I couldn't be here. I'm throwing up. That's the body we have. A body is coming.
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That will be amazing. Jesus had that body right here. And what we see in verse 15 is that Jesus talks to Mary.
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Mary thinks that Jesus is the gardener. And the gardener had taken the body somewhere.
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But the moment Mary knew it was Jesus was when He said her name. He says to her,
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Mary, it's me. It's amazing how well we know one another's voices.
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A mother knows the scream of her baby in a room full of babies. Not the man, right?
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The mother. The man's like, what? Little ones recognize the voice of their parents even in the womb at the youngest ages.
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In the summer of 2020, Mark Brooks, by the way, Mark is watching. Hi, Mark. He recorded a
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CD. Brianna and Lori sing along with him in a couple of the songs.
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Some of you have heard it. There's one song on there that's worse than all the others by far, and that's the song that I sing.
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We used to listen to the CD in our car, and when my song came on, one -year -old
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Isaiah instantly lit up. He knew his daddy's voice. In the same way, in verse 16,
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Mary knew without a doubt that this was Jesus when she heard His voice. As Jesus says to her, Mary, it's me.
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Once Mary recognizes this is Jesus, He tells her in verses 17 and 18 to tell the disciples that He is ascending to His Father.
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Jesus will only be with them a short time. Forty days before He goes to Heaven where He is right now.
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But there's a very important point that we need to notice. The first three people that Jesus appeared to were all women.
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The four Gospels all describe the events of that day, and when you read all of them, all the details are brought together.
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What we see in our text is that Mary Magdalene is the first person that Jesus appears to.
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And the two other women that Jesus appeared to were the other woman described in Matthew 28 .9, and Mark 16 tells us their names.
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Mary, the mother of James. And James was one of the disciples. And the third woman is
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Salome, who was the mother of the disciples John and James.
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Now why is it significant that women were the first eyewitnesses to the resurrection of Christ?
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This is so because in the first century, women were not seen as reliable eyewitnesses.
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If the disciples were trying to fabricate a story that Jesus rose from the dead, they would not have written it this way.
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Because people would have automatically dismissed it. If they wanted to fabricate this, they would have wrote that a prominent man in society found
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Him. But the disciples recorded the true account of Christ's resurrection as it really happened.
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Everything that this book says is true. It presents the facts.
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They are recording history. Every good historian does that. Give the facts.
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Something we don't see in our day, do we? And what they recorded is that women were the first ones to see
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Him alive. Once again, we see that the evidence suggests the story is not being fabricated.
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Women playing an important role is what really happened. And every Gospel writer, Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John, recorded this.
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The internal evidence from Scripture shows that the bodily resurrection of Jesus is a historical fact. And the second reason why is that women played a prominent role.
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The third reason why it's a historical fact is this. The eyewitnesses were not mistaken.
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The eyewitnesses were not mistaken. I once heard a Christian apologist, an apologist is someone who defends the
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Christian faith. I heard this person argue effectively for the legitimacy of the resurrection of Christ.
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And this apologist once debated a man who agreed with him that the disciples really thought they saw
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Jesus after His death. And you might say, well, this person must have been a Christian then. No. This unbeliever said that what they saw was
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Jesus' twin brother. So they really saw someone who looked like Him.
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Jesus did not have a twin brother, right? Of course not. He was born of the
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Virgin Mary. Him and Him alone. But with this story, you see the extremes that people have to go to in order to explain away what really happened on that Sunday morning.
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People just don't want Christianity to be true. Why is that?
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Because people love their sin. They don't want to be accountable to a God. Atheism is convenient.
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It means no judgment. It means I can live how I want. But if this is true, judgment's coming.
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And you better find refuge in Jesus Christ. What we are going to see in verses 19 -23 is that the same person who was crucified at Golgotha on Friday is the same one who appeared to many witnesses.
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Let's read this in verses 19 -23. On the evening of that day, the first day of the week, the doors being locked where the disciples were for fear of the
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Jews, Jesus came and stood among them and said to them, Peace be with you.
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And when he had said this, he showed them his hands and his side. The disciples were glad when they saw the
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Lord. Jesus said to them again, Peace be with you. As the
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Father has sent me, even so I am sending you. And when he had said this, he breathed on them and said to them,
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Receive the Holy Spirit. If you forgive the sins of any, they are forgiven them. If you withhold forgiveness from any, it is withheld.
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In these verses, the disciples were hiding because they feared what the
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Jews might do to them. Let's put ourselves in their shoes. The disciples are thinking, Man, everybody's following us because we're with Jesus.
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We're important. We're the cool guys. Then he dies a criminal's death and they're thinking,
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Uh -oh, we've got to hide. They're going to do to us what they did to him.
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They're hiding. And Jesus appears to them. Now, in this episode,
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Peter and John were absent because Luke 24 -12 says that they left after the women told the disciples the tomb was empty.
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But the rest of the disciples would have been present, except for Thomas, of course.
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So, as the disciples are sitting there, the rumors that he is alive prove true. Jesus suddenly appears to them.
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Now, you will notice that the doors were locked. What we see here is a miracle. Jesus didn't open the door.
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He didn't have to. Why? He's got a new body. He can go through walls.
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He can just suddenly appear. And that's what he does here. If you're a Christian, that's your future.
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Your body is going to be like his body. When he appears, we shall be like him, for we shall see him as he is.
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Isn't that amazing? You won't need to buy a door. Well, you probably still need a door.
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What Jesus does in verse 20 is show his disciples his hands in his side. The mention of his hands in his side is an obvious reference to the wounds that he had from his crucifixion.
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It was at that point that they knew it was him. As the second half of verse 20 says, they were glad they had seen the
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Lord. The same man who went to the cross and died is the same man who stood before them.
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When the Apostle John had a vision of the throne in heaven, in Revelation 5 -6, he said that he saw a lamb as though it had been slain.
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Today, as Jesus sits at the right hand of the Father, he is a lamb who looks as if he had been slain.
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And you might wonder, why is this? Isn't this a glorified body that's perfect? Why are there wounds?
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Why does he have it in his side and on his hands? And I think the answer is this, we will always be reminded of the price he paid to save us.
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In other words, you won't have those wounds, but he will, to remind you of what he did at the cross.
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So we can conclude that the disciples did not see a lookalike, or as one scholar said, a twin brother.
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They saw the crucified man who was now risen. The internal evidence of Scripture shows that the bodily resurrection of Jesus is a historical fact.
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And the third reason why is that eyewitnesses were not mistaken. They saw
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Jesus. That's why we're here today. They saw Him. The fourth reason why is this, the greatest doubters were persuaded.
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The greatest doubters were persuaded. As we have seen thus far, as different people saw Jesus, they believed one by one that it really was
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Him. But there was one disciple who had yet to see Jesus. His name was
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Thomas. The well -known saying, doubting Thomas, comes from this account in John's Gospel.
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Thomas was not with the other disciples when Jesus appeared. Let's see how
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Jesus appeared to him in verses 24 and 25. Now Thomas, one of the twelve, called the twin, was not with them when
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Jesus came. So the other disciples told him, we have seen the Lord. But he said to them, unless I see
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His hands, the mark of the nails, and place my finger into the mark of the nails and place my hand into His side,
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I will never believe. So as we can see here,
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Thomas did not believe their word. He would only believe if he could see
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Jesus with his own eyes and feel Him, feel His hands, feel His side.
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And guess what? Thomas would get his chance to see Him. Verses 26 -29, eight days later, his disciples were inside again and Thomas was with them.
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Although the doors were locked, Jesus came and stood among them and said, Peace be with you. Then He said to Thomas, Put your finger here and see
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My hands and put out your hand and place it in My side. Do not disbelieve, but believe.
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Thomas answered Him, My Lord and my God. Jesus said to him, Have you believed because you have seen
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Me? Blessed are those who have not seen and yet have believed.
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None of us here today have seen Jesus with our eyes. None of us were there 2 ,000 years ago to witness these events.
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We are depending on the testimony of this book. What Jesus says is that we are blessed if we believe their testimony.
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To be blessed is to have God's favor. To be blessed is to experience indescribable joy.
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And what Jesus says is we're blessed if we believe. All of us have a propensity to doubt because seeing something supernatural like what happened on Resurrection Sunday is not common.
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Many people go through their whole lives without seeing a supernatural event with one's own eyes.
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It is true that we see miracles like transformed lives and prayers answered, but we probably have not seen the lame suddenly walk or the blind suddenly see or someone walk on water.
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Have you seen this stuff? These are things that we see in this book, but we haven't seen in our own lives.
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What happened 2 ,000 years ago was a unique time in world history. And I believe, by the way, right before the end of the world, things are going to ramp up again.
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And we might be close to that, but most of world history does not experience these supernatural miracles, these visible miracles.
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The creation of the planet was a miracle. The world and everything in it that you see came from the supernatural.
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The eternal God created it. That is the only explanation that makes any sense.
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And you hear it said that people don't rise from the dead. For the most part, that is true.
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But 2 ,000 years ago, that is precisely what happened. It is the only conclusion that makes any sense.
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With all this in mind, any doubt concerning the validity of Christ's resurrection should be taken away.
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Think about these eyewitnesses. The writer of the text we looked at today and all of the other disciples, people do not suffer and die for something they made up.
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When people make things up, they gain from it somehow. That's why people lie. It benefits the person.
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When a politician makes an ad that lies about his political opponent, he benefits from it. He wants to win, right?
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But look at the life the disciples lived after the resurrection of Christ. Was it a cozy, easy life?
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Not even close. Fourth century church historian Eusebius records how their lives ended.
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All of them suffered because they preached that Christ died and rose again. The only disciple that didn't die was the disciple that wrote this
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Gospel, John. And he was sent into exile to the island of Patmos in the
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Mediterranean. And it was on that island at the very end of his life that he wrote the book of Revelation to tell us how the world was going to end.
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This is the story of the 12 disciples. But what about maybe the greatest apostle, the apostle
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Paul? Paul was on his way to persecute more Christians when the resurrected
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Christ suddenly appeared to him on the Damascus Road. Paul too suffered greatly.
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And he was executed in Rome under the hands of the wicked emperor Nero. The lives of the disciples is one of great sacrifice.
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It is one of selflessness. It is one of spreading the greatest news in the history of the world.
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It's so great that it's worth dying for. It is one of self -abandonment in this life.
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Realizing they would live forever with the resurrected Christ in the next life. And Jesus says that.
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If anyone would come after Me, let him deny himself and take up his cross daily and follow
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Me. For whoever would save his life in this world, when he wants to benefit, will lose it.
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But whoever loses his life for My sake, will save it. That's the life of the disciples.
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And that's the life of every true Christian. They saw Jesus and they gave
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Him their all. They lived for Him the time that God gave them on this earth.
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And they died for Him. I once had a friend say to me...
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He was kind of a mediocre Christian. And he said to me, I would die for Jesus.
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And I said to him in response, I said, well, will you live for Him? You only die for Him if you first live for Him in the present.
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We should make it our aim to live for Him every day and die for Him if that's His will for us. The same
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Jesus who rose from the dead is the same one who lives in every true believer in this room.
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In 1933, hymnist Alfred Ackley wrote a hymn titled, He lives, He lives,
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Christ Jesus. You know that song. And in the chorus he writes, You ask me how I know He lives?
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He didn't go to the evidence. He just said, He lives within my heart. That's how I know
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He lives. Anyone who believes in Christ, He has changed. You are a new creation and Jesus is there in your life.
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You walk with Him every day. Every believer knows what it is like to have fellowship with Jesus even though you can't see
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Him. And 1 Peter says, though you have not seen Him, you love Him. Though you do not now see
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Him, you rejoice with joy that is inexpressible and filled with glory concerning the outcome of your faith, the salvation of your souls.
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You don't see Him now, but you will see Him. So it is true that no one in this room was there, but you believe the eyewitness testimony and the most convincing way you know that He is risen is that you know
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Him and you love Him. And no one can ever say anything to change that.
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There was a preacher in the middle of the 20th century. This was back in the God is dead movement that was really popular and some of you maybe remember that.
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And the preacher was asked, What do you think about this movement that God is dead?
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Is He dead? And the preacher said to him, I don't know what you're talking about. I talked to Him this morning.
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And that's the story of every Christian. If someone asks you,
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How do you know that He is alive? You can say with the hymnist, I know because He lives in me and I go through every day with Him.
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Thomas looked at the resurrected Christ and his doubt was taken away. And when you look at the mountain of evidence that He was raised, your doubt should also be taken away.
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Not the least of which is His obvious presence in the life of every believer in this room.
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His work in your life and in the lives of other believers. So what we have seen this morning is that the internal evidence from Scripture shows that the bodily resurrection of Jesus is a historical fact.
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And there are four reasons why from John 20. Grave robbers did not take the body. Women played a prominent role.
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Eyewitnesses did not see a lookalike. They saw Him. And lastly, even the greatest doubters had to believe.
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We don't gather today to celebrate a myth. If we were, we would be of all people most to be pitied.
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We celebrate the fact of Christ's resurrection. His resurrection is the only hope this world has.
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You think of the turmoil this world has been through. You want to give people answers? You want to give people a solution?
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Point them to Christ. It's not electing a politician. We should all vote, right? We should all vote. We should all get involved.
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The hope is preaching Christ and Him crucified and Him risen. That's what people need to hear.
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And He's not only the resurrected Christ, He is the Judge. And the only way you will be found not guilty at the final judgment is if you believe that He died and rose again for your sins.
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Your sins will be paid for in one of two places. Hell or the cross of Christ where Jesus bore the holy wrath of God.
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He faced hell so that you don't have to. But instead, you can be forgiven and then heaven is your future.
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This is the message of today. We're not just remembering some great historical person.
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We're remembering the most important person. We're remembering the author of life who will come again.
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And here's how John closed out this chapter. He said, Jesus did many other signs in the presence of His disciples which are not written in this book, but these are written so that you may believe that Jesus is the
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Christ, the Son of God, and that by believing, you may have life in His name.
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So John is telling you, believe. Believe in the Lord Jesus and you will be saved.
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That's the message. And that's your future. And what a great place to be. You're one heartbeat away from fullness of joy and pleasures forevermore in the presence of the
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One You were created to know, Jesus Christ. At this time, let's pray. Father, He is alive.
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And because He is alive, we have life and freedom and hope and the brightest future possible.
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And my prayer is that everyone in this room would have that. Thank You for the plan that You have.
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Thank You for the future that You have planned for Your people. And my prayer is that You would work in everyone's hearts here.
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You know where everyone is at, Lord. Work in everyone's heart right where they are at through Your Spirit.