 He's so good. Let's open our Bibles to Matthew's gospel. We're going to spend a few moments today looking at chapter 28 We're going to be looking at obviously the resurrection of the Lord Jesus Christ. I am so happy to be home I'm so happy to have you guys with us today I really am you can't imagine how last year it was so difficult for us and And and all on Easter to not be able to celebrate with our our friends and family and so again I love you guys. It's so it's so good to see you praise the Lord that you're back and I hope you come back next week Okay, so beginning At verse 1 Matthew chapter 28 verses 1 through 8 now after the Sabbath as the first day of the week began to dawn Mary Madeline and the other Mary came to see the tomb Behold there was a great earthquake for an angel of the Lord descended from heaven and came and rolled back the stone from the door And sat on it his countenance was like lightning his clothing as white as snow And the guards shook for fear of him and became like dead men But the angel answered and said to the women do not be afraid for I know that you seek Jesus who was crucified He's not here for he has risen as he said Come see the place where the Lord lay and go quickly and tell his disciples that he has risen from the dead And indeed he's going before you into Galilee there. You will see him. Behold. I have told you So they went out quickly from the tomb with fear and great joy and ran to bring his disciples word so we're Gathering today to celebrate the cornerstone of our faith we're gathering to celebrate the resurrection You know as Christians we generally celebrate two basic important holidays one of those holidays obviously is Christmas and Christmas is a very important holiday to us because it's a recognition of the birth of Jesus Christ Though Christmas is important It's not the most important holiday that we Celebrate the holiday that's most important to us believers will always be Easter now. Why would that be true? Well, someone said Easter is important because Christianity revolves around the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ If Jesus did not die for our sins or if Jesus did not rise again after three days Then the entire hope of Christianity is based upon nothing but a lie Christianity would be meaningless because our sins would not be forgiven And that's what Paul said in 1st Corinthians 15 verse 14 when he said if Christ is not risen our preaching is empty Your faith is also empty He went on in verse 17 of 1st Corinthians 15 to say if Christ is not risen your faith is futile and you are still in Your sins so we celebrate Easter because it's the fulfillment of God's promise that he would rescue us All the way back in the beginning the book of Genesis in chapter 3 verse 15 God had promised that Messiah would crush the head of the serpent and the serpent would bruise his heel Well, that happened at the cross when Jesus died and that happened when Jesus was later resurrected So Easter fulfills the prophecies that were given concerning what Messiah would do when you look in the Old Testament book of Isaiah written over 700 years before Christ Isaiah the prophet at prophesied concerning Messiah And Isaiah 53 verses 2 through 6. This is what he wrote He grew up before him like a tender shoot and like a root out of dry ground He had no beauty or majesty to attract us to him nothing in his appearance that we should desire him He was despised rejected by mankind a man of suffering familiar with with pain Like one from whom people hide their faces. He was despised and we held him in low esteem Surely he has surely he took up our pain and bore our suffering yet We considered him punished by God stricken by him and afflicted, but he was pierced for our transgressions He was crushed for our iniquities the punishment that brought us peace was on him and by his wounds We are healed. We all like sheep have gone astray each one has turned to our own way The Lord has laid on him the iniquity of us all You see in the Garden of Eden Adam and Eve took of that forbidden fruit God said that in the day that they ate of it They would surely die But in their disobedience to God sin entered into the world and through sin death itself Paul wrote in Romans 5 12 Therefore just as sin entered the world through one man death through sin in this way death came to all people because all sin Adam is called theologically the federal head of mankind. So his nature was given to us He had a fallen nature. We have inherited and so he sinned and that nature has been passed to his descendants That's why Paul in Romans 3 10 would say there's none righteous. No, not one That's why Romans 3 23 would say I'll have sinned and fall short of the glory of God and again in the Old Testament book of Ecclesiastes chapter 7 verse 20 The writer said there's not a just man on earth who does good and does not sin. All of us are sinners by nature And because the wages of sin is death Jesus took upon himself human flesh and died on our behalf He said in Matthew 2028 He the Son of man did not come to be served but to serve and to give his life a ransom for many So in order to point towards the work of Messiah God established festivals in the nation of Israel One of those festivals is Passover. It's a time to remember Israel's deliverance from the nation of Egypt and and their bondage At that time sacrificial lambs of slain intending to point to the work of Jesus Messiah And that's why in John 129 John the Baptist called Jesus the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world Peter later on in 1st Peter 1 18 and 19 would say you know that it was not with perishable things such as silver or gold That you were redeemed from the empty way of life handed down to you from your forefathers But with the precious blood of Christ a lamb without blemish or defect So at that festival it was at that festival that Jesus voluntarily gave up his life on the cross and he did so Voluntarily he wasn't forced to do that. He did it of his own will in John 10 17 and 18 He said my father loves me because I laid down my life that I might take it again No one takes it from me I lay it down and I have power to take it again and this command I've received from my father So from the beginning of his ministry To its completion Jesus had made it clear that he would die All the way back in John chapter 2 verse 19 in the first cleansing of the temple Jesus said destroyed this temple in three days. I will raise it up and John later said he spoke of the temple of his body Throughout his ministry to his men. He made it clear. I'm going to die But I will resurrect We look in Matthew's gospel and see several instances where he said that in Matthew 16 21 He records from that time Jesus began to show his disciples that he must go to Jerusalem Suffer many things from the elders and chief priests and scribes and be killed and be raised Again the third day Matthew 17 22 and 23 Jesus said the son of man is going to be betrayed into the hands of men They will kill him and on the third day He will be raised to life and again in Matthew chapter 20 verses 17 through 19 As Jesus was going up to Jerusalem He took the 12 disciples aside said to them we're going to Jerusalem the son of man will be betrayed to the chief priests and the teachers of the law They will condemn him to death and will turn him over to the Gentiles to be mocked and flogged and crucified On the third day. He will be raised to life So that has been completed Jesus at this point has been betrayed And Jesus has gone to the cross And Jesus has died It is now the first day of the week He's been crucified He's died And he's been buried And all of this had occurred on Friday But it is now Sunday It says in verse one after the Sabbath as the first day of the week began to dawn It's Sunday morning Sabbath has come And Sabbath has gone Women got up early. They made the way to the tomb Matthew gives us the names of two of the women, but Mark gives us more information In Mark's gospel in chapter 16 He said when the Sabbath was over Mary Madeleine, Mary the mother of James and Salome Bought spices so that they might go to anoint Jesus's body Very early on the first day of the week just after sunrise. They were on their way to the tomb You see according to the Jewish method of calculation three days have passed The Jews considered reference to a day as meaning any part of that day And Jesus was buried on Friday afternoon His body was in the tomb all of Saturday and into Sunday morning for three days He had prepared his disciples for what was going to occur But as is common the disciples did not fully understand what he had said to them One of the things you might want to remember It's a great blessing for us to remember is most lessons that God gives to us Are repeated often very often over our lifetime He gives us a lesson we learn a bit of it gives us a second lesson the same kind of lesson We learn more and more and over time we actually grow to understand his ways And I'm thankful that God doesn't say things just one time, but he reminds me often And here in verse one the women have come to the tomb early. They're there to complete the burial There were two men Joseph and Nicodemus and they had lavishly buried Jesus But for these women that wasn't enough And so what this is is a picture of loving devotion, but it's also a picture of unbelief They may have followed him as he carried his cross They remained throughout his crucifixion and his death In John 19 25 it says they're stood by the cross of Jesus his mother his mother's sister Mary the wife of clampus and Mary Madeline So they had been with Joseph they had been with Nicodemus when Jesus was buried And they've returned in order to complete the burial process And as they walk They're dealing with the concern Mark 16 3 says they asked who will roll the stone away from the entrance of the tomb You see the stone was very heavy. It weighed between four and six thousand pounds It's a wheel on an incline and It would be rolled down the incline and lodge into a section that had been carved out It wouldn't have been possible for the women to move the stone alone Now that is a touching picture But in reality, it's an activity that's rooted in unbelief because they're expecting to find a dead body The dead body of Jesus in a tomb Again as it's so often They were concerned about something unnecessarily They didn't have to move the stone The stone had already been moved But under the duress of incredible grief They forgot what Jesus had said he had consistently told them this is going to happen, but they forgot Again, many of the lessons the Lord intends to teach require repetition The theoretical and intellectual is intended to become the experiential And so the stone according to verse two was moved and the tomb is open A earthquake occurred when an angel had Descended from heaven and the angel had rolled back the stone from the door and sat on it Verse three tells us that his countenance was like lightning his clothing as white as snow So it's a picture of radiance. It's a picture of purity It's a picture of holiness and when this happened verse four the guards shook for fear of him They became it says like dead men It's interesting that the word in verse four shook Is a word that is what is called the same root word As the word earthquake they were shaking as if they were in an earthquake Even though there was that wasn't an earthquake and these men by the way One commentator pointed out about these men here these soldiers. They were 16 commandos They made up what would be called a security unit. They were roams if you will delta force These were not guys who were just hanging around with potbellies These were guys who were they were the baddest of the bad And they were very skilled as they were skilled in warfare But they were no match for just one of god's angels And so when they saw him they became afraid they shook for fear and became like dead men They fainted dead away But verse five the angel answered and said to the women Do not be afraid For I know that you seek Jesus who was crucified Now they didn't express fear it doesn't say here in the in the in the text that they showed fear But the angel knew that they were afraid at the side of the glory They would cause them to tremble and so he has to calm the women down. He has to soothe them They're startled. They need comforting The guards had every reason to be afraid but the women he says you don't need to fear Because you're not enemies of Jesus. You're his friends. You're his followers. And so he says in verse five. I know that you seek Jesus Now again, they obviously thought Jesus's body would still be in the tomb In luke 24 verse 5 luke gives us more insight It says in their fright the women bowed down with their faces to the ground But the men said to them, why do you look for the living among the dead? Luke speaks of two angels. That's why he says the men they had the appearance of men and that's why he said that And then he goes on in verse six to say this He's not here For he's risen notice as he said In mark 16 verse 6 it reads don't be alarmed. You're looking for Jesus the Nazarene who was crucified. He's risen. He's not here See the place where they laid him So here you go. How does he comfort them? Word is my comfort come from word is yours come from many people's comfort come from various sources But our comfort is to come from the word of god What comforts me what strengthens me isn't the cheerful words of encouragement Friends might give to me and I appreciate every cheerful word of encouragement that I receive. I'm very grateful for it But but uh, you're going to make it or you know Stiff upper lip and all of that said that doesn't comfort me. It's going to be okay That doesn't come from me what has comforted me in my times of trials and the times of fears that I've had It's always been the word of god It's always been what god has said and that's what he's doing He's comforting them by god's word one of the worst things that we can get into the habit of is not reading god's word and a lot of believers unfortunately have have Departed from the reading of the word of god. It's a word of god that gives you light It gives you encouragement. It gives you strength. It gives you guidance. It gives you it builds your faith It nourishes your soul and it gives you comfort and peace in times of struggle and trial And so we need to hold fast to the word of god and he says that he's risen as he said In luke 24 6 through 8 it says he's not here. He has risen Remember how he told you while he was still with you in galilee The son of man must be delivered into the hands of sinful men be crucified and on the third day be raised again Then they remembered his words There are times when I have had difficult times So many I've been following the lord for a long time And and where has my strength come from it has come from god's word It's come from reading the word And and looking at his promises. I will never leave you nor forsake you. I will be with you always I will provide strength for you. I will bring you comfort. I I'm with you. I raise you up I will hold you fast There are so many things the lord has said over over time and it comes to his word because I can trust god I can trust what he has to say In numbers 23 19 the bible says god is not a man that he should lie Nor a son of man that he should change his mind Does he speak and they're not act Does he promise and not fulfill? And so the bible is telling us he's alive He is alive. He has risen I remember I've said this before but it comes to mind even as I see this, you know this passage I remember How one time when we were in israel and my daughter ana at that time was I think seven years old Some of you will remember this story, but it's imprinted in my heart that we went to the the tomb the historic site of where Jesus Had been laid and and we went into the tomb and as we went into the tomb My daughter my little girl was the last one to go in my ana she was seven and As she was standing there waiting I my wife and I Stepped away and gave her her private time to walk into the tomb. I'll never forget How my little girl went in for a minute and then she came out and when she came out She had her arms raised like this and she's only seven she raised her arms and she yelled out He's not here. He's not here and we all cheered. Yeah, because he's alive. He has risen He is no longer in the tomb. He's our savior and he made the promise and he kept it Now there's a fly here grabbing me and I'm going to have to take his wings off. I hope you guys don't mind So it says in verse 6 come see the place where the Lord lay I want to I want to develop this with you for a moment Come see the place Where the Lord lay Come and see Where the Lord of glory was But remember He's not here This is an invitation It's an invitation for them to come And see that Jesus Is who he is Jesus is who he said He is The women are not only being invited to come and see an empty tomb The fact is they're being invited to come to the one Who is no longer in that tomb Now as I was reading and I read the words come Come see I thought of another place where people are invited to come In Matthew 11 28 through 30 Jesus said this Come to me All you who labor and are heavy laden And I will give you rest Take my yoke upon you Learn from me For I am gentle and lowly in heart And you will find rest for your souls For my yoke is easy My burden Is light I read something recently that a great preacher of another day Charles Spurgeon I read something that Charles Spurgeon once noted Spurgeon said that in the four gospels there are 89 chapters of biblical text In the 89 chapters There is only one place Jesus tells us about his own heart And it's found here in Matthew 11 28 through 30 When Jesus issues an invitation for people to come to him One author said that in the gospels we read of his birth We read of his ministry We read of his disciples and we read of his travels In the gospels we read of his prayers We read of his disputes We read his teachings We get a glimpse at his prayer life In the gospels we read of his arrest We read of his death We read of his resurrection But in only one place Do we ever read about him opening up his heart To us And Jesus when he revealed his heart and some people need to hear this today When Jesus revealed his heart He didn't reveal an unfeeling heart He did not reveal a harsh heart He did not reveal a demanding heart He revealed a heart that is gentle and lowly You see in the bible the heart is not always used to speak of emotions The heart is most often used to speak of the core of our being That's why we're commanded to love God with all our heart In mark 1230 you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart With all your soul with all your mind with all your strength This is the first commandment We're commanded to love God with everything within us from the core And the heart speaks of the core it's the center of our being That's why we're to guard it Proverbs 423 above all else guard your heart For everything you do flows from it And so Jesus is revealing to us a heart a heart that is welcoming a heart that is loving A heart that is gentle a heart that is humble is revealing this heart to us And that's what he's speaking about He says that he's gentle when it says gentle it simply means that he's he's he's meek. He's humble He's not harsh He is not one who overreacts he he isn't impatient So he speaks I have a gentle heart. He says that I have a lowly heart The word lowly in this verse speaks of being someone who has been pushed down in life It's a picture of someone who's been pushed down. It's like what Isaiah 53 3 said He's despised rejected by mankind a man of suffering familiar with pain like one from whom people hide their faces He's despised we we held him in low esteem. He's saying I understand you Jesus didn't come for the perfect people. Jesus came for the sinner And he's saying to the sinner you can come to me You don't have to be afraid of me. You don't have to fear me I'm not the one coming right now on fire that will come in the book of revelation in the second coming But in his first coming he's saying to us you can come to me because i'm gentle you can come to me because i'm humble You can come to me because i'm welcoming you can come to me because i love you and i'm inviting you to come to me That's what jesus christ did And he's saying i'm lowly and hard And so he's simply saying and this is so beautiful when he says i'm lowly he's saying i'm accessible Though he's god in human flesh Though he is the lord of glory He invites us to come Now who is it that he's inviting who is he saying come to me who is he speaking to all he says who labor and are heavy laden All of you who are trying so hard to find peace All of you who are burdened all of you who are weighed down You see at the core of his being He's saying i'm gentle And i'm lowly And i'm the one Who can give you rest Listen our sins are never too great for his loving grace and power to forgive Our way of life is never so far gone that he cannot redeem and transform He does not just meet us in our place of need He lives In our place of need Just as last wednesday we had visitors here For our wednesday night study. There were men who came from A ministry you turned for christ Many of those men all of those men Have placed themselves into this home rehab home Because every one of them have failed miserably And they know it And so they came to visit and they came to church because these are men Who are finding that jesus christ doesn't reject them If you look within yourself even at this moment and think about the life that you lived i might have some perfect people here You never know I guess all of us can admit to be failures at one time or other All of us can say i have failed i have Sin and fall short of the glory of god. I haven't lived a perfect life. We all can admit that i would hope What are you going to do with your sin? Who's going to forgive it? How's it going to be that you're going to have peace? How can you have peace? How can you know for certain that you're forgiven? We have so many testimonies in this church of of people who Were used by god who were turned around from one life and and went into a new one We have a young man that a couple weeks two or three weeks ago Some of you were with us and you'll remember we mentioned him His name is halberd and halberd came from mexico from from the yucatan area and and halberd had come to church and And halberd, you know had gotten into the united states in the way that many do he just came and he stayed And he came to church here a few years ago He was invited apparently and he came to church And halberd came and he heard the gospel and he gave his heart to christ And as halberd stayed and and began to learn about the things of the lord God began to move on halberd's heart and said to him go back to mexico Go back to mexico and halberd did He got up and he went to mexico And he started a little bible study in the village he's from And while he was there some kids began to come to the bible study Well, it's only 450 people in this village But he's got a good group of kids 40 or 50 children coming from bible study. They begin to bring their parents Now the numbers of kids is growing and the parents are beginning to show up So halberd is talking to us and says, you know, I could sure use some help because we don't have much resources here Can you help and we mentioned it to this church to many of you we said listen if you want to give And we didn't take an offer. We didn't say the halberd fund We just said if you want to give please do it's going to cost $25,000 to build a building so he can hold church services And this church gave $30,000 to build that church to build that church You see when you when you're touched when you're touched By the lord and your life is changed and you have a purpose Then you take that to others You come and see and you see that he's alive and he transforms you and then he sends you and uses you And and halberd knew that I know that many of you know that your sins are never too great for his grace Never forget that and his blood is capable of washing you clean from every single stinking sin You have ever committed and his power can transform you into a brand new person That's what he did with me. That's what he's done with many of us Every one of us if we had an opportunity to give our testimony to say this is where I really was not the Sanitized one that we tell other people the real one The one that only you and god know Every one of us know that we are like filthy rags compared to the righteousness of god But what did he do? He took you from the miree clay and he put you on the solid rock jesus christ and he transformed you because our savior lives And he lives and sets us free and he welcomes us. He says come to me All you who labor and are heavy laden. I will give you rest My love and my grace jesus would be saying are capable of Transforming a life and that's why we came to him and that's why I invite every person who's listening right now to come to him In hebrus 416 the writer said let us then approach god's throne of grace with confidence So that we may receive mercy and find grace to help in our time of need And so jesus said come Come to me and the angel said come and see And after you see Do something else In verse 7 go quickly Tell his disciples That he's risen from the dead and indeed he is going before you into galilee There you will see him behold. I have told you Go quickly tell the disciples And they're these disciples that are being spoken to by the way are in mourning Particularly the apostle peter because peter had denied the lord So go and tell them bring this news to them and do so quickly Because it's going to serve them It's going to give to them comfort. It's going to give to them peace So go tell them These words Are going to strengthen them Later on we know that the lord jesus christ has to bring a word of Reconciliation to the apostle peter for peter had denied the lord terribly three times in the same night And the lord had to bring him to himself and had to reconcile because peter was broken hearted He was the one who had said on that night before jesus died. He had said though all were to forsake you and flee I will never do it I'll die for you and yet three times He committed the the sin of rejection the sin of denial three times And the bible tells us on the third time that he did that that jesus was being led past him And peter said i don't know the man and looked up and and jesus was passing by and jesus looked at him And he looked at jesus and he was crushed within peter wasn't and he wept bitterly the scripture says a broken man And jesus said to him Do you love me? And he said i do Feed my sheep tan my limbs Peter i know what's in you. I know that you have a heart to desire to do the right thing The will was present the ability to perform that what you desired is not That's why you need me i'm not rejecting you. I will strengthen you I will strengthen you And the same man who denied knowing the lord ultimately gave his life up for that same lord Because he had been restored and he had been filled with the power of the spirit and that's what god does And the bible makes it very very very clear that we're to speak concerning this and notice verse eight They went out quickly from the tomb with fear and great joy Ran to bring his disciples word So there's a mingling of fear It's it's an awe And rejoicing fear Because they'd been in the presence of a mighty angel and joy because jesus is alive And what is this too? Well, it provokes them. They leave the tomb quickly They ran to tell the disciples who are around a half mile or so away from the tomb And they told them and as painful as this was They were able to see the purpose of it He died in order to secure salvation He paid the price on the cross But he was resurrected to show us that he has power over death Listen You don't have to be afraid of dying. I'm not saying go and jump in front of a car But you don't have to fear death Why because death has been conquered by life Jesus christ gives us life And that more abundantly There's something worse than covid There's something worse than that We have forgotten the church itself in many places has forgotten There's something worse than covid That which is worse than covid is dying without jesus That's worse than covid Jesus took upon himself my sin your sin So that he could give to me life He's imputed to me paul said in second quinthians 5 the righteousness of god in him I can stand before the lord I can come boldly before the throne of grace and obtain mercy and help in my time of need because I have admitted I am a sinner and I need help I'm a sinner and I need forgiveness. I'm a sinner. I need you I can't make it on my own I can't do it in my own strength I'm not good as a person But he is see We celebrate Easter because We are sinners who've been saved by grace The church shouldn't walk around all haughty and arrogant of all people We ought to be the most humble because we know what we've been And we know what god can do And when you know that that helps helps you to have humility So you don't arrogantly point fingers at people We remember that the finger were pointing at somebody there are three pointing back at me And because we're aware of that we speak with humility and we actually cry to people and say please receive christ as your lord and savior Because I want you to be in heaven. I want your sins forgiven. I want you to have joy I don't want you to live in fear anymore. I want you to have that relationship with god And that's why I told that to my dad And I said daddy I don't want to be in heaven without you And that's why my father gave his heart to christ Because he knew that god changed his sinful son And that god could change him And my father gave his heart to the lord my mom and others and over these years I've seen many who've opened their hearts and said god be merciful to me. I'm a sinner It takes humility and it takes honesty and it takes an awareness of your need And it takes faith that jesus christ is who he said he is So the invitation remains come Come see the place where he lay come And be aware of the one who died for you who no longer is there because he's alive And he's alive and ever lives to make intercession for you jesus christ the savior of the world We do not worship a dead teacher. We worship a living savior and that's what easter is all about