easter

I am the Resurrection and the Life - 我是復活與生命

4/8/2012 Sermon by Minister Michael Johnson; translated by Nick Wang (see attached ppt file)

Today is Easter Sunday. Today is the day we celebrate the Resurrection of Jesus Christ. I want to spend some time talking today about His resurrection. To begin I want to read today’s passage again.

John 11:21-26 Martha said to Jesus, “Lord, if you had been here, my brother would not have died. But even now I know that whatever you ask from God, God will give you.” Jesus said to her, “Your brother will rise again.” Martha said to him, “I know that he will rise again in the resurrection on the last day.” Jesus said to her, “I am the resurrection and the life. Whoever believes in me, though he die, yet shall he live, and everyone who lives and believes in me shall never die. Do you believe this?”

As this passage was read you might be thinking, “How does this passage have anything to do with Easter?” If you asked this question you have asked it rightfully so. The passage I just read is Jesus talking to Martha just before raising Lazarus from the dead. What I want to emphasize in this passage is what Jesus says to Martha because it holds significant importance to Jesus’ power over death.

After Jesus explains to Martha that Lazarus will rise again she interprets this to mean in Heaven, just as you and I would have if we were in her situation. But to demonstrate that Lazarus will be resurrected on that day Jesus makes an important statement about His power as God. Jesus states, “I AM” when He begins His response to Martha. Stating the words “I AM” is a profound statement made by Christ. Can anyone think of where else this proclamation has been made? The answer is in Exodus 3:14 which states, “God said to Moses, “I AM WHO I AM.” And he said, “Say this to the people of Israel, ‘I AM has sent me to you.’” God the Father reveals His name as “I AM”. He is all powerful and in control of everything. By revealing his name as I AM the Lord leaves no room for discussion about the length and breadth of His power. This power includes power over life and over death.

Jesus is making the same statement to Martha. He is declaring His dominion over death long before He is even nailed to the cross. I want to say it again. Jesus states, “I AM the resurrection and the life.” Imagine the gravity of making that statement. What would you think if someone walked up to you and stated, “I am the resurrection and the life.” I think many would first wonder what on earth the person was talking about. What does it mean to make this statement? If you go to the hospital for a medical concern your doctor probably says something like “Hi, I am your doctor. How might I help you?” The doctor does not walk in and say, “Hi, I am health. I will heal you.” The doctor does not hold this power. Your doctor is not the embodiment of health. He or she simply can offer you options or medicine that might result in you being healthier but he cannot infuse you with health. In contrast, Jesus is declaring that He is the resurrection and the life. He does not say, “Let me look at Lazarus and see what I can do.” Jesus makes a statement that He holds power over death and can breathe life into Lazarus. It is kind of hard to think that way, isn’t it? To think of someone being the resurrection and the life, not just offering resurrection and offering life, but being the embodiment of resurrection and being the embodiment life. Jesus tells us that because He is resurrection, He holds the power over death. You must understand this in order to understand Christ’s work in resurrection.

I want to explore 3 points regarding the resurrection of Christ. The first point being that Christ could not be destroyed by the efforts of humans. The second point is that Christ broke the bonds of spiritual death through His resurrection. Third, we’ll look at what the resurrection means to us today.

Humans have an unfortunate habit of overestimating their strength and power. This makes itself obvious in many ways. We try to create life. We try to cheat death. We even try to make our own spirituality and path to Heaven. The Pharisees of Jesus’ time thought they could stop Jesus’ work as the Son of God on earth. They thought they could cease His message. The Pharisees were willing to lie to have Christ killed on the cross and in doing so attempted to stop his Kingship. The Pharisees were seeking to humiliate Christ and in doing so found a way to have Christ killed in a very degrading manner. Death on a cross was considered to be the worst of the worst ways to die. In doing so the Pharisees wished to have all of Jesus’ credibility shattered. However, they were not the only ones who wanted Jesus’ credibility destroyed.

Pilate also tries to shame Christ and attack his Kingship by placing the placard above Christ on the cross with a very specific message. John 19:19-22 writes, “Pilate also had a notice written and fastened to the cross, which read: “Jesus the Nazarene, the king of the Jews.” Now, many of the Jewish residents of Jerusalem read this notice, because the place where Jesus was crucified was near the city, and the notice was written in Aramaic, Latin, and Greek. The chief priests of the Jews said to Pilate, “Do not write, ‘The king of the Jews,’ but rather, ‘This man said, I am king of the Jews.’” Pilate answered, “What I have written, I have written.” Pilate was attacking Jesus’ character. Jesus’ Kingship had been established throughout the course of the gospel. Then at the end it is called into question by those who despise Jesus. Men tried to say that Jesus was not who he was claiming to be to the people. Pilate wished to demonstrate in a cruel manner that Jesus was not the king of the Jews because if He were then He would not be hanging from the cross. But Jesus’ purpose of being here was to take on the punishment of our sin, which is death, and conquer it.

Despite the evil effort of man, Jesus broke the bonds of these efforts. His Kingship was not shattered by the cruel intention of Pilate. Jesus could not be discredited. In fact even in the face of the cruelty and the horrible death on the Cross Jesus was exalted. He broke the bonds of physical death in His resurrection and established himself as the perfect King over the world.

The second is that Christ defeated spiritual death. We all know the passage that begins, “the wages of sin is death…” from Romans 6:23. The death mentioned in Romans is not a physical death, but a spiritual death. When Christ died He took on the sin of believers. In taking on the sin of believers He was a sacrifice to bear the punishment of spiritual death. If we look to the Apostle’s Creed we see that Christ was crucified, dead, and buried. Then it states, “He descended into hell.” What does that mean? The wages of sin is spiritual death and this means eternal punishment. Some understand Jesus descending to hell to mean he literally went to hell because he took on the sin of people. Others understand it to mean a metaphorical hell because he took on the sin of humans. Somehow even bearing the sin of people was to experience hell without literally going to hell. Regardless, if someone believes Christ descended into hell literally or if the hell He endured was the weight of sin endured, Christ beat the death that comes from sin and He rose again. In doing so Christ has beaten Satan. I love what Paul writes in 1 Corinthians 15:54-55 where he references Hosea, “Death has been swallowed up in victory. Where, O death, is your victory? Where, O death, is your sting?” When Christ rose from the dead and destroyed the bonds of death He allows all those who believe in Him to stand before the Lord righteous not on our own action but because Christ is the sacrifice that atones for our sin. No one can take away this gift from Christ to those who believe in Him.

Have you ever done anything wrong? That is what God calls sin. The punishment for sin is death. It doesn’t matter what good things you’ve done, what good decisions you’ve made or what good things you’ve said. If you’ve done one thing wrong, you’ve sinned against God and deserve death. As an RCA church, we adhere to the idea that we were born into sin because of what Adam did back in the garden. So we don’t have to actually do anything wrong first. Because we are born into sin, we deserve death. But Christ took our sin upon Himself, all the sins of believers from the past, present and future. He endured the wrath that was meant for us, so that we could escape it. He stepped in front of death on our behalf, took it all upon Himself, and then conquered death fully and completely. And He wasn’t at the wrong place at the wrong time. He came here, to Earth, to accomplish this very thing. We serve a humble King.

So what does this mean for us in our modern context? It means we can live in freedom! It means we have life, and life abundantly. To consider this modern day application fully, we need to go back to the beginning of the sermon when we read what Jesus says to Martha, “I AM the resurrection and the life.” By making the statement that He is the resurrection and the life Jesus is making a Kingdom statement. We are currently living in a time of “already not yet.” The Kingdom of God is being ushered into our current age, but has not been revealed in its fullest yet. When Jesus says he is the resurrection and the life he is making resurrection real on earth. People certainly believed in the resurrection in Heaven. Christ made a statement that resurrection is here and now. It is not just a distant concept we hope for after we die, but something we can have here and now. It comes from knowing Christ. We can experience the resurrection as we speak. This of course does not mean we are careless with our lives right now, but resurrection now means we are regenerated from spiritual death to spiritual life.

This is how Jesus can state the last sentence in verse 25 and the first sentence in verse 26. Jesus states, “Whoever believes in me, though he die, yet shall he live, and everyone who lives and believes in me shall never die.” Jesus speaks to the fact that physical death will lead to life in Heaven and spiritual life will keep us from dying. It is by Jesus that we have spiritual life. Again, He states, “I AM the resurrection and the life.” This is the importance of remembering the power of His death and his resurrection. When Christ died His blood was shed as a sacrifice for our sin. His blood covers us and atones for our sin. Because of this, we can live life to its fullest, by walking in the power and the life of His resurrection.

I believe this gives a deeper meaning to the thought of Jesus walking by our side. Jesus is not walking with us passively. He does not wait for us to run into trouble so He can swoop in and carry us out of difficulty like some superhero we watch in the movies who is assisted with a script and special effects. No, Jesus is with us in power, in actual pure, death-conquering power wherever we go. He is with us in power because He cannot be confined by any other power. Therefore, we who believe in Him are not confined by the power of the world either. We may call on Him in time of trouble, as we should, but also call out to Him in times of joy. We seek the Lord for strength, but we also claim His work to provide for us. The Kingdom is here. It is all around us. While we may battle with the flesh, Christ has already conquered it. Praise His name for the good and seek Him in trouble. Praise the Lord now! Today we celebrate His resurrection. Today we praise Him that we are not bound by sin! Today we magnify His name that while we were still sinners, He died for us! Today we walk in victory because Christ removed the sting of death. Today we praise Him for eternal life! Let us pray together, that we may all walk in the power of Christ’s life, death and resurrection. Amen.