Are you a good person? Click here to take the quiz and win a prize!

Are You Out of Work? Click here

To find out why we believe Jesus rose from the dead click here

This month’s featured article

A word about immigration

Sermon Transcript - Easter 2006

Welcome! Today we celebrate the anniversary of the resurrection of Jesus from the dead. This resurrection was one of a kind. He was raised not in a human body, one that would die later, no, He was raised in a perfect body that will never grow old or see decay.

In order to fully understand what Jesus did for us at His resurrection, it is necessary to apprehend the meaning of the Law, and its provisions for lawbreakers so that we might then see the reasons why the crucifixion and resurrection were required.

The Resurrection is meant to open the way to God for anyone who is willing to come to Him, to submit to Him willingly and in love, to give up their self-centered way of life and to have their heart and mind shaped and renewed by His working in their lives. God calls everyone to be His child, His servant and His special joy. People who are willing to see truth will see. People who are willing to hear truth will hear. People who are smug and self-satisfied will never understand until they grasp their true status before the Lord.

The Law (10 Commandments) was given for several purposes. These are;

• Stops the mouth, this means the Law prevents people from being able to justify themselves in God's eyes.
• Wounds the conscience, unbelievers have built mental and psychological barriers to protect themselves from the idea that they are going to hell. Some do not even believe that hell exists. God gave us all a conscience. Con means with, science means knowledge. The Law assaults the conscience, breaks down the barriers, and lets every person know that they cannot save themselves.
• Convicts the heart, the Law settles into a person's heart and makes them realize they are guilty of breaking the Law of the only true God.

Gen 2:17 sin makes us deserving of eternal punishment

The Law breaks down the arrogance, smashes through the indifference and shows the complete ineffectiveness of human schemes. Unsaved people like to believe that everything is going to be fine, and so they go on and on, never wanting to know the truth about their true status before God. They stand condemned already. ccc verse. We stood condemned before we became Christians. ccc verse to all who believed in His Name He gave the right

Unsaved people would rather believe that the Da Vinci code is true, than believe the Bible. This is because we all have a natural desire to think that some secret knowledge, or some human-based reasoning is all we need. We are all like spiders hanging by a thread over a raging fire. At any moment the thread will break and down we go. ccc Daniel?

The believers, those who have submitted to, and accepted God as Lord and Savior have a safety net. We will not enter the fire.

The Law shows us our true state, and helps us Gal 2:16

Now that we know the purpose of the Law, we need to understand the penalty God imposes on lawbreakers. The penalty is eternal suffering. This is a hard teaching. Even during biblical times false teachers arose and preached some more comforting ideas. Some said that all souls cease to exist after death. This is called Annihilationism. Some other teachers said that there is no hell and we all go somewhere nice. Yet others preached a fable that we still hear told today. These liars say that "a loving God would never send anyone to hell". This is completely unbiblical. Not only does God send people to hell, He also sent the disobedient angels to hell (ccc Peter), and God will send Satan to hell at the appropriate time.(Rev cccc

The problem is that people will do almost anything rather than admit they have broken God's Law and need Him to pay the penalty for them.

Now, we a good grasp of the Law, and its relation to unbelievers, let us look at the Resurrection.

Why were the Crucifixion and Resurrection necessary?

First, it was not necessary for God to save anybody at all. He existed before us and He does not need us to give Him anything. 2 P 2:4

God's decision to save some human beings meant, that because He is perfect, He then needed to create a way for all human beings to choose to be saved on an individual basis. In this way, He does not force anyone to be saved from the penalty for their sins. But He also does not leave anyone out who wants to be saved. The choice to offer salvation to every individual is personal, the choice of how we respond to God is also personal. We aren't saved by being born or by growing up in a certain culture or by belonging to a certain church. We are saved when we personally accept God's offer to call Him Savior and Lord. True faith always results in obedience to His commandments, reading His Word and sharing our experiences of the things God has done for us. Christ died for me. He died for you. But this has no meaning for us unless we believe it, accept it, ask God to save us, and ask the Lord to be our Master. Then He sends the Holy Spirit to dwell within us and guide us daily as to our behavior. The Holy Spirit also heals us understand the Bible when we read.

The Lord demands payment for lawbreaking. You do the crime, you must do the time. But, because the penalty for breaking God's Law is eternal punishment, there is no

parole. No end to the time served. Each moment is only one more moment in a never-ending series of moments.

• The penalty could only be paid by the sacrifice of perfect blood. It had to be blood from
• someone who never broke the Law. That is something impossible for any human being to
• do on their own. All have broken the Law and fallen short of the glory of God Rom 3:23,
• The penalty is death Rom 6:23.
• What would the damned give for the opportunity to come back here and accept salvation ?

Jesus is unique. He is 100% God and 100% man at the same time. He made direct claims to be God, and He did the miracles to prove it. The blood of Jesus was perfect blood. It was the propitiating sacrifice for sin.

Propitiation is a word we don't hear very often. It means "a sacrifice that turns away the wrath of God"  Heb 2:17, 1 Jn 2:2, 1 Jn 4:10

Jesus' crucifixion paid the penalty for all of our lawbreaking.

Jesus did not defend Himself because He was taking our place, and we are guilty.

Jesus' resurrection proved that God, and only God, has absolute control over life and death. Jesus appeared alive, eating and drinking, talking and walking to hundreds of witnesses. They saw the nail holes in His feet and hands. They saw the hole from the spear in His side.

The Resurrection, the greatest miracle ever done, on that first Easter Sunday, proved beyond all doubt that none of the false gods, none of the demons, no human power, and not even Satan himself, could overcome the will of God. By the Resurrection God demonstrates His absolute power. As Creator, God already has the right to be called Lord (or Master), the Resurrection proves that He has the right to be called Savior.

What does the Resurrection mean for us today?

clean consciences Heb 9:14

access to God in worship and in prayer Heb 10:19

we are progressively cleansed from remaining sin 1 Jn 1:17, Rev 1:5b

we are able to overcome our accuser Rev 12:10-11

we are rescued from a sinful way of life and the inevitable destruction 1 P 1:18-19

For Christians it means that our place in heaven is secure forever. God will never leave us. This means when we hit times of frustration, depression, anger, fear, aggravation, we need to ask ourselves if we have temporarily stepped away from God. Are we being faithful to read the Bible, are we being faithful to pray, are we doing what God asked us to do? To do the right thing, to be humble and to love mercy? Are we telling people about God when we have the chance to do so?

What does the Resurrection mean today for unbelievers? it means nothing until they understand the reason for it, that it is the proof that God is real, that He is in ultimate control and that they are alienated from Him, and that He offers them a way to be part of His family. The person who is seeking God, even though they may not know that it is Him they seek, will respond with some internal conflict when we share the Law, the Crucifixion and the Resurrection. Their internal conflict turns to joy when they understand the truth. When the Holy Spirit (which is already at work in us and in them) removes the clouds from their mind, they fall in love with God. Just as we did.

God has set the Gospel call to be given through human speech Acts 3:19, John 3:16

Christians, obediently sharing the truth are the conduits God uses to funnel the message through the unbeliever's heart and into their mind. The Gospel brings knowledge of how to obtain salvation. Gratitude and the Holy Spirit bring lifelong guidance in daily behavior.

Salvation is a love affair. God asks "Do you love Me?"

The genuine personal invitation seeks a personal response. Yes or No.

As we continue our study of Peter next week, remember this above all. Peter wrote two letters, both of which have these two points.

Christians – be grateful for being rescued from the flames, love God for what He has done for us, look forward to heaven, use our time on earth to share the truth about our wonderful, amazing, exciting Lord and Savior.

1 Peter 3:18

[NewChurch Austin] [About God] [About the Bible] [About Us] [About You] [Our Beliefs] [Events] [Awesome Links] [Politics] [Hebrew and Greek] [Recommended Businesses] [Free Speech] [Tough Questions] [Reading List] [Parables] [Sermons] [1 John 2:7-17] [Return of Jesus] [Prelude to the End Times] [City of Heaven] [Easter 2006] [Struggle]

This website is copyright 2002 and 2006 by NewChurchAustin. Articles and papers are copyright by their respective authors.