What Makes Easter So Special?
00:00:00.000 | Pastor John, this weekend we will be celebrating Resurrection Sunday. In a
00:00:10.180 | nutshell, what is the significance of Easter? Jesus Christ, the Son of God, who
00:00:17.540 | came into the world from the Father, born of a virgin, lived a sinless life, did
00:00:24.380 | wonderful miracles, loved people, blew all of our categories, nevertheless was
00:00:30.340 | crucified for our sins. And then on the third day, and this is Easter,
00:00:37.220 | the celebration of that Sunday, He was raised from the dead, never to die again.
00:00:43.500 | And Luke tells us, having done all of his historical research, that He, for 40 days,
00:00:50.460 | gave many infallible proofs. And Paul himself, who was a kind of Johnny-come-lately
00:00:55.980 | to the Apostles, said that when he wrote 1 Corinthians, 500 people had
00:01:01.860 | seen Him alive, and some of those are still alive, if you want to go talk to
00:01:05.620 | them. That's the kind of historical control they had. He was raised physically,
00:01:10.420 | they recognized Him, they could put their hands in His wounds, He ate fish in front
00:01:16.140 | of them, precisely to say, "A spirit, a ghost, doesn't have flesh and bones, as you
00:01:21.500 | see that I have." He was more than physical, because He seemed to go and
00:01:26.620 | come at will. Doors didn't--locked doors didn't get in His way, so there's this
00:01:31.260 | unusual new dimension to His body. He ascended to the right hand of the
00:01:37.260 | Father, He sits on the throne with God, He intercedes for us there, praying for
00:01:43.260 | His people every day, He's reigning until He puts all of His enemies under His feet.
00:01:51.900 | The end of Matthew says He has all authority in heaven and on earth, He'll
00:01:58.300 | never die again, He has the keys of death and hell in His hands. For starters,
00:02:05.220 | Tony, that's what happened. And the question then--let me just add
00:02:11.220 | this--the question then is, so what's the implication of that stunning claim and
00:02:16.260 | reality for us? And I would say, one, it means my sins are forgotten, because Paul
00:02:22.620 | said in 1 Corinthians 15, "If Christ is not raised, we're still in our sins,"
00:02:27.260 | implying if He is raised, our sin problem is over. And that's because
00:02:33.340 | the Resurrection vindicates the event of Good Friday, namely His death. This
00:02:40.820 | death really did cover the sins of His people, it really did provide a perfect
00:02:46.380 | righteousness for us, so that it says in, I think, the end of Romans 4 that He
00:02:53.380 | was delivered up, that is, to the cross, because of our trespasses, and He was
00:02:58.940 | raised up because of our justification, meaning just as our sin brought into the
00:03:06.340 | cross, the finished work of taking care of our sins brought Him out of the grave.
00:03:11.460 | God looked down and said, "Oh, my son's work was perfect. He's not staying in the
00:03:17.620 | grave, and He raises Him from the dead to vindicate all that He had accomplished
00:03:22.220 | for us." So in a sense, you could say, practically, Easter means every day that
00:03:29.460 | the promises of God for me, to help me, every minute of my life, are secured by
00:03:37.740 | the resurrection of Jesus Christ, because the Resurrection vindicates the cross
00:03:41.860 | where those promises were bought for me. And then, maybe I should add, at the end
00:03:49.340 | of my life, Philippians 3, 20-21, says, "He's going to give me a body when I die, and
00:03:59.060 | I'm raised from the dead, a body like His glorious body." So that the body of Jesus,
00:04:05.660 | with which He came from the dead, is a forerunner, it's a first
00:04:10.220 | fruit, it's a kind of paradigm of the way all of His people who trust Him are going
00:04:15.500 | to have new bodies someday. And then, as if that were not great enough, Romans 8
00:04:21.220 | says that when the freedom of the glory of the children of God comes to
00:04:28.180 | pass, and they are raised from the dead and given glorified bodies, the whole
00:04:32.700 | creation gets made over as a suitable galactic playground for those of us
00:04:41.420 | who have been given bodies that will never sin again, never get sick again, all
00:04:47.300 | tears wiped away. So I would say, Tony, that the implications of Easter are
00:04:52.580 | simply staggering. They are personally precious for every day's
00:04:56.620 | life of struggle, and they are globally and galactically precious, because the
00:05:03.420 | Resurrection guarantees that this whole created order is going to be made new.
00:05:07.660 | So everything hinges on the reality of the Resurrection. That's exactly
00:05:13.620 | the reasoning of 1 Corinthians 15, 17, following. If Christ has not been
00:05:21.820 | raised, our Gospel is in vain, your faith is in vain, we are found to be preaching
00:05:27.180 | a false gospel, we might as well eat, drink, and be merry for tomorrow we die.
00:05:31.100 | Paul put all of his eggs in that basket. If that didn't happen physically, bodily,
00:05:38.980 | permanently, then Christianity is just a sham. We may as well pack it up and just
00:05:44.460 | be gluttons the rest of our lives. The stakes are very high. Thank you, Pastor
00:05:49.340 | John. For more details about the life of Christ, consider picking up Pastor John's
00:05:53.420 | book, "50 Reasons Why Jesus Came to Die." You can download it for free right now at
00:05:58.900 | DesiringGod.org. I'm your host, Tony Reinke. Thanks for listening, and have a
00:06:02.940 | wonderful, Christ-centered Resurrection Sunday.
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