Easter 2009
Jesus Leads the Way
I’ve come to the conclusion that there is no need for me to offer you an apologetic,
the reasons why I believe in the bodily resurrection of Jesus.
Many fine teachers have laid out the facts,
People will accept or reject based on the faith that they have.
I want to concentrate on the example that the Crucifixion and the Resurrection is
for those who abide in Christ.
During our study of the Book of Revelation there was an underlying theme,
the way of Christ through this world is the way believers are to follow.
I want us to see how the crucifixion and resurrection of Jesus give us an example
that we are to follow.
I will describe to you how believers can follow Jesus
“becoming like him in his death, and so, somehow, to attain
to the resurrection from the dead” (Phil 3:10-11 NIV).
We have previously established that the way of Jesus is the path of ferocious love.
Jesus gave his disciples only a few commands.
John 15:12-13 (NIV)
My command is this: Love each other as I have loved you. Greater love has no one than this, that he lay down his life for his friends.
If you’ve been around HBCC for any length of time you have heard our definition of love.
Love is something you do, not necessarily something you feel.
Love for God is obedience to His commands.
Obedience not motivated out of fear of punishment,
Rather obedience in response to the love that God has loved you with.
In a sense it’s a quid pro qua—
God loves you, your response is, You love God.
Your love for God is demonstrated by your intent
to obey.
Jesus gave us an example to follow.
In the Garden of Gethsemane, the night of his arrest, Jesus prayed:
Matthew 26:39 (MSG)
"My Father, if there is any way, get me out of this. But please, not what I want. You, what do you want?"
That is a picture of love for God.
I will do what you want Father, not what I want.
If you know the story of the Passion of Christ you know that Jesus
knew his life was on the line.
Love for Others is seeking to meet their need, often at the cost of a personal
sacrifice.
Jesus told us that we are to love our neighbor as we love ourselves.
Then Jesus was asked who one’s neighbor is and through the parable
of the Good Samaritan (Luke 10:25) told us any person
who’s need that we see is our neighbor.
In a sense it’s reciprocity—
Jesus meet your biggest need, a right relationship with the
Father.
Jesus loved you, so now as a follower of Christ,
Give away what you have received,
1 John 3:14 (MSG)
The way we know we've been transferred from death to life is that we love our brothers and sisters.
Love for the Earth is being a good steward of all that God has entrusted you with.
Steward means manager,
Manager does not mean owner.
1 Chronicles 29:14 (NIV)
Everything comes from you, and we have given you only what comes from your hand.
There is nothing you have that hasn’t been given to you.
The lie of the age is that we have earned what we have.
Scripture offers another view.
All the material things of this world are given to us to manage
in the interest of God.
Not only are we to be wise with our use of the wealth we have
received, but also with the treasure that our planet is to us.
Love for self is becoming the person God created you to be.
2 Corinthians 3:18 (NLT)
And the Lord—who is the Spirit—makes us more and more like him as we are changed into his glorious image.
This becoming is not automatic.
We become more and more like Jesus as we choose to appropriate the
grace God has given to mature in our faith.
Grace is both the desire to be and the power to do.
The way to get grace is through the practice of the spiritual
disciplines.
It is through bible study, prayer, fellowship, service, worship,
obedience and contemplation that we have encounters
with the living God,
and in those encounters receive the grace we
need to become who we have been created to be.
Jesus tells His disciples to love as he has loved.
His love brought Him to Golgotha and a cross upon which he was executed.
The way of Christ through this world is the way believers are to follow.
Allow me to spiritualize and personalize this thought.
As an adult Jesus was baptized with the baptism of John.
The sinless son of God partakes in the baptism of John which is a baptism of
repentance and preparation.
Matthew 3:16-17 (NIV)
As soon as Jesus was baptized, he went up out of the water. At that moment heaven was opened, and he saw the Spirit of God descending like a dove and lighting on him. And a voice from heaven said, "This is my Son, whom I love; with him I am well pleased."
When you accept the fact that you are sinner,
When you believe that Jesus can redeem you from your sins.
When you commit yourself to living a holy life,
Spiritually you are following Jesus in the baptism of John.
We act this out symbolically in our Ritual of Baptism.
I want to define sin for you again,
Sin is anything that deters, damages or destroys right relationships.
Sin is unrighteousness, it is relating wrongly to God, to others,
To self and to the world.
We follow Jesus into John Baptism,
By acknowledging that we are sinners.
By believing that Jesus is the reconciler of relationships
By committing ourselves to be Jesus followers.
The Holy Spirit descends upon us and changes us.
The Apostle Paul tells us at that moment we are sealed with the Holy
Spirit (Eph 4:30) and we become spiritually alive (Eph 2:4-5),
2 Corinthians 5:17 (NLT)
This means that anyone who belongs to Christ has become a new person. The old life is gone; a new life has begun!
The voice of the Father from heaven declared that Jesus is His
beloved son.
And so the Holy Spirit of God declares to you have been
made His child.
His beloved child.
Galatians 4:6 (NLT)
And because we are his children, God has sent the Spirit of his Son into our hearts, prompting us to call out, “Abba, Father.”
The way of Christ through this world is the way believers are to follow.
Commissioning
The Father gave His Son a calling.
Something that only He could do.
Colossians 1:19-20 (NIV)
For God was pleased to have all his fullness dwell in him, and through him to reconcile to himself all things, whether things on earth or things in heaven, by making peace through his blood, shed on the cross.
Jesus calling is to reconcile the estrangement of humanity with its Creator.
I have come to understand scripture from a relational perspective and it has
made a incredible difference in my world view.
Everything rises and falls on relationships.
Genesis tells us that God created us in righteousness.
Humanity began rightly related to God, to Others, to The
Earth and to Self.
But sin, created estrangement in those
relationships.
Jesus’ calling, His ministry, His gift is to reconcile those
Relationships, freeing us to live life to the full.
We read in scripture that every believer is given gifts for advancing the cause of
the Kingdom.
The Kingdom is symbolic for reconciled relationships with God.
The Kingdom speaks of a believers new citizenship and
allegiance to the King.
It speaks of loyalty, fidelity, obedience as well as
enjoying the benefits of being a subject of
the Creator.
1 Corinthians 12:7 & Romans 12:6 (NLT)
A spiritual gift is given to each of us so we can help each other. ..In his grace, God has given us different gifts for doing certain things well.
A spiritual gift is our God given calling.
You see: “He creates each of us by Christ Jesus to join him in the work
he does, the good work he has gotten ready for us to
do, work we had better be doing” (Eph 2:10).
Jesus has a job description, a task to do.
As the Father commissioned Jesus so the Father commissions each of
His children.
You have a calling and gifts to fulfill that calling.
The way of Christ through this world is the way believers are to follow.
Calling
One of the great problems with the way most Christians practice their faith in the
USA is that they think faith is enough.
I believe.
But dear friend belief is not enough.
James 2:19-20 (NLT)
You say you have faith, for you believe that there is one God. Good for you! Even the demons believe this, and they tremble in terror. How foolish! Can’t you see that faith without good deeds is useless?
The disciple of Jesus is called to be faithful and fruitful.
The musicianaries Casting Crowns wrote “If We Are His Body.”
The chorus is an indictment against fruitless faith.
But if we are the
body
why aren’t his arms reaching
why aren’t his hands healing
why aren’t his words teaching
if we are the body
why aren’t his feet going
why is his love not showing them there is a way
there is a way
The reason why far too many believers are not going, reaching, teaching, healing is
because they have not followed Jesus to Golgotha.
It is upon the cross Jesus showed us how great a love it is that we are called to.
He gave up his life.
John 10:18 (MSG)
No one takes it from me. I lay it down of my own free will.
There is a crucifixion you must willing partake in.
For I understand that there is a me in each of us,
An attitude, a disposition, a propensity, and inclination,
To be our own God.
To be the one who decides what is right and what is
wrong, what is good and what is bad.
Even though our relationship with God has been reconciled,
What keeps us from fulfilling our calling is selfishness,
It’s the me centered on myself.
It’s my desires to control.
It’s my wishes to succeed in the world by it’s
standards.
It’s my wants for autonomy.
It’s my agenda, my will, and the way I want to do it.
I call it egoism.
It’s the me that needs to be crucified with Christ. (Galatians 2:20)
Until it is, you’re spiritually handicapped.
Jesus was crucified to fulfill His calling, what God ordained Him to do.
Until your egoism is crucified you will not be able to fulfill your calling,
You will not be able to do what God ordained you to do.
Maybe you’ve wondered why some Christians seem to be able to overcome all
the craziness and difficulty that shows up on their doorstep.
They have an inner joy and a contentment and a confidence about
Them even in the midst of chaos.
They feel real.
They have their hands dirty in the work God has
given them to do.
They are lovers.
It because their egoism has been rectified.
Their attitude, disposition, propensity, inclination,
Their desires, wishes and wants,
Are now Christ centered instead of
me, myself and I centered.
These are the Christians who have let go of a life of egoism.
These are the Christians who are fruitful, fulfilling their calling.
John 12:25 (MSG)
…anyone who holds on to life just as it is destroys that life. But if you let it go, reckless in your love, you'll have it forever, real and eternal.
God gives us grace both the desire to be free of egoism and the power to let it go.
Our part is to decide that our egoism needs to be rectified.
Expect that what God commands, He is capable of accomplishing,
and that He can accomplish it now.
Faithfully wait on Him to do this work of
transformation.
I’m not talking about wait as for a ride,
But wait as on a table.
It will be in the midst of serving God and serving others that egoism will be
crucified.
Your selfish world view will be transformed into a Christ
centered world view.
The way of Christ through this world is the way believers are to follow.
Crucifying
Jesus died upon a cross to fulfill his calling.
But after that ordeal, after that miscarriage of justice,
After the mocking, the torture, the suffering, and death,
Came a resurrection.
The women at the tomb came looking for the body of Jesus to anoint it with burial
ointments.
Instead they encountered an angel who said:
Matthew 28:6 (NIV)
He is not here; he has risen, just as he said.
As Christians we believe that on that first Easter Sunday morning,
There was a resurrection.
Jesus rose bodily from the grave,
The Creators sign of validation.
Matthew 28:18 & Revelation 1:18 (NIV)
Then Jesus came to them and said, "All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me…I am the Living One; I was dead, and behold I am alive for ever and ever!
It is by His death and Resurrection that Jesus is able to fulfill His calling,
Making it possible for anyone who seeks it,
to be reconciled to the Father.
If you have a right relationship with God,
Then you are a recipient of the fulfillment of Jesus calling.
When you allow God to rectify your egoism,
To crucify that desire that drove Adam and Eve to eat of the fruit that they
would be like God.
You too will be empowered to fulfill your calling.
What God has gifted and empowered you to do.
You will have risen out of the old way of living with its proclivities for
doing that which is contrary to the will of God.
You will have risen into a life that is in step with the Holy Spirit of God,
Into a devout and holy life.
In which you will be both faithful and fruitful.
John 12:24 (NLT)
I tell you the truth, unless a kernel of wheat is planted in the soil and dies, it remains alone. But its death will produce many new kernels—a plentiful harvest of new lives.
Disciples of Jesus are called to be both faithful and fruitful,
Is egoism keeping you from a plentiful harvest?
Jesus commanded us to love one another.
Then he gave us the greatest example of ferocious love ever witnessed.
He said laying your life down,
The me, myself and I of egoism,
Is that kind of love.
You lay the egocentric life down so that you can fulfill your calling to
your friends.
So you can be the person they need you to be.
So that you can be used of God to bring the
kingdom to others.
It’s a ferocious love that God approves and validates.
There is a crucifixion that you need to experience.
There is a resurrection that you need to experience.
The way of Christ through this world is the way believers are to follow.
Conquering
John 12:26 (NLT)
Anyone who wants to be my disciple must follow me, because my servants must be where I am.
Today on this Easter Sunday morning,
Where are you?
Are you where Jesus is?
Or are you living by yourself?