 |
 |
 |
||||||||
|
|
|
||||||||
|
 |
Greetings to you on a beautiful Maundy Thursday, the day before Good Friday, that great and glorious day when the God of heaven and earth bought and secured our redemption, his only begotten son, Jesus, messiah, cursed and hanging outside the city walls, dying at the hands of gentile Roman soldiers, knowing and experiencing the covenant curse and the wrath of God against sin, your sin, my sin. But death could not hold him, nor would he suffer the decay of death, but he was vindicated, shown to be true, raised bodily, revealed to the disciples, affirming God’s commitment to creation and to human bodily life. When you get this it will be Saturday. Saturday was a dark and lonely and hopeless day almost 2000 years ago for the disciples. They were shaken with grief, scared for their own lives, humiliated, bearing the burden and excruciating disappointment of dashed hopes. It seemed they had been wrong about Jesus. They thought he would bring in the kingdom. They thought he would restore Israel’s fortunes. OK, Jesus had said that he would be taken, that he would suffer, that he would die as a ransom for many, but these words had never sunk in, had never quite broken through the wrong assumptions of the disciples. And now it was a dark Saturday. Jesus was gone. Today on your Saturday as you sit there and read this letter, you find yourself between Good Friday, which you now celebrate as that great and glorious day when your redemption was secured, and Easter Sunday, which you celebrate as that great and glorious day when death itself was defeated. But the disciples on their Saturday before the first Easter looked back to Friday as the day their world came crashing to an end, and ahead to Sunday as only another day to adjust to life with Jesus gone. Despite all Jesus had said, when the news broke on the morning of the first day of the week that Jesus was alive, it couldn’t have been more unexpected and electrifying. This resurrection is celebrated in the most ancient creedal hymns of the early church, before there were official gospels and epistles, hymns were already known and celebrated before being and placed by the writers within the various letters of our NT: For example, there is the very early hymn in 1 Timothy 3:16 (NIV): Beyond all question, the mystery of godliness is great: He appeared in a body, was vindicated by the Spirit, was seen by angels, was preached among the nations, was believed on in the world, was taken up in glory. And again, another similar standardized creed or hymn taken up by Paul in 1 Corinthians 15:3-7 (NIV): For what I received I passed on to you as of first importance: that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures, that he was buried, that he was raised on the third day according to the Scriptures, and that he appeared to Peter, and then to the Twelve. After that, he appeared to more than five hundred of the brothers at the same time, most of whom are still living, though some have fallen asleep. Then he appeared to James, then to all the apostles, and last of all he appeared to me also, as to one abnormally born. And there is the well known early hymn in Philippians 2:5-11 (NIV): Your attitude should be the same as that of Christ Jesus: Who, being in very nature God, did not consider equality with God something to be grasped, but made himself nothing, taking the very nature of a servant, being made in human likeness. And being found in appearance as a man, he humbled himself and became obedient to death-- even death on a cross! Therefore God exalted him to the highest place and gave him the name that is above every name, that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, in heaven and on earth and under the earth, and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father. We find the resurrection at the center of the first great Pentecost sermon of the apostle Peter, which I quote here in part, Acts 2:;22-37 (NIV): "Men of Israel, listen to this: Jesus of Nazareth was a man accredited by God to you by miracles, wonders and signs, which God did among you through him, as you yourselves know. This man was handed over to you by God's set purpose and foreknowledge; and you, with the help of wicked men, put him to death by nailing him to the cross. But God raised him from the dead, freeing him from the agony of death, because it was impossible for death to keep its hold on him. David said about him: "'I saw the Lord always before me. Because he is at my right hand, I will not be shaken. Therefore my heart is glad and my tongue rejoices; my body also will live in hope, because you will not abandon me to the grave, nor will you let your Holy One see decay. You have made known to me the paths of life; you will fill me with joy in your presence.' "Brothers, I can tell you confidently that the patriarch David died and was buried, and his tomb is here to this day. But he was a prophet and knew that God had promised him on oath that he would place one of his descendants on his throne. Seeing what was ahead, he spoke of the resurrection of the Christ, that he was not abandoned to the grave, nor did his body see decay. God has raised this Jesus to life, and we are all witnesses of the fact. Exalted to the right hand of God, he has received from the Father the promised Holy Spirit and has poured out what you now see and hear. For David did not ascend to heaven, and yet he said, "'The Lord said to my Lord: "Sit at my right hand until I make your enemies a footstool for your feet."' "Therefore let all Israel be assured of this: God has made this Jesus, whom you crucified, both Lord and Christ." And of course, there is the so called “apostles” creed, developed over time in the first two centuries of the church, and providing the basis of the later Nicene creed. I believe in God the Father Almighty, maker of heaven and earth, and in Jesus Christ his only Son our Lord; who was conceived by the Holy Spirit, born of the virgin Mary, suffered under Pontius Pilate, was crucified, dead and buried; the third day he rose again from the dead; he ascended into heaven; and sitteth on the right hand of God the Father Almighty, from thence he shall come to judge the quick and the dead. I believe in the Holy Spirit; the holy catholic church; the communion of saints; the forgiveness of sins; the resurrection of the body; and the life everlasting. Amen. As you see can see, the resurrection of Jesus is the bedrock historical basis for our understanding of who we are as Christians. In the resurrection of Jesus, Jesus’ claims to be God’s anointed king are vindicated, shown to be right and true. In the resurrection of Jesus, the promises of the Old Covenant Scriptures are shown to have come true. Jesus’ life, death, and resurrection were not only the basis for our justification, they were the historical fulfillment of God’s plan for Israel. Israel’s history is now focused upon and is wrapped up in Jesus’ history. Jesus represents Israel. In his death he suffers and exhausts the curse of the covenant in her place. In his resurrection he begins to fulfill what the promised life after exile will look like for Israel. In his ascension and pouring out of the Spirit, his presence and resurrected life is made available to all the world, to the Jew first, and then to the Gentile, to you and me. The blessing of God promised to the world comes through Israel’s God, and through Israel herself, through Jesus representing her in death and resurrection. In his resurrection the promise of God to bring blessing to the nations, through Israel, can now explode into the world (as it were) in power. YHWH had promised to Abraham and to his descendents, “I will be their God, and they will be my people.” In the sacrificial and atoning death of Jesus the way is made for us, who were not his people, to be restored back to relationship with the Father. Because of the resurrection, Jesus lives in the present, and our rebirth into life is in and through him. In Jesus, who IS alive, God is with us. He is present. Because of the resurrection, He is our God and we are His people. When we gather each Sunday to worship and fellowship, we do so in Him, in Christ. What binds us together is our shared life in His resurrection life. For us today, existentially and consciously here in the present 2000 years later, the resurrection is of course the foundation of our own hope that there is life after death, and that what we now do and believe in this life in the body matters. 1 Corinthians 15:20-28 (NIV) But Christ has indeed been raised from the dead, the firstfruits of those who have fallen asleep. For since death came through a man, the resurrection of the dead comes also through a man. For as in Adam all die, so in Christ all will be made alive. But each in his own turn: Christ, the firstfruits; then, when he comes, those who belong to him. Then the end will come, when he hands over the kingdom to God the Father after he has destroyed all dominion, authority and power. For he must reign until he has put all his enemies under his feet. The last enemy to be destroyed is death. For he "has put everything under his feet." Now when it says that "everything" has been put under him, it is clear that this does not include God himself, who put everything under Christ. When he has done this, then the Son himself will be made subject to him who put everything under him, so that God may be all in all. The resurrection of Jesus is the basis of our hope that God will renew His creation, and is renewing it even in and through us. Romans 8:22-23 (NIV) We know that the whole creation has been groaning as in the pains of childbirth right up to the present time. Not only so, but we ourselves, who have the firstfruits of the Spirit, groan inwardly as we wait eagerly for our adoption as sons, the redemption of our bodies. The resurrection of Jesus is the basis of our belief and hope that we can and will be made new in Christ: Romans 6:1-10 (NIV) What shall we say, then? Shall we go on sinning so that grace may increase? 2 By no means! We died to sin; how can we live in it any longer? Or don't you know that all of us who were baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into his death? We were therefore buried with him through baptism into death in order that, just as Christ was raised from the dead through the glory of the Father, we too may live a new life. If we have been united with him like this in his death, we will certainly also be united with him in his resurrection. For we know that our old self was crucified with him so that the body of sin might be done away with, that we should no longer be slaves to sin--because anyone who has died has been freed from sin. Now if we died with Christ, we believe that we will also live with him. For we know that since Christ was raised from the dead, he cannot die again; death no longer has mastery over him. The death he died, he died to sin once for all; but the life he lives, he lives to God. For the Christian, the bodily death and bodily resurrection of Jesus are everything. |
 |
|
 |
|
||||
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
||||
