Luke 24:1-12 Easter Sunday

Mark Smith preaching from Luke 24:1-12. 

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Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:21

We're reading from Luke twenty-four, verses one to twelve. But on the first day of the week, at early dawn, they went to the tomb, taking the spices they had prepared. And they found the stone rolled away from the tomb. But when they went in, they did not find the body of the Lord Jesus. While they were perplexed about this, behold, two men stood by them in dazzling apparel. And as they were frightened and bowed their faces to the ground, the men said to them, Why do you seek the living among the dead? He is not here, but has risen. Remember how he told you while he was still in Galilee that the Son of Man must be delivered into the hands of sinful men, and be crucified, and on the third day rise. And they remembered his words, and returning from the tomb, they told all these things to the eleven and to all the rest. Now it was Mary Magdalene and Joanna, and Mary, the mother of James, and the other women with them, who told these things to the apostles. But these words seemed to them an idle tale, and they did not believe them. But Peter rose and ran to the tomb, stooping and looking in. He saw the linen cloths by themselves, and he went home marveling at what had happened.

SPEAKER_01 1:48

Wonderful to have you with us, particularly if you're new or visiting. My name's Mark. I am one of the leaders here at City Church. And what a great Sunday to be with us as we celebrate the resurrection of the Lord Jesus from the dead, the very center point on which history swings and the thing upon which Christianity rises and falls. We do not believe that the resurrection is a story or a metaphor or an image. We believe that it is literally true, a historical reality, and it's something that we can trust and have confidence in. In fact, that's what the gospel writers want us to have. The Gospels of Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John, they want us to be confident that the resurrection of Jesus from the dead is a historic reality because it is so important. It is the thing that changes our world. It is the thing that changes and transforms us. The idea that God, in the person of his son, the Lord Jesus, would come to earth, that he would die for sin and for shame and for all of the wrong and the sad that is in our world, all of the guilt that we carry. And then his resurrection from the dead is the great confirmation that his death achieved all of those things, that we can know life and forgiveness, all the things that we've been singing about and celebrating and uh and cheering on this morning. We're looking at uh at Luke's uh account right at the end of his gospel. I invite you to have that open in front of you in your Bible. Uh Philip Reddit. You know that you're a diverse church if you can have an exuberant Nigerian prayer in Jude and then a very proper English reading. Um, and so that's from my wife, right? Um, and so we're in Luke chapter 24, the first 12 verses. Luke, for those of you who maybe don't know, uh was a medical doctor and he identifies uh himself at the start of the gospel as somebody who was investigating the claims about Jesus. Uh, like an investigative journalist or a detective. He wanted to go around and interview eyewitnesses in order to compile what he describes as an orderly account of the events of Jesus' life. He understands himself to be writing biographical history through the lens of the eyewitnesses. And uh one of the other reasons why we know that this is history and not just made up myth and legend is because of some of the details in this passage. That the people who witnessed the resurrection, the empty tomb first, are the women of Jesus' party. Some of them are named for us there. They're not uh the disciples, not Peter and uh and John and the and the rest. In fact, we'll get on to some of their responses later, but it was the it was the women. And if you're in a first century uh mythologist trying to kind of write a legend, one of the things you wouldn't have is women as the first eyewitnesses, because they wouldn't have been seen in those days as as credible uh in or taken seriously. Uh female testimony, I mean look, this is just describing, this is not a value judgment, right? Just describing their testimony wasn't accepted in the court of law. And so why is it that Luke and the rest of the gospel writers have them as the eyewitnesses? Because if you're trying to make the story sound more credible, you'd have Peter, James, and John heading off there, but you don't. You have these women. Jesus always, through his ministry and Luke here, uh, shows the elevation and the honor of women as those to whom the risen Lord Jesus first reveals himself. They are the first witnesses of the of the empty tomb. And another reason why I think we can have confidence in this is that the proclamation of the resurrection of Jesus begins in Jerusalem. Luke wrote two books of the Bible. He's a kind of a two-volume biographer. He wrote the Gospel of Luke, the biography of Jesus' life, and then he wrote the Acts of the Apostles. That is, the uh the story recounting the birth of the early church and the spread of the gospel. And one of the things that we see there is that the empty tomb is proclaimed in Jerusalem. You think about it, you think, well, if you're trying to make up a myth and a story and a legend, you wouldn't start it in a place where it was so easily refuted if true. If the authorities could just produce a corpse and go, well, you guys are, you guys are kind of just making stuff up, then the story is debunked, but they don't, because everybody knows that the tomb is empty. The only question there is, well, how did it get empty? Again, Luke kind of hints at some of these details. But he says, well, it wasn't just a, it wasn't just a corpse theft, because the women are questioning, well, who's going to roll away the stone? There's a great big stone. Other gospel writers say there's Roman guards there. And uh we are told later on in Luke's account and in others that the grave clothes are still there, kind of still laid out as though a body had passed through them, not that somebody had simply unwrapped them. Again, a thing that Jewish people wouldn't do. They wouldn't touch a dead body. And so either we have some very deceitful grave robbers who are able to work very efficiently in the dead of night, or there's something else going on. Maybe okay. It's the women who are going and taking the spices, they're still cowering, disappointed, disillusioned. And so one of the things you've got to say is, well, none of that was true, and that these 12 guys and others uh launched the greatest conspiracy that the world has ever seen. And if you you know people who are trying to if you have kids and something goes wrong in the house and you interview each of the kids, they'll crack like that, right? Anyone who knows, you know that you can wear one of them dying. But these disciples, no, no, these disciples went to their deaths claiming that the tomb was empty and that Jesus appeared to them bodily resurrected from the dead, died the most horrific death. Peter himself was crucified upside down. There are lots more reasons why we can have confidence in the resurrection of Jesus from the dead, which we can go into, say, during the 3-2-1 course. But Luke wants us this morning to have confidence in the resurrection because the implications are so huge. The interesting thing, though, about Luke's account is it doesn't begin with confidence. It begins with confusion. There's no celebration at first, there's no one waiting outside the tomb. I mean, could you imagine all the you know the 12 disciples standing there all looking at their sundials, going, come on, there's no waiting outside for this stone to be rolled away. There's grief, there's doubt, there's disappointment. Because everyone assumes, as we all would assume, that death is the end. The death means that Jesus is gone. And it's into that emotional space that the resurrection breaks in. And in doing so, Luke shows us, first of all, that one of the things that the resurrection does for the disciples, for the women, for us, is it confounds our expectations, our assumptions about how the world works. It confounds our expectations. Not to cook a meal, but to prepare and anoint the body, right? To make the body smell nice. They were expecting a corpse. They were coming to honor a dead Jesus, not to meet a living one. And then Luke goes on to tell us that they did not find the body. The stone was rolled away in verse 3, but when they went in, they did not find the body of the Lord Jesus. And so their journey towards believing in the resurrection starts all the way back here. Not just with wishful thinking. Jesus' closest insiders didn't expect the resurrection. Faith in the resurrection begins when you let God confound, overturn your expectations, your assumptions about how you think the world works. And what could be a more deeper assumption than a belief that death is final? The women standing there, confused, looking in this empty tomb, meet two men in dazzling clothes. And we know that these aren't just two guys who are blinged out because of their response. So there's a response of the women, they hide their faces. That's how people in the Bible tend to respond to angels. There's fear. When you encounter something of the divine, you get scared, and the women are exhibiting that. So we know that these are angelical beings because of their clothing, because of the response of the women, and they ask the women the seemingly obvious question to them. Why do you seek the living among the dead? Why do you seek the living among the dead? It's not just a question, it's a correction. It's a correcting of their assumptions, their expectations. The angels are saying to the women, ladies, you're in the wrong place. Your expectations are wrong. Your assumptions are wrong. What are your assumptions about Jesus? What are your expectations from Christianity or about Christianity? Jesus is irrelevant, Christianity is outdated, the world works in a very mechanistic way. Of course, death is the final word. People don't come out of their graves. Maybe you've been searching in all of the wrong places. And the angels say, Well, you need to look again. You're looking in the wrong place. The empty tomb stands in history as a thing that overturns all that we thought was certain. Wonderfully. What a great upset. Death is not the final word. There is life and hope and joy and peace to be had even beyond this veil of tears. But the angels don't just correct them. They call them to something. They call them to remember. Because the resurrection doesn't just confound our expectations. It wonderfully, gloriously confirms all that Jesus said. It confirms the words of Jesus as being true. That's our second point this morning. Because Jesus had told them repeatedly what was going to happen. And the angels know this. They say, Do you not remember? Think back. Remember what he said. And so the turning point for the women comes not when they receive more evidence, but when they remember what Jesus has said. Do you see? So verse 5. And the women were frightened and they bowed their faces to the ground. The men said to them, Why do you see the living amongst the dead? He is not here, but has risen. Remember how he told you while he was still in Galilee that the Son of Man must be delivered into the hands of sinful men and be crucified and on the third day rise. And then verse 8, Luke tells us, and they remembered his words. That's the turning point from the women. Not more spectacle, but more remembering. Remembering what Jesus had told them. They weren't expecting resurrection because they'd forgotten. They forgot what Jesus had said. And their forgetting took them to a graveyard. Jesus had told them. He had told them that he would suffer, that he would die, and that he would rise on the third day. Repeatedly, three times, actually, in uh in each of the Gospels, Matthew, Mark, and Luke, he foretells his death. And so the resurrection, folks, the resurrection is not kind of the kind of surprising twist in the story that nobody was looking for. It's not that, aha, got you. It's not like that. It's not supposed to be set up like that in Christianity. Rather, it is the fulfillment of everything Jesus has said. It's the confirmation that the things that he has said about himself are in fact true. The resurrection of Jesus is the great yes and amen to all of the things that Jesus had claimed. And he made some staggering claims throughout his ministry. He claimed to be able to forgive sin. He claimed to have authority over evil. He claimed that through his work God could become our Father. He claimed that true life was found in following him. That even when it's costly, even when it leads to sorrow, that he would sustain us and walk with us through all of those roads. He claimed to be the Son of Man. That's the term that the angels use for him. The one with an eternal kingdom who would come as redeemer and as judge and bring all of his people to himself. And then he said that he would rise from the dead. Folks, this is not, these are not the claims of a good moral teacher, of a sagely Jew 2,000 years ago. No, the empty tomb stands in history. That Jesus is God, come to earth to save his people. It is the great confirmation that everything that he claimed, the forgiveness of sins, life with him, a hope for the future, that all of those things are true. And that in the course of life through through sorrow and celebration, we tend to forget, don't we? We forget his love, we forget his grace, his kindness to us. We forget that he is the source of everything that we enjoy. Every good thing that we have comes from his hand. And so before we sit in judgment over the women and go, are they just a bit slow? I think, well, how prone are we to forget? That we need to hear the angel's question, the angel's admonition, the angel's encouragement. You remember? Do you remember how he has spoken to you? You remember his words to you? You remember his promise to you? The resurrection says that they're true. The resurrection says that you can have confidence in them. The resurrection is the great yes and amen to all of those things. Because when we forget, when we forget forgiveness, we live in shame. When we forget grace, the undeserved kindness of God, we exhaust ourselves trying to clean up our own act and earn our way back, trying to get God to like us again. When we forget hope, we are given to despair. And that is the moment where everything begins to change for the women. Same tomb, same circumstances, but now a transformed understanding. Nothing has changed around them, but everything has changed within them. As they remember what Jesus has said and realize that everything that he said on that Easter day was confirmed to be true. Maybe that's where you are this morning. You've heard stuff about Jesus. You've heard things before, but you've forgotten them. And you need to hear the angel's encouragement. Remember. Remember that he is with you. Remember that he offers you rest. Remember that peace can be found in him. Remember the forgiveness of sin, cleansing your shame and your guilt of all the things that you carry in this room from your past. Remember that through faith in him you can know life. Maybe you're sitting here thinking, I don't know what he said. I didn't do the pre-reading. I've come in right at the end. What did he say? Do you know what you should do? Well, a couple of things. If you don't own a Bible, you can take one from the table down there, take it home, and read a gospel, read the Gospel of Luke. You can read the Gospel of Mark because my name's Mark and it's the best one. No, you can read the Gospel of Mark because it's the shortest one, you know, and you think, well, nobody's got time for John. Shouldn't have said that. Uh read the Gospel of Mark. Read what he says. Do you know the second thing you should do? I don't know if we can throw it up while I'm while I'm talking. I'm gonna freak out Shabbam over here. Throw up the QR code for the 321 course again. Because you want to work out what what he said, you should sign up. There you go. I'll duck out of the way. You sign up for that next four weeks, 1215 to 145, you gotta work out what is it that Jesus claimed about himself? What is it that he said? And then make a decision about whether or not you believe that it's true. It was the tomb empty. Did Jesus rise from the dead? Answer the question for yourself. And if you can look, Christianity rises and falls in the resurrection. If you conclude Jesus. Is still dead somewhere in Jerusalem, right? Then Christianity is done. I'm getting a different job. If anybody would hire me. But if Jesus did raise from the dead bodily in history, then that changes everything and it changes you. And we can spend the rest of your life working out what that means and what it means to live under his lordship. There you go. Well uh we'll go back to the to the normal slide. But here's the thing. Once you remember, once you see all that this really means, it has a kind of confronting effect. And that's where the story goes next. The empty tomb is standing there, and the women go off to tell people. And as they do so, there are three very different responses. First of all, the women themselves, they remember, and then they go and tell. Why? Well, because faith always leads to witness. Faith always leads to telling somebody about what you have seen, about your experience of the empty tomb. It's part of what it means to be a Christian. Maybe you've been invited here this morning because somebody who comes to City Church, somebody who follows the Lord Jesus, has said, hey, they've crossed that pain threshold of the potential social awkwardness enough to say, hey, would you come to church on Sunday's Easter? Why have they done that? Because they believe that this is true. And if it's true, then it always leads to witness, to telling others about it, not just keeping it to ourselves. Hey, I tell you what, you might sit here and think, well, I don't I don't have a lot of theological knowledge. I don't know lots of things about Christianity. What you do know is what Jesus has done in your life. Is what the empty tomb means for you. Often sharing that can be one of the most compelling things. People seeing that, experiencing that, witnessing that. That is what it means to go and to tell others, just as the women do. The second response comes from the disciples. They run to that upper room. You can imagine them kind of bursting in. It's been a bit of a day so far. Met a couple of angels. And what happens? Well, the response of the disciples, goodness me, the response of the disciples, it's like a great big bucket of ice over all of the excitement. Because what does Luke tell us? They thought that it was an idle tale. Great. Thanks, guys. And again, but if you step back and you think about it, if the story of Christianity is 12 guys trying to make themselves look good in order to garner a following, you sidle up to Luke and go, I've got some edits. Could you take out the bit where we look terrible and kind of dismiss all the women and just sound a little bit like jerks? Could you take that bit out? But the reason why Luke leaves it in is because it's true. He's just, he's just telling the news. It's like, I'm just the I'm just the postman, I'm just the mailman. I don't get to write the message, I just deliver it. They thought that it was an idle tale. And hey, we can dismiss the disciples as foolish. Or we can recognize something much closer to home in us. That they were human, that they were locked in their expectations and assumptions. People don't come back from the dead. That's what they expected. That's what they assumed. And what's more, they're so shaped in that moment by grief and by disappointment that they just cannot see that staggering, earth-changing news in front of them. And don't you have that experience when you go through when you go through grief, when you go through suffering, or even just stress and anxiety? One of the things that it does is it just it kind of closes down your world. It creates these blinkers that you can't see beyond what you're experiencing in that moment. And maybe the disciples were a little bit like that. Maybe life feels heavy, disappointing. You've become cynical, and all this sounds too good to be true. Why are all these people so happy? I would love you to take heart from the response of the disciples. These men who would go on to live and to die for the Lord Jesus. But it starts with despair. It starts with hopelessness and doubt. Just a few verses later, and we'll look at it next week. Luke tells us a story about two disciples who are exactly in that place. They're walking on a road to a town called a mess. And the thing that happens, not to give away, steal all of Peter's thunder for next week. So they're in this emotional space, and what happens? Jesus comes and he walks alongside them. And he doesn't berate them, he doesn't call them idiots or an island eegits for not believing. He walks alongside them gently, showing them the truth, and he opens their eyes. If you're in that emotional space of doubt and cynicism, I believe that Jesus would come walking alongside you spiritually speaking. If you ask him, he'll meet with you too. And then the final response as we draw our time to a close comes from Peter. Peter the disciple. Peter is always an act first, ask questions later, sort of guy. And he gets up and he runs because he has to see for himself. He has to investigate the claim of the women. And what does he find? He finds that everything that they have said is true. So he looks. So verse 12, but Peter arose and ran to the tomb. Stooping and looking in, he saw the linen cloth by themselves, and he went home marveling at what had happened. He looks, considers, he marvels. Maybe Peter's not quite there yet. But he's moving in the right direction. Of those three responses, the thing that you need to know is that the empty tomb demands that we consider it and give it some sort of response? Is it just something that we dismiss as an idle tale? Either because we we don't think it's true or because we can't see how it could be true or good? Maybe we're like Peter, we're like, oh well, I'm kind of journeying towards it. I'm trying to figure it out, but I've got more questions. Maybe you're like the women. You're like, no, the empty tomb, the resurrection of Jesus, has changed my life. And I'm I'm ready to get on mission and to tell other people about it and tell other people about what he has done for me. The resurrection confines our assumptions that death is not the end. It confirms Jesus' message that he died for sin, that forgiveness is real, that he rose to give us new life. And now it confronts us and asks, what's our response to it? The thing about Jesus is he's not just some dead teacher to admire. He is the living Lord who has taken your sin away, who has risen again to give you new life. And he calls you, he calls all of us to look in, to stoop down and see the empty grave, and to trust him, to follow him. C.S. Lewis, you know, who wrote the Chronicles of Nani, he said that the only illegitimate response to the message of Christianity is indifference. Some of you sitting here might conclude, no, this is, it's great to be at the music was good, it was nice to be here, good to have a good coffee and donuts and that sort of thing. But it's not true. I reject at wholesale the actual literal truth of the resurrection of Jesus. You could do that. Or you could give your life to him and follow him. The only thing that the empty tomb doesn't allow you to do is go, whatever. Indifference is not an option. This is not just something that you believe, this is something that you live from, that you live out of because he is risen. Brother or sister, you don't have to carry that shame anymore because he is alive. You don't have to fear the future because he has secured it. You are journeying towards him. Death itself has lost its sting. You can stand firm amidst all of the sorrows and trials of this life. You can rejoice even in that sorrow. Because he lives, you can live with courage. Because the worst thing that could ever happen to you is no longer the last thing that will happen to you. The question that the angels ask them is the question that comes to us. Why are you looking for the living amongst the dead? Why keep living as if death has the final word? Why keep searching for life where it cannot be found? But Jesus is not dead. He is risen. Hallelujah, he is risen indeed. Come to him and live. Let's pray. And they remembered the words that Jesus had spoken to them. Father, I pray for my brothers and sisters here that you would impress upon us the words of your truth, that Jesus is alive, that forgiveness is possible, that hope is real, that change is possible because of him. Pray for all those who are searching, who want to know more of Jesus' words and whether or not this is true. As they walk along that road, would you walk alongside them and open their eyes? Pray for us now as we turn to remembering your death for us in the Lord's Supper and celebrating your glorious resurrection as we sing. Give us the help of your Holy Spirit, we ask. In the name of Jesus. Amen.

SPEAKER_02 35:00

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