Sermons

FILTER BY:

← back to list

Apr 16, 2023

Why Easter Matters

Why Easter Matters

Passage: Luke 24:36-49

Speaker: Andrew Kerhoulas

Series: General Topic

Keywords: holy spirit, doubt, scriptures, understanding, witnesses, the resurrection body of christ, christ’s suffering and rising, clothed with power from on high

The reality of the resurrection of Jesus, our troubles and doubts around the resurrection, the joy and mission that comes from believing in the real presence and power of Jesus through the work of His Spirit.

Readings & Scripture

PREPARATION: 1 Peter 1:3-5

LEADER: Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ! According to his great mercy, he has caused us to be born again to a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead, to an inheritance that is imperishable, undefiled, and unfading, kept in heaven for you, who by God's power are being guarded through faith for a salvation ready to be revealed in the last time.

LEADER: Hallelujah! He is risen!

ALL: He is risen indeed!

AFFIRMATION OF FAITH/SCRIPTURE READING/CORPORATE PRAYER: Luke 24:13-35

LEADER: That very day two of them were going to a village named Emmaus, about seven miles from Jerusalem, and they were talking with each other about all these things that had happened. While they were talking and discussing together, Jesus himself drew near and went with them. But their eyes were kept from recognizing him. And he said to them, “What is this conversation that you are holding with each other as you walk?” And they stood still, looking sad. Then one of them, named Cleopas, answered him, “Are you the only visitor to Jerusalem who does not know the things that have happened there in these days?” And he said to them, “What things?” And they said to him, “Concerning Jesus of Nazareth, a man who was a prophet mighty in deed and word before God and all the people, and how our chief priests and rulers delivered him up to be condemned to death, and crucified him. But we had hoped that he was the one to redeem Israel. Yes, and besides all this, it is now the third day since these things happened. Moreover, some women of our company amazed us. They were at the tomb early in the morning, and when they did not find his body, they came back saying that they had even seen a vision of angels, who said that he was alive. Some of those who were with us went to the tomb and found it just as the women had said, but him they did not see.” And he said to them, “O foolish ones, and slow of heart to believe all that the prophets have spoken! Was it not necessary that the Christ should suffer these things and enter into his glory?” And beginning with Moses and all the Prophets, he interpreted to them in all the Scriptures the things concerning himself.

So they drew near to the village to which they were going. He acted as if he were going farther, but they urged him strongly, saying, “Stay with us, for it is toward evening and the day is now far spent.” So he went in to stay with them. When he was at table with them, he took the bread and blessed and broke it and gave it to them. And their eyes were opened, and they recognized him. And he vanished from their sight. They said to each other, “Did not our hearts burn within us while he talked to us on the road, while he opened to us the Scriptures?” And they rose that same hour and returned to Jerusalem. And they found the eleven and those who were with them gathered together, saying, “The Lord has risen indeed, and has appeared to Simon!” Then they told what had happened on the road, and how he was known to them in the breaking of the bread.” The Word of the Lord.

CENTRAL TEXT: Luke 24:36-49

36 As they were talking about these things, Jesus himself stood among them, and said to them, “Peace to you!” 37 But they were startled and frightened and thought they saw a spirit. 38 And he said to them, “Why are you troubled, and why do doubts arise in your hearts? 39 See my hands and my feet, that it is I myself. Touch me, and see. For a spirit does not have flesh and bones as you see that I have.” 40 And when he had said this, he showed them his hands and his feet. 41 And while they still disbelieved for joy and were marveling, he said to them, “Have you anything here to eat?” 42 They gave him a piece of broiled fish, 43 and he took it and ate before them.

44 Then he said to them, “These are my words that I spoke to you while I was still with you, that everything written about me in the Law of Moses and the Prophets and the Psalms must be fulfilled.” 45 Then he opened their minds to understand the Scriptures, 46 and said to them, “Thus it is written, that the Christ should suffer and on the third day rise from the dead, 47 and that repentance for the forgiveness of sins should be proclaimed in his name to all nations, beginning from Jerusalem. 48 You are witnesses of these things. 49 And behold, I am sending the promise of my Father upon you. But stay in the city until you are clothed with power from on high.”

CONFESSION OF SIN: Adapted from The Worship Sourcebook

ALL: Almighty God, in raising Jesus from the grave, you shattered the power of sin and death. We confess that we remain captive to doubt and fear, bound by the ways that lead to death. We overlook the poor and the marginalized and pass by those who mourn; we are deaf to the cries of the oppressed and indifferent to calls for peace; we despise the weak and abuse the earth you made. Forgive us, God of mercy. Help us to trust your power to change our lives and make us new, that we may know the joy of life abundant given in Jesus Christ, the risen Lord. Amen


ASSURANCE OF PARDON: Romans 8:9-11, NRSV

Leader: You are not in the flesh; you are in the Spirit, since the Spirit of God dwells in you. Anyone who does not have the Spirit of Christ does not belong to him. But if Christ is in you, though the body is dead because of sin, the Spirit is life because of righteousness. If the Spirit of him who raised Jesus from the dead dwells in you, he who raised Christ from the dead will give life to your mortal bodies also through his Spirit that dwells in you.

ALL: Come Holy Spirit.

BENEDICTION: Hebrews 13:20-21

LEADER: Now may the God of peace who brought again from the dead our Lord Jesus, the great shepherd of the sheep, by the blood of the eternal covenant, equip you with everything good that you may do his will, working in us that which is pleasing in his sight, through Jesus Christ, to whom be glory forever and ever.

ALL: Amen.

RELATED SCRIPTURES:

  • Isaiah 25:6-8
  • Ezekiel 37 
  • John 5:39
  • 1 Corinthians 15
  • 2 Corinthians 4:13-5:10

DISCUSSION QUESTIONS:

  1.  Easter was a week ago now. What did you feel/think about on that day? Has anything lingered since then? 
  2. What impression(s) did this story in Luke 24 make on you? 
  3. How did Jesus convince his doubting followers that he was not a ghost? Why do you think he did this? 
  4. In what way does Jesus’ commission in verse 47 challenge you? What has he given us to accomplish it?

QUOTES: 

 

  • That indestructibility of hope might be the central and most radical claim of Easter — that three days after Jesus was killed, he returned to his disciples physically and that made all the difference. Easter, then, is a not metaphor for new beginnings; it is about encountering the person who, despite every disappointment we experience with ourselves and with the world, gives us a reason to carry on. So this Easter I will make my way with my family to the South Side of Chicago, to that congregation that serves as our church home. I will do my best to join in the songs of celebration, not because I no longer feel the darkness that has marked so much of my journey, but because sometimes I still do. Esau McCauley
  • But now that the Savior has raised His body, death is no longer terrible, but all those who believe in Christ tread it underfoot as nothing, and prefer to die rather than to deny their faith in Christ, knowing full well that when they die they do not perish, but live indeed, and become incorruptible through the resurrection. But that devil who of old wickedly exulted in death, now that the pains of death are loosed, he alone it is who remains truly dead…Death used to be strong and terrible, but now, since the sojourn of the Savior and the death and resurrection of His body, it is despised; and obviously it is by the very Christ Who mounted on the cross that it has been destroyed and vanquished finally. When the sun rises after the night and the whole world is lit up by it, nobody doubts that it is the sun which has thus shed its light everywhere and driven away the dark. Equally clear is it, since this utter scorning and trampling down of death has ensued upon the Savior's manifestation in the body and His death on the cross, that it is He Himself Who brought death to nought and daily raises monuments to His victory in His own disciples. Athanasius
  • But in spite of the permanent state of mutation in which we exist, our personal identity is maintained and we are the same personal and psychological entity that we have always been. The same is undoubtedly true for our future resurrection bodies; they are remade, but we remain the same person. Michael F. Bird
  • Heaven is a glorious interlude but is not our final destination. Heaven is a temporary abode until the resurrection from the dead and the arrival of the new creation. It is the waiting place for people who belong in the new heavens and new earth. Though God made heaven and earth, he intends in the end to remake both and to join them together forever. Alister McGrath
  • Heaven is important, but it is not the end of the world….For believers, heaven is life after death, but resurrection is life after life after death. N.T. Wright
  • People often think that ‘resurrection’ simply means ‘life after death’ or ‘going to heaven’, but in the Jewish world of the first century it meant a new embodied life in God’s new world; a life after ‘life after death’, if you like. But the new body which will be given at the end is not identical to the previous one. In an act of new creation parallel to the original creation itself, God will make a new kind of material, no longer subject to death, out of the old one. In Jesus’ case, ofcourse, this happened right away, without his original body decaying, so that the new body was actually the transformation of the old one. For the rest of us, whose bodies will decay, and whose bones may well be burnt, it will take an act of new creation. N.T. Wright

BOOKS / DOCS