FROM THE DAWGHOUSE…
RESURRECTION: EVERYTHING HAS CHANGED!
“Everything will change. Everything has changed.”
British General Cornwallis
That’s a pretty close quote from the 2000 movie PATRIOT starring Mel Gibson. Cornwallis was forced to surrender some 8,000 troops to the rag tag American army and militia that he despised and uttered these words in shame and disbelief that he had lost. He couldn’t even turn over his own sword.
I’ve always loved those words because they could well have come from the lips of the Jewish authorities or Pontius Pilate himself when the body of Jesus could not be found and produced and when our Lord’s Disciples began proclaiming everywhere that Jesus was alive. If only those leaders had any idea what was to come!
The first Easter, everything changed.
Luke 24:1-12
But on the first day of the week, at early dawn, they went to the tomb, taking the spices they had prepared. 2 And they found the stone rolled away from the tomb, 3 but when they went in they did not find the body of the Lord Jesus. 4 While they were perplexed about this, behold, two men stood by them in dazzling apparel. 5 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? 6 He is not here, but has risen. Remember how he told you, while he was still in Galilee, 7 that the Son of Man must be delivered into the hands of sinful men and be crucified and on the third day rise.” 8 And they remembered his words, 9 and returning from the tomb they told all these things to the eleven and to all the rest. 10 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, 11 but these words seemed to them an idle tale, and they did not believe them. 12 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.
Everything changed that first Easter.
Facts are stubborn things. The grave was empty. The clothes were left behind, the guards were stunned and frozen in place. No Jewish or Roman authority could produce Jesus’ body. No citizen stepped forward to ask for a reward for producing the body. So many people saw Jesus alive in the 40 days after the Resurrection that it became a fact, though covered up and ignored by the leaders and the press.
Everything changed that first Easter.
- The power leaders of the day were proven wrong to have persecuted and crucify Jesus. People talk about Jesus but no one knows their names.
- The promise of Jesus that He would rise again was proven true…He was proven accurate and trustworthy in what He said. In fact, whatever Jesus said before His crucifixion and resurrection can now be looked back on as absolutely true.
- The ordinary numbers of everyday people who believed in Jesus were now energized and mobilized to confront all manner of opposition. It was from these first believers that we believers today are descended. Ordinary people who changed the world. Ordinary people often do and CAN change their world. Or more accurately, be used by the One True Extraordinary God to change the world.
Everything changed that first Easter.
▪ The fear of judgment was gone.
▪ The weight of guilt, relieved.
▪ The anxiety over death, dissolved.
▪ The focus on earthly wealth, refuted. ▪ The poison of shame, eliminated.
▪ The domination of disreputable leaders, shamed. Everything changed that first Easter.
Because the Resurrection is true, Christianity is true. All of it. All of what we find in the Word of God.
FORGE BROTHERS…
Let Easter into your life every day, and especially every Sunday. We worship on Sunday because it was on the first day of the week Jesus rose again from the dead.
Lean on your Omnipotent Savior every day!
Let His Resurrection prove that you have a new identity as the deeply beloved and redeemed son of the Most High God. That you now have a new purpose, character, confidence and legacy to live out every day!
Everything has changed.
And one day He will return and clean up all of the mess that remains in this broken world. Until then, we get to set straight what we can that is broken as we advance His Kingdom!
What a privilege! Glad to be fighting with you!
You take it to heart!
Pete Alwinson
