The Part in the Middle: Why the Life, Death & Resurrection of Jesus Matter

“The Part in the Middle: Why the Life of Jesus Matters”
 Message @ Jericho Ridge Community Church – Easter Sunday, April 16, 2017
Text: Romans 1:2-5 // Series: Your Kingdom Come

Welcome here to Jericho Ridge.  We’re glad you are with us on this Easter Sunday morning.  I don’t know about you, but when our family started going to church growing up there was a lot of stuff that puzzled me. 

For example, it took me a long time to know when to stand and when to sit.  Some of the songs and words in the songs were puzzling to me.  It was puzzling to me that when the talked about communion they said “bread” but they gave us crackers.  They said “wine” but they gave us grape juice.  It took me awhile to figure some of that stuff out.  But then I noticed other things that puzzled me. 

Like we would say stuff that I wasn’t sure about.  Take the Apostles Creed – one of the earliest recorded summaries of what Christians believe.  The middle part reads as follows…“I believe in Jesus Christ, God's only Son, our Lord, who was conceived by the Holy Spirit, born of  the Virgin Mary, suffered under Pontius Pilate, was crucified, died, and was buried; he descended to the dead. On the third day he rose again; he ascended into heaven, he is seated at the right hand of the Father, and he will come again to judge the living and the dead.”             

The part that confused me as a kid was “On the third day rose again”.  I mean, I was pretty sure that in Sunday School or Kids Church that I had heard that Jesus only rose from the Grave on the very first Easter Sunday.  But those Apostles seem to think he rose again and again?!  That puzzled me.  Then there is another line later on in that creed that says I believe in one Holy Catholic Apostolic Church”.  I remember clearly watching people around me mouth these words and thinking: um, guys.  We don’t go to an Apostolic Church or to a Catholic Church.  We go to a Baptist Church! Why are you saying you believe in those churches?”  I didn’t realize that the word Catholic also means the church universal or global and the word apostolic means “sent one” so it highlights the mission focused nature of the church.  But I was too young to get any of that so I would actually, and it pains me to publically admit this now, I would substitute BAPTIST for the word Catholic. When I said the Apostles Creed, it was “I believe in the Holy Baptist Church, the communion of saints, the forgiveness of sins!” 

But as I took another look at the creeds as an adult, I began to notice an emphasis gap.  A missing piece of the puzzle.  See if you can spot it as I read through the Nicene creed.  This creed was formulated in the 4^th Century as a response to spreading of inaccurate teaching that suggested that Jesus wasn’t really the son of God or divine, he just appeared that way or became that later. 

Nicene Creed

We believe in one Lord, Jesus Christ, the only Son of God… For us and for our salvation he came down from heaven, was incarnate of the Holy Spirit and the Virgin Mary and became truly human. For our sake he was crucified under Pontius Pilate; he suffered death and was buried. On the third day he rose again in accordance with the Scriptures; he ascended into heaven and is seated at the right hand of the Father. He will come again in glory to judge the living and the dead, and his kingdom will have no end.” Amen

Did you spot the missing piece of the puzzle?  This didn’t quite hit me until last fall when I picked up a book by English theologian N.T. Wright, whom I highly regard and highly recommend.  He notes that when we read the creeds, we get a kind of highlights reel… similar to how many people live our lives on social media.  But we also miss a key element: It’s right in this space here…  Born of the virgin Mary, suffered under Pontius Pilate… HOLD ON a minute… There’s a lot we are missing in the space between those two sentences!  Most of the LIFE of Jesus!   Right in that gap, we are missing the vast majority of Matthew, Mark, Luke and John’s Gospels.  The gospels put the emphasis on the LIFE of Jesus as well as His death and resurrection.  And if we miss that element, we are missing a massive part of the point.  Skipping Jesus’ life is a significant GAP! 

This forces us to ask the question why is the life of Jesus important?  Why didn’t He just get born at Christmas, get killed at Good Friday and then get resurrected on Easter Sunday?  Why do the Gospel records spend some much time focused on His life: what He did and said walking here on earth some 2,000 years ago?

We see part of the reason in Romans 1.  What we are reminded of is that God has been unfolding His story throughout human history.  When we teach the kids here at Jericho, we use the term The BIG God story to help them understand that just like we saw in that video that played at the start of our gathering, throughout history, God has been unfolding His plan.  And when it comes to Easter, we see that the life and death and resurrection of Jesus play a pivotal, life-changing role in this plan not merely for humankind, but for you and for me.    

Turn with me in your Bibles or on your device to Romans 1.Here we see why Easter is about Good News [Romans 1:2-5]

In these few short verses, we see the 4 P’s [photo] of Easter.  Problem, Promise, Person and Proclamation. 

The Good news of Easter doesn’t start with the Resurrection. Or Good Friday. Or Palm Sunday or even the manger.  It starts way back in a garden.  It actually starts with a problem. 

You see, way back at the beginning of human history, our forbearers, Adam and Eve were given the freedom to choose.  And the bad news part of the story is that they chose, like each and every human being since, to turn away from God. 

The Problem: Sin & Death

• Adam & Eve (Genesis 1-3)
  • This separation from God impacts every person

To reject God’s goodness and His commands in place for their protection and their flourishing.  And the sin and death entered our world and have been an ever-present struggle for us individually and the global human family each day and in every single human heart.  Every story has a problem to overcome.  And for each of us, that problem is sin and death.  Paul goes on to talk extensively about this in 1:18 “But God shows His anger from heaven against all sinful wicked people who suppress the truth by their wickedness.”  All have sinned.

But almost immediately we move to the second “P”, first is the problem, the second is The PROMISE: Rescue

• Made to Adam & Eve (Genesis 1-3)

God Himself will come and RESCUE people

That He will not leave His created children alone in the world suffering under the weight of sin and separation.  God promises that He will come and make things right.  Evil may appear to have an upper hand for now but this will not last forever. Adam and Eve are promised that a deliverer will come to crush Satan.  

This promise of Rescue is Reiterated to King David

• God will establish His righteous RULERSHIP over all

David, while rich, powerful successful and capable of effecting massive change in his culture and for his country, was, like each of us, ultimately unable to effect change in the human heart.  In his own, or in the lives of others.  But in His grace, God promised that one day, a king would come, from David’s descendants and this King would set up an everlasting kingdom.  It would have no ending.  This king would bring something that each one of us desperately needs: peace to our troubled hearts and weary souls.   

The Promise of Rescue was again repeated and

• Written down by Prophets in the Holy Scriptures

God will RELEASE the captives & RESTORE all things

Romans 1:2 says “God promised this Good News long ago through his prophets in the Holy Scriptures” 

Many long years passed and nothing seemed to be happening.  God seemed distant and absent for over 400 years of silence.  And then, the promise became a PERSON. The Person of Jesus. 

Romans 1:3 says it this way “This Good News is about [God’s] Son. In his earthly life we was born into King David’s family line”… 

You see part of the reason that Jesus life is important is that we realize that He came to show us how deep the Father’s Love for us is.  Our Confession of Faith puts it this way “Christ stands at the very centre of the Christian faith; in him, God brought His many acts of self-disclosure in human history to a climax.”  God made himself known supremely in Jesus.  Beforehand, God spoke through the prophets, but now at last, God reveals himself to us as humankind in the person and work of Jesus.  The perfect life that He lives.  The miracles that He did. The grace and mercy he embodied.  The way he challenged injustice.     

New Testament scholar and historian Douglas Moo reminds us that “This is why the focus of the gospels is on the person of Jesus, not merely on a set of propositions.”  Religion is about rules; but Christianity is about a person! 

Look at all of the names the person of Jesus is given packed into these few short verses: Son of God, Son of David, Messiah, Lord”…  This is our king!  The one who is the Way.  The one who is the truth.  The one who is the Life. 

This is why Easter is such a big deal for Christians.  Because the resurrection ushers in a new age of redemption & reconciliation because The Person of Jesus:

• “He was shown to be the Son of God when He was raised from the dead by the power of the Holy Spirit…” Romans 1:4  

Now, don’t hear what Paul isn’t saying.  He is not in any way suggesting that Jesus only became the Son of God on Easter Sunday morning when He was raised from the grave.  This word “shown” means more like “vindicated” or “declared”.  It’s like the empty tomb shouts out: Jesus’ life, the things He taught, the way He lived, you and I are called to follow Him and to live as He lived.  This is not always glamourous. It often manifests in the small, unseen things of life. 

During Jesus’ earthly ministry, He was shown to be the Son of God in weakness and lowliness. The humble king, amongst His people as one who serves. But at the moment when that stone was rolled away from that tomb, Jesus was amongst His people in power.  On Good Friday on that cross, where Jesus willingly bled and suffered for you and I to do that which no one can do for themselves: atone for sin.  We see the king hanging His head in apparent defeat.  But on Easter Sunday morning, we see the King in POWER where not ever the cords of death and the grave could hold onto him!  We see the King risen in exaltation and might.  We see the King conquering sin, death & we worship!

This is why Easter is such a big deal for Christians because Jesus’ resurrection is the “first installment” payment of what is to come.  We are reminded that just as the Holy Spirit raised Jesus, so too, those who are indwelt by the Spirit of God have through that spirit, their assurance of their own resurrection.  The good news is that God has done for us what we could not do for ourselves.  He has solved once and forever the problem of sin that separates humankind from a holy God.  He has fulfilled the promises God made to His people through the prophets and in the Holy Scriptures.  And in the person of Jesus, His life, His death, His burial and most supremely His resurrection, God has declared His power.

And that is how our text this morning finishes: Look with me at Romans 1:4 and into verse 5… “He is Jesus Christ, our Lord.  And through Christ, God has given you and I the privilege to tell people everywhere what God has done for them, so that they will believe and obey Him brining glory to His name” 

So we come to our fourth P this Easter Sunday morning.  From Problem to Promise to Person and now to you and me.  To Our Profession.  An invitation to declaration.  The empty tomb becomes us not just to come and behold, but also to consider. To ponder and to ask for gracious faith to believe and proclaim.    

Now many people when they hear the word “believe” think immediately of the creeds.  A list of things to which I must give mental assent and affirmation in order to get into Christian club.  But just like the focus on the gospels isn’t on a set of propositions, but on the person of Jesus, so too, your belief needs to be relationally oriented. That by believing you might have LIFE in His name.   

• To “believe” something is not merely mental assent to propositional statements; it is an expression of lived trust and devotion.

Let me give you an example that Mike and John shared with our students in our Source program over the past few months.  Imagine that Pastor Wally burst through the doors of the banquet hall and said “Guys!  The building is on fire!!!  Get out now!  There’s smoke in the hallways, follow me… I can lead you to safety!”  Now, first, Let me assure you that the building is not on fire and Pastor Wally is not a panicky guy.  But let’s pretend for a moment that the building was indeed on fire and he continued to implore us to leave but we all stayed in our seats and kept right on talking, kept on with music and coffee.  We can say all we want that we “believe” Wally, but our actions need to then fall in line.  To believe something is true means acting as if were true. 

So when it comes to the resurrection, it does nothing to simply say “sure, why not.  I guess God has enough power to raise someone from the dead. I could get there in my head.  He is God of the universe, after all.”  In order to show that you believe something, you have to live it.  You have to act as if that thing were true.  Belief is an expression of lived trust and devotion. 

So when Paul says “the reason we have received both a privileged commission and a divine authority is to declare to declare to others what God has done for them”  SO THAT they will believe Him. 

Friend, you might be here today and you might think this whole resurrection / Jesus is thing is simply too much for me to believe.  Let me remind you that faith necessary to believe is not something that you simply muster up.  This too if is gift from a gracious God who loves you and wants you to be in relationship with Him.  In a few moments I’m going to lead you in a prayer inviting God to do that.

The second part of this declaration is equality important, however.  We not only are to believe but we are also to. 

2. OBEY

John 14:15 reminds us that if we say that we love Jesus, we will obey His commands.  Friend, let me put it plainly to you this morning.  If you have no intention of following Jesus’s teachings, the ethnical commands that He has established to keep you from harm and to guide you into wisdom and peace, then DO NOT call yourself a Christian.  You have no business using that label to describe yourself if you are living a life that does not resemble the life that Jesus lived.  The compassion, the love for people who are poor, the sense of purity and holiness in areas of sexuality, the generosity in the area of finances, patience when people or circumstances try and trouble you.  Christians Trust & OBEY!

This is part of the reason that Jesus lived.  So that we could see the fullest revelation of God’s design for us as people.  This is what it means to be a Christian – you say to God and to others “by the empowering work of your Holy Spirit, I desire to pattern my life after the One I follow.   

“So that they will believe AND obey Him…” (1:5)

• “Christianity is an experience of imitating Jesus” Diana Butler Bass (in Christianity After Religion)

In her excellent book “Christianity After Religion” Diana Butler Bass makes the case that Christianity isn’t a set of dead religious principles to be blindly followed.  It is a lived experience of imitating and seeking to imitate Jesus. 

If you are a person who names the name of Jesus, this Easter is a good time to ask ourselves again, am I following God in the way of Jesus or am I just nodding to a bunch of words on a page.  The resurrection is an invitation to declaration:

This is the substance of Christian hope.  This is what we in faith proclaim and

3. DECLARE

That we desire to live out of a place of

• It is a grace-filled authority that comes from a life lived in congruity with what we know to be true in our hearts and in our heads and our hands

None of us does this perfectly, but we press in for forgiveness and mercy and as we do, this is what brings glory to the name of Jesus, our King.  When we believe and obey and declare with our lives the resurrection truth “I believe In Jesus Christ, who on the third day rose from the grave FOR ME”

Butler Bass suggests that in order to fully live into this, we need to return again to a more ancient a more holistic way of thinking about the term “believe” and what it means to say the words “I believe in God…”  She suggests helpfully that what we really are saying when we say “I believe” is really “I TRUST”. 

• “I trust in God the Father Almighty, Maker of heaven and earth. And [I trust] in Jesus Christ, His only Son, our Lord…” (The Apostles’ Creed) I trust in the resurrection and in the Holy Spirit…

“Notice that when we insert ourselves as those who must trust, the tone changes and the Apostle’s creed takes on the quality of a prayer… It evokes humility, hope and a bit of faithful supplication” (CAA, 132). 

This resurrection morning, we are gathered to declare not only with our voices but also with our lives, that we TRUST in our King.  Let’s Pray together.   

“I give my heart to God the Almighty and All-Powerful One who created the Universe, and Jesus Christ, God’s only Son, who through the power of the Holy Spirit was born of the Virgin Mary… And I give my heart to the Holy Spirit, devoting myself to the communion of saints, trusting in the forgiveness of sins, the resurrection of the body, and life everlasting.”  [ADD Salvation prayer]

Chris and the band are here and they will begin to lead us in three songs of response.  Several other response  options will also be available for you.  One will be our prayer team today.  These are people who are trusted and known in our community.  Ali Nicolle, Curtis Cottrell, Meg and Myself.  We will be at the sides and back and we invite you to come and let us know how we can pray with you or for you.  You might be facing something dark or challenging.  You might need to celebrate with someone this morning.  We count it a privilege to do this as an expression of lived faith in the power of Prayer and a God who hears & responds. 

Another creative response that we have prepared this morning is a series of vignettes, images that help us spark our holy imaginations to see and to celebrate the amazing King and God that we love and serve.  Ruth Ellen is going to lead us through this and there be a picture, Ruth Ellen as the leader will remind us of truth and they when the words go up on the screens, you will be invited to say them out loud all together as a congregational response.  I invite you to stand with me if you are able as we believe, obey and declare our trust in the one who is out King!