EASTER - He is Risen!
Week of April 13th
The Message of the Cross
1 Corinthians 1:18
“For the message of the cross is foolishness to those
who are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God.”
Unfortunately, to most of us in this room, our
concept of Easter is just another Sunday at church (dressed in matching
pastels) followed by an egg hunt, some good food, a ton of bunnies and
chocolate, and an abundance of whatever we “gave up” for Lent.
This year has
to be different.
We have spent the entire year at Ozone telling you
about Jesus - who he was, how that should affect our day-to-day lives, and how
we should share that with other people. But what we have to understand is that
in the true meaning of Easter, Jesus
gets his power. It’s only because of
Easter that we have a reason to celebrate and follow our Savior, Jesus
Christ. Without Easter, there is no Ozone. Without Easter, there is no Christian
church. Without Easter, there is no power.
You see the message of the cross is that our debt has been paid. HALLELUJAH, our
debt has been paid!! We are all sinners - broken, dirty and jacked up. When we
sin, we sin against our Father - the Creator God, and because of that we deserve his wrath.
Romans 3:23
“For all have sinned and fallen short
of the glory of God…”
Romans 6:23
“The wages of sin is death…”
But God, in his great love for us, sent his only
son to humbly put on flesh, become a human, and pay our debt on the cross.
Colossians 2:13-15
“When you were dead in your sins and in the
uncircumcision of your sinful nature, God made you alive with Christ. He
forgave us all our sins, having canceled the written code, with its regulations
that was against us and that stood opposed to us; he took it all away nailing it to the cross. And having
disarmed the powers and authorities, he made a public spectacle of them, triumphing over them by the cross.”
Romans 5:8-9
“But God demonstrates his own love for us in this:
While we were still sinners, Christ died for us. Since we have now been
justified by his blood, how much more shall we be saved from God’s wrath
through him! For if, when were God’s enemies, we were reconciled to him through
the death of his Son, how much more having been reconciled, shall we be saved
through his life!”
Romans 8:3-4
“For what the law was powerless to do in that it
was weakened by the sinful nature, God did by sending his own Son in the
likeness of sinful man to be a sin offering. And so he condemned sin in sinful
man, in order that the righteous requirements of the law might be fully met in
us, who do not live according to the sinful nature but according to the
Spirit.”
The message of the cross is that Jesus took our
wrath - fully. Because of the cross we are forgiven. We are righteous.
We are loved by a God that doesn’t need us to get our stuff together before we
come to him, but instead, only because of Jesus, is able to meet us in
our junk, and love us nonetheless. It may seem weird that the day we celebrate
for the brutal, humiliating death of our Savior is called Good Friday, but the truth is there is nothing more good than the message of the cross.
Romans 8:31-32
“If God is for us, who can be against us? He who
did not spare his own Son, but gave him up for us all - how will he not also,
along with him, graciously give us all things?”
Galatians 2:20
“I have been crucified with Christ and I no longer
live, but Christ lives in me. The life I lived in the body, I live by faith in
the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me.”
Not the End of the Story…
Now unfortunately, a lot of Christians don’t go
beyond the cross... Yes, the cross is important, monumental, even, but it’s not
the end of the story. Doesn’t everyone die? If Jesus just died on the cross, how do we know our sin is paid for? How do
we know death is dead and eternal life is real? How do we know?
The
resurrection.
Easter Sunday is the celebration of Jesus rising
from the grave - defeating death once and for all. It’s the picture of God’s
power and might and also his great love for us. On his one and only son, God
poured out all his wrath - the full cup. Christ was buried and on the third day
he rose again, in fulfillment of the scriptures. Those of us who are in Christ
Jesus, therefore, are crucified with Christ and, similarly, raised with Christ.
Death has lost its power over us and eternal life has taken its spot.
Hallelujah!
1 Corinthians 15:55-57
“Where, O death, is your victory? Where, O death,
is your sting? The sting of death is sin, and the power of sin is the law. But thanks
be to God! He gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ.”
1 Peter 1:3-4a
“Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus
Christ! In his great mercy he has given us new birth into a living hope through
the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead, and into an inheritance that
can never perish, spoil or fade…”
Conclusion
So our hope this week is that this Easter would be different. Despite the Easter Egg hunts,
family brunches, pastel outfits and chocolate bunnies, this Easter should be about more - it should be about the power of
BOTH the Cross and the Resurrection. We want you to remember. To realize that what we celebrate this weekend is the
POWER of GOD. It’s the heartbeat of our faith. The foundation of what we’re
fighting for and what we’re hoping in. The death and resurrection of Christ
Jesus on that first Easter changed our lives forever. Don’t let another day go
by without recognizing the unfathomable, unbeatable love of God our Father
displayed in the cross and resurrection of Christ.
“But he was pierced for our
transgressions, he was crushed for our iniquities; the punishment that brought
us peace was upon him, and
by his wounds we are healed.”
Isaiah 53:5
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