Why Do You Seek the Living Among the Dead?

 I encourage you to have a copy of God's word open. Luke chapter 24. The Bible is new to you then 10 51 is the page number in the Pew Bible. Uh, before you. Also, you'll notice in the chairs that are in front of you, there's a number of cards. One of those says Connect card. If every one of you would take those and fill it out and let us know how we can be praying for you and your family, you can drop that card in the offering basket as it comes down the aisle after the sermon, and that'll help us know how we can get to know you and connect you to the life of Trinity.

But even if you just want us to pray for you, we would count that as a huge privilege and responsibility of our elders to do so. It is remarkable that men and women have died given their life burned, sought into, stretched, abandoned, to translate God's word into English. And we take it for granted all the time.

But I wonder this morning as we learn about the cornerstone of our faith, the resurrection. If it might dawn on you afresh that this word that Luke wrote first to Theophilus, Luke, chapter one, now extends to you. Oh, brothers and sisters. Oh, friends. And so if you're willing and able, would you please stand with me as you read Luke chapter 24, beginning at verse one, will read down through verse 12, and this is God's inherent holy word.

Given to you in love, please give your attention to it.

But on the first day of the week, at early Dawn, they went up 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. And 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 11 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 seem 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.

The grass withers and the flowers fade, but God's word stands forever. This is the word of the Lord. Thanks, speedy God. You may be seated. Please. Father, would you take your word, your living ever present, active word, and would you change us by it? Would you shape us by it? Would you, Lord mold us more and more into your image for your glory sake?

And would you help those of us who are just curious about this Christianity thing, this gospel, oh, father, would you show us the beauty of your son? And we pray these things in Jesus name. Amen.

Why do you seek the living among the dead? What an odd question to ask grieving women in a graveyard. This question seems outta place. Why seek the living among the dead? But it is a deeply theological question. Of course, you know, it's a question that doesn't just confront the assumption of the women who came with spices in hand to the tomb, but it confronts you.

And it confronts me.

Luke records the historical account of the resurrection for a young person named Theophilus, young or Old. Actually, we don't know. We imagine Theophilus was a gentleman of high status, perhaps even commissioned Luke to do the historical research that he set out to do. And Luke and Acts all one story, one author, same story broken up between the gospel and the acts of the apostles.

And through though these disciples, when they first heard the news about Jesus's resurrection from Mary and the others, they thought it was a lay Ross, a tale of nonsense, an idle tale that ESV calls it. And yet, how would you explain that? Within a matter of days, these same disciples who thought that these women were just babbly nonsense, were so convinced of the truth of what had just happened.

That they indeed were willing to give their lives in preaching about this good news. All of them, but one and that one, John was exiled to the island of Patmos. What happened in the days following that caused these men to believe what they once thought was an idol tale? How are we to understand this? And throughout the book of Acts, the resurrection is consistently proclaimed as the central gospel message wine because the disciples experienced how the resurrection of Jesus turns the world upside down.

Or better yet, we might say right side up. And if you're here and you're not a Christian, you place your faith in some other religion. It is the central doctrine of the resurrection that separates Christianity from all other religions. Because in all of the religions, they're a great leader. He indeed did die, but it's only in Christianity that Jesus Christ rose again from the dead.

Hallelujah. Hallelujah. I wonder if you know that the disciples experienced how the resurrection of Jesus turned the world upside down, and I wonder if you understand that too. The early church. He treasured this truth. He took it seriously because it was the very cornerstone of the Apostles teaching In Acts chapter one, when the Apostles elected a replacement for Judas, what was the one condition that that person must fulfill?

He must be a witness of what? Oh, Jesus' teaching of seeing him crucified? No, he must be a witness to the resurrection. On the day of Pentecost Peter's first sermon, sinners on the resurrection. Of all the things Peter could have said. He said this, Jesus Acts 2 23 and 24 delivered up according to the definite plan and foreknowledge of God, you crucified and killed by the hands of lawless men.

But God raised up loosened the pangs of death because it was not possible for him to be held by it.

Maybe he goes on to a new topic, but oh no. Peter's second sermon. In the second sermon, Peter says, you killed the Author of Life Acts chapter three, whom God raised from the dead. And to this, we are witnesses and the resurrection continues to be central in the Apostles teaching all throughout the book of Acts chapter four, they were teaching the people and proclaiming in Jesus the resurrection from the dead.

Later in chapter four, by the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth, whom you crucified, whom God raised from the dead. And with great power, the apostles were giving their testimony to the resurrection of the Lord Jesus Christ. And as they gave the testimony of Jesus' resurrection, Luke says, great grace was upon them all later, Paul, the one who tracked down Christians to kill them, converted on the road to Damascus.

In Acts chapter nine, verse six. Paul says God raised him from the dead and as for the fact that he raised him from the dead, no more to return to corruption, he has spoken in this way. And then he quotes the Old Testament. In Acts chapter 17. Paul was explaining and proving that it was necessary for Christ to suffer and rise from the dead.

In Acts, uh, later in 17, the Athenians react to Paul because he was preaching Jesus and the resurrection. Are you hearing me? Are you getting my point? On trial, Paul declares before the Sanhedrin of all the things he could have said. It was with respect to the hope and the resurrection of the dead that I Paul says, am on trial before Governor Felix Paul repeats himself.

It is with respect, sir, to the resurrection of the dead that I am on trial. Before you this day and before King Agrippa, does Paul find a different message? No, he does not. That the Christ must suffer. And that by being the first to rise from the dead, he would proclaim light and beyond the testimony of the early church in the first century.

Paul writes, he writes the letter in the second missionary journey to the thess, uh, to Thess, uh, uh, lanica. And he says to them. You turn to God from idols to serve the living and true God, and to wait for his son from heaven whom he raised from the dead Jesus, to deliver us from the wrath to come. And five years later after that, in Corinth, Paul writes the earliest Credle summary of the gospel.

Christ died for our sins in accordance with the scriptures and that he was buried and that he was raised on the third day according to the scriptures.

Now friends, I tell you all of this because Luke writes these words to Theophilus about five years after Paul writes to the Corinthians, and Luke's point is this O Theophilus. And to each one of us here today, the resurrection of Jesus Christ is not a myth. It is not a metaphor. It is the fulfillment of God's promise.

It's the foundation of our faith, and it is the invitation to respond to the reign of our risen savior. And Luke wants us like he does Theophilus to examine the lens of the resurrection through three people. And just in a few moments, I want us to take us through these three different perspectives of the Women, of the Disciples, and of Peter.

And I wonder which of these groups of people you most relate to this morning. First look with me at the women. Luke tells us that these women came early in the morning with Omata in Greek, with spices. They were looking for a corpse. They did not expect a miracle in the Greek, Luke has a play on words with the word find in English.

He says that they found the tomb empty and they did not find the body. Luke sets up a kind of tension in the story and immediately what is the, what are the ladies' response? It's the same response that you and I might have if you, if you come to a graveside to be able to show honor to someone who has died.

What does it mean? It means that you believe that you were gonna find the body. They knew about Lazarus. They knew that after four days. As the King James version says, he stinketh. And so they come to Jesus with spices to anoint his body to honor their teacher, their rabbi, and it says, notice what the text says when they found the tomb rolled away.

Verse four, they were perplexed about this. The word perplexed in Greek means to be at a complete loss. Unsure, uncertain. To be confused, to be befuddled, to be lost in wonder, to not really know what to do next. Spices in hand jars with us coming to the resurrection, you can see the story and the truss above me.

These ladies brought these spice jars to the resurrection, I mean to the tomb, to anoint him, and yet they find the tomb empty. They're perplexed. And some of us too, when we come. To Easter Sunday, we have all kinds of plans, spices and hands. Easter, dress on ready for the photography after the service with a preacher.

Hurry and step down so we can take a picture at the fireplace. But you know what? Jesus meets us in our perplexity. And what does he say? He has two dazzling men, angels who appear to the women and they confront the women. They confront the women in order to bring an awareness to them. What do they say to them?

It says, why do you seek the living? Among the dead. What a strange question. And the next thing he says to them is he says, remember, of course, when they appear to these women, they fall on their face, they hit the dust frightened by what they see, and he says to them, do you remember the words earlier, Luke chapter nine, another time when the disciples marvel, Jesus said to them so clearly.

I'm gonna be delivered in the hands of sinful men, but in three days I will rise. You can't say it any clearer, but they didn't get it. I appreciate that. 'cause it reminds me about myself. Jesus can say things to me in his word, and even though I'm a student of the Bible, sometimes I just don't get it sometimes.

How about you? Isn't it interesting how these angels lead these women in a proclamation of the truth of the resurrection? They pastor these ladies. They don't just say he has risen. They say in your perplexity and in your fear. Remember, he takes them back to God's word. The same is true for us. If you're here and you're perplexed by this whole Easter idea, I encourage you to go back to his word, to read it for yourself, to see what indeed is true.

It's right there. Luke set out to write a historical account for Theophilus, and he goes through painstaking detail to say, first of all, the women were perplexed and they were frightened, and they were brought back to the word. Secondly, the disciples. After these women remembered what Jesus had said to them, they ran to the apostles.

And when they ran to the apostles, it says in verse 11, these words seem to them, the apostles, a lero, an idol tale. In ancient Greek literature, you wouldn't pick this up, but Luke certainly knew Theophilus would the opposite of logos. The word was leros, an idle tale. And here these women are these women.

Oh, in a system and in a world that devalued the testimony of women who needed to hitch their wagons to a man in order to have a voice in court who traveled in packs because that was the safest way for women to travel. Here are these women. Were the first to see the resurrection of the Lord Jesus Christ.

And they understood that it was the Lagos of God who had risen from the dead. They got it. They understood his word, but oh, the men who should have been responsible to understand it, they thought it was a laro. The women, the Lagos, the men, the Laro and Ile tale. And I wonder about you friends. Don't you know that your body is aging right now?

I'm 47. I feel older than that on some days, and one of these days, one of my profound privileges as your pastor is going to be to lead your funeral and someone in this room is gonna be the last among us to die,

and death is a result of sin.

And the glorious good news of the gospel is that when Jesus rose from the dead, he slammed the door on death, and he set us free for all eternity. Hallelujah. We will go through the valley of the shadow of death because of our fallen human nature. But Jesus in his resurrection, reverses the curse. Jesus vindicates his perfect life for us.

He lived the life we could not live, and he died the death we should have died. And in his resurrection, it is a foretaste of how we too will be resurrected with him. The first Adam fell in sin and we all by taking upon Adam's nature. Also are born with a sinful disposition, completely, totally depraved, and it is only the Lord Jesus who enters into the frailty of humanity to live a life that we couldn't live.

And he died on our behalf as though to say, give me your best shot. And he rose again from the dead. Why? To give us the assurance of his vindication that everything he said was true and that he has indeed defeated. Death itself. And so one day my friends, we will rise again with Christ and some of us this morning.

We look at the resurrection and we think it's an idol tale. These disciples were taught by Jesus in his seminary. They knew the Old Testament better than you, and that they still struggled to believe. What are your objections to letting the gospel shape your life? Because the resurrection proclaims a truth that is not just a doctrine to be believed.

It provides a worldview through which you are able to see everything about life, the way you raise your kids, the way you go to work, the way that you work in your firm, the way that you think about the future. Why? Because history has a direction and death has been defeated. You see the example? Of the women, you see the example of the disciples.

And lastly, you see Peter's response. Oh, Peter, who the last time he was with Jesus denied him. And here's Jesus. I mean, here's Peter, maybe still feeling the way to responsibility that he owed to his rabbi for denying him. He goes and he runs to the tomb, and when he goes and he runs to the tomb. He humbles himself.

He stoops and he looks in and he sees the linen cloths there, and immediately he begins to marvel at what had happened as he goes home. What is Peter doing? Peter is teaching us what it means to worship. He's making connections. A good definition of worship might be to marvel at the empty tomb. And we do that week after week after week after week.

That's why we worship on Sunday, the Lord's day, the day of his resurrection, and we await the great day when Jesus comes again to make everything new. And we will also be raised with him if you believe these things. And I wonder if you do.

I don't mean just intellectually. I wonder if it shapes your life. I wonder if you're allowing the resurrection to be a world of youth through which you see everything about life. If so, why are you so defensive about your politics?

If so, why are you so defensive? When you argue with your spouse, don't you know that you've been given a new nature, a foretaste of everlasting life? Don't you know he's called us into a counter-cultural community for the common good called the church. To live and serve and care for each other. Don't you know oh husbands that he has called you to lay your life down for your wife?

Don't you know oh wives that he has called you to respect and honor your husbands? Don't you know that it should shape our world? Listen, if this church didn't exist, would Tulsa be any different? I wonder We are a resurrection people. And on this glorious resurrection day, we learned that when Jesus rose again from the dead, the profound discovery of that truth for Peter was that all a fallen creation was turned on its head, and the curse was reversed because it was a pronouncement that the new creation had begun.

The new creation had begun as with Jesus as the first fruits and at the right hand and receding for us and by his in dwelling Holy Spirit in dwelling you and in dwelling me so that we might be people who live as though death indeed has been defeated. Where oh grave is thy victory. Where oh, death is thy sting.

And may we together be people standing. Like o Theophilus reading this for the first time, recognizing in the women our own perplexity about it, and recognizing in the disciples our tendency to see it as an idle tale. But may we like Peter, and may you, if you're here, search his word. See the beauty of Christ who rose again from the dead.

A historical account a fact. Investigate it, discover it, find it to be true, and find yourself. Set free in him. Hallelujah Hall. Hallelujah. Let's pray together. Father, thank you that the resurrection means that we are no longer captive to what? Enslaves us. You are risen for our justification. You are risen for our sanctification.

And you're risen. Father, for our eternal life, blessed be you, God, and father of our Lord Jesus. According to your great mercy, you have caused us to be born again to a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead. And so we praise your great name for your glory and honor in Christ.

We ask and praise you. Amen.

Sermon transcript is computer generated.