Everything Changes

First Sunday of Easter, Year A

Matthew 28:1-10

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:01

Well, the way that the Gospel of Matthew depicts the resurrection of our Lord Jesus Christ suggests that a new day has dawned, that everything is different, or better yet, that everything has changed. But what is changed? What is different? When we talk about resurrection, do we fully understand and comprehend the power that resurrection holds? You can say that resurrection is actually Christ wielding the power that we wanted him to wield when he was being beaten, but he abstained. He allowed the strongholds of men to force their power upon him. And it seems like men who put things to death had their victory over the Son of God. And here, right at the beginning of resurrection, we see that Matthew points us back to Genesis. He tells us, on the first day, there was light that dawned. And if you're a reader or a student of the scriptures, that should take you all the way back to the opening of Genesis, where it says, on the first day, God said, Let there be light, and there was light. God has already given you an Easter egg at the opening of the book, how it is all going to end. That there is darkness and chaos. But it's then and there that God shines forth his light by the very command of his voice. Let there be light and there was light. And so Matthew breaks open this narrative about Jesus' own resurrection by what? By saying there's a new Genesis, there's a new creation that is dawning on this day. Everything, everything is different. And my friends, that is good news for you. There's a lot of questions that as if you've been walking with Jesus this week and you've been reading about his beatings, his crucifying, him on the cross, him being mocked, there's this scene where both the leaders of men and the crowds themselves are like, to save yourself. Call on a host of angels to come and rescue you, come to your aid if you are the Son of God. If you are the Son of God, save yourself. You heal blind people, but you're going to allow yourself to be beaten and to be crucified. And then now we're going to watch you being laying in a grave in a tomb with a stone rolled in front of it. Jesus didn't wield any power. And yet we're like, why not? We know he is the most powerful being in all the world. Why doesn't he execute it? But consider this: if he did, if he did all of that, if he showed his power and his might before when it was too soon, you know what we probably would have done? Well, I guess he never faced death head on. So we don't really know if he can die because he never faced death. We would find some way to speculate, as if Jesus is still not powerful. And yet, Jesus does display his power after all of mankind executes as much strength and power over him as possible by putting him to death. That was their greatest weapon. If you kill him, then he is done for. You have these leaders, these authorities with a whole Roman army who continues to guard the tomb, the greatest army at this present time in all of history. And they execute their full strength. They have Jerusalem built up by stacks of stones. They have a temple built up with stacks of stones, a mighty fortress, strongholds built with stones. And then they put God to death. But now, Easter morning, it's Jesus' turn. Now, what you what we just read in the gospel lesson is the display of the unlimited power of Jesus Christ. Now that man has exercised as strong as he is, Jesus moves to display how unlimited his power is. For we're told not only that this is a new creation, that Jesus, by him just resurrecting from life or from the dead into life, he is the firstborn of the dead. Death, the greatest enemy and weapon of man, was no weapon at all with Jesus. You could say somebody is powerful if they take your life. But you know who's more powerful? The one who can bring life and death. So right off the front page of chapter 28, we see Jesus come to life. That death, the strongest weapon of man, was defeated. Then we see other powers unfold. The stone that represents all these mighty fortresses of man, how they erect all these massive buildings and all these strongholds around cities. Jesus doesn't ask for a whole host of angels to come and to rescue and to help and to aid him. Jesus sends one. And it's at the presence of this one angel. He descends, and the whole earth shakes at the power of the resurrection of Jesus Christ. And the angel descends and just takes his two fingers and rolls the stone away. Even the stones that man tried to erect for their mighty fortresses can do nothing but crumble under the power of Jesus. And that represents the stone being rolled away. That man cannot withhold the very thing that God has the power to do, which is bring forth life from the dead. But not only that, these mighty men, these soldiers, the one that were mocking and beating Jesus, thinking that they were so strong that if this is the Son of God, man, he his cheeks bleed just like mine do. Bam! Knocking him, crucify him, nailing him to a cross. They might have thought we did it. And yet, Jesus hasn't even showed up yet. And that one angel, just the presence. The guards just look and they become like dead men. At the sight, wow, what power Christ is wielding over the strength of men. That the men come to be like dead men. But not only that, you have the woman, both Marys, who come just to look at the grave. They're sorrowful. They're mourning. They're motionless. They can't do anything. Their savior is dead and in that tomb. And yet the angel, the messenger from Christ, instills in them, in the midst of their sorrow and mourning, joy. The power of Christ can take somebody from sorrow and mourning to joy and life and delight in but an instant. Can you do that? Power of Christ can. A resurrected Savior, Lord, changes everything in an instant. But not only does he equip them with joy in the midst of their sorrow, these women have been at the feet of Jesus during his teaching. We don't see them moving too much. We see them just listening, listening, listening, absorbing all of his ministry. And yet they are the ones, the first ones, to tell, go and tell the disciples that Jesus is risen. He takes someone who has been sitting at his feet learning, and he employs them into motion and service. Now they have a mission. Now they have a purpose. And this is something that we should also not forget that happened in the first place. In the garden, Eve was approached by a serpent. And she listened to that serpent. And she turned to Adam and she fed him a lie. Now the daughters of Eve are found by Christ. And he gives them the truth and instructs them. And they are to go and tell the sons of Adam the truth. They will turn and give them the truth to go and meet your Savior in Galilee. Jesus in his power undoes the fall. He is the better Adam who steers the daughters of Eve in the right way. Go and tell the sons of Adam to go back to Galilee. And this is the great place where we find ourselves today. Isn't it interesting? And if you're a student of the scriptures, maybe you are wondering, what is the big to-do about Galilee? Why does Jesus want to meet them there? Why won't he just go and tell them himself? It's because remember, this is a brand new day, a brand new creation. Everything is different. What Jesus is doing is he is telling the daughters of Eve to go and tell the sons of Adam to meet him in Galilee where it all began. Do you remember this? Jesus from Nazareth in Galilee. Jesus began his ministry in Galilee. The first signs of where Jesus began happen in Galilee, and then it goes all the way to Jerusalem. What could that mean? A resurrected Jesus wants to go back to the start. He wants to go back to the beginning and he wants his disciples to meet him there. What must be taking place? The only thing that's different is that Jesus is now resurrected. And he wants to start it over with his disciples. And that is to me the greatest Easter egg that Matthew is trying to teach the readers of his gospel. That Jesus, now that he's resurrected, now that we've seen his whole life from Galilee descend into Jerusalem to experience death, is now resurrected. He wants to go with his disciples back to the beginning and have them walk the same steps in the same way, his life, that will experience temptation, that will experience wilderness, that they too will have to experience carrying a cross like Christ did, that they too will have to look death in the face like Jesus did, but they too will meet resurrection life like Jesus did. And this is what our Christian life is to look like as well. That Matthew is trying to teach us that the disciples go back to the beginning to relive the life in the footsteps of Jesus. Because as a Christian, that's what your life in Christ, hidden in God, is to look like. It does not get to look on the way things you think it ought to look like. If the image in the life of Christ is the example and the standard that he sets, then our life must orient to his life. And how is that? By just walking in his steps, doing what he does, declaring the gospel of the kingdom in Galilee, healing and tending to the poor and needy, to go into the wilderness and to meet temptation face on, and with the power of the resurrection of the Holy Spirit to overcome temptation like Jesus does, and then to go and face the cross by carrying it, bearing their own cross, you become forged into the image of Christ, which is the standard of humanity. So we stand in 2026, another Easter, right here, right now, and a new day dawns yet again. Will you meet Jesus back in Galilee, where it all began? And for the rest of this year, walk and stride, step by step, experiencing the same things that Jesus experienced, so that you can experience the resurrection that Jesus embodies. That is the power of resurrection. That is how everything else is different. There are people walking around life dead and enjoying it. And Jesus invites us to say, put that aside and come enjoy the resurrection life that I can offer you and give you. You want to be different? You want to experience this change? You want to have everything different in your life because let's just be honest, your life stinks, or because you've made a mess of it yourself, or others have made it a mess for you, only the power of the resurrection of Jesus coming into your life can make everything different. Can change the way you're living. The way you're living, if you're in him, will look like his. Which means the more you look like Jesus, the more you'll experience what Jesus experienced, including resurrection. When you get to the book of Acts, we see exactly how Jesus and the power of the wreck. He walks through walls, but yet he still eats with his friends. Death has no claim. He passes through death. He is life, and he will never die again. He has a glorious body that still bears his scars because it's his glory. And that's what he's calling each and every one of us this morning on Easter to come and experience what resurrection life is truly all about. So will you do this? Or do you like to eat dead things? Do you like to enjoy the dead world? Will you come and live the resurrection life, which looks like the life of Jesus, and see how everything for you will be different in the name of the Father.