[00:00:01] Welcome to the River Church podcast. We're all about bringing the life, hope and love of Jesus to everyone around us. For more information, check out our
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[00:00:13] Good morning, church. Oh, it's great to be together on Easter Day. And weren't those testimonies fantastic to hear individual lives, people that are declaring Jesus is Lord. Let me just talk to you a little bit about stories, right?
[00:00:29] So stories, most stories, I think have a turning point, don't they? They have this scene or episode within a story of which everything changes. Do you sort of recognize that in, like, films or books that you read? So let me give you an example. I'm going to turn to one of my favorite stories, Star Wars. Okay, apologize.
[00:00:50] I am a geek. That's fine. So Star wars, right, the original, I'm talking about the original trilogy here. For all you peoples that were born a while ago, the original trilogy, right? You had three movies.
[00:01:04] And in it there is a turning point which the whole, the whole, the whole, I think the whole story changes. And this is in the middle, Empire Strikes Back. And it's a story. It's an episode with Luke Skywalker, who's the. Who's the protagonist, who's the young hero who's trying to find himself against the big bad baddie, who's Darth Vader. And they have this battle with lightsabers. I won't get anyone to act it out, but, right, they have this battle and in it, they have this battle and Darth Vader's winning and he could kill Luke Skywalker, he could get rid of him, but he doesn't. He tries to turn him to come and be on his side.
[00:01:49] And the moment, the words that everyone knows that changes the whole story is I am your father.
[00:01:58] That's the moment that everything changes. And like, you've gone from, hey, the good versus the bad, it's been a really easy story.
[00:02:07] And then suddenly we get this revelation. We get this revelation that maybe Darth Vader isn't the complete and evil person that he.
[00:02:16] He could be. Maybe there's something else going on here. And it unpacks. And as we go through the stories, this is a real turning point.
[00:02:24] We get to understand what all of the first series was all about at the first episode and all of the kind of mysteries going on.
[00:02:33] Why am I saying that about this? Well, today we celebrate Easter. We celebrate that Christ is risen, and we do that every day as Christians. But today is a mark in our calendar where, where we say, today we are celebrating it today we're focusing on not just that Jesus was born, not just that he did miracles, not just that he taught us how to live, not just that he died for our sins, not just that he brought an end to the sacrificial system, he did all of that, but he also rose again from the dead. And. And that's really important because I think it's a scene in the story that changes everything.
[00:03:17] It has real meaning. And it was really important to Christians in their early.
[00:03:25] I've got a thing, haven't I here.
[00:03:27] Oh, there we go. Luke Skywalker. Anyway, it was really important to the Christians when they started. So in Acts 2, the day of Pentecost, when all of these Jews from around the Mediterranean came to Jerusalem, they're celebrating. Peter the apostle, he gets up and he does this preach. He's telling everyone about Jesus. He tells them about Jesus being crucified. But he says these words. He says, but God raised him from the dead, freeing him from the agony of death, because it was impossible for death to keep its hold on him.
[00:04:05] Jesus being raised was really important to the message. And then Paul a little bit later in Acts 13, he says, in a completely different context, he's in Greece and he preaches the message. He says, but God raised him from the dead. And for many days he was seen by those who had traveled with him from Galilee to Jerusalem.
[00:04:27] And this Paul would also ultimately write a letter to people in a church in Corinth in Greece, and he would write these words. He says, and if Christ had not been raised, our preaching is useless, and so is your faith.
[00:04:47] Our preaching is useless, and so is our faith.
[00:04:51] Christ being raised is critical to our faith. Why is that?
[00:04:58] In order to do that, we need to just have a quick look back at what death means. Why is it so important that Jesus overcame death?
[00:05:09] Well, death is ultimately as we.
[00:05:14] I can't get my words out. We rewind to the beginning of the story. Death is ultimately a consequence and a punishment for humanity rebelling against, against God.
[00:05:25] Our representatives, the first humans, Adam and Eve, they were called and created. They were called to obey God.
[00:05:33] That meant trusting that God knows best, right? Who's ever thought, hey, I know best and not God, right?
[00:05:43] They were called to trust God, to believe that God knows best. And that means following his instructions.
[00:05:50] That means believing that God's instructions are the best for humanity.
[00:05:55] But they didn't do so.
[00:05:57] And the punishments, the punishment was that they were not allowed to live forever.
[00:06:03] Now you might think, hey, isn't that a bit harsh?
[00:06:07] Isn't God just a bit mean? Maybe spiteful, Maybe he's a bit vengeful. Hey, they just did one thing wrong.
[00:06:14] But the thing is, this one thing wrong continues in into many, many, many things wrong. As we look through the beginning of history and the beginning of mankind.
[00:06:26] And the question that we should ask of God is should God allow human beings to continue to do things wrong which is ultimately harming one another?
[00:06:37] If these instructions to us were for us to live in harmony with one another and we break them, it ends up with us harming one another. Should God allow us to continue our lives harming one another forever and ever?
[00:06:54] But thankfully God didn't. God doesn't and God won't. There will be an end to all of the harm that there is in the world.
[00:07:05] I don't know when, I don't know why God hasn't done it already, to be honest.
[00:07:10] But this plan, God's promise to bring an end to it was set out. God said it in the very in the same breath that he said, this is the punishment with the consequence saying, with saying there is death, he's also saying there is hope. And this hope is on the other side of death.
[00:07:31] It's beyond the grave.
[00:07:33] And so Jesus died to take on both the punishment of us, of humanity.
[00:07:39] But he also rose again.
[00:07:41] And I'm going to say he rose again. It gives us three really important reasons to have hope.
[00:07:49] The first of these reasons really quickly, the first of these reasons is that Jesus rising again testifies to all of the rest of his words, everything that he said. Jesus claimed, I am the Son of God. He said, I am God, I am one with the Father.
[00:08:06] That's a big claim.
[00:08:08] What possibly could someone do to prove that claim?
[00:08:14] Well, maybe you could do something that no one in history had done before and no one else in history has done since. And that is rising from the grave. So Jesus rising from the grave proved to his disciples was essential to his message that what he said was true. That's the first reason.
[00:08:33] The second reason is that in rising from the grave it confirms that God the Father accepted Jesus death as paying for our sins.
[00:08:47] Jesus is not in the grave still.
[00:08:50] He's not still paying for humanity's wrongdoings. He's not still giving out himself again and again and again.
[00:09:03] Actually, Jesus made a once and for all sacrifice and that was accepted by God.
[00:09:12] And now and that was done. It's finished, it's complete. And so he has risen from the grave. That's the second reason.
[00:09:20] But the third Reason I want to talk to you a little bit more about is that rising from the dead showed us that death is not the end.
[00:09:31] It was not the end for Jesus, and it is now not the end for us.
[00:09:38] Paul, in that letter to Corinthians, said, if only for this life, we have hope in Christ, we are of all people, most to be pitied.
[00:09:50] If Jesus Christ rose from the dead just for hope in this life, what is that? If the hope was for health and wealth and prosperity in this life, if the hope was for comfort in this life, that we might have a great life on earth and amuse ourselves and have all the things we want, then that is not a great testimony for the apostles, is it?
[00:10:19] Eleven of the apostles, as the stories go, were all martyred.
[00:10:26] Paul himself writing in his letter, says, hey, I was persecuted, I was beaten, I was whipped, I was chained, I was put in prison.
[00:10:37] If the hope of Jesus rising from the dead was just for this life, hey, early Christianity is not testimony to that.
[00:10:49] But we have hope that in following Jesus through death, that there is something else, that as Jesus is resurrected, there is a new life for us to live again in a world without harm, where we might know good and evil and just choose to do good, or of the time to live the life that you have always wanted.
[00:11:17] Have you ever seen the titles of those books that promise you can have the life now that you always wanted? Have you seen those in the bookshops? Actually, it creeps into Christianity, I'm sorry to say, but the question is, if you could have the life that you always wanted, why are there so many stories, so many testimonies of. Of people that have everything and yet are still unsatisfied?
[00:11:41] They still end up in drink and drugs and ruining their life, harming themselves and other people.
[00:11:48] C.S. lewis, the writer of the Narnia Chronicles, he said, if I find in myself a desire which no experience in this world can satisfy, but the most probable explanation is that I was made for another world.
[00:12:08] When I truly stop and take stock and evaluate my life, think about my life, I know that there is a desire in me that the world cannot satisfy.
[00:12:23] A desire for a life without pain, without harm, where my heart, my body is never harmed and neither am I harming someone else.
[00:12:34] My desire for a life, freedom from fear, anxiety, worry, a concern for tomorrow, of bills of money, of just making it through life, the freedom from my own negative thoughts and behaviors.
[00:12:55] I know that this world cannot give it to me.
[00:13:00] This world cannot give me the life that I always wanted.
[00:13:05] But the thing is, Jesus gives me hope.
[00:13:09] He promised me hope.
[00:13:12] You know, before Jesus died, he said to his disciples, he said, I was going to die. And his disciples were grieving, said, don't leave us.
[00:13:21] But Jesus said, don't grieve me. He said, why? Because I am going to make a place for you in my Father's house.
[00:13:31] I am going before you to prepare somewhere for you to live.
[00:13:37] And in rising from the dead, Jesus proves this is exactly what he was doing.
[00:13:45] So the question for us, do you want that life?
[00:13:51] Do you want that life?
[00:13:54] Do you want to live life as it's always meant to be? Do you want that life that we all secretly desire?
[00:14:03] And if the answer is yes, then there's only one thing that you need to do.
[00:14:09] And it's not an exam.
[00:14:11] It's not a qualification. You don't have to enter a competition or anything like that.
[00:14:16] It's actually free.
[00:14:18] The one thing that you need to do is to choose to follow Jesus.
[00:14:24] And if you choose to follow him in this life, then you choose to follow him in death and then into the resurrection life. And that is what these people who are getting baptized, that is what they are doing today. They are choosing life.
[00:14:40] Paul explains it here in Romans. He said in a letter that he wrote to Romans, he said, we were therefore buried with him through baptism into death in order that just as Christ was raised from the dead through the glory of the Father, we too may live a new life.
[00:15:00] For if we have been united with him in death like this, we will certainly also be united with him in a resurrection like his.
[00:15:10] These people getting baptized today are saying to everyone, I put my hope in Christ. I believe that he died and he rose again, and I choose to follow Him.
[00:15:23] And if you're gonna. If you already do that, I'm just gonna close in a minute. Just finish with a brief prayer. And if you already do that, I'm gonna pray that God helps us.
[00:15:36] Because following him, although it's simple, it's not always easy, as we've had the testimonies this morning. And I'm going to just pray that God helps us in it, in our journey. But I'm also going to pray that if you're here and you've never made that decision, I'm going to pray that God just reveals Himself, that He shows you in your spirit, in your mind, that he is alive today and he's calling you to follow Him.
[00:16:06] So let me just finish by praying. If we bow our heads, Jesus, we want to thank you that you died and you rose again.
[00:16:18] Lord, we want to thank you that we can put our trust, everything, Lord, every egg that we have in that one basket, Lord, because we are pinning all of our hopes on you. And we know that you are a faithful God who will never, ever fail us.
[00:16:37] So, Lord. But I pray for everyone here that follows you, all those that get baptized, all those that are here that have already made a commitment to you, Lord, I pray that you will come and strengthen our hearts, Lord, not just for today, but for tomorrow and the day after, and the day after that you, Holy Spirit, would be present in us confirming the testimony of Jesus that we know that everything we have, our hopes, are in you. And you will be with us and never leave us.
[00:17:10] And I pray for everyone here that has never made that commitment, Lord, I pray, Holy Spirit, that you would confirm to them that you are real, that you are alive today, you are not still in the grave. You have risen, that you are alive, that you are in charge, and that you are inviting them to come in. That you are inviting them into this relationship to know you and to have their future confirmed, their future in you and for you. And so, Lord, I pray, would you come and show them yourself? Would you come and speak to them?
[00:17:47] Show us all, Lord, that you are King of Kings and Lord of Lords.
[00:17:52] Amen. Amen.
[00:17:54] Fantastic. So it's time now for the first bunch of people to get baptized.
[00:18:01] So I'm gonna. If you're those people that gave their testimonies, if you could come down the front and you're gonna get dunked, Sa.
