We're going to look at a couple
of verses here and kind of build on this. I think as most of you know and
most of us are in agreement upon is that all throughout the world
today they're celebrating a pagan holiday and we don't prescribe
the Easter. However, we do firmly believe
in the resurrection of Jesus Christ. So to say that we reject
and deny and do not participate in Easter does not mean that
we reject the resurrection. The resurrection is the reason
why we meet every week. If it wasn't for the resurrection
of Jesus Christ, we would not be here. If it wasn't for the
resurrection, Christ would not be God, to be honest with you. Hopefully we can see that this
morning. But while millions around the world are celebrating pagan
rituals and festivals and following after Catholic traditions, I
thought this morning we would look at the resurrection a little
bit. I don't believe that there's only one day out of the year
that the resurrection ought to be preached. And I'm not preaching
the resurrection just for this. There's an actual application
to this that I hope to bring out because over the last several
weeks we've been looking at many passages throughout Scripture
that show the unity of the Godhead in the man Jesus Christ. And
I think in every aspect of our salvation, whether it's election,
predestination, whether it's in our perseverance, whether
it's in whatever the case might be, we find that the quote unquote
orthodox people that's out there likes to split salvation up into
This person of the Godhead only does this. This person of the
Godhead only does this. This person of the Godhead only
does this. But if you look through scripture,
you find out that you can't separate them, that all of salvation in
all of its aspects include those three witnesses, which we would
say are not separate persons, individual and distinct, but
one God, revealing Himself in His threefold character as Father,
Word, and Holy Spirit, and that triune Godhead witness is of
that invisible God, that God who is Spirit, is found in the
man, Jesus Christ. He has put Himself into a body
that has encapsulated and become the image of that invisible God
that we might see and that we might interact and that we might,
as I've preached before, that we would have a mediation so
that we would know what God is like, but also that God would
be able to fellowship and worship, or excuse me, fellowship and
love these people because we, being sinners in this lifetime,
being sinners in these bodies of flesh cannot commune with
a holy God. Therefore, we need a mediator
to mediate to God on our behalf so that we can enjoy fellowship
with God. And so Christ becomes that central
figure. So God has manifested Himself
in the flesh of Jesus Christ. They're not separate people.
That's one God. And that one God has taken all
that He is and put Him into a visible form so that we could see and
interact and be mediated for where God can meet with us and
we can meet with God. And that was in Jesus Christ.
So Jesus Christ is fully God and He is fully man and He is
fully all that is God. And so every aspect of salvation
in all of its intricacies all have to do with the man Jesus
Christ. You can't divorce anything from
all three that are one in Christ Jesus. So all of salvation has
to do with an aspect of the Father, an aspect of the Word, an aspect
of the Spirit, and all those witnesses, witness and bear witness,
Jesus Christ. And Jesus Christ is our salvation. He is our life. He is our law keeper. He is our righteousness. He is
our hope. He is our faith. He is everything
to us. He has made unto us wisdom. He
has made unto us knowledge and power. He has made unto us all
things that we need. And so Christ is the center figure
of that. And in the resurrection, Christ
is also the center figure. And I believe that when we look
at the resurrection, we also see that threefold nature or
that threefold character of God being displayed in Christ Jesus. We see the unity of the Godhead
in the resurrection that's before us. And this is truly what whenever
we meet on Sundays, the whole reason that people meet on Sundays
is because of the resurrection. Whenever we preach the Gospel,
you can't preach the Gospel devoid of the resurrection or you're
not preaching the Gospel. We preach Christ's death, burial
and resurrection. So we do that every week whenever
we're here. So the Bible doesn't have anywhere
in there that there were special days to preach on that special
topic. Matter of fact, the Bible doesn't
dictate anywhere that we are to celebrate or to hold forth
any specific celebration of the resurrection of Christ. The Bible
has given us two ways to do that, preaching the gospel and baptism. That's how God has ordained for
his church to commemorate or to memorialize the resurrection
of Jesus Christ, is through the preaching of the gospel and through
water baptism. And that's how we are to do that. And so as New Testament churches,
we are to follow God's prescription for worship. A lot of people
think we're strange because we're a church, call ourselves a church,
but yet we don't celebrate what they call Easter. But there are
many reasons for that, and we'll discuss that maybe here later
after everything's over. In Romans chapter one, verses
three and verses four, I want to draw out a few things here
if the Spirit would be with me. It says, concerning his son Christ
Jesus, or Jesus Christ, our Lord. Now, this is speaking of God
in the generic. God the Father, what we would
call God the Father, okay? The invisible God. That's what
was being talked about above. Paul, a servant of Jesus Christ,
called to be an apostle, separated unto the gospel of God, concerning
his son, Jesus Christ our Lord, okay? There was a little parenthesis
there where he talks about Paul being called as an apostle to
the Gentiles, which was prophesied in the Old Testament. Not specifically
Paul himself was named, but the fact that there would be someone
that would be sent to preach to the Gentiles. But anyway,
so we see that the context here is talking about God, okay? God concerning his son, Jesus
Christ, which was made of the seed of
David according to the flesh. So without going into a lot of
this, we know that Christ was made, we were talking about this
actually before the services started here, being made in the
image of God. Christ is the image of the invisible
God and how Adam was created in the image of God. Everywhere you look in the scripture,
the image of God, when it talks about the image of God, it talks
about the manhood of Christ Jesus. And so whenever, at least as
I understand it, whenever we are made in the image of God,
we were made after His likeness. We were made after His image,
which is Christ. And that's the physical aspect
of it. And I was telling Larry, I believe
there's also a typological aspect to it, where we are made, where
Adam was made as a type of Christ where his bride was in him and
blessed in him in a union just like we are in that eternal Bible
union with Christ Jesus before the foundation of the world.
However, we see here that Christ was made of the seed of David
according to the flesh, but look at verse four, it says, and declared
to be the son of God with power according to the spirit of holiness
by the resurrection from the dead. Why is the resurrection
important? It's because by the resurrection
or through the resurrection, Jesus Christ was declared to
be the Son of God. Now, I want to pause here for
a second and just make something very clear here, because sometimes
there's a lot of people out there and some of the teachings that
you might hear encounter on TV or on the radio or in books things
like that that Jesus Christ became the Son of God by the resurrection
that's what they say and that's what they're saying this means
is that when Jesus rose from the dead he became the Son of
God that's not true he was the Son of God before that he has
been the eternal Son of God He has always been the Son of God. He was brought forth from before
the foundation of the world. He's eternal. And so, that's
not what this is talking about. To declare to be the Son of God
means that He was shown forth to be or He was manifested to be the Son of God. This proved everything that he
had been saying and everything he had been displaying throughout
his three and a half years here during his ministry, that he
truly was the Son of God. Now, it says here, though, that
he was declared to be the Son of God with power, and I think
that with power is very important. He wasn't just declared to be
the Son of God by the resurrection from the dead, He was declared
to be the Son of God with power by the resurrection from the
dead. It was through the resurrection that proved that He truly was
the power of God. that he truly is the right hand
of God, that he truly is that strong man of God, that he truly
is the very person, the anointed one of Jehovah. That was the
proof. And why was that the proof? Well,
some say, well, because he raised up from the dead. Well, brethren,
there was other people that was raised up from the dead, right?
We know of Jairus' daughter that was raised up from the dead.
We know of Peter's mother-in-law that was raised up from the dead.
We know Lazarus was raised up from the dead. In the Old Testament,
one of the prophets raised up somebody from the dead. So we
know that there were people that was raised up from the dead.
As a matter of fact, at Jesus' crucifixion. There were many
in Jerusalem, the Bible says, that there was a great earthquake
and that many came back to life that were in the graves. So there
was a mass resurrection that took place at the crucifixion
of Jesus Christ. So we know that there are people
that are resurrected, but yet that doesn't declare them to
be the Son of God just because you're resurrected from the dead.
And so Jesus being resurrected from the dead is, something's different about that
than it is everybody else that was resurrected from the dead.
Number one, everyone that was resurrected from the dead was
resurrected back into a temporal life, back into a fleshly, simple,
corrupted flesh, okay? They were still in that corrupted
flesh. They were not glorified. They
were not raised in power and glorified and then brought back
into the glory that He had with God before the foundation of
the world. So they were brought back still
fallible, still fallen, still sinful. Christ wasn't. Christ was brought back from
the grave in power and in glory. But the other thing that that
I was thinking about on this very thing is that we see throughout
Scripture, we want to read a couple of verses here. If Jesus Christ
was resurrected, how was he resurrected? How did he come alive? Because
whenever Jairus' daughter was resurrected, Jesus is the one
who went and by his power, resurrected him. Whenever he resurrected
Peter's mother-in-law, Jesus is the one who went there and
resurrected him. Lazarus was the one who Jesus
came. Lazarus come forth and he came
out, right? So Jesus came and verbally and
spiritually and creatively brought life back to these people and
brought them forth. Jesus was the actor who did this
and did that for them. But let's think about this. Here
Jesus has died on Wednesday, put into the grave on Wednesday,
three days and three nights into the grave and then on that resurrection
morning comes back to life. Well, how can someone who is
dead be resurrected back to life unless somebody comes and resurrects
him, right? I mean, all those other people,
they were dead and couldn't do anything and Jesus had to come
and give them life. But there's something different
in Jesus' resurrection. See, He didn't need someone else
to come and resurrect Him. He resurrected Himself. He said,
"...and declared to be the Son of God with power according to
the Spirit of holiness by the resurrection from the dead."
Now, some are going to say, well, yeah, but it was the Father that
resurrected Him. Matter of fact, turn with me,
if you would, to 1 Corinthians chapter 6. 1 Corinthians chapter 6 and down
at verse 14. It says, and God hath both raised
up the Lord and will also raise up us by His own power. So here it's talking again about
God in that generic, God in His unity here. in His Godhead. And God hath
both raised up the Lord, speaking of Jesus, and will also raise
us up by His own power. And I think that right there,
brethren, that's the key. That's why I wanted you to look
at whenever I mentioned back in Romans here, Son of God with
power. I wanted to hone in on that. is because Jesus Christ, the
God manifested in the flesh, is the power of God. He is the
one who is wielding, wielding, holding, exercising, determining,
operating, using, manifesting the power of God, controlling
the power of God. He is the one who is bringing
forth and operating the power of God, displaying the power
of God. He himself is the personage of
God and all the power that God is, is in Christ Jesus. Christ Jesus is the one who is
the displayer and the operator and the bringing forth of the
power of God. And that's what Romans 1 Corinthians
6.14 is saying here, and God hath both raised up the Lord
and will also raise us up by His own power. Now I say that because here it
is the Father that is being given credence to resurrection. It's
the Father that is being, that is given credence, is given credit
for having resurrection power over Jesus. He's the one that
raised up Jesus. But brethren, let's look at something
else. Let's ask a question here. Is
it the Father that raised Him up? Or was it somebody else? Was it one of the other three
persons in the Godhead that are distinctly different from each
other? Distinctly separate from each
other, I should say? Or is it speaking of the same?
One God in His threefold character, one work, one God, but manifested
in Christ. Look at 1 Peter 3. Look with
me if you would, down at verse 18. It says, also hath once suffered for sins,
the just for the unjust, that he might bring us to God, being
put to death in the flesh, but quickened by the Spirit." So
now we see here that the Spirit is the one who quickened or brought
Jesus to life. So is it the Father or is it
Jesus? The Nicene Trinitarians say that
There are three distinct separate persons in the Godhead, all having
the same nature, but all having different operations of their
own. But here we see that God the
Father is the one who raised Christ from the dead. Now we're
seeing it's the Spirit of God who raised Christ from the dead. Well, who did? Which one of those persons was
there raising Him from the dead? How about we look back at John
chapter 10? Maybe we can find out some information
here. John chapter 10. Brothers, whenever
I speak like that, I don't necessarily mean to be facetious, but it's
to draw your attention to some things that sometimes it's just
as clear as day, but we convoluted with a bunch of men's traditions
and what we think is orthodoxy that have been handed down to
us by men's wisdom. Look at John 10 and verse 18.
It says, this is Jesus speaking himself. Jesus says, no man take
it. Well, let me back up and read
17. So you can kind of get. Jesus said, therefore does my
father love me because I lay down my life. I, Jesus, lay down my life that
I, Jesus, might take it up again. No man taketh it from me. That's
his life. No man taketh my life from me.
But I lay it down of myself. I have power to lay it down.
And here's that word again. And I have power to take it up
again. This commandment have I received
of my Father. So the power to lay down his
life and the power to raise up his life is given to him by God. The man Jesus Christ is the power
of God. Why? Because God has given him
power over all flesh. To give what? Life. Eternal life. He's given him
power over all flesh in heaven and in earth. He has power. Whenever the Old Testament says
that he has power over everything in heaven and in earth and among
the inhabitants of the earth. And none can stay his hand. Who's
that talking about? It's talking about Jesus. It's
not talking about the invisible God that's out there that no
one sees. It's talking about that invisible God who has manifested
himself in the flesh of Jesus Christ, in the man Jesus Christ.
He is the man of God's power. And so here we see now that Jesus
saying that he is the one who raised himself from the dead.
So we have the Father raised Jesus, the Spirit raised Jesus,
and the Son has raised Jesus from the dead. Now, I can't help
but think, if I'm going to think like a Trinitarian Nicenist,
whenever it was time for Jesus to raise up from the dead, and
now we've got Each individual distinct person, they were all
three standing there, time to raise up from the dead. Almost
kind of like them cartoons where you see them superheroes and
they raise up their hand and a little beam comes out of their
hand and you see the power coming out of them. All three of them
pointed at Jesus to raise him from the dead. It sounds silly,
don't it? Who raised Jesus from the dead? But so did the Spirit. So did
the Father. I don't think you can divide
it. I don't think you can separate it. Because it's one God. Not three. It's one person. Not three individuals. One person
has been given power and that's because all of the Godhead has
indwelt, has enveloped itself, himself, in the person of Jesus
Christ. And so the resurrection is essential
in the declaration of Jesus being God because all the power of
God to raise to life is found in Jesus Christ. So if there
is no resurrection, then Jesus really wasn't the Son of God
and isn't declared to be who He has been saying He has been
through His whole entire ministry. The reason why they wanted to
stone Him, the reason they wanted to kill Him, the reason that
they did all this stuff is because Jesus made Himself to be God. Jesus declared Himself to be
God and the people didn't like it. They said it was blasphemy.
Whenever He came before the trial, And He said, for all these miracles
that I've done, what are you going to do? They said, not for
any of the miracles you've done, but because you've made yourself
to be God. Listen, it was clear as day that
all those religious leaders of that time, when Jesus was saying
all the things that He was saying, doing all the things that He
was doing, they understood that to mean that Jesus claimed to
be the one and true Jehovah God, Yahweh. He claimed to be that. There was no mistake in that. We even see that in the New Testament
in Philippians. It says in Philippians 2 and
5, it says, Let this mind be in
you, which was also in Christ Jesus, who being in the form
of God, So God took on form. That's kind of strange because
the Bible also says that God is a spirit and is invisible
and doesn't have flesh and bones. But yet in Christ Jesus, God
does have flesh and bone. God did take on human form. God
did take on a form. So being in the form of God,
thought it not robbery to be equal with God. You see that
there in verse 6? did not think it was robbery
to claim to be God because he was God. He wasn't acting on
behalf of God, although he in his manhood was acting in behalf
of God, but the fact was is he actually was God doing the work. Look at what it says there. Thought
it not robbery to be equal with God. If you have a modern translation,
of the Bible, you know what it says there? Completely the opposite. It says completely the opposite.
Look at your, if you look at the modern translation of the
ESV, the ASB, the New King James Version even, I believe, states
it that way. All these other, you know, modern
day Bibles. It says that, but he made himself of, oh excuse
me, who being in the form of God thought equality with God
was not something that could be grasped. That's completely
the opposite of what the Bible says. Jesus is saying that I'm
equal to God, because I am God, saying that I'm God. Those new
translations are saying Jesus thought that equality with God
wasn't something that could be grasped. But here, brethren, we see that
Jesus is claiming to be God. He is the fullness of God bodily. So we have the Father, the Spirit,
and the Son all raising Christ from the dead. Look, if you would,
at John chapter 5. John chapter 5. Look at verse... It says, For as the Father raiseth
up the dead and quickeneth them, even so, or in like manner, or
just the same, the Son quickeneth whom He wills. Now to me, or
to some, this would be saying, aha, there you go. You have the
father quickens whom he wills. And then the son, he's over here
and he quickens whom he wills. But then they'll say, but because
they're of one nature and one essence, they have the same will. So it'll be the same people that
get raised because they have the same will. Brethren, whenever I read this,
I see that it's saying the same person. For as the Father raises
up the dead, because He's talking to Jews who only know Jehovah,
who only know Yahweh. Here, O Israel, the Lord our
God is one God. And to them, they only know that
invisible God in heaven that no man has seen at any time,
that is Jehovah, that is unfathomable. And here Jesus is claiming to
be God. And they're not believing it. They're not receiving it.
They're not buying what he's selling. And Jesus here is claiming
to be that God in heaven that you are worshipping or think
you're worshipping as Yahweh, I am that I am, Jehovah. That is me. I am in Him and He
is in me. There's no distinction between
the two of us because we are one God and we are one God manifested
in flesh. And so he says, as the Father
raises up the dead and quickened them, even so, you're seeing
me doing it, so what does that tell you? If I'm raising up people
at my will and there's only one God, what does that mean, brethren?
That means that I'm God. See, that's why they were trying
to kill Jesus, because He was claiming to be that one true
God. Look, if you will, back at chapter
2, John chapter 2. Look at verse 19. So Jesus has the power to raise
up from the dead. God is raising Christ by Himself. Through Himself. Jesus raised
Himself from the dead. And He did that by the power
of the Godhead. But look if you
would at chapter 2 and verse 19 of John. Jesus said to them,
destroy this temple and in three days the Father will raise me
up. Know what he said? The Spirit
will raise me up. Is that what he said? No, but
brethren, we know the Bible said that the Father raised him up
and the Spirit raised him up. He says here, I will raise it
up. Destroy this temple and in three days he'll raise it up.
Now, surely I don't have to go into much detail about this.
I think we all realize Jesus is talking about his body. He
wasn't talking about the physical temple. They were walking in
front of the temple and talking about the greatness of the temple
and all this kind of stuff and Jesus using the temple as a metaphor
or a symbol for his body, he said, tear down this temple and
in three days, I'll rise up because that temple, that physical temple
that was there, was built after that heavenly temple in the heaven
and was a representation of the man, Christ Jesus. Him and his
body. He said, tear down this temple
and in three days, I will raise it up again. The Easter believers
think that it happens in a day and a half. Kill me on Friday and I raise
up on Sunday morning. Jesus said, the only sign that I'm gonna give
you is the sign of Jonah. That the Son of Man will be in
the heart of the earth three days and three nights. Not a day and a half, not Friday
night, Saturday morning, Saturday night, up on Sunday morning.
That's not three days and three nights. Jesus couldn't have died
on Friday. He died on Wednesday. I got a
whole bunch of stuff that I can give you on that if you don't
understand or don't believe that, I can give you that. But anyway,
Jesus here says, tear down this temple and in three days, I will
raise it up again. So again, we see the overwhelming
evidence of scripture is that the way that God resurrected
Jesus from the grave is by being God in Christ Jesus, who is the
power of God, who is the resurrection and the life. And Jesus raised
Himself, and that's why it showed forth that He was the power of
God. Because only God can give life.
Only God can resurrect someone from the grave. If Christ died
and somebody outside of Him had to resurrect Him, then He would
never be resurrected because He was God manifested in the
flesh who died for the sins of His people. And so there is no
other person who can give life except God Himself. And God manifested
Himself in Jesus who was dead in that grave. Therefore, Jesus
had to have the power, had to be God, because He raised Himself
from the dead. He didn't rely on somebody outside
of Himself to raise Him up. He raised Himself up from the
dead. Look at John chapter 5. We see
that What I was just quoting there is found here in John chapter
5 and 26. For as the father hath life in
himself, here this is almost identical verse to what we just
read a while ago. For as the father hath life in
himself, so hath he given to the son to have life in himself,
and hath given him authority to execute judgment also because
he is the Son of Man. Marvel not at this, for the hour
is coming in which all that are in the grave shall hear His voice
and shall come forth that they that have done good under the
resurrection of life and they that have done evil under the
resurrection of damnation. Listen, He's given power to give
life, not only life eternal to those who will be going and being
with God forever, lack of condemnation, bringing them back forth into
life in that corrupted way and being given damnation. So here's the resurrection all
the way around. Nobody is resurrected apart from
Christ Jesus. Okay? And so we see the unity
of the Godhead in Christ Jesus in the resurrection, which proves
His Godship, Godhood, that He is the of the man of God's right
hand. And lastly, let's look at Romans
chapter 8. Romans chapter 8. We actually see, we see this
tri-part unity in Christ Jesus. This tri-unity
of God in Christ Jesus. Verse 11 says, But if the Spirit
of Him that raised up Jesus from the dead dwell in you, this is
talking about, look at verse 9 to get your context, But ye
are not in the flesh, but in the Spirit, if so being the Spirit
of God dwell in you. Now if any man have not the Spirit
of Christ, he is none of his. So you see the Spirit of God,
the Spirit of Christ is used interchangeably. We've looked
at this before. John chapter 14, Jesus said,
if I go away, I will come again to you. I will send the Comforter
to you, who is the Spirit of Truth, the Spirit of God, the
Spirit of Christ, the Spirit of Truth, the Spirit of Faith,
the Spirit of the Eternal One. The Spirit is God. but yet it is Christ's Spirit. And if Christ be in you, that's
the one who is in you, because if He's not, you're none of His.
So in verse 11 it says, but if the Spirit of Him that raised
up Jesus, so now you have the Spirit of God who raised up Jesus
from the dead dwell in you, well, we know that's also the Spirit
of Christ. And we also know that that's the Holy Spirit. called
the Holy Spirit of God, the Spirit of Truth, the Comforter. He that
raised up Christ from the dead shall also quicken your mortal
bodies by His Spirit that dwelleth in you. We just read a couple
of verses that said that Jesus is the one who raises up life,
gives life. He's the one who raises people
up. And here we see again that Jesus is used interchangeably
with God, with the Spirit, and we see he is the one that has
the power to quicken our mortal bodies by his spirit that dwell
within us. So brethren, the resurrection
is all about Jesus, not only in his accomplishment of salvation
through the resurrection, but also in the declaring himself
to be exactly who he claimed to be, and that is the fullness
of God manifested in flesh. And that's why we celebrate the
resurrection. That's why we preach the resurrection. That's why we don't celebrate
other things that's supposedly supposed to be on this day. We
talk about Christ and Him crucified, buried, and rose again on the
third day. Why? Because this is what proves
that He is God. But not only that, brethren,
because he was raised from the dead that meant that God was
satisfied with everything that Christ had done that he had fulfilled
all righteousness on our behalf as our substitute and therefore
justified us before himself because that payment was all that God
required I say all that God required as if it wasn't much of anything.
I meant that everything that God required for our salvation,
Christ accomplished it. And because he accomplished it,
Christ himself not being corrupt or vile or sinful, but only having
that imputed upon him and taking upon himself our sin and making
the full payment for it. There was no need for Christ
to stay in the grave because Christ had fulfilled all righteousness,
had taken on the full debt, had paid the full penalty. Therefore,
Christ in who He was as God was incorruptible. Christ was perfect. Christ was sinless. Christ Himself
didn't need to stay in the grave because everything about Him
is holy. He's God. So whenever the full
payment is made that satisfied God's justice, there is no need
for Christ to stay dead. And so He raised Himself from
the dead, being God, He raised Himself from the dead, which
proved that everything that He had done on our behalf was acceptable
to God on our behalf. And therefore, now, we all stand
justified before God. Now, brethren, this was the declaration
from the foundation of the world. In our understanding, it happened
and was manifested with Christ. In our understanding, whenever
we come to believe and receive that as the Spirit gives us understanding
of that, at that point is whenever we begin to walk into the experience
and enjoyment of it. However, brethren, this was declared
by God before the foundation of the world because He chose
us in Christ to be holy and without blame. Before Him, in love, having
predestinated us according to everything that He had blessed
us with and what Christ would do, that was the foundation for
why God could say, blessed is the man unto whom the Lord imputeth
not sin. How the Lord was reconciling
us to Himself, not imputing our sin to us. even though we're
sinners. Why is the resurrection important?
Because of that. That is the sign. If Christ does
not rise from the dead, that means Christ's work was not accepted
of God. That means we are still in our
sins and we're without hope. But another thing that makes
it important is because Christ rose from the dead, we are in
Christ Jesus. We are His seed. and we will
raise with Him. That means that we have the hope
of resurrection. Just as Christ was raised from
the dead and returned to His glorious state, the child of
grace who is found inside this body of clay, this mortal body,
will die but will be raised to an incorruptible body. Be raised
from a corruptible to an incorruptible. We will be raised into glory
and be restored into our glorious body that God has prepared for
us. And we will be back home from
where we came. We came from God. We were born
out of Christ as His seed. And then we will be going back
to God in our glorious bodies where we'll be forever. Brethren,
the resurrection is a mighty, glorious doctrine of scripture,
a foundational doctrine of scripture, and how sad it is to see so many
places that call themselves church sully it with paganism and idol
worship every year. Today, in all these places around
town and all over the world, pulpits are preaching the resurrection
And ten minutes later after that are going out and committing
spiritual harlotry and idolatry by participating in all the paganistic
rituals and Catholic ceremonies that's been passed down for generations
and generations. I'm thankful to the people of
God who has stood on these things and has defended these things
and has rejected these things. I didn't know this. There was
many years that I didn't know this, these things. And I'm thankful
that the Lord has brought us to see and to know these things.
All right, does anybody have any questions or comments before
we dismiss? Let's bow and have a little prayer. Lord, once again, we thank you
for this day, and we thank you for your grace and mercy, and
we thank you for the man, Jesus Christ, who has died for our
sins, who is buried and resurrected on the third day. And because
of that resurrection, we have hope of resurrection to come. We have hope of life eternal.
We have salvation secured. He has manifested all that was
needed for our salvation, but He has also manifested that He
truly is God and that we can trust and believe upon Him. But
Lord, we know that that doesn't come by human effort. It only
comes as the Spirit of God gives us life and enables us. So Father,
Lord, I pray for each and every one here. Lord, I pray that they
might be your child and that you might send your Spirit into
them to give them faith, to believe on you, to follow you. And Lord,
I pray that we might all find enjoyment in the gospel of Jesus
Christ, that we might find our hope within him and his finished
work. Lord, we know that salvation
has nothing to do with the efforts of man, But all was done and
completed by Jesus Christ, our Redeemer and our Advocate. And
so Lord, we just lift him up today, honor him today. We show
forth praise and worship to him and him alone.