My pleasure to be here with you
this morning. I enjoy listening to your pastor
on Free Grace Radio. I listen to him often. I enjoy
his sermon outlines, especially since I've been pastoring. They've
been very helpful. God's given you a faithful preacher
of the gospel. What a gift. What a gift to the
church, the greatest gift God's given to His church. Because Christ, we know Christ
is the gift. But to give His church pastors,
pastors and teachers, faithful men, what a blessing. I'm so thankful that for nearly
30 years I was able to sit under a faithful faithful man of the
gospel. And I thank him all the time
when I see him for preaching the gospel to me, for being honest
with me. Be honest with me. Don't entertain
me. Just be honest with me. That's
what I want. That's what you want. A man who
will be honest. Now I want you to turn to Luke We're not Luke, I'm sorry. I
want you to turn to Matthew chapter 28. I've got Luke on my mind. After that Bible lesson, I enjoyed
that lesson. It was a good lesson. I want
you to turn to Matthew chapter 28. But something jumped out at me as Lindsay was teaching. If you look back in Luke chapter
18, I'm going to bring the message from Matthew 28, but this jumped
out at me. As he was teaching out of Luke
19 on Zacchaeus, a rich man came to our Lord, asking Him what he must do to
be saved. He told him to keep the commandments,
and he said, which one? And he said, I've kept them all.
And the Lord said, yet lackest thou one thing, sell all that
thou hast, and distribute unto the poor, and thou shalt have
treasure in heaven. Come, follow me. And when he
heard this, he was very sorrowful, but he was very rich. And when
Jesus saw he was very sorrowful, he said, how hardly shall they
that have riches enter into the kingdom of God. It's easier for
a camel to go through a needle's eye than for a rich man to enter
the kingdom of God. And they that heard it said,
who then can be saved? If a rich man can't be saved,
who then can be saved? And our Lord said, the things
which are impossible with men are possible with God. And then
he turned around and he saved a rich man, Zacchaeus. After
they said, who then can be saved? If a rich man can't be saved,
who then can be saved? And he said, well with men that's
impossible, with God all things are possible. And he proved and
demonstrated the power of God by turning right around and saving
a rich man, a publican, who was rich. That just jumped out at
me when he was teaching this, teaching that lesson. Now Matthew
28, I'm going to start in verses 1 through 10. Now our Lord suffered
Under the wrath of God, we can't even begin to comprehend that.
And he died. He gave up the ghost. He really
died. He experienced death. And he
was buried, as he said. The verse that has
my attention is verse 6. He is not here, the angel said
to these women. He is not here, for He is risen
as He said. Everything we believe, our hope
is completely based on as He said. Thus saith the Lord. Over in the book of Acts, let
me find this, I believe it's Acts 27. Here's the very foundation of
faith, the Word of God. In Acts chapter 27, remember Paul's on this ship
and it's about to wreck and he tells them to stay on that ship
and he says in verse 25 of Acts chapter 27, Be of good cheer, for I believe
God that it shall be even as it was told me." It will be exactly as God said
it would be. That angel said to those ladies,
as he said. He's not here. He's risen. as He said. You can count on
it. You can take God at His Word.
That's what faith is. Real faith is taking God Almighty
at His Word. Without any sight, without any
miracles, it's taking God at His Word. Thus saith the Lord. Everything our Lord said has
come true. And there are many things that
will yet come true as He said. He said He would return. He said,
I will return. The Scripture teaches us that
He's going to destroy this earth. Do you believe that? I believe it. Why do you believe
that? Because He said so. He said so. We can take great comfort in
His Word. In fact, that's where we get
our comfort. The Holy Spirit takes the Word of God and comforts
us with these. He said in 2 Thessalonians, comfort
one another with these words. That's our comfort, the Word
of God. When we go through trials and heartaches, where do we find
comfort? He said, I will never leave you
nor forsake you. Now he said that. Lord, you said
that. Call upon me in the day of trouble
and I will deliver you and you shall glorify me. Lord, this
is a day of trouble. You said, call upon me. There's nothing wrong with taking
God's word to the throne of grace and saying, Lord, you said. That's where we get our comfort.
Confidence. God, who cannot lie, said. And based on that, we act. His
Word. Now it says, in the end of the
Sabbath, this was a Passover Sabbath, Christ died on the sixth
day. He cried, it is finished. And He meant it. And it was. It's finished. He rested on the
Sabbath and He arose on the first day of the week. Our Lord, His
body lay dead in the grave on the Sabbath to show that there
is now an end to the old Sabbath and the old ceremonies. Christ
is our Sabbath. Christ is our rest. We do not
go through ceremonies or we do not perform anything in order
to please God or to be accepted. Christ is my acceptance. He has
made us accepted in the Beloved. He did it. I didn't make myself
accepted by accepting Him. I'm not the missing ingredient.
My faith's not the missing ingredient. There is no missing ingredient. We are accepted in the Beloved. And He put an end to that old
Sabbath and those ceremonies. He put an end to them by fulfilling
them. He fulfilled them. They were
types and pictures and He fulfilled all the types and all the pictures.
All that was written of him, he fulfilled as he said. And after he did that, at dawn
toward the first day of the week, the night is over. The day star
from on high is risen now with healing in his wings. Someone said this, we are not
saved by dead Christ. We are saved by a risen Lord. Yes, He died. He truly died. But He's not dead. He's seated
at God's right hand, rolling and reigning over absolutely
everything right now. There is nothing, there is no
one, there is no demon, no angel, nothing that is not under the
Absolute control of Jesus Christ. Nothing. You say, well, the world
looks a mess. It looks like it's chaos. I tell
you what, it's ordered chaos. It may look like it to you, but
to him it's not. It is under absolute control.
Everything is happening just as he purposed it. He's controlling
it all. Jesus Christ is alive and well
and seated at the Father's right hand. There is a man seated in
glory at the right hand of power. And that man is our representative.
That man is our Lord. That man is our Redeemer. That
man is our sacrifice. That man is our... His blood
is our atonement. He is our righteousness. everything
we need to stand in God's presence, we have seated at God's right
hand. How good is that? That's good
news. That is good news. The doctrine
of His resurrection is the foundation of all that we hope for. If He's
not risen, Paul said, If he's not risen, we are of all men
most miserable. Look what the apostles gave up.
They left all and followed him. Paul said, I count all things
but loss for the excellency of the knowledge of Jesus Christ.
But now if he's not risen, we're not, we are not of all men most
miserable, but we're also of all men most stupid. If he's
not risen, if he's in the grave, he can do nothing for me. Nothing
at all. If He's not risen, we are yet
in our sins and we shall perish. Turn over to 1 Corinthians 15.
In 1 Corinthians 15, in verse 12,
listen to the Word of God. Now, if Christ be preached that
he rose from the dead, how say some among you that there is
no resurrection of the dead? But if there be no resurrection
of the dead, then is Christ not risen? Because he actually died. And if Christ be not risen, then
is our preaching vain and your faith is also vain. And I tell
you, what we're doing this morning is vain, useless. Yea, and we
are found false witnesses of God, because we have testified
of God that he raised up Christ, whom he raised not up, if so
be that the dead rise not. For if the dead rise not, then
is not Christ raised. And if Christ be not raised,
your faith is vain and you're yet in your sins. You see how
important this is? So important. then they also
which are fallen asleep in Christ are perished. If in this life
only we have hope in Christ, we are of all men most miserable.
Look what they gave up. But now, but now is Christ risen
from the dead. He's alive and become the first
fruits of them that slept. For since by man came death,
by man came also the resurrection of the dead, the man Christ Jesus.
For as in Adam all die, even so in Christ shall all be made
alike. We preach Christ crucified and
risen. He was delivered for our offenses,
but it doesn't stop there. He was delivered for our offenses
and raised again for our justification. That's what it says in Romans
4.25. Christ's resurrection shows us that the Father accepted Him
accepted His work and accepted everyone He did it for. Accepted Him and us in Him. And when He rose from the grave,
that declares the Father's acceptance of Him and the satisfaction of
God's law. If God's law were not satisfied
with His death, He'd still be in the grave and we'd have no
hope. We'd have no hope. But his resurrection
tells us that justice is satisfied. It screams satisfied. That's
what it does. Now we not only have God's word
on this, that he rose from the dead, but we have credible witnesses.
There's some witnesses. I want you to notice who's at
the grave first to witness that empty tomb. Mary Magdalene. Not Peter. Not John, not any
of those disciples. At first, it's Mary Magdalene
and the other Mary. Who is Mary Magdalene? He's the
one, this is the one whom the Lord cast out seven devils. You reckon she loved him? To
whom much is forgiven. They love much. They're the ones
who stood afar off over in verse 56 of chapter 27. It says in verse 55, And many
women were there beholding afar off, which followed Jesus from
Galilee, ministering unto him. Those ladies were always taking
care of him. Always. Among which was Mary Magdalene,
and Mary the mother of James and Joseph, and the mother of
Zebedee's children. But Mary Magdalene, that one whom he cast
out seven devils, she was right there. She was right there. There is
nothing, listen, her and Mary Magdalene and the other Mary
went to visit that grave. They went to that place. There's
nothing wrong with visiting the grave of a loved one. It's part
of healing. I think it's part of healing.
There's nothing wrong with that. You and I are complicated creatures
and they went to visit that that grave where the one whom they
loved was laid. He laid there. And then it says
there was a great earthquake. Our Lord did not slip out of
the tomb. When He arose, He arose in power. And He was released of that grave.
He was released in power. It says in verse 2, in the angel,
An angel of the Lord descended from heaven. Oh, I can imagine
he was excited to do that. Excited to do that. Ready to
do that. Ready to roll back that stone.
An angel of the Lord descended from heaven and came and rolled
back the stone from the door and sat upon it. Took a lot of
men to roll that stone. It was a huge stone. They wanted
to make sure no one stole the body. So they rolled a huge stone,
several men rolled a huge stone, one angel moved it. Why did not Christ remove
that stone himself? Did he not have the power to
do it? Of course he did. Of course he did. I like what
one writer said. He said, by this act we see that
he was set free by divine authority. There was a fair discharge. An angel was sent from glory
to move that stone and he walked right out free. Divine discharge. Satisfied. And also angels always
attended our Lord. They attended his birth. Temptation
in the wilderness. But not at the cross. At the
cross he died alone. At the cross he cried, My God,
my God, why hast thou forsaken me? The angels were not allowed
to assist him and help him. But when it's over, oh, here
they come. Oh, here they come to their Lord.
They come and they move away. This one angel comes and moves
away the stone. In verse 3, here back in Back in Matthew 28, we see that it was truly an angel.
It says, His countenance was like lightning, and His raiment
white as snow. And for fear of Him, the keepers
did shake and became as dead men. When they saw this angel, They just fell over like dead
men. What's it going to be like when
they see Him in glory, seated at God's right hand? What's it
going to be like when He says, depart from Me? They just fell
over at an angel. What's it going to be like when
they see the Lord? And I like what that angel says
to his children. Fear not. They fell over like
dead men, but you don't need to. Fear not ye. Don't be afraid. Don't be afraid. How many times does it say in
the Scripture to the Lord's children? Fear not. Fear not. I'm with you. Be not dismayed. I am your God. And this angel
says here, don't be afraid. Don't be afraid of what you've
just experienced. Don't be afraid of me. Angels are sent as ministers. They are sent to help the heirs
of salvation. If only we knew how many were
on our side. Elijah said, Lord, open that
young man's eyes. Let him see. He saw this army, this physical
army, but there was a whole lot more spiritual army in that battle. That whole hillside was full
of angels. If we only knew how many were
on our side, we would have good reason to fear not. We can't physically see them,
but if we could, it would absolutely amaze us what's in our presence
even here. And notice here the knowledge
of this angel of those two ladies. For I know that ye seek Jesus
which was crucified. You don't have to be around someone
long to know whom or what they seek, do you? You don't have
to be around someone long and listen to them talk to know who they're after or
what they're after. You know, when they heard the
disciples, they had taken knowledge that they had been with Jesus. Those who seek the Lord have
no reason to be afraid. Fear not. I want you to notice also, they
sought Him. They sought Him, even though
He was crucified. They were not ashamed of him
though he was crucified in number with the transgressors. Paul said in Romans, I'm not
ashamed of the gospel of Christ. I'm not ashamed of a crucified
Christ. I'm not ashamed of a bloody religion. Some hear this and say, that's
a bloody religion. Well, without the blood, there is no salvation.
There is no salvation. Without his blood. There's no
cleansing without his blood. There's no remission of sins.
There's none. And these ladies were not ashamed
to be identified. With Jesus, who was crucified,
neither are you, if you believe the gospel, you're not. And notice what he says here
in verse six to these ladies. He's not here. He is not here. For he is risen,
as he said. He's not here because someone
stole his body. He's not here because he's risen.
He's alive. Why seek ye the living among
the dead? And he says to them, come see
the place where the Lord lay. Come see. Come see. I'm sure
they were scared to enter that tomb. But there's nothing in the grave
for us to be afraid of. There's nothing about the grave
for us to be afraid of. O death, where is thy sting? O grave, where is thy victory? Come and see. Come and see where
the Lord lay. If we could this morning see
where the Lord lay, you know what we would see? An empty tomb. We would see an empty tomb and
the Scripture is fulfilled. I'm not interested in seeing
an empty tomb. I'm interested in seeing Him.
I'm not going to make a journey over to Jerusalem and then go
look to some tomb that they say this is where he lay. You know,
it's a good tourist attraction. But it's not an attraction for
God's people. He's the one we want to see. I don't want to
see where he lay. I want to see Him. I want to see Him. Christ did truly lay in the grave. But never again. Never again. Once in the end of the world,
He came to put away sin by the sacrifice of Himself. That will
never happen again. Because He got the job done.
He did it the first time. You know those old priests? They
had to offer the same sacrifices that could not take away sin.
They offered them day after day, year after year, for a long time. What a bloody religion. I mean,
just slaying morning and evening, slaying the lamb morning and
evening, shedding the blood. But once in the end of the world,
the Lord Jesus Christ, the Son of God, became incarnate. took upon Him our sins. He bore
our sins in His body on the tree. He was made to be sinned for
us. And God took out His wrath on Him. And He truly suffered
for it. He suffered the hell of the wrath
of God that I deserve. And He died. And He was buried. And He's risen. And He's never
going to die again. I like what my pastor Henry said
one time. We were at a funeral. We were
walking away from the grave. And he said to me, I'll be glad
when we quit dying. He said, I'll be glad when we
quit dying. One day God will save that last
lost sheep. And we'll quit dying. It'll be
over. Death will be swallowed up in
victory. We will not ever, ever again
go to the funeral home and go to the gravesite. He's not here. He's risen. Not even a trace there. Not even
a trace. And then He says to them, go
quickly. That's right. I tell you what, good news ought
to travel quickly. Good news ought to travel quickly.
Now go quickly and tell His disciples that He's risen from the dead.
And that's what I'm doing this morning. I'm telling His disciples
here this morning, He's risen from the dead. He's not in that
tomb. He's seated at God's right hand.
And behold, he goeth before you. Now, if he was dead, he couldn't
do that. He's not dead. He's risen. And
he goeth before you into Galilee. There shall you see him. Lo,
I have told you. That's my job this morning. That
angel was nothing more than a messenger. And he came and he delivered
the message. And he said, I told you. And this morning I can say, Lo,
I've told you. He's risen. He's seated at God's
right hand. And don't you hesitate through
unbelief. You go and you tell the good news to His disciples. And here's your comfort, here's
your confidence, here's your strength. He goes before you.
He's already there. He goeth before you. He'll be
there to back up your message. Oh, I pray His presence here
this morning. He never sends His servants to
a place where He is not. He goeth before you. And there shall you see Him. Where do we see Christ? Well,
we see Him in His Word, and we see Him in His people, in His
church. There shall you see Him. How
important is this gathering? This is not just Sunday morning,
time to go to church. If you and I could grasp the
importance of what we're doing here this morning, there's a
special blessing on the assembly of God's church, where two or
three are gathered together, there am I in the midst. If there's just two here that's
truly gathered together to worship Him, to hear from Him, He's here. As He said, He said He would
be. And they departed quickly because
they believed. They believed the message the
angel gave them. They departed quickly. And notice
how they departed with fear and great joy. And those two go together
in a believer. Fear, trembling, and great joy. You say I sound like a paradox.
Well, you are. And I fear we understand who God is. We understand who Christ is.
We know the importance of this service. We've gathered here
to worship him who is holy. Who is sovereign. We are in his
presence. We are in his presence. And we do this with fear, but
we do it with great joy. We're not doing this without
drudgery. We're not afraid the ceiling
is going to fall in on us. This is with great joy. Christ is our joy. We worship
Him with great joy. As He said, Our hope, our confidence in the Lord Jesus Christ is totally founded on this, as
he said. Paul said, Sirs, be of good cheer,
for I believe God. It shall be just as he told me. Just as he said. All right.