Now This is a Celebration!

Good morning! Happy Easter!

Poem-Molly, Kaye, Doloris
Baptism – Natali Wisekal, Special Music-Barb – He is Risen?,
Kids time-they are singing “This Little Light”

Today my message is entitled “Now This is a Celebration!”

We started this series of messages on Celebration a few weeks ago. We have looked at Why, Who, How, When do we celebrate?

This look at celebration was to prepare us to arrive today with an excited atmosphere of celebration, as we remember what Jesus Christ did, this weekend.

Last week we considered the celebration of the triumphal entrance of Jesus into Jerusalem for the Passover. On Friday, we observed the remembrance of Jesus dying, crucified for our sins, not His. Today we celebrate Jesus rising out of the burial tomb – He is alive!

Each Gospel tells the story of the morning that the ladies went to Jesus’s tomb and the events that follow are spelled out by each writer with their emphasis on details so from all of them combined we get a pretty good picture of how God showed His people that He does what He promises.

***Tie in Jesus’s predictions of this event and Jesus’s promises to apostles after rising from grave.

Let us look at a few times that this event was talked about before the time actually came. First, the announcement by Isaiah, the prophet, of the Lord’s sacrifice and why Jesus did such a thing.

Isaiah 53: 4-6
4 Surely he took up our infirmities
and carried our sorrows,
yet we considered him stricken by God,
smitten by him, and afflicted.
5 But he was pierced for our transgressions,
he was crushed for our iniquities;
the punishment that brought us peace was upon him,
and by his wounds we are healed.
6 We all, like sheep, have gone astray,
each of us has turned to his own way;
and the Lord has laid on him the iniquity of us all.

Then we listen to the words of Jesus about what was coming.

John 2: 19-22
19 Jesus answered them, “Destroy this temple, and I will raise it again in three days.”
20 The Jews replied, “It has taken forty-six years to build this temple, and you are going to raise it in three days?”
21 But the temple he had spoken of was his body.
22 After he was raised from the dead, his disciples recalled what he had said. Then they believed the Scripture and the words that Jesus had spoken.

Is that not what we have done? We have read the Scriptures and believed! Our faith is a fulfillment of why Jesus came to earth, died and rose to life.

1 Cor 15: 12-19
12 But if it is preached that Christ has been raised from the dead, how can some of you say that there is no resurrection of the dead?
13 If there is no resurrection of the dead, then not even Christ has been raised. 14 And if Christ has not been raised, our preaching is useless and so is your faith.
15 More than that, we are then found to be false witnesses about God, for we have testified about God that he raised Christ from the dead. But he did not raise him if in fact the dead are not raised.
16 For if the dead are not raised, then Christ has not been raised either.
17 And if Christ has not been raised, your faith is futile; you are still in your sins.
18 Then those also who have fallen asleep in Christ are lost.
19 If only for this life we have hope in Christ, we are of all people most to be pitied.
We are either believers of an eternal God or we waste our time pretending. If there is no life with God after death, why do we hope for that, believe that and teach that? Would it not be better to enjoy life on earth to the fullest and then die?

For me, I will continue to believe in the Lord God Almighty and look forward to the time coming when I rest in the arms of Jesus my Lord forever. I believe in the Scriptures and trust in the guidance of the Holy Spirit. I believe Jesus is alive – not dead!

Now listen to the words of the song Barb is going to sing “He’s Alive!”

What a wonderful story about our God, who beat death, and rose to be with us forever. All that is written in God’s word declares that Jesus lives. Hear what the apostle Paul and Dr. Luke tell us about Jesus’s last days here on earth.

Acts 1: 1-3
1 In my former book, Theophilus, I wrote about all that Jesus began to do and to teach
2 until the day he was taken up to heaven, after giving instructions through the Holy Spirit to the apostles he had chosen.
3 After his suffering, he showed himself to these men and gave many convincing proofs that he was alive. He appeared to them over a period of forty days and spoke about the kingdom of God.

Luke 24: 50-53
50 When he had led them out to the vicinity of Bethany, he lifted up his hands and blessed them.
51 While he was blessing them, he left them and was taken up into heaven.
52 Then they worshiped him and returned to Jerusalem with great joy.
53 And they stayed continually at the temple, praising God.

That is why we are here today praising God. We believe in a risen Savior!
So why did Jesus go through all of this suffering and dying and rising out of death? God chose to give all of us another opportunity to believe in Him, to put our trust in Him and to become part of His family.

That leaves us with hope for our future. Jesus gave us the path to God, it is our choice to follow Him or not. If we chose to follow, we have a job to do.

Acts 1:8-11
8 But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit comes on you; and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth.”
9 After he said this, he was taken up before their very eyes, and a cloud hid him from their sight.
10 They were looking intently up into the sky as he was going, when suddenly two men dressed in white stood beside them.
11 “Men of Galilee,” they said, “why do you stand here looking into the sky? This same Jesus, who has been taken from you into heaven, will come back in the same way you have seen him go into heaven.”

Our hope is in the return of Jesus Christ. Jesus is alive!
Now this is a celebration!

Let’s pray!