The Responsibility of the Resurrection

Sunday, April 18, 2004

Rev. Ronald Burcham

Typed from audio transcript

Grace, mercy, and peace to you from God our Father and our resurrected Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. Amen.

Did you notice anything unusual about Jesus' first appearance to His disciples? I mean other than the fact that He'd been dead for three days and now He was alive. Other than the fact that they had the place locked down tighter than Fort Knox and yet Jesus just appears in front of them. Aside from those things, did you notice anything unusual about how Jesus comes to His disciples on that first night? The man got right to business. There was no small talk involved there. It wasn't, "Hey, Jesus, how have you been? Gee, whoa, you had us worried there for a minute, Teacher." There wasn't any talk about, "Hey, did you know about Joseph of Arimathea? Wasn't that nice that he gave you his grave? Of course, he can have it back now. How about Nicodemus? Nicodemus was willing to be public there and be at your funeral." None of that talk happened. There was no being reacquainted. It was Jesus right down to work because He comes and He says, "Peace be with you," and then He says, "As the Father has sent me, now I'm sending you."

Jesus gets right down to business. God the Father had sent Him on a mission. That mission was completed when He came out of that grave. He had one salvation for all of mankind and now that His mission was complete, He now gives us our mission. Our mission now is to take the power of the resurrection out to the whole world. There is no time for small talk. There is no time for stories about how they were worried, because it's too important. It's too vital. We read urgency in John's gospel. The urgency is that Jesus sends them out into the world to carry out that message to those who don't know the power of the resurrection. Every man, woman, and child needs to know about Jesus and what Jesus has accomplished for them so there's no delay. Although this morning we'd like to just sing a few more Easter hymns and just bask in the glory of the faith that God has given to us, we can't. There is urgency to the matter. There is a world of people who don't know Jesus, and God has given us the responsibility.

You see, God moved the stone away from the grave but now He tells us to get moving, to get moving out into the world. Therefore, Jesus sends us, but He sends us with confidence. He doesn't just send us out there without any knowledge. He didn't send the disciples out without instilling in them a confidence of the faith that was in their heart. He wanted to wipe away any doubt they might have in their mind so they had a firm conviction that Jesus was and is the Son of God, that He did die on Friday, and He was alive on that very night. The first thing Jesus does is He says, "Why don't you go ahead and check out my hands." He says, "Do you want to see my side? It's really me." There's no hoax going on here. There's no pretending. This isn't an impostor. The wounds are real. The man that they saw beaten up and bloody on the cross, the man who breathed His last and died, the man they wrapped in burial cloths and placed in that tomb for three days is the same man that is standing in front of them that very evening. Jesus wanted to wipe away every doubt, even every doubt of Thomas. Jesus was willing to come back the next week. "Thomas, you wanted proof. Go ahead. Put your finger right here in the nail hole. Extend you hand. Go ahead and put it in my side. Stop doubting," Jesus says, "and believe." Jesus wanted to make sure that His eleven disciples knew beyond any doubt that He was dead but now He is alive so when they went forward, they could go out with a conviction in their heart, a conviction that would give them courage like no other. They would stand up in front of family, in front of friends, in front of enemies, in front of the Romans, in front of everyone, and speak of the power of the resurrection. Jesus was going to send them, but He sent them confident.

And Jesus wants you to be just as confident. In fact, Jesus has given us so much evidence that we can be confident of the resurrection of His Son. Not only do we have the accounts of the gospels that talk about the appearance of Jesus to His disciples or the appearance of Jesus to over 500 believers at one time but, on top of that, just sheer logic, sheer reason about everything surrounding the disciples and the resurrection lead us to believe it has to be true. Consider this: If it were all a hoax, as some might want to say, if it was all just made up by the disciples, then why would the disciples make up a story that would cause them years of grief and pain and torture and eventually cost them their lives? Why would they do that? Answer me this: Paul saw his life's work as to rid the world of Christianity that it was a sect that came out of their Jewish tradition and it was his duty to God to wipe them out and yet Paul goes from chief persecutor to an advocate for Christianity and the evangelist to all gentiles. You can't explain those things. The only explanation is that Jesus is alive, that Jesus is the Son of God and that He was dead for three days and He came back to life. Not only do we have the scriptures testifying to it but even our very reason and the logic that God has given to us shows beyond the shadow of a doubt that Jesus is the one who said He was. That means everything Jesus said was true and every promise Jesus made can be trusted. He wants to erase any doubts you might have in your mind. Erase them so you can have a firm conviction that you know down to the depths of your soul that Jesus is your Savior that Jesus is the Son of God, and that Jesus does live.

Therefore, yes, Jesus sends you out but He sends you out confident, confident in your salvation, confident in His love for you, and confident in His love for all people. Then Jesus sends you out as His representative. You represent Christ to the world. That's what the disciples were. The disciples were in training for three years and, when the teacher leaves, then the disciples represent the teacher. The disciples were being sent out to represent Jesus to the world and whatever people saw in the disciples, they would equate that with Jesus. Whatever they saw in the disciples, they would equate that with being a follower of Jesus or Christianity. They did the same with the early church, the early believers. How well did it work? Acts 2:42 says this, "They enjoyed the favor of all the people and God added to their number daily." In other words, when people that didn't know about Jesus saw the Christians, saw the love they had for one another, saw how they treated other people, recognized they were different than the rest of them, they were drawn to that and God added to their numbers, the number of believers in Jesus daily.

We have a responsibility, and that is we represent Christ and we represent Christianity. When the world sees us, that's their impression of what Christians are all about. That's their impression of Christianity. That's how society works. We see an individual and generalize what we see to a whole group. For instance, we have not looked at the police department the same since Rodney King, have we? Each time we hear about violence and an arrest, there's always something in the back of our mind that says, "Was that justified?" Why? Because of a few officers, that's why. We don't look at the presidency any different since Watergate, do we? Because every time there's a hint of a scandal, what do we think of? We think, "Well, can he be trusted? Is he covering up? Is he telling the truth?" What about what's happening with the Roman Catholic Church and the controversy they have with the priest? Now people look at all priests differently. In fact, people look at all clergy differently. Because what they see in one, they transfer to the whole group.

That's a heavy responsibility to carry. When unbelievers see you, they see Christianity. When unbelievers watch you in action, they say, "That's what being a follower of Jesus is all about." It can be either positive or negative. It is something that God has called us to do, and it's a heavy responsibility, but He equips us. He equips us to carry out that responsibility because He gives us the gift of the Holy Spirit. Right then and there to the disciples, He breathed on them and said, "Receive the Holy Spirit." The gift of the Holy Spirit would then come on Pentecost Sunday, and that's when all of a sudden the disciples go from frightened followers to excited evangelists standing on the street corners, one moment locked up behind closed doors, the next moment standing out in the temple telling anybody and everybody about Jesus and the power of His resurrection. That's the power of the spirit, and that's the same spirit that you have living in you. It is the same spirit that called you to faith at baptism or called you to faith through the power of the Word. It's the same spirit that lives in your heart, and it's time for us to trust that spirit, to know that God's spirit lives within us and to know the power of that spirit and to exercise that power. You know, Jesus said, "If somebody comes to you and has a question about your faith, don't worry about how you'll answer because My Spirit will give you the words to speak." There's no formula that has to be used. There's no set dialog when somebody asks us about our faith. We simply speak from the heart about what Jesus means to us and all that He has done in our lives.

There is no more powerful witness than the life of a Christian, because when people see us they should see something different. As we have been loved by God, we should be loving. As we have been forgiven by God, we should be forgiving. When the world sees us, they should see us as being a little bit different, a little bit out of sync with everyone else. When they see us going through tough times, they'll notice that we have something going for us that they can't explain. When they see us in good times, they'll know that there's an extra joy about us, an extra spring in our step that they don't quite understand. When they see us loving each other and loving the world, then God is going to add to our numbers daily because people are drawn to that. That's the responsibility we carry is to be His representative and, empowered by the Holy Spirit, we can.

My Friends, we have an opportunity in our society that I have not seen before. There is an openness to talk about Jesus like never before. In fact, there is an eagerness, and there is a hunger on the part of the world to know more about Jesus. Because of the hype of The Passion of the Christ, because of Easter, because of all the stories in the newspapers and magazines, and the specials on TV, suddenly Christianity has bubbled up to the top and people are anxious and eager. They have questions. We have answers. They have hurts. We have the one who can heal them. This is an opportunity for us. That's why there's no more small talk with Jesus. There's no time to dilly-dally around. There is urgency. While we still live in this moment of hype, there is urgency for us to reach out to people with the power of the resurrection, and it happens when one person shares their heart with another person. When one person tells of the difference that Christ has made for them to another person, then God's spirit works and draws that person in.

God has given a responsibility to us. The resurrection of Jesus is the single most important thing that ever happened in history, and the power of the resurrection has changed eternity for each one of us and it is God's will that it would change eternity for all people. God moved away the stone, but now He tells us, "Get moving." Amen.

Copyright 2004 Gloria Dei Lutheran Church