When you talk to people about the resurrection, notice I said when you talk to people about the resurrection, not if, but when you talk to people about the resurrection, they have one of three responses. These are the same responses that Paul got when he preached in Athens. In Acts 17 he had preached a sermon about the resurrection of Jesus Christ. In verse 32 it says, when they heard of the resurrection of the dead, some mocked. But others said, we will hear you again about this. So Paul went out from their midst, but some men joined him and believed. So those are the three responses. Some people will mock, some people will want to hear more, and some people will believe. A lot of modern people, especially those who are deemed more sophisticated by society, dismiss the resurrection out of hand. They are the mockers. Others are more winsome in their unbelief. They prefer to think of it as a metaphor, you know like the resurrection of the earth every spring. I remember talking to people when I was in the university ministry who tried to talk about the resurrection like it was the metaphor. They said they believed in the resurrection. But when I said to them, do you believe that Jesus rose from the dead physically, they scoffed. Others try to reframe it as a political event or uprising. A recent New York Times article does that very thing. I was reading it the other day and they said that Jesus was crucified not for blasphemy, as the Bible says, but for insurrection. And that supposedly as he entered Jerusalem on Palm Sunday, that at the same time Pilate was entering not on a donkey like Jesus was, but on a stallion. Although I don't see any record of that in the biblical story. A lot of times people will want to find an excuse for what the resurrection means. But their disciples, and John here, when he wrote this, wrote it as though it were fact because it is. He reports them as truth. He reports it as a first-hand account. First of all, in verses 1 through 10, Peter and the other disciple whom Jesus loved, which we know is John, the author of the Gospel, they had heard Mary Magdalene's report. She had gone to the tomb, presumably to finish the process of entombing Jesus. And the stone had been rolled away and Jesus was not there. So she ran back and reported that the stone had been moved, that the tomb was empty. And so John and Peter ran to the tomb. And one commentator points out that in those days a Jewish man who wanted to preserve even a shred of dignity wouldn't run. But there they were, running to the tomb to see what had happened, to see if Mary's report was in fact true. John is apparently faster than Peter, so in verse 4 he reaches the tomb first, looks in and sees the grave clothes that Jesus had been wrapped in lying there, just as he had taken them off, which of course he had. And then shortly after, Peter arrives and he goes into the tomb to investigate. John says they both leave convinced that Jesus is gone, but they're not convinced that he's been raised from the dead. Verse 9 says, yet they didn't understand the Scriptures, that he must rise from the dead. Even though Jesus had told them that on more than one occasion, on the third day I will rise again. They see the empty tomb, they see the grave clothes, but they still don't understand. Now ask yourself this question. If you or one of your unbelieving friends or family members, if you were inventing this story, this resurrection story, if you had been Peter or John or one of the other apostles, if you were inventing this story, would you invent it like this? Would you want to look dumbfounded? Or would you want to look like you had believed all along and that you had rejoiced when you saw the empty tomb? Would you want to look good, even heroic? But the fact is Peter and John, the disciples who were closest to Jesus, are just as reluctant to believe that he rose from the dead as some of us are. One minister wrote this in verses 11 through 18, Peter and John go back to their homes. Mary stays behind. She is understandably devastated because she assumes this is the latest outrage that the body of Jesus has been desecrated. And while she's weeping over it, she meets Jesus, although she thinks he's the gardener. But it's not until Jesus speaks her name, Mary, that she suddenly realizes who is addressing her and instantly she wants to cling to him. I don't know if you've seen these. They're on Facebook. I got on Facebook initially because all my kids were on Facebook, and they're all over the United States, and we could talk to each other more easily. We could even make phone calls for free on Facebook. So that's why we got on it. But then it became not hip enough for them. So they're not really on it anymore. But I go on every once in a while because I've talked to people that I went to school with, high school and university. But one of the favorite things that shows up is military coming home and being greeted. It's usually surprising. The thing about it is when they come home, when they show up unexpectedly, oftentimes the mothers or the fathers or the spouses or the children break out in tears, weeping, because their loved one has come home. And the thing about a military family is they're never quite sure if they're coming home because their service is dangerous at times. They could die. They could be injured. And so when they come home, there is cause for a lot of rejoicing. And it always tears me up too when little girls run to their fathers, jump in his arms and just weep. Or when wives do the same. I want you to think of that scene and multiply it by about a hundred when they think that Jesus is dead and Mary sees him alive. And all she wants to do is hug him. All she wants to do is cling to him. But Jesus says, you can't. You can't, Mary. I have to ascend. So Mary went back and announced to the disciples, I've seen the Lord and tells them the things that he said to her. Now, again, we have to understand that in that day, very patriarchal society, you think this is patriarchal. You haven't seen anything. In that society, the word of a woman was not very credible. In fact, it wouldn't be taken seriously in a court. So again, imagine that you're writing this story. You're making it up. It's a story to convince other people that Jesus rose from the dead when he really didn't. Would you have it that a woman is the first one to see him? Would you have it that John and Peter, after seeing the empty grave, didn't believe? I don't think he would do that. John would not write that Mary was the first to see Jesus unless she was the first to see Jesus. Then notice what happens when Jesus appears to the disciples in verses 19 through 23, and especially when he meets Thomas and the others in 24 to 29. He presents to them physical evidence. Do you see it? We know that Jesus really died. That's not in dispute. But chapter 19 verses 32 to 33 records the grim business of breaking the legs of crucified victims. The Romans went to break the legs. The reason they did this is because the Jews didn't want anybody on the crucifixion tree when the Sabbath started. So they wanted to make sure they were dead. Sometimes it took days for somebody to die from crucifixion. But the way crucifixion worked is that the person being crucified would alternately push up on his legs so he could breathe. Or once, as the pain was too great, he would sag down to relieve his legs and begin to asphyxiate. So if the person wasn't dead yet, they would break their legs so they couldn't push up and they would die quicker. And when they came to Jesus, they saw that he was already dead. So they didn't break his legs so that the scripture would be fulfilled. Not a bone of him should be broken. But just to be sure, they pierced his heart up under his ribcage. So Jesus is dead. Why mention this? Because throughout the centuries, there are people that have claimed that Jesus never really died. That he passed out. And the soldiers incorrectly presumed he was dead. But my friend who is a PhD disease pathologist told me that when somebody dies, the blood and the serum separate because it's no longer coursing. And especially the heavier parts would in a corpse that was upright. So when the spear went in, blood and water came out indicating that Jesus was indeed dead. You see, some people are willing to cuck-cock any story to avoid believing the gospel even if they know it's true. Matthew 28 says, when they had assembled the elders and taken counsel, they gave a sufficient sum of money to the soldiers and said, Tell people, his disciples came by night and stole him away while we were asleep. And if this comes to the governor's ears, we will satisfy him and keep you out of trouble. You see, soldiers, if they fell asleep during their shift, so to speak, they would be executed. So in order to concoct this story, they had to be bribed. So Peter and John returned to the others. What does it say in verse 19, on the evening of the day, the first day of the week, the doors being locked where the disciples were for fear of the Jews. Again, they're not looking a bit heroic. They've gone someplace. They're hiding away. They locked the doors because they're afraid. Why are they afraid? Because Jesus has been brutally tortured and killed, crucified. Cursed as everyone who hangs on a tree, the Scriptures say. And the disciples thought they might be next. So they were hiding away. Jesus came and stood among them. Jesus, be with you. They had to be astonished and afraid. They might have thought they were seeing a ghost. In fact, Luke records that very thing in his gospel. But they were startled and frightened and thought they saw a spirit. And he said to them, why are you troubled? And why do doubts arise in your hearts? See my hands and my feet, that a design myself touch me and see. For a spirit does not have flesh and bones as you see that I have. When he had said this, he showed them his hands and his feet. And while they were still disbelieving for joy and were marveling, he said to them, have you anything to eat? And they gave him a piece of broiled fish and he took it and ate it. He says, peace be with you because they need peace in that moment. He shows them his hands and his side. He shows them the nail marks and the wound where the spear had punctured his side. And he eats a piece of fish because the spirit doesn't eat fish. Thomas wasn't there that day and he said, I want physical evidence. Unless I see his hands and put my fingers, actually it would have been here, my fingers in the nail prints and my hand in the spear mark, I will never believe. Maybe you can relate to that. Maybe you can relate to that skepticism. But Jesus deals tenderly with Thomas. He says, put your finger here. See my hands, put your hand and place it in my side. Do not disbelieve, but believe. Thomas is convinced and when he sees this he worships Jesus and says, my Lord, oh my God. John is saying that this is an account of what we really saw and what we really touched and what we really heard. He says this in his first letter, his first epistle. He says, that which from the beginning, which we have heard, which we have seen with our eyes, which we have looked upon and have touched with our hands concerning the word of life, the life was made manifest. We have seen it and testified to it and proclaimed to you the eternal life, which was with the Father and was made manifest to us. That which we have seen and heard, we proclaim to you so that you too may have fellowship with us and indeed our fellowship is with the Father and his Son Jesus Christ. John makes much of having seen and heard and touched because for one thing, there was a group of people that were called Gnostics who wanted to say that Jesus just appeared as a spirit. That he didn't rise physically. But that's not what happened. And when Jesus comes to them, he offers them peace. Three times in this chapter, verse 19, verse 21 and verse 26, Jesus offers peace to his disciples. John wants us to understand that Jesus is the sacrificial lamb. He's come to make a toner for the sins of the people. Once for all, he was the fulfillment of the Passover. We were reconciled to him. He made peace so he can give peace. Romans chapter five says, therefore, since we justify by faith, we have peace with God through the Lord Jesus Christ. Through him we have obtained access by faith into his grace in which we stand and we rejoice in the hope of the glory of God. Why do we need peace with God? Because it goes on to say in verse eight of Romans five, God shows his love for us, and that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us. That's why Jesus had to die because we're sinners, because all of us have fallen short of the glory of God. All of us have earned as our wages for our sin death. But God, being rich in mercy because of the great love with which he loved us, even when we were dead in our transgressions and sins, made us alive together with Christ by grace we have been saved. Romans five goes on to say, but God shows us his love that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us. Since we have now been justified by his blood, much more shall we be saved from him by the wrath of God. For if while we were enemies, we were reconciled to God by the death of his son, much more now that we are reconciled will be saved by his life. See, sin alienated us from God. God, we were enemies of God. He was angry about our sin. But Jesus died and has risen to secure peace with God for everyone who believes. And because of that, we can pursue peace with each other, forgiving each other, standing together, fighting for instead of one another. Jesus brings peace because he lives. The resurrection brings us peace. The resurrection also brings purpose. Dr. David Strain of Jackson First Presbyterian Church says, the resurrection brings purpose as we look at verse twenty one. The Father has sent me, so I am sending you. Jesus has been on a mission to save us from the holy and righteous wrath of God by bearing the wrath in our place on the cross. And now having risen again, he brings his peace reconciling us to God. When a person becomes a Christian, they don't become passengers. They're not spectators. At least they're not supposed to be. They're called to be missionaries. The resurrection brings peace and gives us a new purpose. We are sent by the risen Christ. The next thing is the resurrection brings power. He breathed on them the Holy Spirit. It was a dramatic way to communicate what he really offers. When God made Adam back in Genesis one, he breathed life into him. The resurrection means of Jesus means the breath of God, the Holy Spirit has been sent to us by Jesus Christ. Jesus told them he was going to leave them in the upper room. We learned about that earlier in our series in John. But he would send them a comforter who would come and the Holy Spirit would dwell in their hearts and empower them to fulfill the mission he was going to give them. And that's true of us. That's what it's about. It's kind of an enacted promise that we would do more than simply give them be a spectator, but we would have a new purpose. The resurrection also brings the call to proclaim. We're supposed to go tell them. Jesus is telling his disciples that their preaching of the message of the resurrection will accomplish world evangelization. In the gospel we get to tell the world there is forgiveness available for anyone who wants it through faith alone, the risen Christ alone. We get to tell them, not that we have to tell them, we get to tell them. When you believe this message you are forgiven. If you believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead and you confess with your mouth that Jesus is Lord, you will be saved. If you reject this message, the guilt of your sin still remains. Those whom the gospel acquits shall be acquitted, those whom the gospel condemns shall be condemned. In other words, what does the resurrection offer? What does it bring? It offers pardon. It offers salvation. It offers peace. You're a Slav Pelican, famous historian, when he was dying, said, if Jesus is not risen then nothing else matters. That's what Paul said in 1 Corinthians 15. If Jesus is not risen then we are the most pitied of all people. But Dr. Pelican went on to say, if Jesus is risen, nothing else matters. It's the most important event in all of history. It's the most important reality you will ever be called to deal with. The resurrection, Easter, is about saving your life. It's about life in his name. You get it by believing Jesus lives and for everyone who will entrust themselves entirely to him he gives new peace, new purpose, new power and a message to proclaim. Peace, pardon, mercy, grace for the whole world. As Paul said, I'm sorry, as John said in his second chapter of his first epistle, My Children, I am writing these things to you so that you may not sin, but if anyone does sin, we have an advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous. He is the propitiation for our sins and not for ours only, but for the sins of the whole world. That word propitiation means he's taken all the wrath of God for the guilt of our sin. He made him who knew no sin to be sinned that we might become the righteousness of God in Christ. Propitiation for our sins, but not only for ours, but for the whole world. Do you believe the gospel? Do you believe that your sin are deserving the eternal punishment for your sin by a holy and righteous God? Do you believe that Jesus Christ lived a perfect sinless life in your place and that he died the death you deserve to die and has risen again and sits at the right hand of God the Father? Do you believe that if you do, you are saved? If you don't, please, I beg you, on behalf of Christ, be reconciled to God. Believe the gospel. Father, thank you for your word.