Cornerstone PLUS

But this is our Easter Sunday service, and it's always a joy to think about the Resareza of the lord Jesus Christ. So that's what we're gonna think about this morning. Jesus was crucified on a Friday. He was buried placed in a tomb, but just 3 days later on Sunday morning, that tomb was empty. There is no final resting place of Jesus unlike many religious leaders.

We don't know where Jesus well, we do know where Jesus' body is. You wouldn't be able to find it in a tomb. And that's brilliant because it's the ultimate victory, isn't it? That story has the ultimate victory to it. Jesus the rescuer, the deliverer, the redeemer, the savior who died on a cross could not be held by the grave.

He was too too powerful. He defeated death. Satan's ploy to try and destroy the son of god, to try and, you know, foil his work failed epically. Satan was made a public spectacle through the resurrection, triumphed over once and for all. If you were going to put the ultimate twist into the story of god's rescue plan, if you wanted to have that twist at the end that really surprised people.

Well, this would be really great, wouldn't it? That's what the resurrection does. And I think for a lot of Christians, that's what, that's really what we take away from the resurrection. God 1. The big thing is the cross, right?

The empty tomb just gives a victorious ending to what Jesus came to do. But the Bible has far more to say about the resurrection than that. And what better opportunity then is to Sunday morning to take a look at what I wanna do this morning is look at 3 massive implications for us as God's people that the resurrection has for us, 3 implications for us. And the first 1 is this. I just called it an a new status, a new status So let me read to you what the apostle Paul wrote.

You've been doing the series going through Romans. This is what he wrote in Romans chapter 4. So having just related the story of Abraham who was given or credited is what the the Bible says a righteousness from god, that means that simply because Abraham took the promises of god seriously believed them. God put righteousness, that is a right standing with god into his account. That's a heavy sentence.

We're gonna we're gonna look at what that means. But Paul says this, he continues by saying this verse 23, the words it was credited to him were written not for him, that is Abraham alone. So listen up. This is not just Abraham, but also for us, to whom god will credit righteousness. For us who believe in him who raised Jesus our lord from the dead.

He was delivered over to death for our sins and was raised to life for our justification. Now do you see what Paul's doing here? Look at those words on the screen. I mean, you've got Bible on your seat if you want it, but most of the stuff's gonna be up on screen this morning. See what Paul's doing?

He says that Jesus died. He died on the cross to take the penalty for our sins. Quite clear, isn't it? He died for our sins, and then he was raised to life so that we could be justified. Or declared righteous by god.

Paul seems to be in these verses. Just ever so slightly separating those 2 things out so that you can get a good clear look at them. Usually, the Bible sticks it all together in the work that Jesus did on the cross. But here, Paul just separates it out a little bit. So let me illustrate this with a bank account.

It's a crude illustration, but maybe it will help you to follow this. So imagine you have Well, let's call it a righteousness account. Okay. So you've got your own personal righteousness account. Got it?

Now you need to have a healthy righteousness balance in your account. You've got to have a good some, you know, good amount of righteousness there to be right with god. I told you this was rough. Otherwise, you would not be qualified to be in his presence. You'd be excluded from heaven unless you've got the right balance in that account.

Now Paul has spent chapters of Romans up until saying this stuff that's on the screen here, proving that every single human being has not just got too little in that account. But is in fact a horrible debtor. It's gone way in the red. We've got negative righteousness. If that was even a thing.

The Bible uses the word sin. Yeah? But says Paul, for those who like Abraham who have just had the story of put their trust in god's promises, namely in Jesus his promised savior, On the cross, the debt of our sin was fully paid. Jesus bore the agony of the punishment that we deserved everything that the debt demanded. But more than that is what Paul's saying here.

Paul goes on to say he was then raised for our justification. His death and resurrection secured a permanently healthy balance in our account. Does that make sense? Debt cancelled and then also the riches of Christ credited put in. Does that make sense?

That's a wonderful, wonderful truth, isn't it? Through the resurrection of Jesus Christ, we are declared. We are proclaimed universally proclaimed, not guilty by god, the creator. But instead righteous before him, or the word used there justified, justified. You see, the fact that Jesus rose from the dead confirms it.

It's the first exciting thing about the resurrection, isn't it? It's confirmed. So we're not left wondering to ourselves Did Jesus really manage to pay for my sin on the cross? Did he really manage to do enough to put me right with God? Have I got enough in the account?

Did he do enough for me to get eternal life? Do I still have to be worried about what death might hold for me? When when god raised Jesus from the dead, it was like his declaration of approval. The approval of Christ's work of redemption. So god approved it.

That's what the resurrection tells us. God declared it complete everything that Jesus had done. The resurrection was like god's rubber stamp on our righteousness, rubber stamped, Now we're sharing, again, a crude illustration, sharing a joint account with Christ himself. We have Christ's righteousness credited. You see, if all that was necessary had been done, then there was no longer any reason for Jesus tries to remain in the grave.

So it must have all been done. Listen to this wonderful quote, from the Princeton theologian BB Warfield. Now have a look at this picture of this guy because when you've got a beard like that, you have got to listen up. Okay? You've got to take seriously a beard like that.

Listen to what he says. But really, there's some some wonderful stuff in here. So listen carefully. The resurrection of Christ is fundamental to the Christian's assurance that Christ's work is complete and his redemption is accomplished. It is not enough that we should be able to say he was delivered up for our trespasses.

We must be able to add He was raised for my justification. Else, what would enable us to say he was able to pay the penalty he had undertaken that he died manifests his love and his willingness to save It is his rising again that manifests his power and his ability to save. We cannot be saved by a dead Christ who undertook but could not perform and who still lies under the Syrian sky another martyr of impotent love. To save, he must pass not merely to, but through death. If the penalty was fully paid, it cannot have broken him.

It must needs have been broken upon him. The resurrection of Christ is thus the indispensable evidence of his completed work, of his accomplished redemption, It is only because he rose from the dead that we know that the ransom he offered was sufficient. The sacrifice was accepted and that we are his perch just possession. In 1 word, the resurrection of Christ is fundamental to the Christian and the Christian's confidence. And that's worth shouting about, isn't it?

Couldn't it put it better myself? Well, we're going to sing another song now that speaks about the secure hope that we have because Jesus, the king of heaven, has 1 eternity for us. Those wonderful truths we've just read. So let's sing this song through all life's sorrow. Right.

So the resurrection of Jesus means we can have confidence that we have a new status, a new status. That means we're not left wondering, did it work? Am I forgiven? Is my debt canceled? Do I have eternal life?

No. We don't need to ask those questions because Jesus has risen. He is alive, and we are secure, and that status of ours will not change as long as Jesus Christ holds us in his hand. And he says no 1 can take us out of his hand. Wonderful truth, isn't it?

But additional to our new status, we also have secondly a new kind of life through the resurrection, a new kind of life. Listen to what the apostle Peter wrote. It's on the screen there. He says, praise be to the god and father of our lord Jesus Christ. In his great mercy, he has given us a new birth into a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead.

Do you hear that? New birth. You've been given a new birth. Through the resurrection, through the raising of Jesus Christ from the dead, he says we've been reborn a new life has started. Even now, a new life has started in all of god's people.

Now, Now this is all over the New Testament. So listen to what Paul writes in Ephesians chapter 2, he says this. As for you, you were dead in your transgressions and sins. Like the rest, we were by nature deserving of wrath, But because of his great love for us, god who is rich in mercy made us alive with Christ Even when we were dead in transgressions, it's by grace you've been saved. You were dead, says Paul, you were dead, but now you've been made alive.

You've never known real life like the new life you have in Christ. It's a different kind of life. The life you lived before was a life of death. Now this could get confusing. It's a life of death.

It was only actually physical life that you had before you came to Christ. You were breathing, walking, talking, sure. But all of it was stained and overshadowed by death. It was riddled with death. It was a death life.

Paul describes that death life as following. I sort of picture in my head like a zombie really following. He says following the ways of this world following the ways of the ruler of the kingdom of the air, the spirit who is now at work and those who are disobedient. You see what I'm saying? It's an un- sort of sort of almost an unthinking sort of driven following after these things like a sort of strange zombie creature.

It was a lemming life actually. Does anyone remember that game lemmings. Those little creatures, I mean, the kids play all these kind of first person shooting games and stuff, but lemmings was where it was at. Wasn't it? Those little creatures that just they march ever onwards towards whatever doom might lie ahead of them.

And if nothing else guides them, they just march merrily over the cliff edge, don't they? It's a doomed life. They're like drones, it's like slavery. Now people think that they are free. That's the irony of it all, isn't it?

But the freedom that we have is an illusion. The hard truth is that we are not free to choose not to sin. Only free to choose how to sin. Did you hear that? As again, there's a mind.

You guys are fine. Can you can you understand it? On your own as a human being, you cannot choose not to sin on your own. Under your own strength. You can only choose how you're going to sin.

That's a tricky concept, isn't it? I think that's what Paul describes as our supposed life being dead. He says it's dead in transgressions and sins. That's what he that's the picture he gives. And the inescapable results of that kind of death life is a death sentence.

Bible says the wages of sin is death, doesn't it? But the resurrection of Jesus Christ gives us says Peter, a living hope, a living hope to the lemmings. We've got new life. It's why Jesus describes it as being born again, doesn't he? Being born again?

Born again with spiritual life. Spiritual life coursing through your veins. Jesus rose from the grave with a new quality of life, resurrection life in a human body with a human spirit that are perfectly suited for a relationship with a fellowship with with god and obedience to him forever. That's the kind of quality of life we have. And by his resurrection, this is what we're being told, by his resurrection, he has purchased for us new life just like his.

It's a mind blowing concept. Now, we don't have the fullness of that life yet, I mean, it would absolutely blow us away, wouldn't it if we did? We still get sick, we still get old, but in our spirits, we are now alive with resurrection power. Don't forget that. It's what the theologians call regeneration as your word for the day.

Listen how the Bible speaks about the believer. Listen to this. Says I have been crucified with Christ and I no longer live. That's a weird sentence, isn't it? I'm crucified with Christ and I no longer live, but Christ lives in me.

The life I now live in the body I live by faith in the son of god who loved me and gave himself for me. I mean, with almost every verse I'm putting up on the screen, there's a sermon that could be preached behind it, isn't there? Now the best picture of what's going on here really is seen in baptism. Which Paul says illustrates, this is what he says in Romans 6, that we were therefore buried with him through baptism In order that Justice Christ was raised from the dead through the glory of the father, we too may have a new life. So listen to what's going on here.

Steve's clicked us on 1, but these little pictures do do sort of help us to see this. Paul tells us we're united with Christ when he dies on the cross. I have been crucified with Christ. Did you get that? I'm crucified with it.

So I'm united with him on the cross. And then I'm so I'm united when he's crucified but I'm also united with him when when when I'm when he's buried. I'm buried with him. That's why we put people under the water in baptism. It's a great picture isn't it?

Reminds us of this Easter Truth, doesn't it? And then I'm united with him as he is raised to that new kind of resurrection life. It's a life where we are now, listen, set free from sin. A life where you're set free from sin. Sure.

We still sin. We're not yet completely perfected. Christians mess But now with this new life, sin is no longer my master. Sin is no longer an inevitability. I'm not a lemming anymore.

Sin is now a choice. Sin's a choice. We have real freedom. Freedom not to sin. That's a great freedom, isn't So Paul urges the Christian.

Listen to what he says. After telling him about this new life he's got, with this new life coursing through your veins, he says, Hey, Don't let sin reign in your mortal bodies that you obey its evil desires. Do not offer any part of yourself to sin as an instrument of wickedness, but rather offer yourselves to god as those who've been brought from death to life and offer every part of yourself to him as an instrument of righteousness as a tool for doing righteousness as an instrument he can use to do his work in the world. Your new life is a powerful life. It's a powerful life.

You have power to gain victories over sin. Not just to have righteousness in your account, do you see, but to be an instrument of righteousness. That's amazing. The expectation of the believer is that this new life will make them more and more like Christ with every day that passes. That's how you know you've got this new life.

You start to behave like Jesus. But the apostle John reminds us if anybody does sin, we have an advocate with the father. Jesus Christ, the righteous 1. He is the atoning sacrifice for our sins, and not only for us, but also for the sins of the whole world. So, Christian, because Jesus rose from the dead.

You have a new status before god. You have an advocate with the father, the risen Jesus himself. And you have a new life to live for him each day, power to live for him each day because of the resurrection. And there's even more, but we're going to sing before we get the cherry on the top as it were. So first, we're going to sing because Jesus is not only risen from the dead, but exalted to the throne room of heaven, and this song picks up on that theme who has held the oceans in his hand.

Let's stand. Let's sing this together. So we've had the first 2 amazing truths of the resurrection. The implications for us. The first 1, do you remember?

What's the first 1? New status. That's right. And the second 1, a new Life. They're all news, aren't they?

They shouldn't be news to us, but they are news. So we've got a new status with god. And we've got a new life to live now, power to live for god through the resurrection. Thirdly, we've got a new body waiting for a new body, new kind of body. So Paul writes to the Corinthians this in 1 Corinthians 15.

He says this. Christ has indeed been raised from the dead. The first fruits of those who have fallen asleep interesting sentence. What he's saying here is that the resurrection of Jesus is the first fruits of our own resurrection. His resurrection is like the model example of what will 1 day happen for all of us as his people.

The first fruits is what you get at the start of a harvest. So you plant a field of corn, yeah, You go out there. Throw the seed in there. You make sure it's all nice and it's watered and everything's lovely. The fields looking good.

And then you wait. And then finally, the day comes when it's harvest time. You can start picking corn. So the first stuff has kinda come up. The first lot's ready.

The first corn that you pick on day 1 of the harvest, well, that is the first fruits, especially obvious, isn't it? And the first fruits, when you look at the first fruits and you look at the look at it, you can tell from the first fruits what is going to be the quality of everything that is harvested after it. Gives you a sense of what to expect from the whole harvest, and that's Paul's point here. Those who have died trusting Jesus. He describes in that verse as having fallen asleep.

That's all it is to them. And when they wake up, At their resurrection, it will be with a new body just like Jesus. Actually, not a new body per se. There's a continuity between the body that we have now and the 1 that we'll have in creation. Some of you now worried.

I I I guess we will recognize 1 another just as Jesus's disciples were able to recognize him, but there will also be radical difference sigh of relief The body uses the word transformed. You will be transformed in the twinkling of an eye. Transformed. Transformed then from what and into what. Why is this such an exciting hope?

Well, let me show you 2 pictures that the Bible uses. The first picture is from 2 Corinthians chapter 5 and it's a picture of a tent. So Paul writes this. We know that if the earthly tent that we live in is destroyed. He's talking about his body.

We have a building from god, an eternal house in heaven, not built by human hands. That's exciting, isn't it? So here are present bodies are described like tents Now, I don't I mean, I like camping. I'm quite a fan of camping, our family goes camping. I know it's not for everyone.

I mean even with the glamping, that's still a reach for some people, but I love the outdoors. I love the stillness and the cool of the night and the darkness. I actually I mean, getting up for the loo in the night is not great and sometimes a shower block can be a bit dodgy, but I like all of that stuff. I like the Alfresco living. I like cooking on a stove?

I mean, who doesn't like that stuff? I like washing in a stream. Hands down. But listen, although I really like all of that stuff, I like it for the first few days. K?

If it's rainy as well, Oh, it starts to really get you down, doesn't it? It starts to grow old after a while, doesn't it? Camping? I wouldn't wanna live permanently in a tent in a field, would you? And that, listen, that is how we should feel about our present bodies.

That's what Paul's saying. That's how you should you should kind of feel that about your present body. We're on a camping trip That's what this life is. You get that. Your life is a camping trip, you guys.

And as we get fed up and frustrated with this old tent, especially when it starts to get old and a bit threadbare, especially when it starts to leak. Yeah? We should take great delight. We shouldn't we in remembering what awaits us. Wanna waits us then for 1 day says Paul, this tent will be folded up and we're gonna move into our eternal building.

Not built by human hands, which waits for us in heaven, he says. What a wonderful picture, isn't it? I'm looking forward to my mansion. My body will be upgraded from a bivy bag to a mansion, and that's exciting, isn't it? Well, the second picture is that of a seed.

Here's the second picture. A seed, it's the same kind of principle being said again. Paul writes this in 1 Corinthians chapter 15. He says, what you sow as a seed does not come to life unless it dies. When you sow, you do not plant the body that will be but just a seed, perhaps of wheat, something else.

But god gives it a body as he's determined into each kind of seed He gives its own body. Do you see their picture? He's drawing for us there? It's the same kind of idea again. A seed is really nothing like the plant that it's gonna grow into.

Really nothing like it. I mean, even we know that an acorn is gonna become an oak tree, but when you look at an acorn, you don't think, ah, oak tree, do you? You look at it and think, That's a funny looking little nut there. We're gonna plant funny looking nuts in the ground. And they're going to grow into a mighty, mighty oak tree.

The seed is just a dead thing. That's what Paul said. It's just a dead thing. You pop in the around. But god gives it life.

God gives it a body. God gives it the body he has determined from it. And you and and in some sense, it'll be radically different from the thing that's put in the ground. Paul goes on. Does he verse 42 there?

He says, so it will be with the resurrection body. With the resurrection from the dead. The body that is sown is perishable, it is raised imperishable. It is sown in dishonor. It is raised in glory.

It is sown in weakness. It is raised in power. It is sown a natural body. It is raised a spiritual body. Can you see the transformation that takes place there.

Let me walk you just through it very briefly. From Perishable. You're gonna go from Perishable. Subject to sickness and decay and decomposition and and frustration, perishable, to imperishable, always at its best, always at its full potential. From dishonorable says, Paul, subject to shame.

You don't wanna show it from that to glory. Glories are word that describes the radiance that surrounds the presence of god himself. Jesus himself said at the end of 1 of his parables, that on the day of harvest, he said then the righteous, his people will shine like the sun in the kingdom of their father. Glory. From dishonorable to glory, from weakness, subject like we all are to to tiredness and stress and fatigue.

I've just got a new mattress. It's helping wonderfully, but I'm still feeling tired and fatigued and my back kills me some some some days. And subject to weakness, but from that, to power, a powerful body. From natural, that is subject to sin and moral corruption, the frustrations that we have with ourselves. Natural body to spiritual, to a body that is animated by the spirit of god himself.

As the theologians put it from a body kindled by the soul to a body kindled by the spirit. What a transformation? Well, so as you're tucking into your chocolate eggs later on today, And they're a great little picture. The potential of new life, aren't they eggs? Well, remember the 3 good news of the resurrection.

You've got lots of good news to remember. A new status Right with God. Jesus' risen so you are right with God. Jesus' risen so you have a new life spiritual life gives you the power to be like Christ each day. Don't forget that that life is now yours.

And a transformed body. 1 day, this tent is gonna be folded up. Time to leave the field. Time to take up residence in your heavenly house. What I hope to be face to face with your risen savior, the lord Jesus Christ.

That's the resurrection hope. We're gonna sing our final song. A great rousing hymn. So let's sing it rousingly. Thine be the glory, risen, conquering sun.

Endless is the victory. Dower, death has won, single.