Grace Emmanuel Church
Pastor Sam Chess
(Cornerstone of Forgiveness)
I. The Cornerstone in the Foundation of Forgiveness
The sham of a trial is over… The religious leaders have convinced
with their lies, the common people have screamed for Jesus to be
crucified…Governor Pilate has given in…
Jesus is now laid out on a roughly hewn cross… Coarsely fashioned
iron spikes are being driven into his hands and feet. The cross is
levered up… dropped into a waiting hole.
It's right at that moment that Jesus yells out those eternal
words…
Father, forgive them… they don't know what they are doing!
It's awesome enough that he was giving us an example of forgiving
our offenders… But notice something deeper here… As the blood starts
to flow out of his body…down the rough sides of the cross…as the
cross turns from wooden brown to scarlet red…Jesus begins to
intercede with the Father for our sin's. This was the pinnacle moment
for which Jesus came into our world. With all the sins of mankind
coursing into, and through, his mind and body…he shift out of first
gear into overdrive and jams down the accelerator.
Everything Jesus had done up to this point, awesome as it all was,
was like idling along in your car with your foot off the accelerator.
As Jesus blood started to flow it was like the cars approaching the
start line at the Daytona 500. You can hear the roar… you can feel
the power in the air… As Jesus screams out the words "Father
forgive them" he is jamming his foot to the floor (Not on
a ______ mile oval level but on a universe wide cosmic level)
We can't even begin to imagine the shock waves that hammered
through the universe…On the surface, the Bible says, there were
massive violent earthquakes… The sun went pitch dark at a time when
it was chronologically impossible to have a solar eclipse.
Matthew 27:51-52 At that moment the curtain of the temple
was torn in two from top to bottom. The earth shook and the rocks
split. 52 The tombs broke open and the bodies of many holy people who
had died were raised to life. (NIV)
My point is: That was like when we test a nuclear bomb deep
underground and all you see at the surface is a vibration and some
stirred up dust… These amazing things that happened as Jesus Christ
bled out his eternal life giving blood onto the ground… were just the
"surface vibrations" to what was going on outside human perceptions.
Outside the realm of human perception every molecule in the
universe was shuddering. If the earth was violently shaking… imagine
what was going in the spiritual realm. If long dead people were
waking up and walking around imagine the size of the battle that was
going on between the forces of life and death. If our sun went dark
for three hours imagine other less stable stars that just imploded
under the terrific cosmic stress.
All because the blood of the incarnate "God in the flesh" was
spilling out onto the ground and He was using his last few breaths to
pray for humanities forgiveness.
When Jesus sucked in a small lungful of air and belted out: It is
finished!
1) He was alerting the Father… that he had paid mankind's sin debt
in full
2)He was alerting all of us who would ever hear the words that the
price of our salvation was paid…we wouldn't have to earn it…only
accept his payment.
3) He was alerting the powers of hell that he was coming to take
the keys of death and the grave away from them.
Within minutes Jesus would stop breathing…the earth would still…
blackness would cover the earth… every voice would be hushed…
But don't make the mistake of thinking that's what was going on
inside the pits of hell.
The phrase: "all hell broke loose" fits nowhere better than here.
It may have been quiet here on earth… but the shock waves are still
hammering through the rest of the universe.
Inside hell, wherever that is…all hell, literally, breaks loose!
Everything the evil one had been trying to accomplish in fallen man
hangs in the balance.
The one thing satan, intuitively, knows is that the "dead savior"
cannot become an "eternally living Savior" as Jesus, himself, had
prophesied. If the evil one can keep Jesus dead… the payment for
mankind's sin will not be applied to anyone's account.
While satan's forces are in hand-to-hand combat with the Savior of
the World…. back on earth we find something going on that is so
inept… it is downright comical.
Can't you just see all the host's of heaven looking down as the
Priest and Pharisees and Pilate and the Roman soldiers scurry to make
sure Jesus doesn't come out of the tomb.
A Roman decree, a squad of soldiers, a seal. How can we be sure
Jesus won't come out of the tomb… Put a wax seal around it…that'll
keep him there! With universe size shock waves still reverberating
across the cosmos… on an earth that just quieted down they are going
to make sure nothing else happens with a decree, a dozen soldiers,
and a pail-ful of wax.
A few years later, John the disciple would have a revelation from
Jesus in which a then risen and ascended Jesus would say to him…and
us:
Revelation 1:17-19 When I saw him, I fell at his feet as if
I were dead. But he laid his right hand on me and said, “Don’t be
afraid! I am the First and the Last. 18 I am the living one. I
died, but look—I am alive forever and ever! And I hold the
keys of death and the grave.
But were not there yet…in this sermon… We can rejoice in a Savior
who prayed for our forgiveness as his blood ran out…We can get very
excited about Jesus yelling "It is finished" signifying that our sin
debt was paid. We can even relish the cosmic battle between Jesus and
the forces of sin and death…but:
Without a resurrection… the Good News of the Gospel…would be Bad
News!
The resurrection is a vital ingredient in the whole gospel. The
"death in place of our sins" wouldn't mean anything… if Jesus stays
dead. Satan will still have won.
Using our earlier illustration of the foundation cornerstone being
Jesus forgiving us as he spilled his blood…without a resurrection we
still have only , a partial foundation to build our spiritual lives
on, … the resurrection is the capstone…the keystone…
1 Corinthians 15:13 … if there is no resurrection of the dead,
then Christ has not been raised either. 14 And if Christ has not been
raised, then all our preaching is useless, and your faith is
useless…16…if there is no resurrection of the dead, then Christ has
not been raised. 17 And if Christ has not been raised, then your
faith is useless and you are still guilty of your sins. 18 In that
case, all who have died believing in Christ are lost! 19 And if our
hope in Christ is only for this life, we are more to be pitied than
anyone in the world.
That's strong… millions of people, for whom Christ died, don't
really believe Jesus actually rose from the dead! There
are people sitting in churches right now in this town and the Pastor
is telling them that the resurrection is to be viewed as symbolic not
real. …Christ rose in our hearts not in the flesh.
That's not what the Bible says… In fact, the book of Romans links
your acceptance of this truth to whether or not you can receive
Christ's gift of forgiveness.
Romans 10:9 … if you confess with your mouth, "Jesus is Lord,"
and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will
be saved. (NIV)
1) How, in the world, can Jesus offer to save you from the bondage
of satan's hold unless he visibly did it first?
2) How can he offer us eternal life unless he visibly defeated
death himself?
But if he did…If He can be proven to have defeated sin, and
satan, and death, and hell then there is no sin that cannot be
forgiven… there is no defilement that cannot be cleansed… there is no
heartache that can't be comforted… there is no fearfulness that can't
be calmed…. Anywhere, in anyone…for the rest of time!
1 Corinthians 15:17 And if Christ has not been raised, then
your faith is useless and you are still guilty of your sins. 18 In
that case, all who have died believing in Christ are lost! 19 And if
our hope in Christ is only for this life, we are more to be pitied
than anyone in the world. 20 But in fact,
Christ has been raised from the dead. He is the first
of a great harvest of all who have died. (NLT)
Jesus Lives!
The tomb is empty!
Death is Defeated!
The grave is opened!
God, not satan, is in control!
God's Word is proved infallibly true!
The devil is destroyed!
Death, and the grave, are powerless!...... God
overwhelmingly, overpoweringly…WON!
Paul begins to list his evidence:
1 Corinthians 15:4 He was buried, and he was raised from the
dead on the third day, just as the Scriptures said. 5 He was seen by
Peter and then by the Twelve. 6 After that, he was seen by more than
500 of his followers at one time, most of whom are still alive,
though some have died. 7 Then he was seen by James and later by all
the apostles.
You say…I don't know…that is a huge leap of faith. I didn't see
him rise from the dead…all we have is this Bible record… Oh come
on!...
How many believe that Timothy McVeigh was guilty of the OKC
bombing? No witnesses watched McVeigh load explosives into a Ryder
rental truck. Nobody saw him drive to the front of the Federal
building… and no one saw him detonate the bomb. Yet he was convicted
without any reasonable doubt.
While none of the 137 witnesses saw him commit the crime… a
businessman said he rented him the truck…a friend said he told him he
wanted to bomb the building…a scientist said his clothes had
explosive residue on them when he was arrested. Everything together
formed a convincing web of evidence that showed irrefutably,
McVeigh's crime.
We don't just have the biblical account…(we actually have
extra-biblical accounts as well)
That's aside - How does anyone explain how a bunch of running,
cowardly, disciples turned instantly into courageous witnesses and
martyrs. You could imprison them, beat them, kill, them, but you
could not make them deny their conviction that on the third day
Jesus rose from the dead and they had seen him, and talked with
him, and been taught by him…until he ascended back to heaven with the
promise of sending his Spirit.
How does anyone explain away the sudden explosion of growth of
any early church which went from hundreds to thousands to millions
almost overnight and within one hundred years had spread to the ends
of the civilized world…The centerpiece message of that church through
all of time has been the substitutionary death of Jesus (in our
place) and his resurrection from death…to eternal life
Lastly: no one can explain away the evidence that a living Jesus
lives within the lives of every believer…scores of people sitting in
this room who were chained to addictions and sins…unable to break
free… Then they met Jesus!
Not a dead Jesus whose never produced bones are rotting in some
undiscovered tomb…but a living Jesus who lives inside out hearts and
minds.
Most of us know him personally…we speak with him often…He is our
deepest and most personal friend… He has transformed our lives…and
continues to minister his grace into our lives on a daily basis.
How could you, possibly, convince me that Jesus isn't alive when
I've been talking to him all morning…and he, in turn, has been
talking to me?
When Jesus was here on this earth he was limited by time and
space…he could only be in one place at a time…He could only heal
those who were directly around him…He provided wonderful healing and
wholeness…if you could get to him…
Not anymore… Now he is 100% available to every-one of us all of
the time. Every bit of his grace…is available you… all of the time
If you have not quite grasp this…I want to speak to you strongly!
Just before he died…. the famous French atheist Jean-Paul Sartre
admitted he was resisting feelings of despair but would keep saying
over and over to himself; "I know I will die in hope! Finally; in
realization of how silly it was to have "a hope in nothing" he said:
"I realize that hope needs a foundation"
Without the resurrection … you've got no foundation!
Even your mental belief in Jesus dying for your sins…is not
enough… it gives you a part of the foundation but not enough to build
your eternal, spiritual, life upon.
In 1173 the Italian Architect Bonnano Pisano began work on what
would become his most famous project…for all the wrong reasons. He
began work on an eight story tower for the city of Pisa. The builders
discovered the soil was much softer and far to shallow to support the
185 foot tower…but the built on anyway. Not long into the process the
tower began to lean more and more… they kept building… In fact they
spent 174 years building, working to shore up the foundation over and
over…building the upper levels at an opposite angle to try to make
the building look straight. Nothing worked. It still leans 18" out of
plum and will someday fall over.
Several lifetimes used up trying to build a faulty structure on an
improper foundation.
Christianity is not pluralistic…It doesn't teach that there are
many paths to God. In fact it is very, very exclusive. Jesus
repeatedly claimed to be the only path to salvation;
John 11:25-26 Jesus said to her, "I am the resurrection and the
life. He who believes in me will live, even though he dies; 26and
whoever lives and believes in me will never die. Do you believe
this?" (NIV)
Conclusion: Do you believe this?
John 6:40 For it is my Father’s will that all who see his
Son and believe in him should have eternal life. I will raise them up
at the last day.” (NLT)
Repent
Accept
Believe
Embrace his gift
Invite
