Watch on YouTube

So in the last several videos, I’ve been explaining these other alternative theories that dismiss the resurrection of Jesus Christ. And now I want us to focus on the evidence for the truthfulness of the resurrection, and I want to do it this way. The lives of many people were changed, and they were changed drastically because of this testimony, and this proclamation that Jesus rose from the dead.

Take for example Peter. Peter who denied Jesus three times because, why, he was pressured by a 14 year old girl and several others. But what happened to Peter? He goes on to become the leader of the apostles. He’s willing to be arrested, willing to suffer. In about 68 A.D. he is crucified upside down for his belief in a crucified but risen Lord Jesus Christ. What explains this?

You have the half brother of Jesus by the name of James. James and his other brothers thought Jesus was not the Messiah. In fact, they said he was out of his mind. But what happens? James goes on to become the leader of the church in Jerusalem. James also suffers and is martyred.

And then you have Paul. Paul the great persecutor of the Christian faith. He not only has people arrested and put in jail, but he also votes to have them put to death. Paul goes on to become the greatest of the apostles in a sense, the greatest missionary, the greatest defender of the Christian faith.

He suffers greatly during his missionary trips, and finally he too is martyred in about the year 66-67 A.D.. So what explains this? What explains this? Does a swoon theory explain this? Does a wrong tomb theory explain this? Does a hallucination explain this? Does stealing the body explain this? No. Whether it be these three men or so many others who suffered for what they saw with their eyes and touched with their hands, and ate with their mouths as they joined him for a meal. The only thing that explains their willingness to suffer and even die is a man who was truly resurrected from the dead.

If he was resurrected from the dead and he was, it means that he is the Son of God.

But what does that mean? Well, it means before he rose, he was dead. And what does that mean? Well, it means that sin is very real.

It means that my sin is very, very serious. Your sin is very, very serious.

And it means, ultimately that my sin and your sin is really forgiven. Why else would the Son of God leave his place in heaven, come to earth, take on human flesh, and suffer and die in the way he did?

For those of us who are baptized and who believe in Christ, we have that forgiveness right now.

But if we are not there, we need to listen to the words of Peter in the book of Acts, where the Jews there, when they heard this message of the crucified and risen Christ, it says, they were cut to the heart. And they said, what should we do? And Peter said to them, repent and be baptized, every one of you in the name of Jesus Christ, for the forgiveness of your sins, and you will receive the gift of the Holy Spirit.

My name is David Thompson. I’m the director for The Center for Apologetics and Worldviews. Thank you for watching.

Watch on YouTube

In this video, we’re going to look at another theory regarding the resurrection of Christ, a theory that explains away the resurrection of Jesus of Nazareth. And this one we call the hallucination theory. And this one assumes that there was so much trauma for the disciples that they eventually had hallucinations of a risen Jesus. The problem with this theory, however, is that this hallucination occurred not just to one, but to many disciples. Another problem is that this hallucination occurred not just to individuals, but whole groups at the same time. And hallucination occurred not just once, but many times, at least 12 times over a period of 40 days. And finally, the problem with this hallucination theory is that the disciples not only saw Jesus, but they touched Jesus and they ate food with Jesus.

So all of these things combined together make it impossible for there to be such a hallucination. Again, according to the experts who have studied this, they say this is not how hallucinations occur.

So let’s go to another theory right away too. It’s called the stolen body theory. Now, the first three I mentioned the swoon theory, the wrong tomb theory, and the hallucination theory. There’s no historical evidence for them. They’re just ideas or theories made up in the minds of people, despite there being no historical evidence. The last one, the Stolen Body Theory, does have a little bit of historical evidence to it. Matthew chapter 27. And so this theory simply says that the disciples came and stole the body of Jesus at night. Well, even though there is some historical evidence for this one, it’s, you might say, kind of a really oh, I would say dumb theory. And let me tell you why.

So in order for this one to be true, the disciples who were gathered into a house, scared to death, they would have had to come up with the idea. Let’s suppose Peter said, men, this is a bad situation, but let’s make the most of a really bad situation. Let’s go steal the body of Jesus. So that means we have to sneak up there in the middle of the night without waking up the guards. Move the stone without waking up the guards. Go in there and unwrap the linen burial cloths from Jesus. It’s going to take a while and then we’re going to leave without waking up the guards. We have to get rid of the body. But then what we also have to do is we have to come up with a number of appearances of Jesus to us. So, Mary, we’re going to say that it appeared to you first. Then he appeared to me, Peter. Then he appeared to some of you other women. Then he appeared to you two disciples on the road to Emmaus. Then he appeared to all of us. Minus you, Thomas.

But then we’re going to say he appeared to all of us. And, Thomas, you’re there at that time, and you make this great confession of faith, my Lord and my God. And then we’re going to come up with a number of other appearances, and we have to make sure they’re fairly consistent with one another. And not only that, but then after we say that he appeared, we’re going to go tell everybody that we can that he rose from the dead. And we’re going to do so even under great duress and difficult, even if it means we’re going to have to suffer. Even if it means that if some of us might have to die, we know it’s a lie, but we have to be willing to suffer and maybe even die for what we know is a lie. There’s nothing in it for us, but let’s do it anyway for some reason.

So you can see how ludicrous this theory really is. It doesn’t make any sense whatsoever. So again, this is one of those theories that doesn’t hold any water. Has a little historical evidence to it, but not much. But it is rather ludicrous. And again, Christians believe that the historical evidence is overwhelming. And it’s in those historical documents we call Matthew, Mark, Luke and John that clearly testify that Jesus was dead. But he rose again, and that is for us and our salvation.

My name is David Thompson. I’m the director for The Center for Apologetics and Worldviews. Thank you for joining us.

Watch on YouTube

We’re continuing now, our talk and discussion about these other theories regarding the resurrection of Jesus Christ. People saying, no, he wasn’t resurrected. Here are better theories to consider. So this time we’re looking at what we can call the wrong tomb theory. And this theory basically says that the women on Sunday morning, they went to the wrong tomb. And of course, if you go to the wrong tomb, there’s not going to be a body there.

So does this sound like a reasonable explanation for what took place? Well, just like the previous one, there’s no historical evidence for this, but let’s look at this in a little more detail. First of all, we know that at least five women followed Joseph of Arimathea to the tomb where the body of Jesus was placed. It’s probably more like six, maybe seven. And they not only saw the tomb, but they were close enough so they could see how the body was laid in the tomb. That was on Good Friday, and then on Sunday they come back again. A minimum of five women. They start out when it’s dark by the time they get there, the sun had risen to some degree. And so they, it’s not like they couldn’t see what was going on or where they were. They knew exactly where they were. And if you have 5 or 6 or more women there and they were at the wrong tomb, you would think one of them would have said, hey, are we at the right tomb? You have the bodies gone, but maybe we’re not at the right tomb. So it’s really hard to explain that the the women got confused because there were so many and because it was light by that time.

Another thing to keep in mind about the tomb it was a well known tomb. It was the tomb of Joseph of Arimathea. He was a member of the Sanhedrin. If the women had gone to the wrong tomb, the other members of the Sanhedrin would have questioned Joseph and said he was buried in your tomb, right? And then they would have gone to the tomb themselves, the right tomb, and they would have discovered the body. And so they could have said, you women, you’re a bunch of idiots. You went to the wrong tomb and they could have simply disproved the wrong tomb theory themselves.

If the women went to the wrong tomb, that also means that Peter and John went to the wrong tomb. It also means that the guards who were guarding the wrong tomb as well. So we can see that there’s a lot wrong with this wrong tomb theory. And again, there’s no historical evidence for it. So again, the wrong tomb theory just falls short. It doesn’t hold water. And again, we as Christians we say the historical evidence is there, but that historical evidence is included in those eyewitness testimonies that we find in John, we find in Matthew, and we find also indirectly in the Gospels of Mark and Luke as well.

Next time we’ll look at another theory. My name is David Thompson, the director for The Center for Apologetics and Worldviews. Thank you for joining us.

Watch on YouTube

In the last video, I mentioned that there are basically four different theories that try to explain away the bodily resurrection of Christ. And so we’re going to look at one of those right now, namely the swoon theory. It’s a very interesting theory. And it used to be more popular, but it’s not nearly as popular today. And the swoon theory basically says that Jesus never really died on the cross. Rather, he swooned or went into a coma and they took his body down thinking he was dead, but he was still alive. And they put him in the tomb. And then somehow he revived and came out of the tomb and presented himself as the risen and glorious Messiah and Savior.

So is this a legitimate, reasonable theory? Well, let me point out, first of all, that there is no historical evidence for this swoon theory, but here are some other things to consider about this theory. First of all, if he’s taken down from the cross alive in a coma and then put in the tomb and he then he revives somehow. Well, first of all, he has to take off of himself all these strips of burial linen that have been put around his body, plus a shroud. Now, you may think, well, that’s not so difficult, is it? Well, it is because of this one extra reason. And the church Father Chrysostom tells us this. He says the myrrh that was combined with the strips of linen. And there’s a 75 pounds of myrrh and aloes connected with the strips of linen that were placed on him. That myrrh acts like a glue.

So it had been very, very difficult for a man, especially a man who had just been crucified and was in a coma next to impossible for him to remove these strips of linen by himself. But let’s suppose he does that. Okay, so he removes the strips of linen. And then what? Well, he has to get up and move the stone. Okay, well, how big is that stone? Well, at a minimum, it’s 440 pounds, but more likely it’s a ton or even two tons. Some people even say maybe it was three tons. So imagine a man who had just been in a coma had just been crucified, moving this stone and trying to do so from inside the tomb, where he doesn’t have the leverage that he could have from the outside.

But let’s suppose he does it. So he takes off the the burial strips of linen, he moves the stone, and then he comes out of the tomb. And then what does he have to do? We probably have to scare away the Roman soldiers that are guarding the tomb. Okay. Well, let’s suppose he does that too. Well, then, what happens next? Well, then we read that, you know, keep in mind that he had been crucified with the nails through his wrist, the nails through his feet. He appears several miles away on a road walking on this road. He shouldn’t be able to walk at this point because the nail through his feet. But he’s walking along this road with these two disciples on the road to Emmaus. He’s walking for several miles, and they don’t figure out there’s something terribly wrong with this man? I mean, he shouldn’t even be able to walk in those conditions, but even if he was able to walk, obviously he would appear very, very distraught and injured. And he should not be recognized as the Messiah.

But then 2 or 3 hours later, what happens? He appears to all of his disciples, minus Thomas. And again, keep in mind he had just been in a coma. He had been crucified. He had the nails through his hands and his feet. His side was pierced. He’s going to try to convince them that he is the glorified and crucified Savior and Messiah. I don’t think so.

Let me mention several other things about the crucifixion that are important to keep in mind here too. In many cases, as in the case of Jesus, the crucified victim was first of all whipped or flogged, and the flogging was very painful, but it also resulted in a great loss of blood. You know, the Jews were limited to 40 lashes, not the Romans. And this was a Roman flogging. So it was probably, well, more than 40 lashes. And so there was a great loss of blood. In all likelihood, he was state of a critical state at this point. But then there’s the crucifixion itself. And those medical authorities who have studied the crucifixion, realize this is not only extremely painful, but it always results in death, always results in death. The Romans perfected crucifixion. It was practiced by other cultures in the area too, before this time. But the Romans perfected the crucifixion. They knew how to kill somebody by crucifixion.

Plus, we know that when it was reported to Pilate that he was dead, he was a little concerned. This was awfully quick, he thought. But it was confirmed by the centurion. Yep, yep. He was dead. The centurion wouldn’t have told Pilate he was dead unless he knew he was dead for sure. Otherwise, the centurion would have been taking a big risk, risking his own life for not being accurate in what he reported. We also have one of the soldiers piercing Jesus side. It wasn’t just a random pierce, but it was probably very, probably very strategic. He knew exactly where he was piercing Jesus. And out comes what? A flood of blood and water. What does that indicate? Well, again, the medical authorities who have research said this indicates heart failure. The man is dead.

So crucifixion results in death. There is one exception to that. Josephus reports that there were three men who were crucified. But Josephus knew these three men. And so he asked the Caesar at that time, who was Titus, to have them taken down, because they were apparently his friends. So these three men who were crucified are taken down, two of the three still die. And the third one, he lives. But he lives not because the crucifixion was fulfilled, but because it was stopped. So everything else we know about crucifixion, it always leads to death.

Well, one more thing to mention here that’s very important when it comes to a crucifixion and this swoon theory. We not only have the testimony of the gospels that said he was dead by crucifixion, we also have non-Christian historians. Both Josephus and Tacitus say that he died by crucifixion. So there’s ample proof. Even from non-Christian sources, that he was dead by crucifixion.

So that’s an understanding of the swoon theory. But of course, Christians say the swoon theory is not true. It’s not correct. It can’t be correct. It’s just too crazy to believe in. Christians say the scriptures which were written, especially the Gospels of John and Matthew, were written by eyewitnesses. Mark and Luke were written by those who had contact with the eyewitnesses. They all clearly say that Jesus really rose from the dead. And if that’s the case, then we have one who truly is the Son of God and one who, prior to his resurrection, died. Why? For the forgiveness of our sins.

In the coming video, we’re going to look at another theory to see how that holds up. Again, my name is David Thompson. I’m the director for The Center for Apologetics Worldviews. See you next time.

John 20:25-29

Watch on YouTube

Kids will argue about the strangest things, won’t they? I’d be willing to bet that on any playground in America, there’s an argument going on going something like this.

“My dad’s so strong that I saw him lift up an entire house.”

“Nuh-uh. That’s impossible.”

“I saw him do it. Really?”

“Well, then prove it.”

As silly as that sounds in the moment, it feels very real to those children, doesn’t it? On one hand, the child isn’t crazy for having faith in his father. In his mind, his father can literally do anything, right? But on the other hand, the kid he’s arguing with he isn’t crazy either, because he wants proof to prove this outlandish claim. In our text today, we have a situation just like this in the Gospel of John, where the disciples tell Thomas that Christ has risen from the dead. And Thomas says,

“Unless I see in his hands the mark of the nails, and place my finger into the mark of the nails, and place my hand into his side, I will never believe.” (John 20:25)

In essence, this interaction is like the two kids in the playground shouting prove it! I’m guessing that if we were in Thomas’s shoes, we’d be saying the exact same thing. And then eight days later, Jesus appears to the disciples and to Thomas, and the first thing he says is, peace be with you. But the next thing he does is approach Thomas and say,

“Put your finger here, and see my hands; and put out your hand, and place it in my side. Do not disbelieve, but believe.” (John 20:27)

And Thomas replies, my Lord and my God. (John 20:28)

And Jesus later says,

“Blessed are those who have not seen and yet have believed.” (John 20:29)

Now I think we’d all like to believe that we would be one of the ones who would believe without seeing. Right? But the reality is, is that if you and I were at this, in this room that day, it’s very likely that account would be about you and me. They would call me Doubting Scott. And the reality is, is we’re all guilty of that same doubt in our lives. We all doubt the resurrected power of Jesus when we can’t clearly see him. Sometimes we doubt him when we receive that cancer diagnosis, or when our marriage is struggling, or when our prayers go seemingly unanswered, or when we lose our job, or when our child gets sick, and maybe we don’t say it in the same way that Thomas did, but with our thoughts and our sins, we proclaim that I won’t believe it unless I see it.

But notice that Jesus doesn’t rebuke Thomas for having doubts or questions. No, he comes to Thomas with his word, his comforting word of peace. And he says, place your hand into my side. Do not disbelieve, but believe. And although we don’t get to place our hands into the side of Jesus the same way Thomas did, Jesus is still approaching you in the same way he approached Thomas through his comforting word, the word that attests that he appeared over 500 people after he rose from the dead and engaged all of their senses to prove to them that he really was the resurrected Christ, the same Christ they had seen crucified on a cross only a few days earlier.

And those people were so moved by what they saw and sensed with all of their senses that Jesus was truly alive. They went around the world proclaiming in an outlandish way that my God is so strong that he raised Jesus from the dead. And today, Christ is proving his resurrection to you today through His Word, through your baptism, and through Holy Communion. He’s engaging all of your senses to prove to you that he really did rise from the dead. And if he really did rise from the dead, then you can have full comfort and confidence and conviction that your sins are truly forgiven, that you too will rise again, just as Jesus did on the last day. And don’t you doubt it.

So may the grace of our risen Lord Jesus Christ. Guard and keep your heart in undoubting belief and faith and obedience to him. Amen.

Hosea 13:14, Zechariah 2:8

Watch on YouTube

Our reading today is from Hosea the prophet, chapter 13, verse 14 And God says,

O Death, I will be your plagues!
O Grave, I will be your destruction!
Pity is hidden from My eyes.” (Hosea 13:14)

There are times when snakes will climb up into tall trees and go way up into the nest of, let’s say, an eagle or some other bird, and they might start eating the eggs or the little chicks that are in that nest. And those tiny birds are just completely powerless from such a deadly predator. And that’s really kind of symbolic of how we are that when it comes to death by ourselves, we are completely powerless to do anything about death. We can’t hold it off. We can’t keep it away from us. In fact, it frightens us to such an extent that we don’t even like to look at it or think about it. We even pay people a lot of money to take care of it for us when it happens to one of our loved ones.

And that’s why the Bible often speaks about death in Scripture as an enemy of ours. It describes it as a prison. It describes it with words like being a sting. And Martin Luther said about it, even the nature, he says, even the pig squeals at the slaughter. So there’s something inside of all of us that just recoils at the concept and the idea of death. Because we’ve been made to be alive, our bodies want to live.

There’s also a type of eagle that’s called a brown snake eagle, a brown snake eagle, and it actually likes to eat snakes as a source for food. And if a poisonous snake were to go up into the nest of this eagle and attack one of the small eagles in the nest, this mother eagle, the brown snake eagle will not only take and kill the snake, but consume it and swallow it whole. A lot of ancient writers in the church used to use that type of a bird to depict what Jesus has done. He’s gone into death itself, and he’s taken death on, going into the grave, on Good Friday we know he was laid in the grave, cold, dead, in order to go in and destroy it. By allowing himself to be taken into death he has now destroyed death and consumed it. And he’s done all of this on your behalf and my behalf. He takes absolutely no pity on death and the devil. That’s why he says here. Pity is hidden from my eyes.

But thank God he has taken pity on you and me. Because through faith in him we have this wonderful power now over death because of what our Savior has done. He wants you to be able to live forever without fear of death in your future.

Note something here that death and the grave are not merely our enemies or the enemies of Christ’s church, but they’re also the enemies of Christ Himself. And he is the Lord of all life. And he’s more powerful than anything like a fallen angel the devil could ever do. And so to those who belong to Christ, the prophet Zechariah tells us from God. Whoever touches you touches the apple of my eye. (Zechariah 2:8) Isn’t that a great line? Whoever touches you touches the apple of my eye, your gracious God says. Amen.

1 Corinthians 15:56-58

Watch on YouTube

Our devotion today is based on First Corinthians 15, beginning with verse 56.

The sting of death is sin, and the power of sin is the law. But thanks be to God, who gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ! (1 Corinthians 15:56-57)

Back in 1933, during construction of the Golden Gate Bridge, unemployed men would stand waiting at the foot of the bridge to see if other workers up on the bridge would end up falling to their death, hoping to take their place and take their jobs. They were 750ft high in the air, and ultimately 11 men fell to their death during that construction.

Our text talks about the sting of death. There’s kind of a double pain when it comes to death. The hurt that takes place, just like venom going into our veins, has a double impact. It’s hard to watch other people die in our families, and to see loved ones have to deal with loss. But it also points each of us to our own mortality when we watch people go through it as well. On Good Friday, the evil serpent of the devil dug his fangs into the body of our Lord Jesus Christ, who took that venom. But he has then come out alive, victorious, and he himself has now become the very antidote of death itself. That’s why Paul says he gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ.

And in a sense, Jesus has defanged your death. All this is now yours, this victory of Christ, through a little activity that God places in your heart the gift of faith to trust in Jesus as your Savior. And the mission of the church is to implant that faith in us and to cause it to grow so that we can ultimately be death defiers, just like our Lord Jesus. Because of this victory, we can now stand over the graves of our loved ones who have fallen asleep, asleep in Christ, and sing wonderful hymns of victory. I know that my Redeemer lives, and so on. I remember at my mom’s funeral, I just love singing a hymn verse that had this line in it. I’m going to quote, and every time I sing it, it makes me think of her victory as well, and her now life in heaven. This is the line: Death itself is transitory. I shall lift my head in glory.

Death is now nothing but a passing for us. When they were building the Golden Gate Bridge, they designed a safety net, finally, because so many had died that would catch the workers below. And it saved the lives of 19 men. They called themselves jokingly, the Halfway to Hell Club because they felt that they had cheated death. And the man who came up with that idea knew that it would save lives. But he also knew that it would give greater confidence to those who were doing the work. The resurrection of Jesus Christ not only spares us from our future death and giving us life. In that way, it’s the ultimate safety net, but it also gives us tremendous confidence to carry out the work and things that we do on behalf of God’s church.

And that’s why Paul concludes this section with these words, knowing that we have the resurrection, our own Easter coming.

Therefore, my dear brothers, be steadfast, immovable, always abounding in the Lord’s work, because you know that your labor is not in vain in the Lord. (1 Corinthians 15:58)

May God grant all of us a blessed celebration of our Lord’s Easter and our own future easters. Amen.

Colossians 2:13-14

Watch on YouTube

Hi, I’m pastor Luke Ulrich. I want to share with you a couple of verses from Colossians chapter two, verses 13 and 14.

Even when you were dead in your trespasses and the uncircumcision of your flesh, God made you alive with Christ by forgiving us all our trespasses. God erased the record of our debt brought against us by his legal demands. This record stood against us, but he took it away by nailing it to the cross. (Colossians 2:13-14)

Let me ask you, can a dead person choose to be alive? Can a dead person choose to be alive? No, it doesn’t work that way. If you’re dead, you can’t make yourself alive. In this verse, in the beginning of this verse, verse 13, we hear that we are dead in our trespasses. And elsewhere in Scripture it also talks about how we are dead because of our sins. We are spiritually dead before God. We are as good as dead. As a dead person can’t choose to be alive. We can’t choose to be spiritually alive. We are without hope. If it were left up to us, we would be totally lost and forever dead. But what’s the good news? The good news is God chooses to bring us life. An outside source who has power over death shares that victory over death with us.

We can’t choose to be alive. But God, who brought everything to life at the very beginning. Our Lord Jesus, who spoke to Jairus’ daughter, who spoke to the young man in the coffin outside the city of Nain, who spoke to Lazarus as he was still in the tomb. Come out. Our Lord Jesus has power over death. We have a God who has power to give life. And that’s proven especially in this Easter season, where we consider how Jesus himself rose from the dead. Proof to us that he has power over death.

He’s the one who now comes to us, who should be dead before God. And he says, you are alive. He speaks life into our hearts as he points us to what he has done for us, what our Lord Jesus has done, how he lived a perfect life for us, how he went to the cross, how all of our sins were nailed to the cross with Jesus. I love that verse from Colossians 2. And because of that, we who should be spiritually dead are now alive, not because of what we have done, but because of what God has done.

Jesus desires you to be alive and to be alive with him forever in heaven. And you don’t even have to worry about doing anything to have it. We simply put our hope, our trust in Jesus. We hear this message of what he has done for us. We believe in it, and the gates to heaven are then open to you and to me. This is good news. This is good news that can motivate you and me today as we can go out into our lives, we can live fearlessly, not worrying about death, not worrying about all the fearful things of this dying world. Because you and I have life, life handed to us from God. Thanks be to Jesus. Peace be with you.

1 Corinthians 10:1-3, Colossians 1:13

Watch on YouTube

Christ is risen! He is risen indeed! Alleluia! It is the joyful Easter season right now in the church, and it’s such a wonderful time. I remember as a kid just going into church early on Easter morning and smelling those Easter lilies and that fresh baked bread and muffins and that Easter breakfast that was cooking in the oven. What a wonderful, joyous, celebratory feast that Easter can be for us as Christians, as we rejoice in everything that Jesus our Savior did for us.

Interesting family tradition we always had at Easter time was the old movie The Ten Commandments with Charlton Heston was always on TV and we would watch that. And I always remember that it was a striking movie, right? And it tells the story of the Exodus, God’s people, the children of Israel, how they were able to be delivered from slavery in Egypt. He led them out by a mighty hand. The ten plagues that he worked to get Pharaoh to let his people go. And then they went, traveled out of Egypt and God led them through the Red Sea on dry ground. What a miracle. And you always remember that image of Moses standing there with the waters being separated. This is a beautiful picture for us as Christians of our baptism. Saint Paul tells us in first Corinthians chapter ten he writes,

For I want you to know, brothers, that our fathers were all under the cloud, and all passed through the sea [The Red Sea], and all were baptized into Moses in the cloud and in the sea. And all ate the same spiritual food. (1 Corinthians 10:1-3)

The children of Israel passed through the waters of the Red Sea, and this was a picture of their liberation from slavery to Pharaoh. For us in baptism, we are set free from a very real Pharaoh. That Pharaoh is the devil, Satan. He was the one who once held us in slavery to sin and fear. And he made us do the works of iniquity, and we were pushed around by him and abused by him. But then our Savior Jesus came to set us free. Jesus is the greater Moses who showed up on the scene and delivered us from the devil. And he did this by his death on the cross, where he paid for all of our sins. He took the punishment for our sins upon himself, and he ransomed us and paid the ransom price for us so that we might be free, so that we would be set free from the devil’s dominion of darkness. As Saint Paul tells us in Colossians one,

For he [God] has rescued us from the dominion of darkness and brought us into the kingdom of the Son. (Colossians 1:13)

And so we pass through the waters of Holy Baptism. We’ve been set free from that old Pharaoh, Satan. We’ve been set free from our sins and from death. And now we journey together as Christians on our way to our promised land, and we journey through the desert wilderness that is this world. We know this place isn’t our permanent residence. We pitch our tents here for a while, for a time in this life. But we’re journeying together toward our promised land, the promised land of heaven, God’s heavenly kingdom, where Jesus is leading us to as his dear followers.

So we follow him through this life, and he provides for us on the way. He feeds us even with bread from heaven, with manna from heaven. We think about in Holy Communion, where we receive his very body and blood for the forgiveness of sins. We’re journeying together and Jesus is leading us, and one day we’ll pass into our promised land. We’ll cross over the waters of death, and there be with our God forever and joy and in peace. And what a comfort this is to us. And what a beautiful picture the Exodus story is of our baptisms. And so we rejoice that Christ has brought us over. We have passed over with our Lord Jesus from death to life. With him we have all things, we are forgiven and we have eternal life. And so all thanks and praise be to Jesus, our risen Lord and Savior. Amen.

John 5:25-28

Watch on YouTube

Death is the most jarring and unsettling thing in this life. Whether it’s the death of a childhood friend or the death of a family member, a father, mother, brother, sister, son or daughter, a gut punch doesn’t even begin to describe it. It’s more like the very definition of sorrow. When that happens, memories of all the times that you shared with them come flooding back into your mind. There’s a hollowness when you realize that expectations you had for the future are gone and taken away. Those things won’t happen.

I think even those who suppose that death is just a natural part of life, they still feel that anguish and pain associated with that loss. Death is unsettling because it is unnatural. It’s not supposed to happen. Death is a terrible result of the fall into sin. It’s what happens when mankind turns away from God. God did not want man to sin. That’s why he instructs us not to. He instructed Adam and Eve not to. But they were deceived, and they took from the fruit of the tree of knowledge of good and evil. And now they know evil. We know evil, and we know death, which is a result of it. The whole world was cursed in the fall into sin, and now people die. There are diseases, there are tragedies, and the world is dying. It almost seems like death wins. It seems like death gets the final say. But that is not the case. Scripture reassures us of this. In John chapter five, verse 25 through 28.

Most assuredly, I say to you, the hour is coming, and now is, when the dead will hear the voice of the Son of God; and those who hear will live. For as the Father has life in Himself, so He has granted the Son to have life in Himself, and has given Him authority to execute judgment also, because He is the Son of Man. Do not marvel at this; for the hour is coming in which all who are in the graves will hear His voice (John 5:25-28)

Death doesn’t get the final say. Jesus does. Jesus Christ, the Son of Man, came into this world specifically to conquer death. He took on our flesh. He took on our sin. He took on the evil world, and he won. He went to the grave on our behalf. But he did not stay there. He went through the grave and he rose from the dead. He’s now seated at the right hand of the Father. So as Christians, we likewise will go through the grave to eternal life. Death no longer has to be as unsettling. There is still pain because there’s a separation and a loss. But we have the knowledge that Jesus Christ has the victory over death. Death didn’t win when it took your loved one. Very truly, I tell you, there is coming a time when they will hear the voice of Jesus and come out of the grave.

Jesus has life in himself and therefore all believers have life in him when they believe in him. He is calling us now to life in him through our baptisms and through the Word of God. And at the end of time he will raise up all of the dead. His resurrection is a glorious proclamation of victory over death to us. The Easter Hymn 346 in the Evangelical Lutheran Hymnal says it this way.

Death is dead, the true Life liveth!
O’re the portals of the grave
Life’s great Sun, bright-shining giveth
Light our darkened souls to save:
Christ arisen bursts our prison;
See his triumph-banners wave.

John 14:1-4,6

Watch on YouTube

You’re going on a trip to a faraway place you’ve never been to before. You’re trying to get to a certain village, but to do so, you have to traverse miles of dense jungle filled with poisonous plants and dangerous animals. Could you make this trip by yourself? What if you had a guide with you? Someone who is familiar with the area, who knew how to deal with the wildlife. Who could go through the jungle without getting lost. Would you rather make this trip with or without him?

There is a similar trip that we all have to take at some point. It’s to a place none of us has ever been to before. The path is filled with all sorts of worries and concerns about what’s going to happen next. And above all, it’s a trip that once you make it, you never come back. This trip we take is death, and we all have to face it at some point.

Some people might place their trust in medicine and living a healthy lifestyle. Now, these are good things in and of themselves, but no amount of earthly medicine or balanced lifestyle can save you forever from the power of death. But what if there was a guide, someone who knew the way, who could lead you through death into a better life? The Gospel writer John records for us these words of Jesus found in chapter 14, verses one through six.

“Do not let your hearts be troubled. Trust in God ; trust also in me. In my Father’s house are many rooms; if it were not so, I would have told you. I am going there to prepare a place for you. And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come back and take you to be with me that you also may be where I am. You know the way to the place where I am going. I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me.” (John 14:1-4,6)

Because of sin all of creation and all people feel the effects of death. That’s why Jesus entered into this world. To live the perfect life we could not. To take our sin and bring them to the cross, to experience the punishment we deserve and to die. Jesus is not asking you to go anywhere he hasn’t. But because of what Jesus has done, we no longer have to fear what’s going to happen when we die. The joy of Easter is that Jesus has risen from the dead. That’s what these words are declaring to us, that Jesus is preparing a place for you, so that someday, when it’s your time to leave this world, Jesus will take you from this valley of sorrows to be with him forever in heaven. Cling to the promises of Jesus because there is no other guide and there is no other Savior.

1 Corinthians 15:20-23

Watch on YouTube

It’s been a bit of a weird winter here in Minnesota. You get up in the morning and it’s like 20 to 30 degrees outside. You go out, you get your car started, you warm it up, you defrost the windows, maybe you chuck on another layer or maybe even a coat. But then by around noon you get outside and it’s like 50 or 60. You have to take off a couple layers. By the time you get home, you’re probably thinking it’d be a good day to put on a short sleeve shirt, go take a walk. Just kind of bask in this little taste of spring.

There’s a certain sense in which Christ is like one of those little tastes of spring. But he’s more than that. He’s a ray of light, not just from a new season, but from a new creation that we can see in his resurrection from the dead on our behalf. Paul says it in this way in First Corinthians chapter 15,

But Christ has indeed been raised from the dead, the firstfruits of those who have fallen asleep. For since death came through a man, the resurrection of the dead comes also through a man. For as in Adam all die, so in Christ all will be made alive. But each in turn: Christ, the firstfruits; then, when he comes, those who belong to him. (1 Corinthians 15:20-23)

There’s a certain sense in which we’re all born into a kind of spiritual winter. It’s cold and dark all around us, in our lives and within us. Outside of us, we suffer. We undergo pain and emotional trouble. And finally death comes to all of us and makes our bodies cold. But more than that, and worse than that, our hearts are also cold and dark. We do not really properly understand or grasp the goodness of God and the goodness of the kind of life he wants us to have, and even when we do understand it, in some degree, our hearts are kind of cold towards it. We don’t really want to obey it. We kind of want to fulfill it a little bit and then get it off to the side so we can get back to doing those things in the dark that we would prefer to do for ourselves, the things we like to do.

And that sort of cold and dark in us if we want to really fix it, it’s not something that we can resolve on our own end. It’s kind of like if you tried to take two pieces of ice and sort of rub them together and hope you get fire out of it, it just doesn’t work. And that doesn’t come from us individually, ultimately, we’re born into this condition. It came from the first man, Adam, who was born in a sort of spiritual spring. He walked with God in light and warmth and love. And yet he and his wife, Eve chose to eat of the fruit God had commanded them not to eat. They sinned against him. They tried to find those things apart from him. And because God is himself, light and warmth and love apart from him, we can have none of those things. We grow cold and dark.

But that doesn’t mean we’re without hope, because the love of God is such that His Son, the second person of the Trinity, entered into the world as its light and as the consuming fire, who took on our sin and death into his own body and suffered it, consumed it therein in his death. But more than that, he displayed the light and glory and love of God in his resurrection on our behalf, so that he’s a sort of taste of the spring to come, so that even now he sends us His Holy Spirit, who comes into our hearts and teaches us to know him. He enlightens us, but he also gives us warmth. He teaches us to thaw our icy hearts and to begin to really love those gifts God has given us.

And even more than that, the day will come when the resurrected Christ shines his light upon us and raises us from the dead. And when we reflect that light and warmth of God, and live in it with him in perfect love forever, by the power of His Son, by the power of His Holy Spirit in us, and for the glory of God the Father. Amen.