Something to Shout About - by Dr. Vander Warner, Jr.
2/20/03 Easter Sunday
BBC Year Of The Bible
Something to Shout About!
Dr. Vander Warner, Jr.
Romans 1:3,4
Dr. Mark Becton told me of a great Christian who awoke with laryngitis on Easter Sunday….penned a note to his wife….terrible to not have a voice with which to shout, "He is risen."
I read the story once of a son whose father was a great and faithful preacher of the Gospel….he developed cancer of the throat and in his 40th year of ministry could not preach. It was Easter. His son visited to comfort his dad. "Dad, it's Easter and I know you are sorry not to be able to preach tomorrow." "Yes," replied the dad, "But it would be worse to have a voice and have nothing to shout about!"
Well, we do have a voice and we have something to sing shout about!
1. Jesus Is Alive (Each Easter I read all the Gospel accounts of the Resurrection again.)
MATTHEW 28:6 - "He is not here: for he is risen, as he said. Come; see the place where the Lord lay."
MARK 16:6 - "And he saith unto them, Be not affrighted: Ye seek Jesus of Nazareth, which was crucified: he is risen; he is not here: behold the place where they laid Him.
7 But go your way, tell his disciples and Peter that he goeth before you into Galilee: there shall ye see him, as he said unto you."
LUKE 24:3 - "And they entered in, and found not the body of the Lord Jesus.
4 And it came to pass, as they were much perplexed thereabout, behold, two men stood by them in shining garments:
5 And as they were afraid, and bowed down their faces to the earth, they said unto them, Why seek ye the living among the dead?
6 He is not here, but is risen: remember how He spake unto you when he was yet in Galilee,
7 Saying, The Son of man must be delivered into the hands of sinful men, and be crucified, and the third day rise again.
8 And they remembered his words,"
No other faith group proposes to have a resurrected Savior/leader.
The evidence is good. In 1 Corinthians 15, look at how Paul presents the Gospel with the foundation stone of the resurrection. He moves from one (Peter) to the few (the twelve), then to the many, "above 500 brethren at once." Then he tells of his own post resurrection experience with Jesus.
Someone might say that they were just making all this up to explain the absence of Jesus. It makes more sense to say rather that the Resurrection explains them! One scholar points out that the apostle Paul himself is enough proof for the reality of Jesus and His resurrection….You couldn't explain a conversion like Paul's any other way.
2. Everything is changed!
Everything He said is true! (Note the marked words above.)
He said, He is the Son Of God…Romans 1:1-4 (declared so by the resurrection)
The Gospels have many affirmations of His deity, His Sonship.
There were three titles of Jesus recurring often in the Gospels, - "The Son of Man," "The Son of God," "The Son."
"The title "Son of God" occurs in Matthew 9 times, in Mark 4 times, in Luke 6 times, and in John 11 times. I find in Matthew that He is called the Son of God six times by men, three times by devils. Mark records two occasions when men so designated Him, and two occasions when devils called Him the Son of God. Luke gives one occasion when a man called Him that, four when devils so name Him, and one when an angel declared Him to be the Son of God. In John we find six occasions when man referred to Him as the Son of God, and five when He so named Himself.
The title, "The Son," occurs in Matthew 4 times, Mark 1; Luke 3, in John 15 times. It is never on the lips of devil, man, or angel. Is the peculiar phrase of Jesus only!"(GCM)
Further we have those two supernatural events when a voice from heaven said that Jesus was the Son of God:
At his baptism: "This is My beloved Son, in Whom I am well pleased."(Mat 3:17)
At the holy mount of Transfiguration: "This is my beloved Son in whom I am well pleased; hear ye Him."(Mat 17:5)
He said, "I'll be with you….I give you peace…confess me I'll confess you…Lazarus, rise,…demons come out….deaf be hearing, blind be seeing, lame go walking…and nothing better than this, "I forgive you…..and I will come again."(And it's all true!)
The universal way to Heaven…."I am the way, the truth, the life no man
comes to the Father but by me" (John 14:6) Everything He did matters. Christ died for our sins, according
to the Scriptures.
Not hard to believe when one considers the resurrection.
No one took His life, and death couldn't keep him. "It was not possible that He should be holden of death"….**Death said to the devil, "He got away"
3. Things can be different for you, now!
1Co. 15:32….The advantages of righteousness…Here is motivation to live a life that doesn't produce regrets.
For the Christian it is more than eat drink, and be merry for tomorrow you die…..
I can eat drink and be merry, without a hangover and tomorrow if I die I will live again……You know the ole beer commercial, "You only go round once get all the gusto you can"….Shoot, I'm going around again!
My little life has meaning, now. "Whatsoever you do in word or deed do all the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God and the Father by Him."
"The soul can split the sky into and let the love of God shine through." (Benet)
4. Things are different at death! 1Co 15:26 "The last enemy that shall be destroyed is death." We don't have to cower in the presence of death…
My dear departed first wife Jane….When questioned about her illness and death was not afraid at all…..Was not hostile to God….and The last look on her face was one of awe and surprise.
**Dad Coggin said to me and Jane…."Jesus appeared outside that window and I am not afraid anymore." (He said this at Bowman Gray Hospital in Winston Salem.)
