#139- He Is Risen, He Is Risen In Me

This Easter Sunday's message is from Acts 9 about Saul’s encounter with the risen Jesus—and what it means that Christ is not only risen, but present and alive in our lives today. We’ll look at how a violent skeptic was transformed into the apostle Paul, and how the same risen Lord still meets skeptics, searchers, and believers with grace and power. Let's celebrate the living Christ—He is risen, and He can be risen in us.

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Transcript

Transcript: He is risen

 Today is Easter and we celebrate the risen Lord.

 Jesus is alive.

 As we say, He is risen, He is risen indeed.

 The passage of scripture we will read from today is Acts 9.1-5.

 Not necessarily a traditional scripture for Easter Sunday, but I believe it has something to teach us.

  It reads as follows.

 Now, as he was going along and approaching Damascus, suddenly a light from heaven flashed around him.

He fell to the ground and heard a voice saying to him, Saul, Saul, why do you persecute me?

He asked, who are you, Lord?

The reply came, I am Jesus, whom you are persecuting.

 I am Jesus.

It's interesting, this persecutor of Christian Saul, in fact, this violent opponent to Christianity, we might ask the question, did Paul believe or Saul in his pre-converted state believe in the risen Christ?

Was he in fact a convert?

There is sufficient evidence, and he would have had enough, there would have been enough people to speak to, to get eyewitness accounts about the resurrection of Jesus.

There were the women at the tomb.

There were the disciples.

There's the Emmaus Road experience.

There's the upper room.

And then even in 1 Corinthians 15, verse 6, it speaks about more than 500 people seeing the risen Lord.

Was Saul...

 a believer in the resurrection of Jesus?

I think, quite honestly, probably not.

I don't think he believed that because would he actually have violently pursued Christians had he known Jesus as the Son of God and as the risen Savior, even as a risen individual, somebody who'd come back from the dead?

 I believe it's highly unlikely that Saul believed in the resurrection of Jesus.

Saul was not merely a skeptic, I would say, but he was in fact a violent opponent of all who claimed to be followers of the way who believed in the death and the resurrection of Jesus.

 In many ways, today as we come and gather on this Easter Sunday, we might ask ourselves and look at a person like Saul and say, Saul serves as a kind of a type, a model of a person, the many people we have in the world today who have heard about the resurrection.

 Around the world, people are celebrating Easter Sunday, celebrating the resurrection of Christ.

But even though people understand and have heard the message, the Son of God died on the cross and rose again, they still struggle to believe.

 There are those that maybe violently oppose the faith, the Christian faith, and violently oppose the views and the beliefs of Christianity.

But then there are those that just are mere skeptics and say, well, it doesn't make rational sense.

Maybe they're atheists.

Maybe they're agnostic.

Maybe they just purely look at it from a rational point of view and say, people don't rise from the dead.

And so in many ways, as we read the account of Saul,

 As he enters into this moment, this encounter with the risen Jesus, we see in him the kind of person that we see all around us.

Despite the witnesses of believers, the historic account of the resurrection of Jesus, the authenticity of the biblical text, and even the body of evidence supporting the death and the resurrection of Jesus, we know today still many people don't believe.

 In Acts 9, verse 5, an interesting passage, just that one verse, what a powerful verse.

He is struck to the ground.

He hears a voice that says, Saul, Saul, why do you persecute me?

And then his response, listen to this, a voice speaks to him and he responds and says, who are you, Lord?

 And at that point, he has this divine encounter.

And hearing the voice and understanding that this is a divine encounter, he already acknowledges that the person that he's speaking to, this individual, this entity that is engaging him, is in fact Lord, a sign of reverence, a sign of respect, a sign of leadership.

 And then Jesus identifies himself and says, I am Jesus whom you are persecuting.

In this moment, Saul instinctively knows he has come face to face with the divine and he calls him Lord even before Jesus reveals himself to Saul.

Saul was his Jewish name.

 And we can track his journey from this point onwards throughout the New Testament.

We know Saul as the Apostle Paul.

 Paul was the Roman name that he took on.

Arguably, Paul was the most significant New Testament figure apart from Jesus himself.

Now, there are a lot of very significant figures that we can talk about, the writers of the gospel, the disciples, but Saul, who then becomes Paul and is known as the Apostle Paul, is credited with writing 13 to 14 of the New Testament books.

He planted churches all over the known world.

 He is acknowledged as an apostolic leader within the church.

He's recognized as a missionary and an apostle to the Gentiles.

He trains up and disciples people.

And today, we can actually credit Paul with a lot of what we see in the church today, what we understand about the Christian faith, and even the spreading of the gospel.

 And so here we see Paul.

He has had an encounter with Jesus.

He is transformed and something changes.

If you're here and you're listening to this, you might say, I'm a skeptic in the resurrection of Jesus.

You're in good company.

Saul was a skeptic of the resurrection of Jesus.

 And if you think Saul was bad, well, he was more than a skeptic.

He was a violent opponent to Jesus and to Christianity.

And look how he turned out.

Might ask the question, what happened to Saul?

What caused this radical shift in his life?

 We know from the passage of scripture that we've read, Saul encountered the risen Lord.

And so when we say today on Easter Sunday, he is risen, it's not just a saying, it is a life transformation, something that if we understand that Jesus is alive and risen, it will impact change, radically change the course of our lives and even the history in our lives, our families and our kids and our kids to come.

 Let me say one or two more things about this.

He is risen.

And let's say this.

He is risen and he still is risen.

It sounds a bit like I'm saying the same thing.

 We hear the passage that we read on Easter Sunday, Luke 24, 1 to 2.

These women come to the tomb.

They've got spices that they've prepared.

They want to kind of embalm the body.

They want to treat the body.

And they come and they find that Jesus is not there.

He's gone.

And instead of Jesus, they see angels.

They turn.

These people are speaking to them.

 Their faces are glowing and they speak to the woman and they say, it says, the scripture says in verse five, the woman were terrified.

They bowed their faces to the ground and the man said to them, why do you look for the living among the dead?

He is not here.

He is risen.

I mean, these are beautiful passages.

 And we see other gospels share some of these accounts of Jesus encountering people after the resurrection, the Emmaus journey.

What a beautiful story.

There's just these continual moments where Jesus reunites with his friends, he reunites with his disciples, and our hearts are warmed to know that he has not been lost to the grave.

They are incredibly beautiful and moving.

But why do they move us so dramatically?

 Jesus thought to be lost to the grave is risen.

And as the risen Lord, he remains accessible, giving hope to all who'd come to him.

One of the things that's interesting about Easter, and I think we need to think about this a little bit more.

We say, let's celebrate the resurrection of Jesus because it's Easter.

We should say, let's celebrate the resurrection of Jesus every single day.

 He is risen on Easter Sunday.

He remains risen on the day after Easter.

A week later, he is still risen.

A month later, he is still risen.

A year later, he is still risen.

The passage of scripture that I read you takes place probably about one to three years after the death and the resurrection of Jesus.

And yet Saul is on his way to Damascus to violently persecute the Christians.

And guess what?

He is still risen.

 And he encounters Paul on the journey.

And he says to him, why do you persecute me?

And in that moment, a powerful thing happens.

Who are you, Lord?

He says, I am God.

 Jesus.

Watch that.

Not I was Jesus who died on the cross and rose again and ascended.

Not I will be Jesus whose returns.

All those are true.

He says, I am in the present here with you now, Jesus.

We need a Jesus that is present with us in the here and the now.

As we read those words, I am Jesus here.

 Something in me goes back to Exodus chapter 3, where Moses encounters God in the burning bush, and he says to God, who should I say send me?

And God says to him, I am who I am, and you should say to the Israelites, I am has sent you.

Not I was, not I will, I am.

 I am in the present.

Similarly, Jesus is not the one who was.

He's not the one who will be.

All these are true statements.

But he is the one who is in the present.

He is in the present in the past.

He is in the present in the present.

And he will be is in the present in the future.

He is God in our lives, in the here and in the now.

 As we think about that today on Easter Sunday, he is risen so many thousands of years ago.

 He is risen today again, living, alive and active in our lives.

Maybe you need a great I am in your life today.

Not a I was or I will be, but you need one who lives in the here and now and who's here now for you.

The message of Easter for you is He is risen.

 Well, here's another point.

Jesus is risen, and he is risen in us and in me.

One of the things we look at, and even from a skeptical point of view, we might say, if he is risen and the world is celebrating Easter around the world, the resurrection of Jesus, and he is alive, well, where is he?

 I don't see him.

Do I need to have a Damascus Road experience like Saul did in order to experience Jesus?

I want to tell you that Jesus is here and he is speaking and he continues to speak.

If only we would stop, listen, and see what God is doing in our lives today.

 Psalm 19 verse 1 to 2 says the heavens are telling the glory of God.

They are telling the glory of God.

The firmament proclaims his handiwork day to day.

Paul's fourth speech, a night to night, declares knowledge.

God's fingerprints are all around us.

If we would just stop long enough, pause, pay attention, see, respond, and allow him to move our lives.

 Well, there are ways that we experience the divine risen Christ in our lives today.

One of those ways is through divine encounters.

Signs, wonders, and miracles are still happening in our time and in our world, whether it's a healing or miraculous encounter or divine revelation.

 There are places in the world where people do not know Jesus and are having divine revelations of Jesus Christ and coming to a saving faith because he has, like on the Damascus Road, revealed himself to people.

We hear about these situations, but because we tend to be inclined towards skepticism, we don't always stop, take them in, allow them to kind of marinate in our soul and give God glory for his work in our world today.

 Another way that he speaks to us is through creation, that which he has created, that which God has made, often points back to the creator.

In Romans 1, verse 20, Paul writes, he says,

 His eternal power, his divine nature, his invisible though they are, have been understood and seen through the things he has made.

So they are without excuse.

And so when we walk into maybe nature, see a beautiful waterfall or a sunset, encounter the strength,

 strange but beautiful and intriguing, mysterious things that God has created all around us, it points back to the Creator.

When we see and experience beauty, it points back to the Creator.

All these things are talking to us all the time, pouring forth day after day.

 something else that we see kind of points to the creator and that which is created by the creator is humanity.

And that's a difficult one for us to talk about.

 people are yet another one of God's beautiful divine creations and when they are filled with the spirit and they're aligned with God's will and with his ways they clearly point back to the creator the image that they bear is that of the creator and when we are aligned with God we clearly point back to Jesus because he is risen but he also lives and he's risen in me

 Unfortunately, because we have so much evil in the world, and generally bad news sells better than good news, we tend to focus on evil.

We tend to focus on bad people.

We highlight the bad all the time.

We take a highlighter and we just go over it all the time and say, here's bad, here's evil, here's bad.

But in all fairness, if we were to stop and actually change our perspective on

 kind of from a glass half empty to glass half full perspective, we might understand that there is an incredible amount of good that is going on in the world today.

And it's being done by beautiful people who are selflessly giving of their time, they're giving of their money, they're giving of their resources, they're giving of their energy to serve this world and the people in it.

 People are feeding the poor in the name of Jesus.

They are housing the homeless in the name of Jesus.

They're adopting orphans.

They are doing what they can to serve the broken, the sick, and the destitute all in the name of Jesus.

 We go back to Saul, a man who is very content to drag back Christians in chains, murderous threats that he's breathing out, an angry, aggressive person.

And then we look and we see the writings that he gives us in the New Testament.

We don't see that same person.

Something has changed in this man called Saul who became poor.

 In Ephesians 4.28, he actually encourages people to work hard.

Why?

So that you can share with the needy.

That doesn't sound like the same person.

And then, to make matters worse, today at just about every wedding, somebody wants to quote 1 Corinthians 13, which is the passage about love.

 this beautiful, well-written piece of literature that just moves our hearts about how deep it is to love and to sacrifice.

And it is something that has just stuck with us.

Some people don't know the Bible, but they know that beautiful piece of writing about what love is.

 Guess who wrote that?

That was the apostle Paul, the same guy that was breathing out murderous threats.

You see, here's the thing.

The risen Jesus changes lives.

The risen Jesus took a hold of Saul, changed his life and made him Paul.

The risen Jesus is seen in the changed life, not only of Saul and Paul, but in so many that have actually found Jesus.

 People often miss Jesus, and I've mentioned this before, because they don't know a Christian.

Well, the truth is sometimes they do miss Jesus because they have seen a Christian and they do know a Christian, and that Christian has not necessarily represented Christ correctly.

And as the church and as Christianity around the world, we need to own that and we need to do better.

 Even in, we look at Christian apologetics, there's a move away from classic apologetics that focused on reason, logic, and evidence.

And there's now a move towards what they would call cultural apologetics, where it is to show that Christianity is in fact good, and it's a compelling way to live.

 But that means that we as Christians have to align ourselves with the Christ that we claim to serve.

And I think the time has come for the world again to see the beauty, to see the love, and to see the grace of the risen Jesus.

 And if they're going to see it, if the world is going to say Jesus is risen, then we as a church need to say he is risen.

But you know what?

He is risen in me.

And may I rightly represent Jesus Christ.

If you're here today and you're listening to this and you're a skeptic, let me encourage you.

Give Jesus a chance.

Please forgive the frailty.

 of our humanity, the frailty even of the Christian faith, the frailty of the shortcomings of the church, and allow the love and the grace of the risen Jesus to meet you, to find you, and to transform you into the beautiful person that you were meant to be.

And if you're listening and you're here and you're a believer,

 Well, I have the same invitation to you.

Give Jesus a chance.

Open your heart to the transforming power of his love and his grace.

And let us together as the body of Christ work at, learn to, and let us strive to be more like our risen savior.

Jesus is risen and may he be risen in me.

Amen.