Miracle of Resurrected Saints

Introduction: The Miraculous Context of Christ's Death

0:03 This sermon was preached on Sunday morning, April 8, 1990, at the Trinity Baptist Church in Montville, New Jersey.

0:13 Now may I urge you to follow with me as I read two portions of the Word of God this morning, first of all from the 15th chapter of Mark's Gospel, Mark 15, verses 37 to 41, and then we shall turn over to the parallel passage in Matthew's Gospel, chapter 27, Mark 15, and verse 37. And Jesus uttered a loud voice, and gave up the ghost. And the veil of the temple was rent in two from the top to the bottom. And when the centurion who stood by over again, against him, saw that he so gave up the ghost, he said, Truly this man was the Son of God. And there were also women beholding from afar, among whom were both Mary Magdalene, and Mary the mother of James the less, and of Joseph, and Salome, who, when he was in Galilee, followed him, and ministered unto him. And many other women that came up.

1:33 And now Matthew 27, beginning in verse 50, Matthew chapter 27, verses 50 through 53. And Jesus cried again with a loud voice, and yielded up his spirit. And behold, the veil of the temple was rent in two from the top to the bottom. And the earth did quake, and the rocks were rent, and the tombs were opened, and many of the bodies were raised, and coming forth out of the tombs, after his resurrection, they entered into the holy city, and appeared unto many. Now as we come again to our studies in these events which surround the death of our Lord John. Jesus, let us seek the aid of the Holy Spirit that he will take of the things of Christ, and bring them home to our hearts with understanding and with power. Let us pray.

2:50 Our Father, we have sung together of the great blessing that comes when we as your people stand at the cross, and there seek by the aid of the Spirit, illuminating the written page, to enter in more faith. And as we again come this morning to stand by the cross of our Lord Jesus, that great fountain of life and salvation, O God, may our standing not be that of idle curiosity, but that of reverent worship. May our standing, and our beholding, not increase our damnation, but be instrumental to our salvation, and be effective to our increased sanctification. O Holy Spirit, gift of the risen Christ, come among us with power, and reveal the things of Christ with saving efficacy, we pray, in Jesus' name. Amen. Now we return this morning to a place called Golgotha.

4:17 We have reverently followed with our mind's eye the details of our Lord's arrest, his trial, his condemnation, his crucifixion, and his death, as they are set before us in the Gospel of Mark. However, no sooner...

God's Voice in Miracle: The Veil, Earthquake, and Rent Rocks

4:40 No sooner does the Lord Jesus give forth his cry of triumph, it is finished, no sooner does he again cry with a loud voice, Father, into your hands I commit my spirit, but that we find when his lips are sealed in death, that the Father comes forth to speak, to speak not in the language of the Word of God, but in the language of the Word of God. The language framed by human lips, and the language and the voice that demands the living diaphragm and lungs and larynx, but he speaks in the language of miracle, the language of the living and the true God. And we have begun to study together those miraculous signs and wonders which accompanied the death. The miracle of our Lord Jesus Christ, and constitute God's own vivid picture words concerning vital aspects of the death of his own dear Son. Mark, along with Matthew and Luke, records the first and the most significant of those

6:04 miracles, and the one most easy to understand, the miracle of the veil that stood before the sun. The three-pointed temple, the sanctuary at the temple, being split by the finger of God from top to bottom, thereby signifying no doubt to the wonderment of the priest who ministered at that hour approaching the evening sacrifice, that the way into the very presence of God now was opened through the death of his own beloved Son. There is no more need for earthly preachers. and animal sacrifice, the new and the living way has been constituted through the veil of Christ's flesh rent upon the cross, to which God answers in the tangible, phenomenal world by splitting that thick curtain that stood before the holiest of holies, thereby saying to all men, welcome sinners, if you come by the way of the cross.

7:18 Then we had occasion to note that only in Matthew's gospel are these other miracles that cluster around the death of Christ mentioned, and because they are mentioned and because we have never had occasion to consider them in all my years of ministry, with you, I felt it would be to our edification were we to turn to Matthew's gospel and allow something of the light and the glory of these subsequent utterances of the voice of God in miracle to break in upon our own understanding to the end that we may have a deeper appreciation of the significance of the death of Christ. And so with Matthew's gospel before us.

8:08 We have contemplated that second miracle and I took the shaking or the quaking of the earth and the tearing of the rocks as a unit miracle that miracle in which God shook the earth and tore rocks as though they were tissue paper declaring in this awesome language of raw power that in conjunction with the death of Christ, of his son, he, the living God, was drawing near in covenantal blessing and in righteous anger and judgment. And I did not place that significance upon the quaking earth and the tearing rocks arbitrarily, but we looked at pivotal passages in the Old and the New Testaments, which clearly indicate that when God comes forth in earth, quake and in power to rend rocks, he is coming forth on the one hand to enter into new dimensions of covenantal blessing and grace for his people. And he is coming forth to manifest the awesomeness and the fearfulness of his judgment and of his anger against sin.

The Miracle of Resurrected Saints: Facts Simultaneous with Christ's Death

9:36 Now, this morning, we focus our attention. Upon the last of the miraculous attendance of our Lord's death, we focus upon the strange events described in Matthew 27, verses 52 and 53, or 52b and 53. And the tombs were opened and many bodies of the saints that had fallen asleep were raised. And perhaps better rendered, and having come forth out of the tombs, after his resurrection, they entered into the holy city and appeared unto many. And so having considered God's message in the rent veil, God's message in the earthquake and the rent rocks, this morning we consider God's message. This morning we consider God's message in the opened tombs, the raised bodies and the subsequent appearance of many saints.

10:49 And as with our treatment of the other attending miracles, we shall consider the text under two major headings. First of all, the facts of the miracle, and then secondly, the message of the miracle. First of all, then, the facts of the miracle. The facts of this particular miracle fall clearly into two categories, those that were simultaneous with the death of Jesus and those that were subsequent to the resurrection of Jesus.

11:27 And this distinction is made very clearly in the text itself. As we seek to grasp the facts of the miracle, note first of all those which were simultaneous with the death of Jesus. As we noted in our previous study, all of these things are strung together by the repeated use of the conjunction, and. And I sought to emphasize this in the very manner in which I read the text to you.

12:02 And in bringing these truths before us in this way, God is indicating that we must not place any significant time sequence to these events. They all clustered around the cross as soon as our Lord utters his last words, Father, into thy hands I commend my spirit. And he yields up his spirit into the Father's hands. His lips are sealed in death, and the Father now comes forth to speak in the language of miracle, the miracle of the rent veil, and, at the same time, the miracle of the shaking earth, and of the shearing rocks, and, at the same time, the miracle recorded in these two verses. Now, what were the specific events, that were simultaneous with the death of Jesus? Well, the text is very clear. And the tombs were opened.

13:17 Secondly, many bodies of the saints that had fallen asleep were raised, and, having come forth out of the tombs. Tombs were opened. The bodies of many saints were opened. These saints were raised, and these raised saints came out of their tombs.

13:43 Now, one need not spend a lengthy period of time explaining the significance of those facts, or the, not the significance, but the substance of those facts. First of all, we are told the tombs were opened. In that part of Palestine, it was difficult to dig graves. Due to the kind of topography, the geological structures, we know that Golgotha was called the place of the skull, because it was a rocky mound that had a skull-like appearance to it.

14:21 And as we read in verse 60 of this very chapter, the sepulcher in which our Lord was placed was hewn out in the rock. And so our text leads us to believe that no sooner does our Lord yield His Spirit into the hands of His Father, that while the earth is shaking, and the rocks are being sheared, and the attention of people is being directed to these various phenomena, they also see that the stones which close over these above-ground graves or tombs or sepulchers hewn in the sides of rocky structures, that those graves are being opened. Now some commentators very carelessly attribute this to a kind of automatic side effect of the earthquakes and the shearing of the rocks. But think for a moment, and you'll see that that's impossible. A general earthquake would have caused the caving in of the tombs.

15:44 A general shearing of the rocks would have caused a collapse of the tombs, crushing the bodies of any that were in there that had not yet turned fully to dust. But our text tells us that the tombs were opened, and the word for open is the standard word found in the New Testament for the opening of the mouth , for the opening of a door , for the opening of blind eyes . It's the standard word used for an orderly opening. And so what we have here is not some incidental attendant of the earthquake or the shearing of the rocks, but we have Almighty God in a neat and orderly and a divinely selective manner opening up the tombs of some, not all, but many of the saints. Then the second thing we are told is this, and the tombs were opened and many bodies of the saints

17:06 that had fallen asleep were raised. Sleep is used as an image of death with respect to the bodies of the people of God, never with respect to their souls. The doctrine of soul sleep is a serious error that prepares people for the serious heresy of annihilation. And it's not without accident that most groups that believe in soul sleep eventually embrace the heretical doctrine of the annihilation of the souls of the wicked and the unbelieving. No, it is the bodies of the saints that are sleeping in death. And we are told that many such bodies of the saints that had fallen asleep were raised. Where they lay asleep in the sleep of death, in varying stages of disintegration that comes with that state of death, those bodies were in an instant of time brought to full, ordinary,

18:30 vigorous physical existence. That's what the text tells us. Now already questions are beginning to be raised. I'll show a sympathy with the questions though I'll not answer them.

18:47 We're simply trying to grasp the facts of the miracle as they are set before us in the text. And then we read, not only were the tombs opened and many of the saints raised from their state of sleep in death, that is their spirits rejoined their bodies, but thirdly they made an exit from their tombs. Now it's a fine grammatical point and it is possible that the words and many of the bodies of the saints that had fallen asleep were raised and coming forth out of the tombs after his resurrection could mean that though they were raised they lay in their tombs until after the resurrection and then after Jesus had been raised they came out of the tombs with the life that was given to them right at the time that he died. Now there's no question, that this matter of the opening of the tombs and the raising of their bodies was attendant or were activities attendant upon his death. It's in that cluster of activities

The Miracle of Resurrected Saints: Facts Subsequent to Christ's Resurrection

20:15 that God himself initiates and effects as soon as the Son of God yields up his spirit. However it is perfectly possible and I believe even more likely both from the language and from the analogy of scripture that the terminology, because we have a participle, we do not have what we call a finite verb or the main verb of action in these words and coming forth out of the tombs, we have an aorist participle and we could render it in this way and many bodies of the saints that had fallen asleep were raised and having come forth out of the tombs after his resurrection they entered into the holy city. So what we would have as the activities that were simultaneous with the death of Christ would be the opening of the tombs, the raising of the bodies and those raised bodies coming out of the tombs but not appearing appearing in Jerusalem until the resurrection of the Lord Jesus. But then the facts of the miracle not only take place simultaneous with the death of Christ

21:41 but there are two facts which took place subsequent to the resurrection of Jesus and they are set before us very clearly in the passage and after his resurrection they entered the holy city and appeared unto many. They went back after the resurrection of Jesus into the very city where Jesus had been arrested, condemned and sent forth to die the death of a common criminal. And while they were there the text says they appeared or were made manifest to many. Isn't it interesting? There's no record that they said a lot. Now they may have said much but the emphasis falls upon the fact that they appeared. They appeared or were made manifest to many unlike our Lord who restricted his post-resurrection appearances to a select circle from individual disciples, male and female to gatherings gatherings of the eleven and according to 1 Corinthians 15 to one group of 500 brethren all at once possibly a group gathered on that mountain from which he ascended

23:08 back into the presence of the Father as recorded in Acts chapter 1 but that is only speculation. The text tells us that these saints who were raised and went back into Jerusalem appeared to an indiscriminate many. We are not told that they appeared only to their fellow saints or only to the company of believers but the impression is given they appeared to many in a very indiscriminate way. Now these are the bare facts of the final miracle attending the death of our Lord.

Unanswered Questions and the Silences of God

23:53 The three facts simultaneous with his death. The tombs were opened the bodies were raised they came out of their tombs. Subsequent to the resurrection of Jesus they entered into the holy city i.e. Jerusalem and there they appeared unto many. Now the questions which are raised by this complex miracle are many and in a sense inescapable if we are reading with any thoughtfulness at all. Who were the saints that were raised? Were they some of the old worthies who had been buried in the environs of Jerusalem?

24:41 Or were they saints who were made such through the ministry of the Lord Jesus in the days of his earthly pilgrimage there in Palestine people who died in the course of his own living ministry? Would it have been some of those Old Testament saints whose lives enter into the early chapters of the gospel records such as Elizabeth and her husband Zacharias and others? Who were these saints that were raised? I don't know and no one else knows but God and the people that saw them and since God's not going to speak and answer this morning and since the people who saw them are in their graves and I can't raise them I don't know and I'm not called to preach my speculations. What did they do from Friday afternoon to Sunday morning? I don't know. They knew and if they did it with any other people they know but none of them are here.

25:57 So I don't know what they did from Friday till at least Sunday morning when our Lord was raised from the dead. Third question were they given glorified bodies which were then taken up straight into heaven? Or were they raised from the dead only to die again awaiting the final day of resurrection? And here I'm amazed at the dogmatism of the commentators.

26:25 One after another that I've read and I scoured my commentators and many of them pragmatically assert that these were raised with the very resurrection life that is parallel to the resurrection of the last day and it's unthinkable that they should have gone like Lazarus after he was raised from the dead back to the grave and yet not a one gives a text to support his dogmatism. Not a one. I found not one who could give a text to support his dogmatism. So I don't know whether they were raised with the kind of semi-resurrection life that was given to Jairus' daughter and to Lazarus in the days of our Lord's living ministry or whether they were raised with the very life with which Jesus was raised a totally new quality of life though a physical body that could be seen and touched could pass through walls a body that could eat and assimilate food yet was not dependent upon it I don't know and it must not be important or God would have told us. You see faith must not only believe what is revealed by God no matter how much it goes against our grain of what seems possible but sometimes faith

27:52 is most vigorously active when it submissively bows before the silences of God.

28:02 Faith is active when it believes God's pronouncements. Faith is active when it bows submissively before God's silences. So it is my thesis that if I can't answer those questions from Scripture and this is the only record of these events so we can't turn to any other Gospel record this event to my knowledge is not referred to anywhere else in Scripture so we have no analogy of Scripture to bring to bear upon it. So before those haunting questions faith bows and says Oh God your silences are wise and good.

28:40 Furthermore faith says the message of the miracle must in no way be tied to a certain answer to these questions or God would have answered them. In other words the message of the miracle must stand on the facts that are clear. The tombs were opened. Many bodies of the saints that slept were raised and they came out of their tombs.

Message 1: Efficacy of Christ's Death for All His People

29:07 After the resurrection of Jesus they entered Jerusalem they appeared to many and God is saying my message in this miracle is contained in those naked facts. Strip away the secondary concerns and all the other questions as innocent as they may be and find the message of what I've done in what I've revealed. And that brings us then secondly to the message of this miracle. What is the message that God intended to bring to us?

29:48 Well as we take up what I believe are three strands or three aspects of the message of God in this miracle remember this whatever the message was to those immediate witnesses whatever it is to us we must remember that it comes in terms of reasoning from what is observable to the realities which lie behind what is observable. Look at verse 54 of Matthew 27 Now the centurion and they that were with him watching Jesus when they saw the earthquake and that word feared exceedingly saying this truth was God's Son. You see those who were there when God spoke in miracle and remember both the pagans and the Jews believed in an open universe they didn't have a mechanistic atheistic view of the universe it was an open universe where in the case of the pagan Romans the gods could break in and influence

31:17 what happens in human history and for the Jews Yahweh the great creator God the God of the covenant who had parted the Red Sea for their fathers who had stretched a day in battle for Joshua and his soldiers this God can break in to space time history and act and what he does in his actions is often set forth to declare some great truth about himself and the intention of his heart and certainly if a pagan centurion and that particular group of soldiers assigned with him to keep watch over the cross on which Jesus hung and over the body of Jesus when what they saw watching him and the other things that were done caused them to reason back from the things they saw to unseen realities so likewise it is incumbent upon us to do the same what then is the message of this miracle first of all this miracle constitutes a convincing indication that the death of Jesus had virtue and efficacy

32:45 for all of his people this miracle constitutes a convincing indication that the death of Jesus had virtue and efficacy for all of his people now while he was alive he had repeatedly indicated indicated to his own that what he did and would do would be done on the behalf and for the sake of his own for example he said I am the good shepherd and as the good shepherd I will lay down my life for the sheep no man takes my life from me I lay it down I have power to take it up again further he said I did not come to be ministered unto but to minister and to give my life my single one life a ransom for many and we could multiply text in which Jesus while he was yet alive asserted again and again of himself and John the Baptist had asserted the same thing as his forerunner behold the lamb who bears away the sin of the world

34:11 in other words it was no strange thought that his work was to have virtue and efficacy for all of his people however there was nothing about his appearance which would indicate that he sustained such a relationship to all of his chosen ones that his life his death and his resurrection were the life death and resurrection of the head of a whole new humanity now this truth is fully explained in Romans 5 12 to 21 there the great apostle opens it up in language that cannot be misunderstood that it is as Adam did not act as a private person in his first transgression but stood with the whole human race piggybacked upon him and in his fall we all fell so likewise Paul says Christ stood in all of his life in all of the perfection of his obedience and in all the agony of his death not as a private person but with all of the new humanity God's elect those chosen in him and given to him they were all piggybacked on him

35:39 and as through the one death came upon all so through the one life will come to the all who are given to him piggybacked upon him joined to him there the truth is fully explicated and set before us in a more condensed form we find it in 1 Corinthians 15 45 and 49 but it's the same truth but now take yourself back to the cross and see how this truth though not set forth with the clarity of Paul's didactic words in Romans 5 surely God is making the message clear by his deeds there you are standing with that centurion and your fellow soldiers and the devout women who are off at a distance looking upon these scenes and you hear the piercing cry my God why didst thou abandon me and the darkness is rolled back and the sun shines upon his face and then another cry it is finished and then another cry Father into your hands

37:05 I commend my spirit he bows his head in death and while your eyes are beholding the scene suddenly the earth beneath your feet begins to rock and to tremble and the earthquake that eerie ominous frightening unhinging experience of terra firma becoming terra mush and you're gripped with fear an earthquake and as you look around you see the crosses swaying in their sockets and you look beyond them and you see solid rock being sheared like tissue paper and while your spirit is almost paralyzed taking in all of these things you begin to see an orderly taking away of the stones from the mouths of a grave here and a grave there and a grave there and a moment later out comes one saint and another and another and another and as you stand there what are you to realize that there's a connection between the cry

38:33 my God why did you abandon me the cry it is finished the cry into your hands I commit my spirit and no sooner does he bow his head in death it's as though the graves themselves cannot contain their hallelujah and the only way they can express it is by yielding up some of their victims what he does in death he does on the behalf of his people to procure their life as they live in death their heads rise up from their tombs and they walk out living man his death had virtue and efficacy that resulted in their life and resurrection how much they understood or perceived how elementary their perception would have been we who stand this side of the full revelation of the new testament witness must understand this truth with utmost clarity

40:02 if we are ever to come to any solid assurance of our acceptance in Christ and any well grounded assurance that will enable us to look straight into the grim eye of death and the reality of the cold earth of the grave and yet do so in the confidence of faith you see God's method of dealing with all humanity is at the very foundation of what we have in this passage he deals with all humanity in terms of our connection with Adam or our connection with Jesus Christ and that is not a truth just for theologians that's a truth for ordinary Christians in Rome some of them slaves and some of them people of very limited formal education they must know this truth why? I say it is the foundation of all well grounded assurance and stability in the Christian life I give you one text as an illustration of it in Romans 8 in verse 34 the Paul who was painfully conscious of the depth of his sin not only in his unregenerate days his days of unbelief and blindness but according to Romans 7

41:30 deeply aware of the horrible depths of his own remaining corruption that makes him groan and cry out who shall deliver me from the body of this death yet listen to what this man can say in verse 34 of Romans 8 who is he that condemns where is there in all the moral universe of God creature angel and cherub that condemns who can justly condemn me well who is speaking a man acutely aware of the vast of his own sins and sinfulness and yet he can say who is he that condemns he throws out a challenge to the entire moral universe and said come forth any who can justly condemn me and where did he get that confidence look at the next words it is Christ Jesus that died yea rather that was raised from the dead who is at the right hand of God who also makes intercession for us you see his confidence was grounded in realities total totally external to himself and exclusively embedded in the life history and ministry of Jesus Christ

42:57 who is he that condemns and my friends some of you who for every step forward take one backward you are going to continue to do that until God by the Holy Ghost enables you to lay hold of this truth that God will gather when the head of his son and two and then saints are raised and come out of their tombs that which Jesus does has virtue and efficacy for all of his people and you must as the scripture says write this truth upon the tablet of your heart and how do we write truth upon the heart by the pen of meditation and the ink of the Holy Spirit's ministry truth is written upon the heart of the child of God and therefore by careful perusal of the word of God and earnest prayer for the instruction of the Spirit give yourself no rest of the body of the Holy Spirit but to live in the orbit of God's voice in this miracle

Message 2: Destruction of Death and Certainty of Resurrection

44:26 from Golgotha that the death of Jesus has virtue and efficacy for all of his people but then secondly this miracle not only constitutes a convincing indication that the death of Jesus had virtue and efficacy for all his people but this miracle constitutes a powerful declaration that the death of Jesus secures the destruction of death and the certainty of resurrection for all his people this miracle constitutes a powerful declaration that the death of Jesus secures the destruction of death and the certainty of resurrection to life for all for all of his people. You see, death would never, never be a word in our vocabulary apart from a shorter word, the word sin. In the day that thou eatest, thereof thou shalt die. The wages of sin is death.

45:40 The soul that sinneth, it shall die. Funerals, mourning, death shrouds, graves, tombstones, headstones, none of those words would be in our vocabulary except as on that sin never entered.

46:07 But because sin is entered, death is entered. And as long as sin reigns, death reigns. And the only way for the reign of death to be broken is for the reign of sin to be crushed.

46:25 Now what is God saying in this miracle? Here is his own beloved Son. In that body that we have seen, from its face downward was one mass of bruises and blood mingled with spittle. The back laid bare to the bone in the sinews by the lash of the man.

46:52 The man that sinned, the man that sinned, the man that sinned, the man that sinned, the man that scourged him. And yet no sooner does he yield himself up in death. Father, into your hands I commit my spirit. As his head bows in death, so the tombs recognize they've lost their claim over their inhabitants.

47:18 And they've got to give them up. Isn't it amazing how God speaks in miracles? And the tombs that have held them say, we can righteously hold them no more. And they open their arms and unloose their grasp and out come resurrected bodies.

47:42 His death exhausts the claims of sin and therefore the rightful claim of death. And isn't this exactly what the writer to Hebrews tells us? He tells us, that he likewise partook of our nature. Why?

48:05 That through death he might destroy him that had the power of death and deliver them who through fear of death were all their lifetime subject to bondage. Go back and put yourself at Golgotha. You're standing there with the Roman soldier and his cohort. You're standing.

48:29 You're standing. You're standing. You're standing there with those women looking from afar. You have felt the trembling.

48:35 You've seen the shearing of the rocks. You've heard the triple cries that cluster around his last minutes. You've seen him bow his head in death. Then you've seen the selective opening of the tombs and saints coming forth.

48:53 Surely you would not need to be a genius to say there's something in the virtue of his death. There's something in the virtue of his death that is securing their resurrection to life.

49:08 And as we know, this is not Easter Sunday, but I'm preaching an Easter message because the text finds us there, that Jesus Christ did not act as a private person in death or in resurrection, but we read from the scriptures that after they came out of the tombs, the saints that were raised subsequently after his, his resurrection went back into the holy city and appeared unto many people who knew them would recognize them if they were some of the older ones known by reputation. The moment they'd make their identity known, people would gather around us and say, what, you've been dead for 30 years. You've been dead for a hundred years. What happened?

49:55 They would tell them when he bowed his head in death, our heads were raised in life. God is saying this marvelous miracle, declaring eloquently and powerfully that the death of Jesus secures the destruction of death and the certainty of resurrection of life for all of his own.

50:26 Child of God, while Jesus' resurrection is the pledge of ours, listen carefully, while Jesus' resurrection is the pledge of ours, if we believe that Christ, died and rose again, them also that sleep in Jesus, will God bring with him. Christ was raised from the dead, first fruits of them that sleep. Yes, Jesus' resurrection is the pledge of ours, but never forget this truth. It is his death which is the purchase of ours.

51:01 Our resurrection was purchased in his death. His pledge in his resurrection, it was purchased in his death. And while his resurrection validates the virtue of his death, the virtue is in the death itself. Therefore, beware of any theology that changes the focus of your leading object of devotion from Christ crucified to Christ resurrected.

51:40 While the crucified Christ is alive, and we have no crucifixes, and we do not conceive of him as still upon the cross, if we are thinking biblically, we will say, God forbid that I should glory save in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, by which the world is crucified unto me, and I unto the world. And I, brethren, when I came unto you, determined to know nothing among you, save Jesus, Christ and Him as resurrected? No. Him as crucified. The preaching of the resurrection is the power of God. No. It is the preaching of the cross that is the power of God and the wisdom of God. And we do not denigrate His resurrection. We do not conceive of Him

52:40 as still hanging upon a cross. But we must never upset the delicate wheel of balance concerning what God has revealed about our salvation. And every part of it was purchased by His death. And that's why my unconverted friend, until this immolated, bruised, contused Christ, rejected by man, lying under the anathema of God under darkened heavens, until He becomes to you the pearl of great price.

53:17 For which you're willing to sell everything else. You are yet bound to your sins and you have no real hope in life, death, in the grave, or in the day of judgment. But blessed be God when we have seen in the bowed head and in the self-giving of the Lord Jesus in death God's own pledge to us that in His death He conquered death. And secured infallibly the resurrection of all His own. When we see that, then we sing as we did this morning, time like a rolling stream bears all its sons away. When we sang that verse, you know, it went through my mind, if the Lord tarries, I said, God, in a few short years at best, and if this place still exists, somebody else will stand. Where I stand this morning and sing, O God, our help in ages past, time is going to bear me away. And where is it going to take me? It's going to take me to the grave. But it's

54:37 not going to leave me there. Blessed be God. God gives token in pledge that death is conquered and the tombs and the saints are raised and they come forth out of their graves. And one day I too shall be raised from the dead.

55:07 But I've got no questions about the resurrection I'm going to have. Because the scripture tells me that He shall fashion this body of my humiliation like unto the body of His own glory. And I shall be raised never to die. Do you have that confidence? If you have it on any other grounds but that Christ's death destroyed death, you have it on grounds that you are being saved. This feraa of death is because one of God's miracles 거예요You will be as good asк because you are not against death and death contractor. 林 talents. Um that will one day disappoint you and land you in hell.

Message 3: Validation of Jesus' Personal Claims

56:12 But then thirdly and finally this miracle not only constitutes a convincing indication that the death of Jesus has virtue and efficacy for all his people not only constitutes a powerful declaration that the death of Jesus secures the destruction of death and the certainty of resurrection for all his people but thirdly, This miracle constitutes a convincing validation of the personal claims of Jesus Himself. It constitutes a convincing validation of the personal claims of Jesus Himself. It did that for that pagan Roman soldier. I take you back to those words that when He saw, when He beheld, He said, truly this is God's Son.

56:51 He had probably been there when the accusations were made. And He was taunted, if you're God's favored one, ha, ha, ha, from the cross, trusted in God, you're His son, you're His favored one. And the scripture tells us, You remember that the soldiers entered into that very mockery, maybe He was one of them. Just like in the beginning, the two thieves, they both were mocking one turn from a mocker to a penitent believer and went to heaven in a few hours.

57:33 When He saw, when He saw what happened, there was a convincing validation of the personal claims of Jesus. Well, just try to relive. What happened after Sunday morning, Christ is raised from the dead, and the news spreads through the believing community, and shortly thereafter, your uncle that you buried ten years ago shows up at your door.

58:04 You talk about a little excitement. You remember what happened in the book of Acts with a bunch of believers when they're praying for Peter. James had had his head knocked off, and they're praying for Peter. And the little maid comes up to Peter.

58:21 I mean, Peter comes. They knock and say, Who is it? Peter. She goes running.

58:24 She's so excited, she doesn't even open the door. She runs back into the crowd and says, Peter's here. He said, No, I can't be here. It's his ghost.

58:31 The Spirit can't be here. Peter keeps on knocking. You see, these people lived in an open universe. They believed in the realm of the Spirit.

58:40 They believed in the realm of the supernatural. Now, think what it would have meant. It says, They went back into the holy city and appeared unto many.

58:51 And here's someone, dead ten years, shows up. And they look.

58:57 Hey, hey, hey, you, Uncle A.B.? Yeah, that's me.

59:03 Uncle A.B., we, we, we, we, we buried you. That's right, you did.

59:09 What, what, what happened?

59:13 When Jesus died. They were a real people. It says there, If the people by whose lifeless forms you've stood and wept, and wept even more bitterly when they've been lowered into the rock tombs hewn out of the side of a rocky hill, How convinced are them that the Lord will return. And you've gone through the grieving process.

59:48 And then you've known what it is to have some little law of association. Rip your heart open and the floodgates open. And the grief and the sorrow overwhelm you. And now enough time has passed that you carry a deep heart that always has a little bit of the tissue that never completely heals when you've truly loved.

60:10 And that love tone is taken away. And many, many, many, many, page 139. When they put the facts together, their appearance as living men was directly connected to the death of Jesus, the dying one. Now, what claim in particular does this validate?

60:43 And it was driving here to church today as I was wrestling. Lord, there's still one more key that brings us all together. Lord, what is it? What is it?

60:55 And then when these verses flashed into my mind, I'm not embarrassed to say I bellowed out two hallelujahs that probably scared the neighbors in the house I was passing by.

61:07 You remember what particular miracle of Jesus was the final straw that broke the camel's back? That precipitated his death at this Passover season and not another one? Because they didn't intend to do it this Passover. They didn't want to do it during the Passover lest there be a tumult, remember?

61:26 But what brought it to a head? It was raising Lazarus from the dead. And the leader said, look, the whole world's going after him. We've got to get rid of him.

61:37 And then there was a prophecy made by a man who didn't know he was a prophet. He says, you know nothing at all. He says, we'll have one die for the nation so that all of us don't perish. And then John says, this spake he, being a prophet.

61:54 He didn't know he was a prophet, but he was speaking a prophetic word. You see, it was the very raising of Lazarus from the dead that was the straw that broke the camel's back, brought the pressure that led to his death at this time. And it was in conjunction with Lazarus' death that he made this claim. I am the resurrection and the life.

62:18 He that believes in me, though he were dead, yet shall he live. And whosoever lives...

62:29 and believes in me, shall never die. Now here's one who says, I am resurrection, I am life. He that believes in me will never die. And now he's on a cross, out in agony.

62:45 He cries out in triumph. He submits his spirit into the hands of his father, bows his head. And what happens? His claims are validated.

62:58 In conjunction with his death, the graves, the tombs, the tombs were opened. Many of the saints were raised. And having come out of their tombs, after his resurrection, they enter the holy city, they appear unto many, and when they are asked, how did this come to pass? They say, in conjunction with what happened at Golgotha,

63:29 when he bowed his head in death, death, death, and when he was crucified, he said, I am the resurrection and the life. And whether the Lord Jesus imparted a mere extension of this present life, or whether they were actually given the kind of resurrection bodies that made it fit for them to be translated, a question no man can answer. This side of the consummation, this resurrection, As much is clear, those claims no longer sounded wild and fanatical. As Paul says he was declared to be son of God with power by the resurrection, he is declared to be son of God when he says, I am the resurrection, when in his death many of the saints are raised to life and appear unto many. Oh, dear people, how thankful I am that my salvation does not rest on a set of religious notions hammered out in somebody's little chamber way off in a secluded place in the woods who comes forth to say, I've had a revelation, I have the answers.

64:59 My salvation is rooted in the stuff of this passage, the stuff of a bowed head, of a dead body, of one called Jesus, the stuff of real stones that close the mouths of reels that roll away and out of which come reels unto many. And when they touch them, their fingers hit their arms. Blessed be God for a salvation rooted in the stuff of space, time, sight, sense, touch, feel, history.

Conclusion: A Salvation Rooted in Historical Reality

65:45 We do not follow cunningly devised fables. We stand. Make our salvation on the testimony of those who saw.

66:00 And blessed be God that he did not allow men to have the last word at Golgotha. He had the last word. And his last word is the rent veil. In the death of my son, the way of access is open.

66:20 Cutters, sinners of all ages, sinners of all backgrounds, sinners of all ages and shapes, the way is open. Come by the cross and you are welcome. My sinner friend, that's humbling. But that's the only gospel there is.

66:42 What will you do with it? Will you tell God that he split the veil in vain as far as you're concerned? Will you go on wallowing in your sins? Hugging your sins, trying to suck sweetness out of the thing that is death itself?

66:57 God is saved by the split veil. The way is open. Come. By way of the cross, God is said by the earthquake and the sheared rocks that at the cross he came to establish the new covenant.

67:16 And he came in judgment and fury to punish the sins of his people in the person of his son. Will you believe that? Or will you despise the blessings of that covenant, trample underfoot the blood of his son, and then one day meet that God when you cry for rocks and hills, to fall upon you and to crush you, when God comes with the final shaking at the second coming of Jesus.

67:42 And then God is saying, in the open tombs, in the raised saints, and they're coming out of the tombs and entering the city and appearing unto many, God is saying, Christ's work has virtue for all his people. Christ's work in death destroyed. Christ's death, Christ claims, are all valid. Child of God, what reinforced concrete realities undergird our hope of everlasting life.

68:21 And my sinner friend, if you don't have the hope based on these realities,

68:28 may God help you today to flee from whatever is the object of your trust and run to this Christ who now lives. To make good everything the Father said by the voice of miracle when he bowed his head in death upon the cross. Let us pray.

Prayer and Final Exhortation

68:56 Our Father, we do thank you for your holy word. Oh, how we thank you. We bless you and praise you. We thank you for the gift of your son and for all that you've said to us in him.

69:14 And oh, how we thank you. And oh, how we thank you. And oh, how we thank you. And oh, how we thank you.

69:14 And oh, how we thank you. Oh, God, this morning, have mercy upon any who refuse in their pride or stubbornness to come to that open veil. Have mercy upon those who ignore the message of the earthquake in the sheared rocks. Have mercy upon those who ignore the message of the open tomb and the raised saints.

69:40 For we know, Lord, you're not going to speak anything more than what you've spoken in your word. Until you summon them from their graves and call them to judgment. Oh, God, have mercy, have mercy upon boys and girls and men and women and turn them to yourself this morning. And then, oh, Father, for your dear people, may their confidence be strengthened and deepened.

70:08 May those who constantly look away from Christ to the pathetic state of their own hearts for comfort, oh, Lord, teach them how to have that fixation of sight upon the work of your Son, which alone will give them stability in their Christian experience. We think of those who grieve this morning. Oh, Lord, may the cross and all the glory of its message be the very conduit of comfort to their hearts. Seal, then, your word, we plead, for your glory.

70:46 And for our good. Amen.