Resurrection Sunday 2023
Pastor Bruce A. Shields
House of Faith Church | www.PS127.org | www.TruthDigest.org
Online Audio Files | HOF Church Facebook | Truth Digest Facebook
This document is a Sermon Outline. You may hear the full audio of the actual sermon by following the link Online Audio Files located above for this and other Full Sermon Audios. For a complete list of Sermon Outlines, visit TruthDigest.org or Truth Digest on Facebook; for our Official Church website, visit PS127.org, or find us on Facebook at House of Faith Church.
INTRODUCTION
We began this short three sermon series on Palm Sunday, one week ago today. We read in about the Lord fulfilling scripture by riding into town on a donkey as everyone cried out hosanna, throwing palm branches and their garments before Him making the ride smooth.
It was the entrance of a King.
We then had our Good Friday service, speaking of our Lord and the cross.
Today, resurrection Sunday, we speak of the Lord rising from death and setting into motion the beginning of the church, or age of grace.
Let's Look at the Holy Week God ordained and what it Means for Us
SCRIPTURE READING (Legacy Standard Bible)
Isaiah 53:12 " Therefore, I will divide for Him a portion with the many, And He will divide the spoil with the strong; Because He poured out His soul to death, And was numbered with the transgressors; Yet He Himself bore the sin of many, And interceded for the transgressors.”
TODAY'S MESSAGE
I. PASSOVER (πάσχα pascha: פֶּ֫סַ×— pesah) Sader = order
a. Exodus established the Holy Week of Passover
i. We read in Exodus 12 the instructions for the Holy Day of Passover
ii. It was a celebration of what Yahweh had done for the Hebrews
iii. Each part of the celebration is a foreshadowing of Christ, and all He accomplished at the cross to free humankind from the bondage of sin
iv. Thus, reconciling God with His creation
b. What it meant for the Hebrews
i. The traditional meal includes scripture reading, wine, telling stories from the bible, eating special symbolic foods, singing, etc.
ii. It is held after nightfall on the first night of Passover. (i.e. the Last Supper)
iii. During the course of the evening you will have;
1. Four cups of wine
2. Veggies in saltwater
3. Matzah (unleavened) bread
4. Bitter herbs, horseradish, romaine lettuce, dipped in charoset (paste of nuts, apples, pears and wine)
iv. Each having its place in a 15-step choreographed combination of tastes, sounds, sensations, and smells telling the story of the Exodus.
v. Some of this was instructed by God in Exodus, and some was added over the years to help accomplish the teaching and remembrance of all the things God had instructed them.
c. What it foreshadows for Christians & Christianity
i. The Last Supper was the Passover meal Jesus had with the disciples
1. The meaning of the Exodus and Passover was to prepare the people for the coming Savior, Jesus
2. He would be sent by the Father (as was Moses)
3. He would free the people from bondage of sin (as Moses freed from Egypt)
4. He would lead the people in this fallen world (as Moses led the Hebrews through the desert)
5. He would give them spiritual food and drink in the form of the Word of God and the Holy Spirit (as Moses did with manna [bread from heaven] and the rock [symbolic of Jesus] which gave water [symbolizing the Holy Spirit]
ii. The Passover Holy Week celebration was not only to commemorate what God HAD done, but teach what He WOULD d0o for all of mankind, and it began with a sacrifice of a lamb for their sins.
iii. John 1:24-30 “Now they had been sent from the Pharisees. And they asked him, and said to him, “Why then are you baptizing, if you are not the Christ, nor Elijah, nor the Prophet?” John answered them, saying, “I baptize with water, but among you stands One whom you do not know. “This One is He who comes after me, of whom I am not worthy to untie the strap of His sandal.” These things took place in Bethany beyond the Jordan, where John was baptizing. On the next day, he saw Jesus coming to him and said, “Behold, the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world! “This is He of whom I said, ‘After me comes a man who has been ahead of me, for He existed before me.’”
II. THE CROSS
a. Good Friday
i. Isaiah 53:7-12 “He was oppressed and He was afflicted, Yet He did not open His mouth; Like a lamb that is led to slaughter, And like a sheep that is silent before its shearers, So He did not open His mouth. By oppression and judgment He was taken away; And as for His generation, who considered That He was cut off out of the land of the living, That for the transgression of my people, striking was due to Him? So His grave was assigned with wicked men, Yet He was with a rich man in His death, Because He had done no violence, Nor was there any deceit in His mouth. But Yahweh was pleased To crush Him, putting Him to grief; If You would place His soul as a guilt offering, He will see His seed, He will prolong His days, And the good pleasure of Yahweh will succeed in His hand. As a result of the anguish of His soul, He will see it and be satisfied; By His knowledge the Righteous One, My Servant, will justify the many, As He will bear their iniquities. Therefore, I will divide for Him a portion with the many, And He will divide the spoil with the strong; Because He poured out His soul to death, And was numbered with the transgressors; Yet He Himself bore the sin of many, And interceded for the transgressors.”
ii. Jesus, the Lamb of God was that sacrifice
b. Sin requires blood atonement
i. God made this clear in the book of Exodus
c. Exodus foreshadowed the crucifixion
i. The lamb would be sacrificed
ii. Its blood over the door-stoops symbolic of the blood of Christ on our hearts
iii. And the angel of death would pass over all of those with the covering
iv. Not because of who they were, but because they had obeyed Yahweh and thus, were protected
I am not real keen on creeds and oaths and such, with exception of the Apostles Creed, which served an important purpose in the early church.
The Apostles Creed distills the basic outline of what it means to be a Christian. A summary of indisputable beliefs.
This helped the early church know if those they worked with were true to the faith, or misunderstood some of the basic teachings. These are the things there can be no doubt or disbelief in.
Within this creed, however, there is a statement in the line which is not as much incorrect as it is misinterpreted by the early church.
“was crucified, dead, and buried;
(He descended into hell.)1
On the third day He rose again from the dead;”
“He descended into hell.”
Firstly, though the concepts of the Apostles Creed is a great tool, it is not in the bible.
Secondly, the line “He descended into Hell,” is not present in the earliest transcripts of this creed, but was added later.
The truth being, those who died went to Sheol, the place of departed spirits. The faithful to God going to Abraham’s Bosom (meaning heart, center, security) while the unfaithful found themselves in torment.
Jesus gives an example of Sheol in the parable about Lazarus and the rich man who died.
III. JESUS DID NOT GO TO HELL
a. When Jesus died on the cross, He went to Sheol
i. To Abraham’s Bosom, which is also called, Paradise.
ii. This is where Jesus promised to take the thief on the cross who confessed he was a sinner, and asked Jesus to remember him when He came into His kingdom.
iii. Jesus said to the thief, “Truly I say to you, today you shall be with Me in Paradise.”
“for just as JONAH WAS THREE DAYS AND THREE NIGHTS IN THE BELLY OF THE SEA MONSTER, so will the Son of Man be three days and three nights in the heart of the earth.”
Jesus said this in Matthew 12:40
“(Now this expression, “He ascended,” what does it mean except that He also descended into the lower parts of the earth? He who descended is Himself also He who ascended far above all the heavens, so that He might fill all things.)”
The book of Ephesians 4:9-10
“For Christ also suffered for sins once for all, the righteous for the unrighteous, so that He might bring you to God, having been put to death in the flesh, but made alive in the spirit; in which also He went and made proclamation to the spirits now in prison,”
1 Peter 3:18-19
“For to this the gospel has been proclaimed even to those who are now dead, so that though they were judged in the flesh as men, they live in the spirit according to the will of God.”
1 Peter 4:6
“He brought them out of darkness and the shadow of death And broke their bands apart.”
Psalm 107:14
“As for you also, because of the blood of your covenant, I have set your prisoners free from the waterless pit.”
Zechariah 9:11
Acts 2:31 “he looked ahead and spoke of the resurrection of the Christ, that HE WAS NEITHER FORSAKEN TO HADES, NOR DID His flesh SEE CORRUPTION.”
The Greek word Hades is used for Abraham’s Bosom in Luke 16:23, and used to translate the Hebrew word, Sheol. Psalm 9:18; Proverbs 1:12; Proverbs 15:11; Job 14:13
After Jesus died on the cross, He went to Paradise, Abraham’s bosom, and was not “forsaken” to stay there, nor would His flesh see “corruption”, rather, He, and Jesus says in His own words in Matthew 12:40, “the Son of Man be three days and three nights in the heart of the earth”
Doing what?
He descended into the lower parts of earth, Sheol, the place of departed spirits, to “make proclamation to the spirits now in prison,” (1 Peter 3:19), to “proclaim the gospel even to those who are now dead, so that though they were judged in the flesh as men, they live in the spirit according to the will of God,” (1 Peter 4:6), THEREFORE, “because of the blood of your covenant, I have set your prisoners free from the waterless pit.” (Zechariah 9:11), “He brought them out of darkness and the shadow of death And broke their bands apart.” Psalm 107:14
After this, Jesus rose from the dead!
IV. THE RESURRECTION
a. Jesus rose, leaving two angels in the tomb
i. An empty tomb except for two angels, one at the head and one at the feet of the tomb, sitting. This represents the completion and fulfillment of the promise of God for the salvation and redemption of His creation through the works of the cross and Jesus Christ.
b. Jesus was present for 40 days before the Ascension
i. Over the course of the next forty days, Jesus would spend time among the disciples, preparing them for the coming promise of the Father, the Holy Spirit.
ii. Forty, representing the testing, trial, probation.
c. This was when He gave the Great Commission
i. In Matthew 28, Jesus gives the last instruction to the disciples before His ascension.
ii. The Great Commission.
CONCLUSION
It would be days later before the promise of the Father would arrive, on the Holy Day of Pentecost.
Again, fulfilling one of the prophetic Holy Days of God’s calendar.
Passover – Jesus is the Lamb
Feast of Unleavened Bread – Jesus is the Manna (bread) from heaven
Pentecost – The Holy Spirit / Church Age (Age of Grace) Begins
[WE ARE HERE! Awaiting the sound of Trumpets]
Feast of Trumpets – The Rapture
There are four major views of Eschatology that theologians cannot agree upon.
1. Amillennialism – No literal reign of Christ on earth, all symbolic
2. Postmillenianism – The ever-spreading gospel until the world becomes Christian, THEN Christ returns
3. Historic Premillenianism – Christ will return physically and visibly and usher in the millennial age
4. Dispensationalism – The millennial reign of Christ begins after His return, at the end of seven year tribulation
I personally believe in dispensationalism, even though scholars cannot come to an agreement.
Day of Atonement – Judgment Day separating the sheep from the goats
Feast of Tabernacles – The celebration feast with Yahweh, Jesus, and the Holy Spirit
The Eighth Day – Eternity with the New Heaven, New Earth, New Jerusalem, and New Temple
Today, Lets Praise God for the Cross, Resurrection, Covenant Purchased in His Blood, and the Fact that we, who confess and call on the name of the Lord, are redeemed, filled with His Holy Spirit, and repent of our sins.
This and other Sermon Audios can be found for FREE at
https://www.ps127.org/online-audio-files
Want to learn more about Salvation?
Want to read more FREE sermons?
No comments:
Post a Comment