Easter 2024 Sermons

“Christ is risen – he is risen indeed, alleluia.” Church services up and down the land will begin with this bold acclamation this Easter Sunday. He is risen – the tomb was empty, many eye-witnesses testified to seeing Jesus alive, indeed as the apostle Paul argued: ‘these things were not done in a corner,’ they were in the open, it was public and it caused the Church to explode into life. Resurrection is credible. He is risen. Here is the heart of our hope: a risen Jesus declares the triumph of the cross, the resurrection demonstrates that it really is ‘finished,’ justice done, sin atoned for; therefore the jailer of death has lost all right to hold all those for whom Jesus paid. His resurrection guarantees his follower’s resurrection, this is our certain hope. He is risen!

We continue our theme of resurrection as we consider the apostle Peter’s call to praise God for the living hope and unfading inheritance it secures. Though life may bring ‘trials of many kinds’ the certainty of future inheritance changes our perspective and comforts us in the midst of struggle. As the Son approved through his obedience, Jesus Christ is the worthy inheritor, confirmed in resurrection. United to him by faith, we share in all that is his, his life, his approval, his inheritance. We will come, through him, into future glories to reign with him. This inheritance is certain and secure, it is unfading and kept for us Peter argues, that is, it cannot be snatched away, and we are kept for it, shielded by God’s power until we come into all that he has for us. This assurance of the future gives us hope in the present, the best is yet to come, and we will come to the best. Whatever our circumstances, through faith in Christ, we have this living hope of life forever with the living Jesus.

Hard pressed, perplexed, persecuted, how does the Apostle Paul keep going? How is it that he did not lose heart? 2 Corinthians 4 reveals the answer – resurrection was a ruling principle in his life. Paul was certain of resurrection through faith in Christ. Present sufferings for the sake of the gospel are put in perspective by this hope, they are light and momentary compared with the weight of eternal glory to come. Convinced by the realities of hope, he speaks the gospel word by which God speaks light into the darkness of the human heart to grasp grace and glory in the face of Christ. It might cost him, he might appear unimpressive and weak, death might be at work in him, but life, eternal life, is at work in his hearers, to the glory of God, and so he presses on. Present hope of future glory through the resurrection of Christ from the dead makes all the difference in the world, ‘therefore, we do not lose heart’.