Sermon
Making the Ultimate Choice
April 10, 2004
Pastor Donald Sheley

I'm going to ask you to take your Bibles, and I'm going to change our thoughts for this evening. Let me read for you the story of the resurrection, so take your Bible. It's Luke chapter 24 and I'm going to read the story from the Scriptures as to the event that we as the Christian Church around the world are celebrating.

Luke 24: "Now on the first day of the week, very early in the morning, they, and certain other women with them, came to the tomb bringing the spices which they had prepared. But they found the stone rolled away from the tomb. Then they went in and did not find the body of the Lord Jesus. And it happened, as they were greatly perplexed about this, that behold, two men stood by them in shining garments. Then, as they were afraid and bowed their faces to the earth, they said to them, "Why do you seek the living among the dead? He is not here, but is risen! Remember how He spoke to you when He was still in Galilee, saying, "The Son of Man must be delivered into the hands of sinful men, and be crucified, and the third day rise again.""

And they remembered His words. Then they returned from the tomb and told all these things to the eleven and to all the rest. It was Mary Magdalene, Joanna, Mary the mother of James, and the other women with them, who told these things to the apostles. And their words seemed to them like idle tales, and they did not believe them. But Peter arose and ran to the tomb; and stooping down, he saw the linen cloths lying by themselves; and he departed, marveling to himself at what had happened.

Now behold, two of them were traveling that same day to a village called Emmaus, which was seven miles from Jerusalem. And they talked together of all these things which had happened. So it was, while they conversed and reasoned, that Jesus Himself drew near and went with them. But their eyes were restrained, so that they did not know Him. And He said to them, "What kind of conversation is this that you have with one another as you walk and are sad?" Then the one whose name was Cleopas answered and said to Him, "Are You the only stranger in Jerusalem, and have You not known the things which happened there in these days?" And He said to them, "What things?"

So they said to Him, "The things concerning Jesus of Nazareth, who was a Prophet mighty in deed and word before God and all the people, and how the chief priests and our rulers delivered Him to be condemned to death, and crucified Him. But we were hoping that it was He who was going to redeem Israel. Indeed, besides all this, today is the third day since these things happened. Yes, and certain women of our company, who arrived at the tomb early, astonished us. When they did not find His body, they came saying that they had also seen a vision of angels who said He was alive. And certain of those who were with us went to the tomb and found it just as the women had said; but Him they did not see."

Then He said to them, "O foolish ones, and slow of heart to believe in all that the prophets have spoken! Ought not the Christ to have suffered these things and to enter into His glory?" And beginning at Moses and all the Prophets, He expounded to them in all the Scriptures the things concerning Himself. Then they drew near to the village where they were going, and He indicated that He would have gone farther. But they constrained Him, saying, "Abide with us, for it is toward evening, and the day is far spent." And He went in to stay with them.

Now it came to pass, as He sat at the table with them, that He took bread, blessed and broke it, and gave it to them. Then their eyes were opened and they knew Him; and He vanished from their sight. And they said to one another, "Did not our heart burn within us while He talked with us on the road, and while He opened the Scriptures to us?" So they rose up that very hour and returned to Jerusalem, and found the eleven and those who were with them gathered together, saying, "The Lord is risen indeed, and has appeared to Simon!" And they told about the things that had happened on the road, and how He was known to them in the breaking of bread.

Now as they said these things, Jesus Himself stood in the midst of them, and said to them, "Peace to you." But they were terrified and frightened, and supposed they had seen a spirit. And He said to them, "Why are you troubled? And why do doubts arise in your hearts? Behold My hands and My feet, that it is I Myself. Handle Me and see, for a spirit does not have flesh and bones as you see I have." When He had said this, He showed them His hands and His feet. But while they still did not believe for joy, and marveled, He said to them, "Have you any food here?" So they gave Him a piece of a broiled fish and some honeycomb. And He took it and ate in their presence.

Then He said to them, "These are the words which I spoke to you while I was still with you, that all things must be fulfilled which were written in the Law of Moses and the Prophets and the Psalms concerning Me." And He opened their understanding, that they might comprehend the Scriptures. Then He said to them, "Thus it is written, and thus it was necessary for the Christ to suffer and to rise from the dead the third day, and that repentance and remission of sins should be preached in His name to all nations, beginning at Jerusalem. And you are witnesses of these things. Behold, I send the Promise of My Father upon you; but tarry in the city of Jerusalem until you are endued with power from on high."

And He led them out as far as Bethany, and He lifted up His hands and blessed them. Now it came to pass, while He blessed them, that He was parted from them and carried up into heaven. And they worshiped Him, and returned to Jerusalem with great joy, and were continually in the temple praising and blessing God. Amen."

Let me take just a few minutes this evening and I'm going to tell you why the resurrection is really at the heart of our Christian faith. And to do that I must go back to the very beginning of time and paint the picture of history as to what God was dealing with at the moment when it came to that open tomb that we're going to celebrate tomorrow. We go back to the very front pages of the Bible, and in the early moments after God had created this universe the Bible tells us that He created man. And it says that into man He breathed the breath of life and man became a living soul. And thus He assigned the beautiful garden as the living place for Adam and Eve, and this is recorded for us in the book of Genesis.

The reason why God created man, the reason why He created us, is He created us for friendship. That's the reason why He created Adam and Eve. He wanted friends. In fact, the Bible tells us that He would come down -- is that He was a spirit I do not know which form that He would take -- but it says that He would come down in the cool of the evening and He would talk, walk and talk, with Adam and Eve. So there was fellowship with almighty God. There was something about man that God had placed within him, in Adam and Eve, that allowed them to walk throughout the garden and have personal communication with God, and thus God enjoyed their friendship.

But, you and I know that friends must be friends by choice. You can't force someone to be your friend. And God wanted man to make the choice himself; that he would be the friend of God, that he would love God, and enjoy His fellowship. And so God placed within man a marvelous capacity which all of us have, and that is, the ability to make choices. That's something that is a prized possession of all of us. We can choose in most situations as we grow up and we move beyond the boundaries and the limitations of our home. We have the capacity within us; we can pretty well choose what we want to do. God gave that to us as a gift.

But the reason why it was given to us as a gift is God wanted us to use that gift of choice to choose Him as our friend. But He said to Adam and Eve, now He said, there is a tree and if you eat of that tree it will be an act of disobedience, and in that act of disobedience what you're saying is you really don't want Me as your friend. And if you partake of that tree you're going to die. Now the moment came.

We do not know what kind of tree it was. We just simply know that God set that object in the garden and that object became the object which allowed Adam and Eve to exercise choice, and they chose, as we read the story, they chose to ignore God, disbelieve Him, and listen to Satan, and as a result, they sinned. They partook up the fruit that tree; as soon as they did something happened. The Bible says that prior to that time they were unaware that they were naked. And when you go to the Book it seems that when God created man He clothed him with a glory that shrouded them, the glory of God. They had friendship with God. They could communicate with God, and they lived in this beautiful garden. And God had clothed them with His presence, His glory.

But just as soon as they partook of that tree the glory is gone, and they see themselves in all of their nakedness, in their created nakedness. And what do they do? They run into the garden and they make for themselves out of the leaves of the garden a covering for their nakedness. Now the Bible tells us that when God came down the evening time, He said, Adam are you? He said I'm out here hiding. Why are you hiding? Because I'm naked. God said who told to you were naked? He said I ate of that fruit. Well, we know the conversation that carried on.

God had every right at that moment, because He said if you eat of that tree you'll die; God had every right to exercise the act of death and eliminate the human race. But young people and adults, that was the moment God revealed His marvelous mercy. He did something very unique. The Bible tells us that He went into the garden and He selected an animal and the animal was slain. That animal had done nothing. The animal was slain and his skins were used as the covering for the nakedness of man. And that brought about within the human race the concept of a substitute. God allowed an animal to die to cover, to provide the covering for the sins of man so that man could live.

And then He took Adam and Eve to the edge of the garden and because of their failure He said now you must leave the garden. And I've always said that what He did at that moment He must have reached in to man and whatever that divine something within him that made man able to communicate with God, He took that away. And that's why we have -- everybody has it -- there is this sense of yearning; there is this sense of emptiness. We always feel that there is something greater for which we are here. We reach out. We try everything in life to find it, but in the stillness of the night when all reality comes back, that haunting yawning emptiness is still within us. And the reason why, is because that ability that God gave to man in his creation has been taken from them, that ability to have fellowship with God.

Now what God did is He instituted a form of worship, which throughout the Old Testament is all the way through the Old Testament. The idea of a substitute sacrifice, and so God set up the sacrificial system. So when you sinned what you did is you went into your flock and, because it was a rural kind of living and they had their flocks, you selected an animal from that flock and you brought that animal to the priest, he laid it upon the altar, and while that animal -- because that animal now is going to be your substitute to cover, to die for your sins -- what happened is man took and reached out and he put his hand of the head of that animal as if to transfer his sins to the animal. The animal died and man walked away from the altar with his sins covered.

Now I don't know why God did it that way, but all the way through this Bible throughout all these pages in the Old Testament, century after century, you find that man is going out to his flock, getting his substitute, bringing it to the sanctuary, and it's being offered. So you have sacrifice after sacrifice after sacrifice. That's the way God provided man to know that he had done something that brought about the act of His forgiveness because those sins had been transferred to an animal, the substitute that had died.

The Bible tells us that in the fullness of time God made the choice to change it all. He's going to send His Son, Jesus Christ, and Christ is born. We celebrate that on our wonderful Christmas season, but Christ was born as the Son of God. And the reason why He was born is He came into this world destined, predetermined that the time would come when He would become the final sacrifice, and when He died on that cross over 2000 years ago what God's plan was...that upon Jesus Christ all the sins were heaped; the sins of the past, the sins of the present, and the sins of future. And how God did it I cannot tell you. All I know is what the Bible says that God placed on Christ all of our sins; your sin, my sin, the sin of all the world, and there on that cross 2000 years ago Christ died as the sacrifice, as the substitute for all mankind. That's why we call Him the Savior of the world.

And something interesting -- when Jesus died on that cross and He said those words, 'It is finished', that place of worship where they had the altar out here and where people would bring their sacrifice, and there was this curtain that no man could ever see behind; only once a year could the high priest go there to make the offering of sins for the nation. When Christ said 'It's finished', that veil was rent from top to bottom. And what it says to all the world is no longer is God curtained off from mankind. God through Jesus Christ opens His heart in love and forgiveness, and if we'll put our trust in Christ as that substitute, that one who died for all of us, when I say, Lord Jesus, I believe that 2000 years ago You fulfilled the divine plan of redemption. You died as my substitute, because the Bible says the wages of sin is death. Christ took our death on Calvary so that you and I could have life.

Now when we go back to the first part of the story, Christ coming and being the sacrifice, that resolved the problem of sin. Now man has the ability to have once again fellowship with God. And as I often say, when we say Jesus, I put my trust in You as my Savior and I believe that You died on that cross for all mankind, including me, and I receive You as my Savior, something marvelous happens. What happens is that precious divine spirit that God removed from man because of sin reenters, and we call that the new birth. We call that being born again. God by His spirit comes to live within us.

And I cannot tell you...it's hard to explain, but once again we enjoy the reason for which God created us, we enjoy having fellowship through prayer, worship, and singing to God, and it's very real to us because His spirit is within us now. And it's made so because Christ took the problem of sin, solved it on the cross, providing a way for me and all of us to say, Jesus, now I invite You to come and by Your spirit live within my heart.

But there's one major problem that still remains for mankind: Christ is in that tomb, death is man's worst enemy, and death was the reason for sin. And if God is going to resolve this whole matter completely with regards to conquering death, He must do something and He provided that in the resurrection of Jesus Christ. And three days after Christ is taken from that cross God did something marvelous. Jesus Christ came out of that tomb, and in coming out of that tomb He conquered the problem of death. It proved that God has power even to override death itself, which was the ultimate cost and the ultimate result of sin. And so the reason why we as Christians make Easter morn such a marvelous day of rejoicing is because there that open tomb tells the world that God not only provided the answer to man's sin, but He conquered man's greatest enemy, death. Jesus says because I live, you will live also.

Because of that open tomb, every Christian has the promise that when this life is over we'll live forever with Jesus. We'll live forever with Jesus, and that open tomb is the proof that we as Christians have a life that's eternal forever with God. Yes we'll die, but I want to tell you that there is a vast difference between a person who dies with faith and a person who does not have faith. If you have faith you know that when you close your eyes in death -- and death is not a welcome guest no matter how good a Christian you are. We weren't made to die; we chose it by sinning, and thus even the finest Christian doesn't relish death, but we know this, and I know this, that when I come near those moments when this life will be finished I know that as soon as I close my eyes in death...the Bible says to be absent from the body is to be present with Jesus.

So the reason why we Christians make a marvelous celebration at Easter is because it's the culmination, it's the final step that God took to resolve the whole problem of sin and of death in the person of Christ; and because He lives we're going to live too.

Now something else: you noticed in the story we read Jesus went out to the Mount of Olives and His closing moments with His disciples He talks with them, and while He's talking with them all of a sudden He disappears back into the skies. And Jesus said: Behold, what manner of love the Father hath bestowed upon us, that we should be called the children of God. Beloved, we know not what we shall be, but we know that when we shall see Him, we're going to be like Him just like He is.

But you say, then what is Jesus doing now? If He came and He died on that cross, and came out of that tomb, and He conquered the problem of sin and the problem of death, what is He doing now? The Bible tells us that in heaven He serves as our great high priest, and when you and I pray He's there in heaven and He listens to our prayer, and he's our great high priest. So He's interceding on our behalf at the throne of God. Now you understand why Easter is so important to us as Christians. It's the ultimate victory where God conquers the problem of sin at the cross and He conquers the problem of death in that open tomb, and He says to everyone who will put their trust in Jesus if you'll believe in Jesus you'll not only have forgiveness of sins, but you'll have the gift of life eternal. That's what we believe as Christians. Amen?

Let's bow our heads. Lord Jesus, there is so much about the story of the Scriptures and what we've talked about tonight...there are things we really don't understand very well. We don't understand, God, why You would choose a way of using an animal as a substitute to die instead of man -- the animal taking our sins -- we don't understand that. Really all we know is we read about it, and that's what You did.

And Lord Jesus, when You came to this world, even though You understand your assignment and your divine mission, all those around You didn't. Even the disciples had problems trying to understand Your words, but in the fullness of time according to the divine timetable of eternity You went to that cross and You became the sacrifice, and in Your dying You became the payment for all of eternity for all of our sins. And if we put our trust in You, dear Jesus, You become our personal Savior and the life that is eternal becomes Your gift to us. That's amazing. That is amazing.

When we understand that...now Lord Jesus we really can rejoice at this Easter time knowing that because You live we're going to live also, all of eternity, when this life is finished here because we have eternal life as a gift that comes from You as our Savior. We're going to spend eternity forever living with You. And that, Lord Jesus, is the reason why we as Christians rejoice.

Now Lord Jesus I've done this this evening because maybe there might be those with us who have wondered why we Christians believe what we believe, and maybe have wondered what we believe. I've tried to make the story of Your purpose and Your plan as simple as possible, and I'm asking You now Lord Jesus that by Your Holy Spirit You will reveal these truths to every person here so that they too will understand. And if there are those with us who wrestle with this whole issue of Christianity, who really have a hard time making a decision whether they want to be a Christian or not, I pray that by Your Holy Spirit You'll take the words that we've said this evening dear God and You'll open them up to their hearts and their minds, and may they come to that place where they will bring their heart to You dear Jesus and receive You as their Savior.

That's the ultimate choice we make as a human being is trust You and to love You dear God. And I pray that every person here has done that. With every head bowed just for a moment of contemplation: you are saying, Pastor, I now understand a little bit about this whole matter of Christianity and the reason for the resurrection and the reason for the cross, and I really would like my heart to be opened to God because I want Him to reveal these truths to me so that I can come to faith too, a faith in Christ.

You know, I felt impressed tonight just to talk to you from my heart and to explain God's plan, and I pray that it's clear to you now. Let's all stand together for a closing prayer.

Lord Jesus, I'm fully aware that we as human beings can explain the Christian faith as I've tried to do tonight, but I'm also very much aware that it takes Your Holy Spirit to reveal these truths to all of our hearts. So I pray that as we leave the sanctuary this evening Your Holy Spirit will be at work. And may the subject we discussed this evening become a subject of supreme interest to every person here; that all of us can say with a sincere heart, I have trusted in Jesus as my Savior and He has granted to me the gift of life eternal. May that be able to be said by all of us, I pray this in Christ's name, amen. God bless you all. Thank you all for coming.