Why Does Easter Matter? | Rev. Paul Lawler

If the resurrection isn’t real, everything falls apart, but if it is, it changes everything. This message explores why the risen Christ reshapes our faith, our hope, and how we live right now.

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Welcome to the podcast of Christ Methodist Church in Memphis, Tennessee. Join us as we dive into this week's sermon that challenges our hearts and minds to grow closer to Christ. We pray that your heart is inspired and transformed by God's Word.

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Today, my name is Paul Lawler. I have the honor of serving as a lead pastor of Christ Church. Welcome. Thankful that you're here. If you have a Bible with you, I want to invite you to open it or turn it on to Mark chapter 16. I'm going to read verses 1 through 16. Actually, Mark, yeah, I said 16. I thought I accidentally said 15. Mark 16, 1 through 16. Hear God's word. I'm going to dive right in. So here we go. When the Sabbath was passed, Mary Magdalene, mother, Mary, the mother of James and Salon, brought spices so that they might go and anoint him, that is Jesus. And very early the first day of the week, when the sun had risen, they went to the tomb. And they were saying to one another, Who will roll away the stone for us at the entrance of the tomb? And looking up, they saw that the stone had been rolled back, and it was very large. And entering the tomb they saw a young man sitting on the right side, dressed in a white robe, and they were alarmed. And they said to him, Do or they he said to them, Do not be alarmed. You seek Jesus of Nazareth, who was crucified. He is risen, he is not here, see the place where they laid him, but go tell his disciples in Peter that he is going before you to Galilee. Then you will see him just as he told you. And he went out and fled, they fled from the tomb, for trembling and astonishment had seized them, and they said nothing to anyone, for they were afraid. Now when they er rose early on the first day of the week, he appeared first to Mary Magdalene, and whom he had cast out seven demons. She went and told those who had been with him as they mourned and wept. But when they heard that he was alive and been seen by her, they would not believe it. After these things he appeared in another form to two of them as they were walking along the country. And they went back and told the rest, but they did not believe them. Afterward he appeared to the eleven themselves as they were reclining at table, and he rebuked them for their unbelief and hardness of heart, because they had not believed those who saw him after he had risen. And he said to them, Go into all the world, proclaim the gospel to the whole creation. Whoever believes is baptized will be baptized and saved, but whoever does not believe will be condemned. Would you take a moment and let's pray together?

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Would you join me? So, Father, we pray now.

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Open up our hearts, do the miracle of softening our hearts, do the miracle of opening our ears so that we might hear you as an act of worship. In Jesus' name we pray. Amen. So, any Memphis Grizzly fans in here? All right, there's a handful. I know, I know it's not, they're not having their best year. So we went to the game Friday night, my oldest son and my grandson, my three-year-old grandson, and the crowd is chanting defense, defense. Okay, you get it. You know, you know the cadence when the crowd does that. Well, my grandson actually misunderstood and thought they were saying Jesus, Jesus. And so he began moving in cadence with him. As there the crowd's, you know, defense. My little grandson is going, Jesus, Jesus. And his dad leaned over to correct him. And I said, Oh, don't correct him.

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The grizzlies need all the help they can get.

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Church family, there is a sense in which God has come to us in Christ because you need help that some of us aren't even aware that we need. And this morning, I want you to know as we journey into our time together, I'm not going to preach what you might call a typical Easter sermon. I want to share with you why. I've been doing this for decades. And for decades, I've proclaimed the resurrection of Jesus on Sunday. And I find that most of the time people leave church, they go to the restaurant or the country club or home for dinner, and they reflect, yeah, I believe in the resurrection. But I also find that too many people are not transformed by that reality. And I want to submit to you that something diabolical is at work when we hear this news and it doesn't change our lives. Now I I know that that's a bold statement, but I I want to submit to you that Easter is not a ghost story. That something happened at Easter that has the power to transform your life. Something happened at Easter that has the power to change the future of every life in this room. I'm mindful C.S. Lewis once wrote these words. He said, What are we to make of Christ? There is no question of what we can make of him. It is entirely a question of what he intends to make of us. You must accept or reject the story. I'm mindful this morning that many of you, in fact, most of you who are in adulthood, have studied or worked very hard to be qualified in some field or discipline related to your work or vocation. Some of you have been highly trained to manage portfolios, move securities around for individuals or respectable, prominent institutions. Many of you have studied very hard to be licensed to buy and sell residential or commercial real estate. Many of you have worked very hard for a college degree, a graduate degree, or a PhD. But how much have you really studied, really delved in to the claims that bring us together today? How many of you really have studied, reflected deeply on the implications that Jesus' words and the reality that we'll examine together today carries for your one and only life? If there is a God, probably no surprise to you that I believe that there is, but if there is a God, and if he has sent Jesus Christ as the Messiah, as his son, if he went to a cross and died for your sins and rose on the third day, this is worthy of consideration for your one and only life. These claims are worthy of weighing as having utmost importance. Otherwise, life may be meaningless. And I want to know, I want you to know that I'm not using hyperbole when I say that. Many of you are old enough to remember about 10, 15 years ago, when all the new atheists hit the scene, Christopher Hitchens, Dawkins, YouTube was getting all kinds of, had gotten lots of traction, and they were using it to propagate their atheism. And I'm going to share one of the quotes that Dawkins where it became somewhat famous as he shared his perspective on life. Let me read it to you. In a universe of blind physical forces and genetic replication, some people are going to get hurt. Other people are going to get lucky, and you won't find any rhyme or reason in it, nor any justice. The universe we observe has precisely the properties we should expect if there is at the bottom no design, no purpose, no evil, and no other good. Nothing but blind, pitiless indifference. DNA neither knows nor cares. DNA just is, and we dance to its music. Now the question I ask of you as you contemplate Dawkins' words is does that kind of fatalism and hopelessness define our existence? Are we drawn to inferences from statements like this that this is all there is? Contrast those words with the claims of Jesus. Jesus claims that a day is coming when there will be justice. Jesus Christ claims that a day is coming when all of creation will be restored. Jesus Christ claims that a day is coming when there will be no more wars, no more pain, no more tears, no more cancer, no more diseases, no more dying. Jesus claims a day is coming when people who know him will live forever on this planet as he recreates it, as he intends it. And so when you read a statement like what Dawkins shares, is this the kind of thing, and I'm going to go into the first person, is this the kind of thing that I would say to my own mother when she was laying an ICU, suffering from the effects of an aneurysm and dying way too young in the prime of her life? Would I lean out of a spirit of love into her ear and whisper there these words? Mom, you will just have to dance to the music of a blind, pitiless indifference. No son who loves his mom would ever say such words. Why? Because there are realities that go beyond the physical. And one of those realities is the reality of love. Instead, my brother and I and family members, very similar to many of you who have been through similar things, lean into her ear and say, Mom, we love you.

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Mom, we're here at your side. Mom, you're not alone.

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That's what love does. Love has a proclivity to lift up what is most true. Years ago, I knew of a father and son that were deeply estranged from one another as adults. The son had betrayed the father repeatedly in business, stabbed him in the back, lied about him, cheated, betrayed, just connived in all kinds of dark ways. The son found out his father was laying in ICU dying. And the son rushed to the hospital. And I witness the son lay on top of his dad, saying, Dad, I'm sorry. Please forgive me for all the things that I've done. Dad, I love you. Please forgive me. And what was happening in that moment was the reality of something that goes beyond the physical, and that is love. Love has a tendency, a proclivity to elevate what is most true. It will always, when it's in operation, magnify what is most true, what is ultimately true. Now here's a question. What does this have to do with Easter? I appreciate you asking. Here it is. The stone was rolled away. Let me explain, because at Easter that sounds like a cliche. Like, well, you're supposed to say that. But look with me how the Bible affirms it. Matthew 28. Behold, there was a great earthquake. Angel of the Lord descended from heaven, came, rolled back the stone, sat on it. His appearance was like lightning, and the clothing white as snow, and for fear of him the guards trembled and became like dead men. Women come to the tomb. When they looked up, Mark 16, 4, they saw the stone had been rolled away, for it was very large. Now here's a question. Why are we pointing that out? Is it because that's what you do at Easter? Or is there something richer, more profound and preeminent that we need to pay attention to? The issue is not just that the stone was rolled away. The question, the deeper question is why would God roll the stone away? Because isn't it true that after Jesus takes on his resurrected form, that when you read the gospels, he's passing through walls? Anybody catch that? Passages moving around. So if Jesus is doing that, why was it necessary to roll the stone away? Because Jesus could just pass through the wall of the tomb in his resurrected form. So God didn't roll the stone away for Jesus. God rolled the stone away for the women to see. God rolled the stone away so we can see. In other words, love will always magnify what is ultimately true. Love will always magnify what is most true. And that's why when you get to verse 5, entering the tomb, they saw the young man clothed in a long white robe sitting on the right side, and they're alarmed, because it's not natural for someone to be raised from the dead. The Bible tells us this is an angel sent by God. And critics of the story like to say, well, wait a minute, one gospel says there's one angel, another gospel says there's two angels, and critics who don't think deeply, and if we don't think deeply when we hear criticism like that, we miss the depth of what's happening. That is corroborating witnesses. Let me put let's pretend for a moment here in SEC country that any Mississippi State fans in here? Okay. I th I thought it would be like that. Like I'm nothing personal. I just said, you know, if I ask about Mississippi State, it's it's it's okay.

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Any Ole Miss fans? Okay. All right. Any Tennessee fans? Okay. Any Alabama fans? Not bad. All right. So let's move on.

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So let's let's just pretend you've never been to a football game. You go for the very first time in your life. In fact, you live in another culture. Football to you is soccer, but you come here and you observe a football game. And somebody asks you what was happening. One of you might say, Well, there were a bunch of people in uh bright colored clothing pushing uh an inflated piece of leather back and forth. And so that might be one perspective. There might be somebody else that says, oh no, there were these guys dressed like zebras, they were wearing zebra jerseys, and they were just running back and forth. And there are a few of the guys might say, oh no, there were these cute girls in short skirts waving pom-poms, and that's what was going on. The point is, is that the corroborating evidence supports that something significant is happening. And when you have more than one witness in the Bible, Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John, and they're giving perspective on something, it doesn't take away from the truth that of what has happened. It corroborates that something significant has happened. Christchurch's finest lawyers would love to defend a case like that. So the the women go in, his body is not there, but his grave clothes there were positioned in a way that they're sitting right next to where his body was, which indicates that thieves did not steal the body. And so the angel says, verse 6, he said to them, Don't be alarmed. You seek Jesus of Nazareth, who was crucified, he is risen, he is not here. See the place where they laid him. Now, church, the fact that Jesus rose from the dead is a reality that is to gift a hope that has true leverage in your own heart and life. Because death in Christ has been overcome, and the implication is that death can be overcome in your life if your life is in Christ. So this for reasons like this that the psalmist writes, for you make known to me the path of life, in your presence there is fullness of joy. But get this at your right hand are pleasures forever, forevermore. So you probably know, you've probably some of you've read the statistical data, and that they're quite impressive, matter of fact. Ten out of ten people die. The Bible says, Psalm 89 48, what man can live and not see death? Can he deliver his life from the power of the grave? Hebrews 9 27, it is appointed for men to die once, but after this, the judgment. One day you will die. Now I'm not speaking that into you to be morbid. I'm speaking that into you because we get the opportunity to magnify hope. And hope is a person. His name is Jesus. And this is a real hope for every single person in this room. When I was a kid, I I remember sometimes the Sunday school teacher would ask kids if they had memorized a verse. And there was always a fifth grade boy who would say something like, Yes, I've memorized the Bible, and then he would quip, Jesus wept. And there would be chuckles because he had memorized that the shortest verse in the Bible. Very easy to memorize. But loved ones, I want to ask you a question. On that day where the Bible records Jesus wept, why was he weeping? You might remember he's about to raise Lazarus from the dead. In fact, Martha and Mary are there, and this is their brother, they're sad. Jesus, if you had only been here, blah, blah, blah. Holy blah, blah, blah.

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But and Jesus is weeping. Now, if you know that Lazarus is going to be okay, why cry?

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Some of you are oncologists, and let's say someone received a misdiagnosis for stage four pancreatic cancer, and you realize that it was a misdiagnosis, and you're going back to them to give them, hey, I've got great news. You don't have stage four pancreatic cancer. You're going to be okay. Well, you wouldn't do that with great joy, but here Jesus is weeping. Now, the Bible doesn't tell us specifically why, but I have a holy hunch, and I'm going to go there. The Bible says, Jesus, or Jesus says, I don't ever do anything I don't see the Father doing. And I think that God, the Father, is speaking to Jesus' heart in this moment. And I think it's why he's weeping. Because Jesus knows that when he raises Lazarus into dead, this is going to kick in, the final straw for the Pharisees and chief priests who now say, look at the crowds, they're going after Jesus. Now we've got to kill him. Jesus knows that this act of raising Lazarus from the dead is going to propel him right into what God sent him to do, and that is to go to the cross and die for sins. And Jesus, I suppose, is experiencing intimacy with the Father that he knows it's as if the Father's saying to him, Now, as we raise Lazarus from the dead, what you're going, what I'm going to do in Lazarus, I'm going to do in you, Son, only it's for eternity. And as you go to the cross and on the third day I raise you to new life, just as we see Lazarus come to a new life, this will be not only for you, but for all persons who turn to you in faith for your glory. And so this is why Jesus would say things like before he died, because I live, you will live also. Listen to this quote from Tim Keller. In the resurrection, we have the presence of the future, the power by which God will finally destroy all evil, all suffering, evil, deformity, and death at the end of time, has broken into history now and is available partially, but substantially now. When we unite with the risen Christ by faith, that future power that is potent enough to remake the universe comes into us. Huh. It gives us insight as to why Jesus said things like this in Revelation 1. Do not be afraid. I am the first and the last. I am he who lives and was dead, and behold, I'm alive forevermore. Amen. And I have the keys of Hades and death. So Jesus has authority over death and life, over hell and over the grave. And this gets into a deeper question, which is why was Jesus crucified? Well, the Bible answers that question. First Corinthians 15, 3. Christ died for our sins. Would you say that out loud with me? 1, 2, 3. Christ died for our sins. There's a sin problem in all of us. Every drunken incident is a symptom of sin. Every drunk driving accident is a symptom of sin. Every tension you have in A relationship in the past, in the present, in the future is a symptom of sin. Every war is a symptom of sin. Every conflict between people in your office or the workplace or the plant or the factory or the assembly line is a symptom of sin. Jesus said that murder is a sin in Matthew 5, 6, and 7. But he also said that when we have hatred toward another individual in our heart, we've already committed murder in our heart. Jesus shares that sex expressed outside the covenant of marriage between a man and a woman is a sin. He goes on to share that if you even think impure or sexual-oriented thoughts toward another human being, you've committed adultery already in your heart. We have a sin problem. Christ went to the cross for sins. A couple of years ago, Missy and I had the honor of traveling with part of the Christchurch family to Washington, D.C. for the national prayer breakfast. While we were there, Anthony Bocelli made a guest appearance with his daughter, and they sang a hymn. Oh my gosh, it's beautiful, transcendent, majestic. In fact, I remember sitting there listening to him sing, he and his daughter, and I just closed my eyes and just listened to the beauty of what was happening among us. And then when I opened my eyes, I was shocked as I looked around the room, the number of people scrolling on their cell phones while Boccelli and his daughter were just bringing this beauty and glory among us. Is it a sin to scroll on your cell phone? That's not my point.

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My point is what sin has done to us. So much so that when we're in the presence of beauty, we're numb.

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The definition of sin in the New Testament is it comes from the Greek word amartia. It means to miss the mark. It's like if you take an arrow and you shoot it right at a bullseye, to miss the bullseye, to miss what God intends. Romans 3.23 says, all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God. Romans 3.10 says, there is none righteous, no, not one. In fact, 1 John 1.8 says, if we say we have no sin, we deceive ourselves and the truth is not in us. You may have been raised in church, but to say you have no sin and to believe that you're in good standing before a loving and holy God is a deception at the highest order. Sin, whether you go to church or not, has separated you from a loving and holy God. Jesus Christ was crucified on a cross for our sins. Again, listen to these words from the Apostle Paul, 1 Corinthians 15, 3. Christ died for our sins. He did not sin, but we have sinned. He paid our debt. That's why some of your Bibles translates the Lord's prayer this way: Forgive us of our debts as we forgive our debtors. He paid a debt that he did not owe. We owed a debt that we could not pay. So think with me. If you had a debt to pay and somebody else stepped in to pay it for you, that would be pretty cool, wouldn't it? Cool is a theological word, you know that. Very cool. I was in rural Alabama and I was in a grocery store, and I was toward the end of a line, and at the front of the line there was a mom with two small children, and she went to pay for the groceries in her buggy, and she pulled out food stamps, and she didn't have enough. And so I'm I'm kind of witnessing what's happening. And there was a gentleman right behind her who pulled cash out, and as the mom turned to wipe her her little boy's nose, he slipped the cash to the cat the cash register gentleman and did like this at it.

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Just he paid her debt. That's what Jesus did.

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Jesus gives you salvation as a free gift. The issue is you've got to open the gift. The death of Jesus was what we would call a substitutionary act. Let me explain it this way. Years ago, I was invited to speak at a missions conference. It was a very prominent uh opportunity. I was honored that they invited me. There have been a lot of people that were well known that were invited to speak there. And when I got there, I I found out I was their second choice. In other words, I was subbing for someone. I was standing in. I was his substitute. Jesus is your substitute. Anytime you look at a cross, anytime you look at a cross, and you see it depicted with Jesus hanging there, you can ask a relevant question. Why is that man hanging there? Here's the answer. He's subbing for you. That's why the Bible says things like, for our sake, God the Father made Jesus, not created him. Jesus is eternal. In other words, led him to him, Jesus, to be sin. He took your sin. God judged Jesus on the cross in place of your sin, so that in him, in Jesus, you and I would become the righteousness of God. Just as there's a Passover where God did not judge the Israelites when the blood of the Lamb was over the door. This is what Jesus Christ does as he substitutes for us at the cross. Verse 6 tells us not only did he take our sins, but verse 6 tells us he's risen. All four Gospels affirm that he rose from the dead. The Gospels affirm that he appeared for 40 days to Mary and Martha, to the disciples, and over 500 other witnesses. He is risen. I'm mindful that people have been willing to suffer for standing on this truth. The Apostle Paul suffered, died for this truth. Peter suffered, died for this truth. John suffers in exile for this truth. This is why Blaise Pascal wrote the words, I believe the witnesses that get their throats cut for their testimony. C.B. Hardy, a Canadian scientist, once was exploring world religions before he became a Christian. Listen to his words. He said, When I look at religion, I have two questions. First, has anybody ever conquered death? Second, if they did, did they make a way for me to conquer death? I checked the tomb of Buddha, and it was occupied. I checked the tomb of Confucius, and it was occupied. I checked the tomb of Muhammad and it was occupied. I came to the tomb of Jesus and it was empty. And I said, There is one who conquered death. And I asked the second question, did he make a way for me to do it? I opened the Bible and I discovered that he said, Because I live, you shall live also. Church family, if you've read your Bible, you may have noticed there are times where God inspired, and I believe that in the New Testament, the authors to include some unique details. One of those details is how long certain people suffered. There was a woman who had an issue of blood. The Bible tells us she suffered for 12 years. There's a story of a woman who was bent over, maybe she had scoliosis, but she suffered for 18 years before Jesus healed her. And then there's a man at the pool of Siloam that suffered as an invalid for 38 years. The question is, why would God inspire the writers to include the years, 12 years, 18 years, 38 years? Here's why. Because God wants you to understand something. It's not too late for you. Some of us think I'm too far gone. It's not too late for you. You may have a condition that has been 12 years, 18 years, 38 years. And what's happened in your self-talk is you've put a lid in your mind that there isn't a possibility of you pressing through the glass seating ceiling that's been created in your mind. You can see that there's something better, but you haven't crossed over and experienced what's better. You're still living in the power of Friday. Friday's when Jesus is hanging on the cross, and there's no heartbeat when the work is completed, and you haven't moved into the reality of Sunday, where there's new life. Years ago, I was in Huntsville, Alabama. We were planting our first church, and we were getting ready to move on to our property. And there was another church about four miles down the road. They were getting ready to move on their property on the same highway. It was an African American church, and we were primarily a white church. And so I, the pastor and I had gotten to know one another, and we were concerned about race relations in our city. So we decided that we would do some things. And one of the things that we did was we invited his church to come worship with us on a Wednesday night. And then we would go the next month and worship with them in their new facility on a Wednesday night. Well, they came and the choir filled the balcony, and oh my gosh, powerful, glorious. I thought the roof was going to come off for the glory of God. It's powerful. And then the next month, we went to their church. He preached at my church, I preached at his church. Now, when you preach in an African-American church, you preach better.

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You do. You do, church.

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Because I'm telling you, the part of what's in the water and the culture, they bring you out. There'd be a sweet lady right over here, start waving a hanky, going, Well, well, bring it now. And there's a a brother in Christ over here would start saying, I mean, praying, help him, Lord, help him, help him. And and guys, I gotta tell you, the more I preach, the better I got. And the more they prayed, the more we interacted. There seemed like there was just a greater presence of the Holy Spirit. And we just got into a groove. And in fact, the groove got so good, I wanted to take notes on myself. Okay. It just now there's a gentleman that some of you may remember. He's gone on to be with the Lord, named Tony Campolo, who is a sociologist and also a Baptist minister. And he had a similar experience. He was invited as a white man to preach in a black church. And the same thing happened to him. He shares how God just seen as they he was in that environment just to get into a groove, and God was glorified as the word of God was being taught. And when he finished preaching, he looked at the senior pastor of the African-American congregation. He said, He looked at me and went, Hey, how was that? And the pastor stood up, who had loved his people well for decades, and he sat Dr. Campolo down and he said, Boy, you sit and you watch.

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And he went to the pulpit and he began to say something like this. It's Friday.

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Jesus is hanging on the cross. That's Friday. But Sundays are coming. Jesus is hanging on the cross. Satan's dancing with glee. He thinks he's won. That's Friday. But Sundays are coming. On Friday, people are filled with fear and anxiety. That's Friday. But Sunday's coming. The Prince of Peace is going to reign on Sunday. And the people are going to be delivered from fear and anxiety and worry because he's going to pick up their burdens, because he's alive. But on Friday, Friday, you can live in Friday if that's where you choose to live. But oh, let us live into Sunday where he's alive and he's on fire. Come on, church. And so as that African-American pastor so beautifully began to contrast Friday, Sunday, Friday, Saturday, Friday, Sunday, the roof began to come off.

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As he asked his congregation this question, what's it going to be for you?

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You're going to live in the right reality of Friday? Or are you going to choose to respond to the love of God, the grace of Jesus, who died for every sin? Are you going to move into Sunday where you humble yourself before Christ in light of why he came and say, Lord, I confess my sin. I repent of my sin. You're worthy. I want relationship and life and life with you as the risen Savior. You're going to settle for Friday deadness, deadness in your trespasses and sins? Or are you going to move to new life in Christ, risen from the dead, who has bought you with a price that not only begins now, but goes on into eternity? What's it going to be for you? In the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit. Amen. Let's pray.

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Church, let's pray. Let's pray together. So, Jesus, we're just mindful of your words this morning.

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You God so loved the world that he gave his one and only son that whoever believes on him will not perish, but has a brand new life now. It begins now and goes on to eternity. And the next verse says, You didn't send the son to condemn the world. You sent the son because you love the world. And so we pray all over this worship space. Move people out of that spirit of condemnation, out of Friday, into resurrection life. Let there be liberty to confess sin, to repent of sin, and turn to your loving arms. Just like the prodigal son came home to you. Draw us, Lord. Draw people that you love. You love all these persons, Lord. Draw them to new life in the sun. In faith, trusting that you are the Lord and you've risen from the dead. Pray that you do this all over this worship space this morning. For your glory. This we pray in Jesus' name. Amen.

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Thanks for tuning in to another episode of the podcast for Christ Methodist Church in Memphis, Tennessee. We pray that today's message has inspired and encouraged you in your walk with Christ. To stay connected with our church community, visit us online at Christchurch Memphis.org. We hope to see you this upcoming Sunday for worship as we seek to glorify God and make disciples of Jesus Christ among all peoples.