Remember This

“He isn't here! He is risen from the dead! Remember what he told you back in Galilee.”  Luke 24:6

You’re caught! You forgot something important, and because you forgot you look like an idiot. You should have remembered. It all makes sense now, but it’s too late and you’ve suffered a million agonies because you forgot. 

That’s what Jesus’ friends felt like when the angel gave them that look. “Remember what He told you…”  Facepalm. Of course Jesus wasn’t in the tomb! He’d spelled it out in capital letters a half-dozen times. He’d done everything except draw them pictures. Why hadn’t they caught on? Why hadn’t they believed Him? If they had remembered, they would have been saved days of unremitting grief.

We would also be saved years of unremitting grief if we remembered the things He’s told us. He wrote an entire Book so we wouldn’t forget, but we’re to busy to read it. We think we already know what’s in it. We substitute motivational memes for a thorough study of God’s word, and then wonder why we’re having such trouble living godly lives. We’re not much better than those first disciples who dashed to the tomb, expecting to find the body of Jesus. We dash off in the wrong directions trying to find the answers we need, when all along our Creator has written them down for us. Instead of remembering what He told us, we dash to the bar, the casino, or the TV to tell us how to handle life. 

If all you have time for is the Bible’s Cliff notes, remember this: He is alive. He loves you. He offers you eternal life with Him if you will repent. He has a plan for you. Don’t forget.

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Looking for Jesus

 

He said, "You are looking for Jesus…who was crucified. He has risen! He is not here.”  Mark 16:6

These people were looking for Jesus in the wrong place. Millions still are. Some carve His image onto wooden crosses, and then pray to the wood. Some claim to see His face in the clouds or on a waffle, and then sell photos to the hopeful. Some make pilgrimages, some make idols, and some make excuses, but they, like the disciples, are looking in the wrong places.

We tend to look for Jesus where we expect Him to be and He is rarely there. We think the right music, the right atmosphere, or the right shiver down our spines might bring us closer. We don’t find what we expect because we’re not looking for the real Jesus. The disciples went to the tomb looking for a man; Jesus would reveal to them God. We go in search of the longhaired Jesus in the Sunday School Picture, because He looks harmless and comfortably outdated. But the Jesus who rose from the dead, commands obedience, and talks about coming judgment is a little scary. And that’s why we can’t find Him. Often He is not who or where we expect Him to be. We cannot seek Him only as Savior; He is Lord. Undisputed boss. Creator. King of Kings. Judge of all the Earth. And unless we are willing to bow to Him as such, we won’t find Him either.

 
 Are you looking for Jesus in all the wrong places? Fall to your knees and make Him Lord, and He will be there. 

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Pilate's Fears

“Take a guard,” Pilate answered. “Go, make the tomb as secure as you know how.” Matthew 27:65

Those orders did not end that day. The enemies of the Lord have been working ever since to convince the world that Jesus is irrelevant. “If we can just neutralize Jesus and the whole resurrection thing,” the thinking goes, “Christianity will die of natural causes.” And they’re right. If Jesus is nothing but a sweet-talking guru, then let’s board up the churches and build casinos.

Pilate’s orders continue to echo through the centuries, taking cues from popular culture. God is Dead! shouted the headlines in the 60’s. It’s the Me Generation, we were told in the 70’s. Cultural Christianity is the New Cool, the 80’s informed us. It was Anything Goes for the 90’s, and for every generation since. Attacks against the validity of the Bible, the deity of Jesus, and the reality of God continue to escalate. When Pilate can’t deny the existence of Jesus, he repackages Him as a shy, lamb-carrying hippie who had some great ideas but is hopelessly out of touch. However, every attempt to discredit Jesus hits the same obstacle—an empty tomb. Pilate’s fear that a resurrected Christ would transform his empire was well founded; but trying to stop Jesus with a rock He Himself had created was not. So go ahead, Pilate, make that tomb as secure as you know how. It won’t matter, because the One who walked out of that tomb is still transforming your empire.

 
“You can shut him up for a fool, you can spit at him and kill him as a demon, or you can fall at his feet and call him Lord and God, but let us not come with any patronizing nonsense about his being a great human teacher. He has not left that open to us. He did not intend to.” –C. S. Lewis 

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Hope Behind a Rock

Then he rolled a stone in front of the entrance. Mark 15:46

Boom! Finished. The End. A giant boulder sealing a tomb symbolized the finality of death. To the Roman executioners, it meant that no zealous disciple could tamper with the body. To Jesus’ watching friends and family, it meant the end of a beautiful dream. The end of hope. Staring at that stone, they had no choice but to accept that their Master, Teacher, and Friend was gone. They had waited and prayed, silently pleading that He might come off the cross, call down some angels, or vindicate Himself. But He hadn’t, and now it was too late. The future He had inspired them to pursue was shattered. Hope had been defeated and now lay dead, hidden behind a gigantic rock.

Have you heard the clunk of a giant boulder sealing off your hope? You thought you understood your life, where it was going, what God was doing, and then boom! You get a diagnosis. Divorce papers are filed. You flunk out of school or don’t get accepted in the first place. It feels so final. You see no way out, no future. The empty tomb is a reminder that God’s way does not include dead ends, only turns. When our faith is in Him, no boulder is big enough to keep us from His plan.

Boulders that appear to seal off hope
 are merely pebbles to God  

(Isaiah 46:9-11).

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