Audio Transcript:

Hello welcome to our online Easter service. Greetings, happy Easter, happy resurrection day, we're so glad you're with us. It's strange not worshiping together on Easter. However, we have access to Jesus Christ because of his resurrection from anywhere anyhow even in our PJ's, we will worship him. One of the things that we do at Mosaic as a church on Easter Sunday is we do a call and response. That's been done in the church throughout the ages. I say 'Christ is risen' and I welcome you to say, 'he is risen indeed' three times, louder and more emphatically every time. So would you join in with me? Christ is risen. Christ is risen. And Christ is risen. Praise God.

Let us pray over the preaching of God's holy word. Heavenly father we thank you for your resurrecting power. We thank you that because of the death, the burial and the resurrection of our Lord Jesus Christ, we have access to you, to worship you the great God of the universe in spirit and in truth no matter where we are, no matter where we're from no matter our background we come to you Lord. We bring our worries, our anxieties, our burdens and we ask that you replace them with joy and peace and gladness. And we today want to celebrate the resurrecting power of Christ. Lord, we thank you that you make sense of all the pain and the suffering. Because of the resurrection, because of Easter Sunday, because of Christ rising from the dead, you shine your light of brightness upon our darkest moments and you redeem them. And I pray that you bless our time in the holy scriptures. Administer to each one of us and fill our hearts with joy. And we pray this in Christ's holy name, amen.

Boston is a city of champions. It's a city built on comebacks as our fearless mayor Marty Walsh said recently in a news conference. We will come back from this. We will come back stronger and we will come back stronger together. However, my prayer is that we come back stronger and we come back to the Lord. That our strength isn't just in ourselves, it's not just in our pride or ambition or our resilience but it's in the Lord.

The title of the sermon today is, 'There is a Cure'. A cure not just to corona or cure to our physical ailments. There's a cure to the worst disease that besets all of us and that's the disease of sin. Because of the Lord, Jesus Christ has sacrificed his death, his burial, we have a cure that's greater than the polio vaccine or penicillin or insulin or even a corona vaccine that hopefully will be created soon.

We have a cure for our greatest problem. In the resurrection of Jesus Christ, God took the most hopeless, the darkest, the saddest, the ugliest most miserable event in the history of the world and he transformed it into the most hope filled, the most beautiful, the most joyful event and that's the resurrection of Jesus Christ.

Today we're gonna look at Matthew 28 and the resurrection account and the context is that on Friday, on Good Friday, Jesus Christ, the king of the universe, died on a cross through crucifixion. He was bruised, he was bloodied, he was scourged, and he died and with his last gasp, it seemed that we lost our last grasp of hope and on Saturday, Jesus was just a corpse in a tomb. Just, rotting away.

And the disciples were despondent. They didn't know what to do, they were weeping and Sunday morning, they went fishing. However the ladies, the women who followed Jesus, they woke up early at dawn and they had a mission to come and to finish the burial process, to anoint Jesus' body and yes they're grieving as well. However, they want some closure. And on the way to the tomb where Jesus was buried, they start wondering, how are we going to move the massive stone with which the tomb was sealed? Perhaps we'll ask the Roman guards that were placed there to keep the disciples from stealing the body as the pharisees had warned. Who will roll away this weight? Who will remove this burden? Who will get rid of this symbol of death? And as they approach, they feel the ground rumbling and they even stumble a bit and that's where we find ourselves in Matthew 28 verses one through 10, Matthew 28, one through 10, would you look at the text with me? "Now after the Sabbath, toward the dawn of the first day of the week, Mary Magdalene and the other Mary went to see the tomb. And behold, there was a great earthquake, for an angel of the Lord descended from heaven and came and rolled back the stone and sat on it. His appearance was like lightning, and his clothing white as snow. And for fear of him the guards trembled and became like dead men. But the angel said to the women, Do not be afraid, for I know that you seek Jesus who was crucified. He is not here, for he has risen, as he said. Come, see the place where he lay. Then go quickly and tell his disciples that he has risen from the dead, and behold, he's going before you to Galilee. There you will see him. See, I have told you. So they departed quickly from the tomb with fear and great joy and ran to tell his disciples. And behold, Jesus met them and said, 'Greetings!' And they came up and took hold of his feet and worshiped him. Then Jesus said to them, 'Do not be afraid; go and tell my brothers to go to Galilee, and there they will see me." This is the reading of God's holy, inerrant, infallible, authoritative word, may he write these eternal truths upon our hearts.

Here in the beginning, I just wanna focus on a very curious detail perhaps that you, a detail you haven't noticed before. We know about the angel, we know about the stone being rolled away but the angel which is a massive warrior of the Lord, like lightning, it says he looked like lightning. He was glorious, when angels appear in holy scripture, people would fall down in trepidation and even were tempted to worship them. This wasn't just a little chubby little baby with a diaper and a harp on a cloud. An angel's a warrior of God, descends from heaven to roll away this stone. And he does this effortlessly, it's like a Tic Tac like a cookie that he just flings away from the entrance and what does this angel do? This angel takes a seat on the stone. He sits down on the stone. He sits on the rock. Can you see this, can you imagine this? Can you see this in your mind's eye? This glorious figure who has come from heaven, removes the stone from the tomb and he sits down.

I like this angel, I can't wait to meet this angel. This is an angel with personality, this is an angel with attitude, just sits down on the stone. First of all you gotta ask why is this detail even included? What does it do to further the plot? It does nothing to further the plot. Why is it included in this text? Because of the eye witness accounts. The Marys couldn't forget this image. It was emblazoned on their hearts. An angel of God, sitting on the stone.

We remember the most important details about, the most important memories in our lives. Just think about memories in your life that are vivid. That are it seems emblazoned on your heart and sometimes in particular when they come as a shock or perhaps with death. I remember where I was when I heard about Princess Diana dying. I remember exactly where I was when I heard about 9/11. It was freshman year in college and I remember walking out of my dorm room and as I was walking out the building, there was an all purpose room with a television. Everyone was crowded around it, I remember vividly that moment. And I remember details, strange details, like the color of the couches in that room. I remember the moment when Kobe Bryant died, when I heard about this news. I was actually in a membership class here, Mosaic, in the basement of Temple Ohabei.

There are memories that are incredibly vivid, we remember the details, it's almost like we can't forget them. I remember when my family immigrated to the United States, I was five years old and I remember that my dad gave me two cans of condensed milk and he put one in one pocket and one in the other jacket pocket and I remember that memory vividly. I remember my first bike, a red bike with a little pouch I would hide matches in from my parents. I remember first day of high school. I remember getting my first car and I remember the smell of it. I remember the first fight I ever got in. I remember the second fight I ever got in which was against two guys and they remember that fight better than I do. And I remember, you have memories like this as well. I'll never forget the day I met my wife. I remember exactly what her hair looked like, exactly what she was wearing.

The most important memories in our life come with details and they're vivid and we see this detail here. That Mary Madalene and the other Mary, they saw this angel and it was sitting on the stone. The other reason why it's included, not just because it happened, but also because there's deep theology in the stone. There's deep theology in the geology, if you will. What is a stone, a stone is dust that's been compressed over the ages, over time through heat and pressure. Well scripture talks about dust in Genesis three when humanity rebelled against God, the curse came as ascendance for our sin and this is what that sentence said. This is what God said to humanity. Genesis 3:19, "Till you return to the ground, for out of it you were taken for you are dust. And to dust you shall return." The stone is symbolic of death. Compressed over time, pressure, heat and lots of death.

And here the angel was sitting on the stone, a symbol of death in front of the tomb, a place of death and the angel was sitting on the rock of the grave, his job is done. He's just admiring the work of his hands. Just sitting there, just relaxing, just chilling out on a tombstone. And I love this image, the angel hanging out. This image is refreshing, I don't know if it is for you, it's refreshing, it's like a vacation for my soul. This is beauty in motion, poetry in action and he's not sitting because he's tired. Angels don't get tired. They don't need to rest. He's sitting because he's literally mocking death. Death has been humiliated and he's sitting there with disdain, big smile on his face, content. Just cheesing at this incredible work of redemption. Sitting defiantly, cool, calm, collected. Cool as a cucumber, cooler than the other side of the pillow he's at rest. Tranquility.

And this is one of the things that Easter offers us today. It offers us rest for our souls, for our weary, sin sick souls. Jesus Christ says, today, everything around us might be shaking. The ground might be shaking, the guards in the story are shaking. But we don't have to be shaking, we can be at rest in Christ. Matthew 11:28, Jesus offers us incredible invitation. He says, "Come to me, all who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest." We can have rest from our anxiety, from worry, from our burdens, from fear. Matthew 28, five through six, this is what the angel says to the women. "Do not be afraid, for I know that you seek Jesus who was crucified. He is not here for he has risen as he said. Come see the place where he lay." This is incredible detail. He gives them a tour of the tomb, come, look, it's empty. Look to the left, that's where his body lay, it's gone. He's not here. The tomb is empty and there's an interesting detail here that the angel did not come down, did not descend in order to roll the stone away to let Jesus out. Jesus was already gone, he's already resurrected. His glorified body, he could move through the stone just like later in the text, he moves through walls. No, the angel doesn't come down to let Jesus out, he comes down to let Mary in, to let the disciples in. Come and see that because the tomb is empty, life is full of meaning and the resurrection power.

Matthew 28 nine through 10, Jesus meets the Marys right after this account. "Behold Jesus met them and said, 'Greetings!' And they came up and took hold of his feet, they worshiped him and Jesus said to them again, Do not be afraid." This is what the stone is communicating, this is why that detail is there, the angel sitting on the stone. The stone is communicating, the stone is preaching. The stone has been transformed into a pulpit to communicate that sorrow has been rolled away. Grief has been replaced with glory. It's been transformed.

All throughout scripture, you see stones as memorials used to remind people of the work of God. In first Samuel, there's a stone called the Ebenezer stone. It's the stone of help where Samuel says, God has helped us until this moment. We sing this text and these lyrics and come thou found, here I raise my Ebenezer, hither by thy help I come. And I hope by thy good pleasure safely to arrive at home. Jesus Christ tells us that we have a greater stone of remembrance and it's not just the stone that was rolled away. Yes that stone is important. That stone is given to us as a sign. We actually don't even have the stone. It's the most important stone in the history of the universe and it was used to seal off the most important tomb in the history of the universe and we have neither. Why, because for the early Christians, this wasn't that important. The memory to which the stone pointed and the memory to which the tomb pointed were more important than the memorial signs themselves. We don't need the memorial stone because we have the person of Jesus Christ with us.

Easter doesn't mean that sad things do not happen. Sad things do happen. Good Friday was heart breaking. However, what Easter does is it shines light, it shines brightness on our past mourning. It makes sense of our suffering. It infuses our pain with purpose. On Good Friday, nothing made sense. On Easter Sunday, everything made sense. The gospel makes sense of everything. Easter illuminates yesterday's tears. It illuminates yesterday's tombs. Everything sad will come untrue. This is what Easter promises. The resurrection turns a sign of death, the stone, into the ultimate sign of life. The stone still weighs as much as it weighed on Good Friday. On Easter Sunday, same weight but now the weight isn't a weight of grief, it's a weight of glory, it's a sign of victory, it's a trophy of the ultimate victory that Jesus Christ took a stone and he hurled it at the Goliath of death, a stone cold killer and Jesus Christ smacked right in the forehead and he's toppled. And in the death of Jesus Christ, we see the death of death itself where Jesus takes the sword of death and chops off its head with its own sword.

Jesus Christ tells us, the stone is a sign. What's it a sign of? It's a sign of the fact that we have victory. It's also a sign of the fact that we have a sure foundation to build our lives on and that's the foundation of Jesus Christ and of the gospel. In Matthews seven, Jesus tells us that storms come to everybody. And what matters most in how you get through the storm is what is your foundation? Matthews seven, 24 through 27. "Everyone then who hears these words of mine and does them will be like a wise man who built his house on the rock. And the rain fell and the floods came and the winds blew and beat on the that house but it did not fall because it had been founded on the rock. And everyone who hears these words of mine and does not do them will be like a foolish man who built his house on the sand. And the rain fell and the floods came and the winds blew and beat against that house and it fell and great was the fall of it." Oh dear friend, are you building your life on the foundation of the gospel of Jesus Christ, the only sure foundation that's been proven, it's been tested, it's been verified by the resurrection of Jesus Christ.

The rock became a footstool for the angel as a symbol of Jesus Christ sitting down on this throne when he's ascended and scripture says, "He will put his enemies and use his enemies "as a foot stool for his feet." And the ultimate enemies Jesus has conquered. Satan, sin and death, Jesus conquered death. He's the ultimate victor, the ultimate conqueror and in Christ we are more than conquerors.

Today we celebrate life. Easter tells us, the message of life is a message from God who is the source of all life. He is the life giver and no matter the darkness in our life, he brings light down. We love life. I love life, yes sometimes things are hard and there are dark times but there are moments when everything clicks. There are moments where everything flows, everything comes together. Almost magical, majestic. You wake up in the perfect mood, the perfect amount of sleep, even your hair looks perfect. You have a perfect cup of coffee, there's a perfect amount of sunlight coming through the window. Nothing annoys you, no one around you annoys you, everyone's in a tremendous mood. Perhaps it's your birthday and all you hear is good news, that's the only news you get all day, you got that promotion. You got that raise. Your favorite team just won. You're planning the perfect dinner. Perhaps the perfect steak or perfect salad or perfect steak and salad, both and. You read a perfect book, you watch that perfect movie. Wear that perfect pair of jeans that finally fits because you woke up five pounds lighter. How did that happen, I don't know. You put on a crisp tee shirt, your friends text you and they send you the funniest memes or you go to a concert and it's spring. You feel reawakening in the air or you're at vacation. You're at one of those nice resorts with the drinks with the umbrellas and crisp ocean breeze or a Red Sox game on a balmy Sunday night. The kiss of a beloved, the smell of a baby that's not screaming, you sign the last check for the last payment of your school loans. The last payment on your mortgage and you're moving in to your dream house. And Tom Brady is still a patriot and he's won his seventh Super Bowl against, finally the Giants, it's perfect life. Peace, joy, happiness.

We have moments like that and every single one of those moments, they whisper. They're whispers of eternity, they're whispers of something greater. They're signs to something more satisfying. This is how life should be but isn't. Why? 'Cause no matter how good life gets, there's always that reminder. That death is coming. It's coming for each of us. This is why we hate death because life is such a great gift. We despise death, it's an enemy. Scripture says that it surprises every single one of us. Catches us off guard although it's with us and it's such a downer, it's the ultimate kill joy. It's a cosmic buzz kill. It destroys and devastates and separates families, it separates parents from children and vice versa that leaves dreams and hopes shattered. And works unfinished be they symphonies or art or albums or books.

Why is there so much death in this world? Scripture says that was part of the curse. Part of our rebellion against God because of sin. What's the connection between sin and death? Well sin is death. Sin doesn't just lead to death. Scripture says that sin is death. The sting of death is sin. When you think about sin like this, it makes more sense. Sin isn't just breaking commandments. Sin isn't just doing the wrong thing. Sin isn't just mistakes or screw ups or foibles or character flaws or being naughty. It's not Las Vegas and it's not Lynn, it's death. It's death of self. It's self destruction, it's self sabotage, self subversion, self deception.

We know that we're supposed to be better, better versions of ourselves. We know what we're supposed to be, we know what we're supposed to do and we're still powerless to do it. Why? Because we're sick with sin.

And the gospel says that Jesus Christ came. He took the weight of our burden, the stone of our sin upon himself. He took the sting of sin and he vanquished it. See, the gospel of Jesus Christ isn't just fire insurance just in case. The gospel of Jesus Christ is medicine for our sin sick souls. It's medicine for our stone cold hard hearts. Sin isn't just action, it's a condition. An incurable condition. Jeremiah 30 verse 12 says, "For thus says the Lord, Your hurt is incurable and your wound is grievous. There is none to uphold your cause, no medicine for your wound. No healing for you." That was the old testament. Because of the sacrifice of Jesus Christ on the cross in our place, there is a medicine.

Four practical points, my dear friends, four practical points, we're all infected with sin so practically, number one, accept the diagnosis. Number two, take the medicine. Three, visit the doctor often. And four, share the doctor's contact info.

First accept the diagnosis. The diagnosis is dire. We're not just suffering a fatal injury, a life threatening injury. It's terminal. Condition. Every single one of us suffers from this condition and there's no cure for it in and of ourselves. We can heal ourselves, there's no person who can heal us. There's no one else who we can trust in. We're all going to die. What this corona pandemic has shown us, it's that we can't get away from this. We're all dialed into the fact that we are mortal and we are mortal. And it's showed us that we need salvation. We need healing. Like we need healing from corona so much more, infinitely more we need healing from our sin.

And God gives us signs of the fact that we are terminal through chaos and pandemics and calamities but he also gives us the law. In holy scripture, God gives us a law, the 10 commandments, and he gives us the law not so that we save ourselves by fulfilling but gives us the law as a divine diagnostic tool. We diagnose how sick we are by looking at the perfect law. Looking at the 10 commandments which Jesus summarized and he said this is the essence of the commandments. Love God with all your heart, soul, strength and mind. Love your neighbor as yourself.

We don't love God with all of our fiber, with all of our being because there's so many other idols vying for our affection. We don't love neighbor as self because often we're too self absorbed. We fall short of the law and the law is given not to us to show just how sick we are. It can't cure us. It can't cure us of the disease, it's powerless to do that. It just shows us how far we're missing the mark that we don't measure up, that we're not good enough. All it does is diagnose, yes, test positive for sin. It can't do anything to cure us. So first of all, we need to go to the doctor and accept the diagnosis, yes I'm sick. And the doctor says, well I've got good news, I've got great news. There's a cure that Jesus has procured the medicine, so take it. We can't cure ourselves. No one else can cure us, only God can cure the incurable. And he does that by actually burying our sickness upon himself. Absorbing our sickness. Scripture says that he who knew no sin became sin so that we might become the righteousness of God. The moment you trust in Christ, repent of sin and believe in him, that moment, you're immediately cured. You're immediately cleansed from sin. Jesus swallows the incurable disease. Allows it to kill him and then comes back from the dead and his blood has an immunity to it and when we believe in Jesus Christ, his blood is in us. His blood, spiritually speaking, is in us and when God tests us again for sin, we test negative. Because in us we have new blood, the blood, the blameless blood of Jesus Christ. First Corinthians 15:54 and 56, "Death is swallowed up in victory. Jesus swallows up death. O death where is your victory? O death where is your sting? The sting of death is sin and the power of sin is the law. But thanks be to God who gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ." Jesus is victorious, Jesus has won, Jesus will win and in Christ we are more than conquerors. This winning, I will never get tired of. In him we are victorious.

First Peter 2:24, how? "He himself bore our sins in his body on the tree on the cross that we might die to sin and live to righteousness. By his wounds you have been healed."

There's an old paradox where the question goes like this, what happens when an irresistible force meets an immovable object? What happens when an irresistible meets an immovable object? That's what happened on the cross. The immovable object is God's holiness, his justice. The justice and condemnation wrath that we deserve for our selfishness, for living as if there is no God. For living lives indifferent toward God, for living as if we are our own God. It's an immovable object but there's an irresistible force and that's God's love. It's his determination to heal us and expense himself to heal for his own glory. And when an irresistible force meets an immovable object, what's gonna happen, well something incredible has to happen only a truly extraordinary event can resolve the paradox and that's what happened at the cross of Jesus Christ. God's justice and God's love, they come together. Where Jesus Christ sacrifices himself, absorbing God's wrath in order to forgive us. And that's what happened on the cross, this collision of our incurable disease, of our incurable wounds and God's irresistible power and desire to heal us. God himself in the form of Christ, stepped in to suffer our incurable pain, our incurable disease so that we might be made well, so that we might be healed. So that we might have life, true life.

God does something incredible. He doesn't just forgive us of our sins, he doesn't just diagnose the problem, doesn't just give us medicine to heal us of our sickness, he does something else. He transforms us. He transforms us through the gospel by grace through faith in Christ, he transforms us and he does so by taking out our heart of stone and replacing it with a heart of flesh a heart that beats for Christ, a heart that loves God, longs to love God more, loves neighbor as self. A heart that's filled with new affections and new desires. Desire for righteousness. And this is what the way of righteousness is.

Lots of people think that following God is gonna keep me from enjoying myself, false. False. What God does is he says, I'm not taking good from you. I'm giving good to you and I'm protecting you from everything that would harm you. I'm protecting you, I'm protecting your soul. So walk in the path of righteousness. That's what God does by giving us a new heart. And also this medicine turns bad fear into good fear.

You see fear mentioned several times in this text. There's bad fear and the bad fear is the fear of the guards. The guards tremble as they see the angel. They see the resurrection happen. They see the angel come down, it's miraculous. And instead of placing their trust in Jesus Christ, instead of falling down at his feet and worshiping him, they tremble and they fall like dead. This is bad fear. That's Matthew 28, four. "And for fear of him the guards trembled and became like dead men." Bad fear is when what you revere most is threatened. That's actually all fear. When what you love most is threatened, when you think that what you love most what's most precious to you will be taken away. Well the guards, when they saw Christ, the resurrected Christ, when they saw the angel, they feared. They didn't love Christ, they feared because they saw in Christ an enemy to what they really love, to their true idols. And that was power or prestige or their positions. Perhaps it was money. Perhaps it was their life. They feared that Jesus would take their life and they loved their life more than Jesus. And that's why for some, Jesus Christ is a stone of stumbling. Where you look at Jesus as an opponent, as a threat to what you truly love.

And this is what the gospel does, it transforms our affections, what we love most and it turns bad fear into good fear. Mary, both Marys, they fear as well and the angel says, don't fear. Jesus says don't fear and Jesus meets them and they fall down at his feet and they worship him and he says, "Do not be afraid." They were afraid because they thought they had lost that which was most precious to them, which was Christ. They didn't fear that they would lose life, they feared something that they loved more than life which was Christ. To them, Christ is life, he's the precious cornerstone. He's a stone more precious than diamonds or rubies or gold or silver. And when Christ appears, they worship him. He is life. There's nothing greater than Christ. That's why I say, in Paul it says for me to live is Christ. That's life, he is the life. He satisfies the soul, he fills our hearts with joy and gladness. And to die is gain, even if we die. That's why Christ said, don't fear those who take away the body. And can do nothing after. If our eternity is secure, if we are spending eternity with Christ in heaven, if he saved us from hell, there's nothing to fear. Bad fear is transformed into good fear.

The greatest day in all of your life, if you live the best life, the little mental exercise that we did where you wake up on your perfect day, it's your birthday, et cetera et cetera. You can go through a day like that and still be empty on the inside. You can still feel dissatisfied. You can still feel tinges of shame and guilt and regret. But you can have a day without any of that. If you have Christ, you have everything that you need. He is life. Jesus Christ came back from the dead so we will never lose him. And because he was resurrected physically, he can resurrect our souls and ultimately, he'll resurrect our bodies.

So accept the diagnosis. Take the medicine and visit the doctor often. Perhaps you've already done step one and two. Perhaps you have repented of your sin, yes Lord I'm a sinner, yes I need the grace but we need to go to the doctor daily, hourly. We need to make sure to keep the disease of sin in remission. You need to open your life to the doctor daily. Don't hide anything from him. Apply his healing thoroughly and completely.

Why am I Christian? Why am I a follower of Jesus Christ? Because Jesus Christ came back from the dead. And Jesus Christ has changed my life. And he changes my life on a daily basis. Jesus is a person and when we fellowship with him, when we abide in him, when we have a relationship with him, his presence and his power come into our lives and they transform us.

Sin leads to death. Sin is when we look to tombs for satisfaction. We go to the grave site, we go to the tombs in order to find life and Jesus takes stones away from the tombs in our life and says no, stop seeking life here, there's only death. That's what the good doctor does. And he does that through holy scripture where he says, this is the way of righteousness, this is the way to life.

We also, we need the holy scriptures. Go to the scriptures daily, find satisfaction in the scriptures and also we need the church. Like never before, we need the church and not just to meet physically but we need to be interconnected with one another because we together are living stones built up as a spiritual house, a holy priesthood.

And four, share the doctor's contact info. If you find a cure for corona, if you find a cure for cancer, if you find a cure for sin, you trumpet it from the rooftops and here's what's fascinating. We have the medicine but it needs to be distributed. We need a core of spiritual doctors to get this medicine out and that's all evangelism is. We're not converting, we're not proselytizing, we're not recruiting, we're just sharing the doctor's contact info. His name is Jesus and you can call him through prayer. Speaking to him. Say, Lord Jesus, forgive me of my sins today. Help me trust in you, I believe in you. I believe, help my unbelief, help me follow you.

Do what the angel did, the angel shared Christ. Do what the Marys did, they shared the message of the resurrected Christ. Matthew 28 10, "Then Jesus said to them, Do not be afraid, go and tell my brothers to go to Galilee and there they will see me." Jesus Christ says, in John 11:25 and 26, "I am the resurrection and the life. Whoever believes in me, though he die, yet shall he live, and everyone who lives and believes in me shall never die.

Do you believe this?" Do you believe this? Are you moved by this truth? The whole world was moved by this truth. The earth was moved, the angel was moved, the guards were moved, the women were moved, are you moved by the gospel of Jesus Christ? How do you know if you have been moved? That medicine, the medicine, you ask for it, you receive it, and it begins to take effect. It begins to cure.

We know that Jesus was resurrected and we live in the already but not yet. Jesus has won and he will win. Revelation 20 verse 14, "Then Death and Hades were thrown into the lake of fire. This is the second death, the lake of fire." Revelation 21:4, "He will wipe away every tear from their eyes and death shall be no more, neither shall there be mourning nor crying, nor pain anymore for the former things have passed away." Christ is risen. Christ is risen. And Christ is risen. Let's pray.

Lord we thank you for the great news, the gospel. Thank you that you conquered Satan's sin and debt, Lord we thank you for this angel who sat on a tombstone ridiculing death, mocking death because you have conquered it. Give us strength to repent of sin, give us grace to believe in you and follow you daily. We love you, we thank you, we glorify your name, we worship you. We pray all this in the beautiful name, Jesus Christ, amen.