SPEAKER_00: Now we turn our eyes to the scriptures.
SPEAKER_00: John chapter 20.
SPEAKER_00: This is the Apostle John's account of the resurrection appearances of Jesus.
SPEAKER_00: On the evening of that day, the first day of the week, the doors being locked where the disciples were for fear of the Jews, Jesus came and stood among them and said to them, Peace be with you.
SPEAKER_00: When he had said this, he showed them his hands and his side.
SPEAKER_00: Then the disciples were glad when they saw the Lord.
SPEAKER_00: Jesus said to them again, Peace be with you.
SPEAKER_00: As the Father has sent me, even so I am sending you.
SPEAKER_00: And when he had said this, he breathed on them and said to them, Receive the Holy Spirit.
SPEAKER_00: If you forgive the sins of any, they are forgiven them.
SPEAKER_00: If you withhold forgiveness from any, it is withheld.
SPEAKER_00: Now Thomas, one of the twelve, called the twin, was not with them when Jesus came.
SPEAKER_00: So the other disciples told him, We have seen the Lord.
SPEAKER_00: But he said to them, Unless I see in his hands the mark of the nails, and place my finger into the mark of the nails, and I place my hand into his side, I will never believe.
SPEAKER_00: Eight days later, his disciples were inside again, and Thomas was with them.
SPEAKER_00: Although the doors were locked, Jesus came and stood among them and said, Peace be with you.
SPEAKER_00: Then he said to Thomas, Put your finger here and see my hands, and put out your hand and place it in my side.
SPEAKER_00: Do not disbelieve, but believe.
SPEAKER_00: Thomas answered him, My Lord and my God.
SPEAKER_00: Jesus said to him, Have you believed because you have seen me?
SPEAKER_00: Blessed are those who have not seen and yet have believed.
SPEAKER_00: Now Jesus did many other signs in the presence of the disciples, which are not written in this book, but these are written, so that you may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, and that by believing you may have life in his name.
SPEAKER_00: This is the word of God, the precious, powerful word of God, and we sit under this morning.
SPEAKER_00: Please join me as we pray.
SPEAKER_00: Father, you were there.
SPEAKER_00: Your power flowed by your spirit into your son.
SPEAKER_00: As your son arose, Lord, we have life in your son, the same power that raised him from the dead, that raises us.
SPEAKER_00: Raise us up this morning, Spirit of God.
SPEAKER_00: Raise us up that we might hear, that we might believe.
SPEAKER_00: Lord, that we might receive all that your son is offering us.
SPEAKER_00: In his name we pray.
SPEAKER_00: Amen.
SPEAKER_00: I'd like to speak for a few moments this morning about a word.
SPEAKER_00: We're going to exchange many words today, greetings.
SPEAKER_00: I hope that you received a word of welcome as you came into the sanctuary this morning.
SPEAKER_00: I hope that you've had opportunity to exchange those hellos, those greetings.
SPEAKER_00: But I want to think and focus on words, particular words, spoken by Jesus himself on that resurrection Sunday, when he met his disciples, when he appeared in their midst.
SPEAKER_00: I want to focus on the word of blessing, the word of commission, the word of receiving, and lastly the word of profession.
SPEAKER_00: A word of blessing, the first day of the week, the resurrection Sunday, that day that Jesus appeared.
SPEAKER_00: John tells us in the middle of them, in the midst of them, Jesus went through walls, locked doors, and appeared right smack dab in the middle, is what the language suggests.
SPEAKER_00: The disciples were overjoyed.
SPEAKER_00: The Greek word really means they were ecstatic.
SPEAKER_00: They were not non-plushed by this.
SPEAKER_00: The Savior that they saw crucified with their own eyes was now the Savior they saw risen with their own eyes.
SPEAKER_00: They were ecstatic with joy.
SPEAKER_00: Jesus speaks to them.
SPEAKER_00: A blessing.
SPEAKER_00: Shalom.
SPEAKER_00: Peace.
SPEAKER_00: This is more than a hello greeting, shalom.
SPEAKER_00: This is far more than a greeting.
SPEAKER_00: No, this is a blessing.
SPEAKER_00: How do they know?
SPEAKER_00: How do we know that these disciples needed this particular greeting?
SPEAKER_00: Locked doors.
SPEAKER_00: They were behind locked doors, trying to live in secret.
SPEAKER_00: Why?
SPEAKER_00: Well, they probably feared that they were next.
SPEAKER_00: They were identified with this Messiah who was crucified.
SPEAKER_00: They had fear, a lot of fear.
SPEAKER_00: There were more crosses in Jerusalem to be utilized for more crucifixions.
SPEAKER_00: The power of fear.
SPEAKER_00: Fear was a big part of the disciples' lives at this point.
SPEAKER_00: The power of fear.
SPEAKER_00: Even after the disciples saw Jesus, the next week, a week later, the doors were still locked.
SPEAKER_00: Fear has a way of persisting, doesn't it?
SPEAKER_00: For all kinds of reasons.
SPEAKER_00: And yet, when Jesus arrives in their midst, he looks at him, he says, Shalom.
SPEAKER_00: Peace.
SPEAKER_00: Everything's different because I'm here.
SPEAKER_00: Everything's different because I am alive.
SPEAKER_00: I'm impressed that there's no scolding by Jesus.
SPEAKER_00: Oh, how he could have scolded these rascals.
SPEAKER_00: With all that I did to prepare you?
SPEAKER_00: All the words, all the time that we spent together?
SPEAKER_00: I spent so many hours trying to prepare you for exactly this.
SPEAKER_00: And you just fell apart.
SPEAKER_00: That's good news for me.
SPEAKER_00: Is that good news for you?
SPEAKER_00: Because there's times that we do fall apart out of fear.
SPEAKER_00: The things that grip our hearts.
SPEAKER_00: He knew exactly what they needed to hear.
SPEAKER_00: He knows exactly what you need to hear this morning.
SPEAKER_00: Shalom.
SPEAKER_00: Peace.
SPEAKER_00: Yes, when we are afraid, we need his presence.
SPEAKER_00: We need a God who can bring peace because this world can throw a lot at us.
SPEAKER_00: Some of you are going through that right now.
SPEAKER_00: Some of us came into this room with a lot of fear, a lot of unknowns about our life, about our health, about relationships, about our future?
SPEAKER_00: The world can throw a lot at us.
SPEAKER_00: That's why every one of us needs to know the personal greeting of peace by Jesus Himself.
SPEAKER_00: But notice he shows up with his wounds.
SPEAKER_00: And so it's a good question.
SPEAKER_00: Why did Jesus choose to keep his wounds?
SPEAKER_00: I suppose he could have chosen otherwise.
SPEAKER_00: Why did he keep his scars?
SPEAKER_00: I like the way that there was a conversation between two theologians, Martin Marty and Yaroslav Pelikon.
SPEAKER_00: Yuroslav was about ready to die.
SPEAKER_00: He was preparing for death.
SPEAKER_00: And he said to his good friend, if the resurrection of Jesus actually happened, then nothing else really matters.
SPEAKER_00: If the resurrection of Jesus did not actually happen, then nothing else really matters.
SPEAKER_00: That's true.
SPEAKER_00: It really is all about did he come alive?
SPEAKER_00: If he's dead, there's nothing that he can do for us this day.
SPEAKER_00: But if he's alive, there's everything he can do for us this day.
SPEAKER_00: If this is nothing more than an inspiring story, as so many churches today are teaching for the pulpit.
SPEAKER_00: So many churches today in our city and around our nation and around the world are saying, what a beautiful story.
SPEAKER_00: I mean, look at the flowers of spring blooming, look at the spring coming.
SPEAKER_00: Isn't this inspiring?
SPEAKER_00: Can't you draw a little bit of inspiration from that?
SPEAKER_00: Are you kidding?
SPEAKER_00: That's what somebody would look for?
SPEAKER_00: Jesus offers so much more.
SPEAKER_00: Peace.
SPEAKER_00: Real peace is possible because Jesus showed up with his scars.
SPEAKER_00: Edward Shalito, the artist, poet, found a poem called Jesus of the Scars in other poems.
SPEAKER_00: He said the other gods were strong, but thou wast made weak.
SPEAKER_00: They rode, but thou didst stumble to a throne.
SPEAKER_00: But to our wounds only God's wounds can speak.
SPEAKER_00: And not a God has wounds, but thou alone.
SPEAKER_00: Christianity is the only religion that would even dare to make that statement.
SPEAKER_00: That our God has wounds.
SPEAKER_00: And therefore he understands your wounds.
SPEAKER_00: He understands the things that keep you up at night.
SPEAKER_00: He understands the things that seem to make your world come apart, fall apart.
SPEAKER_00: Peace shalom.
SPEAKER_00: I want to think two things in particular about this.
SPEAKER_00: He's talking about peace with God, and he's talking about the peace of God.
SPEAKER_00: First of all, the peace with God.
SPEAKER_00: The Apostle Paul said it in Romans chapter 5, verse 1.
SPEAKER_00: Therefore, since we have been justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ.
SPEAKER_00: That preposition is important.
SPEAKER_00: There's no other way to receive this, but through Jesus Christ.
SPEAKER_00: When he says we have been justified by faith, we've been singing about that this morning.
SPEAKER_00: That the Lord Jesus Christ Himself, with a perfect record, offers that perfect record to sinners like us.
SPEAKER_00: He says, You must know that you must trust in my finished work alone if you're ever going to know true peace in this world.
SPEAKER_00: And the good news is, as we receive that gift of his perfect life as we receive the gift of his sacrificial death, the power of his resurrection.
SPEAKER_00: We come alive spiritually.
SPEAKER_00: We are justified.
SPEAKER_00: God looks at us and says, forgiven.
SPEAKER_00: Do you know you can go home today with that assurance that you are forgiven by God Himself?
SPEAKER_00: If you're looking for peace, I don't know what other way you could find that peace like that.
SPEAKER_00: Only when we have peace with God can we have the peace of God.
SPEAKER_00: Paul says in the book of Philippians, do not be anxious about anything.
SPEAKER_00: But in everything with prayer and supplication, offer your prayers to God, and the peace of God will guard your hearts.
SPEAKER_00: Oh, I need that in my life.
SPEAKER_00: Do you?
SPEAKER_00: I need a peace of God that comes inside by faith, and God can give you that peace.
SPEAKER_00: Even with all the scars and the wounds that we receive in this life.
SPEAKER_00: We all have wounds.
SPEAKER_00: Jesus has his wounds.
SPEAKER_00: One day we're going to see them.
SPEAKER_00: I wonder what that will be like when we see our risen Savior in his glorified body with his wounds.
SPEAKER_00: I suppose, so that we will never forget the cost of our salvation.
SPEAKER_00: William Temple said the wounds of Christ are his credentials to our suffering.
SPEAKER_00: And with his wounds we are healed, the prophet Isaiah said.
SPEAKER_00: We could not, none of us could receive healing apart from his suffering.
SPEAKER_00: By his wounds, we are healed.
SPEAKER_00: We are forgiven.
SPEAKER_00: A week later, because Thomas wasn't present the first meeting of Jesus with his disciples, a week later, now Thomas is present, but Thomas has heard from his disciples, he's heard from his friends, and he won't believe it.
SPEAKER_00: Perhaps like some of us, I don't know that I can believe this.
SPEAKER_00: This is just too much.
SPEAKER_00: I wish I could believe.
SPEAKER_00: Is that you today?
SPEAKER_00: I wish I could believe.
SPEAKER_00: I really do.
SPEAKER_00: But I just can't.
SPEAKER_00: Thomas understands.
SPEAKER_00: A week later, eight days later, Jesus shows up again beyond locked doors.
SPEAKER_00: He came and he stood among them and he said, Shalom.
SPEAKER_00: Peace be with you.
SPEAKER_00: And then he looks Thomas in the eye and he says, Thomas, Thomas, put your finger here in the palms of my hands.
SPEAKER_00: He says, Thomas, put your hand in the side where the spear went through my body.
SPEAKER_00: Most scholars don't believe that Thomas actually did touch, that he was already convinced.
SPEAKER_00: We don't know for sure.
SPEAKER_00: But what we do know for sure is Thomas believed at that moment.
SPEAKER_00: He believed Jesus is still getting through locked doors.
SPEAKER_00: Are your doors locked?
SPEAKER_00: Bolted?
SPEAKER_00: It's just too much to believe that this actually happened.
SPEAKER_00: It's just too much to believe because of the wounds in your life, because of the scars that you still bear.
SPEAKER_00: Jesus has a word for you.
SPEAKER_00: Shalom.
SPEAKER_00: He wants you to hear his word of peace.
SPEAKER_00: He wants you to come to him just as his disciples came to him.
SPEAKER_00: He says, I want you to believe I am alive.
SPEAKER_00: This is a word of blessing, but secondly, a word of commission.
SPEAKER_00: As the Father has sent me, even so I am sending you.
SPEAKER_00: This is John's version of the Great Commission.
SPEAKER_00: Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John in the book of Acts, they each have this command, I Jesus.
SPEAKER_00: This is now the mission.
SPEAKER_00: This is the mission that I have for you.
SPEAKER_00: Now that you have seen me alive, go, be my witnesses to a world that desperately needs my peace.
SPEAKER_00: What's interesting in the book of Acts in the eighth chapter, within weeks, probably, or months at the most, the persecution in Jerusalem started to rise up, and it still does today.
SPEAKER_00: You know there are Christians around the world that are meeting in secret celebrating the resurrection.
SPEAKER_00: Because it's against the law for them to meet in the name of Jesus.
SPEAKER_00: There is still persecution going on.
SPEAKER_00: There certainly was in Jerusalem.
SPEAKER_00: But listen to what happens in Acts chapter 8, verse 1 and verse 4.
SPEAKER_00: And now there arose a great persecution against the church in Jerusalem, and they were all scattered through the regions of Judea and Samaria, except the apostles.
SPEAKER_00: The apostles stayed, but all so many, the pastors stayed, and you all left.
SPEAKER_00: The pastors, the apostles stayed so that they could witness to others in the city, and you all scattered.
SPEAKER_00: That's the commission Jesus gives to his disciples still today.
SPEAKER_00: Now those who were scattered went about preaching the word.
SPEAKER_00: He's calling us to take the word of peace, the word of shalom, to those who desperately need to hear it.
SPEAKER_00: How did all these others believe and move out so boldly?
SPEAKER_00: They believed the apostles' eyewitness accounts.
SPEAKER_00: They believed not only the words, but they also believed God's word.
SPEAKER_00: J.I.
SPEAKER_00: Packer said, when you hear the word of God, this is God preaching the sermon.
SPEAKER_00: It's not just the preacher.
SPEAKER_00: The preacher needs to get out of the way.
SPEAKER_00: This is God preaching.
SPEAKER_00: This is God teaching.
SPEAKER_00: And when you believe that, that word goes deep into your hearts.
SPEAKER_00: And that word will send us out.
SPEAKER_00: The Bible is God's preaching.
SPEAKER_00: God knows where to send his people.
SPEAKER_00: So I asked you this morning, where is he sending you?
SPEAKER_00: Is it within your own house?
SPEAKER_00: Your own neighborhood?
SPEAKER_00: Your office.
SPEAKER_00: God knows where to send us when we're ready to be sent.
SPEAKER_00: Who needs to hear this message that you know?
SPEAKER_00: You know this.
SPEAKER_00: Jesus says, go.
SPEAKER_00: Don't stay.
SPEAKER_00: Oh, what joy it is for our missions committee, for our church to send a family later this year to a very remote part of the world where less than 1% of the people believe what we're talking about this morning.
SPEAKER_00: What a joy to be able to send.
SPEAKER_00: What a joy to be able to go in the name of Christ.
SPEAKER_00: Go with peace.
SPEAKER_00: Go with shalom.
SPEAKER_00: Go with the resurrected Savior.
SPEAKER_00: I like the way Eugene Peterson put it.
SPEAKER_00: The Bible is not a script for a funeral service.
SPEAKER_00: It's the record of God always bringing life where we expected to find death.
SPEAKER_00: The need is too great, the laborers are too few to not go.
SPEAKER_00: Let's go.
SPEAKER_00: Let's go this week.
SPEAKER_00: He'll go with us.
SPEAKER_00: It's his commissioning.
SPEAKER_00: Blaise Pascal said, I believe those witnesses who get their throats slit.
SPEAKER_00: Virtually all the disciples lost their lives as witnesses to this message, and they did not regret, not a one.
SPEAKER_00: Thomas tells church history tells us Tom himself was martyred in India as he took this message.
SPEAKER_00: Take it to Jerusalem, take it to Judea, take it to Samaria, take it to the other ends of the world.
SPEAKER_00: Yes.
SPEAKER_00: It's a message worth proclaiming because there is real shalom to proclaim.
SPEAKER_00: The word of commission.
SPEAKER_00: Thirdly, the word of receiving.
SPEAKER_00: Let's go back to the story.
SPEAKER_00: Jesus shows up.
SPEAKER_00: He says, shalom.
SPEAKER_00: Look at my scars, look at my wounds.
SPEAKER_00: Yes, it's me and not a ghost.
SPEAKER_00: I'm alive.
SPEAKER_00: And because I'm alive, you're going to be alive.
SPEAKER_00: Paul tells us in Ephesians that the same power that raised Jesus from the dead, the same power that raised his son from the dead is at work in you who believe.
SPEAKER_00: If you think today that there's no way that you could ever believe this, oh how you're mistaken.
SPEAKER_00: If God can raise a dead son, literally, he can raise a dead heart.
SPEAKER_00: He knows how to do that.
SPEAKER_00: Immediately after giving the disciples the commission, Jesus does something that they would always remember.
SPEAKER_00: What was that?
SPEAKER_00: He breathed on them and said to them, Receive the Holy Spirit.
SPEAKER_00: Without the Holy Spirit, this mission will be impossible.
SPEAKER_00: Jesus was saying to his disciples, and he says to us, You will go with my peace.
SPEAKER_00: You will carry out my mission with my power.
SPEAKER_00: Ask the Father who has sent me.
SPEAKER_00: So I send you, but I don't send you as orphans.
SPEAKER_00: I don't send you alone.
SPEAKER_00: I'm giving you my very spirit.
SPEAKER_00: The Holy Spirit.
SPEAKER_00: So I send you.
SPEAKER_00: And Jesus breathed on them.
SPEAKER_00: This Greek word is pneuma, from which we get pneumatic, something that's powerful.
SPEAKER_00: This word is translated breath.
SPEAKER_00: It's also translated spirit.
SPEAKER_00: It's also translated wind.
SPEAKER_00: The context determines the translation.
SPEAKER_00: You remember when Jesus spoke with Nicodemus one night, and Nicodemus said, How can a man be born again?
SPEAKER_00: When he's old?
SPEAKER_00: Jesus said, All the wind, the spirit, blows where he will.
SPEAKER_00: You don't see the wind, but you see the effects of the wind.
SPEAKER_00: When Jesus breathes on you like he breathed on his disciples, there is a power that flows in.
SPEAKER_00: There's a power that flows out from him.
SPEAKER_00: All God had to do was breathe, and this world was created.
SPEAKER_00: Doesn't it take you back to the beginning of the Bible?
SPEAKER_00: The breath of God created this world.
SPEAKER_00: All he had to do was speak, and it was created.
SPEAKER_00: All that he has to do is speak the word to you, and you will be recreated.
SPEAKER_00: This is the power of Easter.
SPEAKER_00: This is the power of the resurrection.
SPEAKER_00: So when Jesus breathed on his disciples, he was equating his breath with the giving of the Holy Spirit.
SPEAKER_00: So in this symbolic action, he gave his disciples a foretaste of what would take place at Pentecost just weeks later.
SPEAKER_00: John Kelvin said he gave them a sprinkling of the Spirit now.
SPEAKER_00: And at Pentecost they would be saturated with the Spirit.
SPEAKER_00: Have you been saturated with the Spirit?
SPEAKER_00: You know you're not going to come.
SPEAKER_00: You know you're going to always be a skeptic until or unless the Holy Spirit begins working first.
SPEAKER_00: Nobody ever just on their own, nobody on their own just up and decides that they're going to be a follower of Jesus.
SPEAKER_00: Doesn't work that way.
SPEAKER_00: But the Holy Spirit is powerful enough that raised Jesus from the dead.
SPEAKER_00: The Holy Spirit is powerful enough to give you faith where you had no faith.
SPEAKER_00: To give you life where you had no life.
SPEAKER_00: Jesus said to the disciples, receive the Holy Spirit.
SPEAKER_00: In the name of Christ this morning, I would say, receive the Holy Spirit.
SPEAKER_00: Pray an honest prayer.
SPEAKER_00: God, I don't believe.
SPEAKER_00: But I'd like to believe.
SPEAKER_00: God, I don't believe.
SPEAKER_00: But would you please take your truth and sink it deep into my mind and my heart?
SPEAKER_00: Give me faith.
SPEAKER_00: Give me the gift of faith so that I could believe.
SPEAKER_00: Not faith in my faith, but faith in the Lord Jesus Christ.
SPEAKER_00: And watch what He'll do.
SPEAKER_00: So who are the sent ones?
SPEAKER_00: Not everyone who hears this message of Easter, no, not by a long shot.
SPEAKER_00: Rather, those who have believed this message and have received the Holy Spirit.
SPEAKER_00: These are the commissioned.
SPEAKER_00: The commissioning requires a receiving.
SPEAKER_00: Otherwise, you're going to go out and you're going to give up like in a day.
SPEAKER_00: Otherwise, you're going to go out and you're just going to get discouraged and you're going to get disappointed and you're going to say, maybe this isn't true because I don't really see.
SPEAKER_00: Don't go out without the equipping, without the anointing, without the empowering of the Holy Spirit.
SPEAKER_00: Your efforts will be futile.
SPEAKER_00: Receive the Holy Spirit.
SPEAKER_00: The Apostle Paul says in Romans chapter 10, verse 9 and 10, if you confess with your mouth that Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that God the Father raised him from the dead, you will be saved.
SPEAKER_00: This is the message of Easter.
SPEAKER_00: Can you confess with your mouth this morning?
SPEAKER_00: Do you believe in your heart that God the Father raised his son from the dead?
SPEAKER_00: And through his life he can give you life.
SPEAKER_00: Do you believe that?
SPEAKER_00: You will be saved.
SPEAKER_00: By the power of the Holy Spirit.
SPEAKER_00: Go joyfully.
SPEAKER_00: Jim Boyce tells a story of a female missionary he knew who was going to go to India.
SPEAKER_00: And she felt so compelled to go that she went even sooner than the required training because God just put this burden on her heart that she went.
SPEAKER_00: And she got there and it's a medical doctor, and she's working with patients.
SPEAKER_00: And she's giving them medicine and she's doing the surgical procedures and all that.
SPEAKER_00: And she her prayer is, Lord, would you please, would you please bring my patients alive in Jesus so that they would know Jesus?
SPEAKER_00: And it just wasn't working that way.
SPEAKER_00: After she'd been there a while, she wrote to people back home expressing frustration and discouragement.
SPEAKER_00: Would you please pray for me?
SPEAKER_00: She had been trying to show love and gentleness to the people, but they didn't seem to be responding.
SPEAKER_00: She asked them to keep praying.
SPEAKER_00: A few weeks later, another letter came, this time saying that she had discovered what the problem was.
SPEAKER_00: It was her translator of the language.
SPEAKER_00: She had been loving them in the name of Jesus.
SPEAKER_00: She had been serving them in the name of Jesus, but then she discovered that her translator was being very rude.
SPEAKER_00: An arrogant man who never conveyed her concern for her patients at all.
SPEAKER_00: The messenger got in the way.
SPEAKER_00: I don't need to make that application, do I?
SPEAKER_00: Let's not get in the way.
SPEAKER_00: Jesus has something very important to say.
SPEAKER_00: And the Holy Spirit has all the power we need as we empty ourselves of self.
SPEAKER_00: Let's get out of the way.
SPEAKER_00: So that Jesus can speak words of shalom and peace to people who desperately need it.
SPEAKER_00: Let it not be because of our unkindness.
SPEAKER_00: Let it not be because of our rudeness.
SPEAKER_00: Let it not be because of our sour disposition.
SPEAKER_00: Holy Spirit, show me what's getting in the way.
SPEAKER_00: So that your power will flow.
SPEAKER_00: Oh, how we need this receiving of the Spirit.
SPEAKER_00: By the power of the Holy Spirit, we go joyfully.
SPEAKER_00: The last thing we need is we do need a profession of faith.
SPEAKER_00: We need a confession of faith.
SPEAKER_00: Thomas was convinced.
SPEAKER_00: How do we know?
SPEAKER_00: After he saw his risen Savior, after he saw the scars and the wounds, after he heard the words of Jesus, shalom, what did he say?
SPEAKER_00: There's not a greater profession of faith in all of Scripture.
SPEAKER_00: He looked at him and he said, My Lord and my God.
SPEAKER_00: What a beautiful confession.
SPEAKER_00: Like Thomas, have you said, I will never believe?
SPEAKER_00: Jesus has convinced skeptics bigger than you.
SPEAKER_00: Convincing us of these truths.
SPEAKER_00: The greatest confession in the Word of God, my Lord.
SPEAKER_00: My God.
SPEAKER_00: And so I ask you the question today: can you say that?
SPEAKER_00: Do you know that?
SPEAKER_00: Have you received the shalom that only Jesus can bring?
SPEAKER_00: To know that your sins are forgiven through the work of Christ on the cross, demonstrated by the power of the resurrection.
SPEAKER_00: The key issue today is not do you like the teachings of Jesus?
SPEAKER_00: If you haven't really read your Bible, well, let me back up.
SPEAKER_00: If you really have read your Bible, there's going to be things you don't like.
SPEAKER_00: I guarantee it.
SPEAKER_00: Jesus could say some hard things.
SPEAKER_00: The question is not, do you like all of his teachings?
SPEAKER_00: Are you sitting back and stacking up all of his teachings and saying, now how do I feel about all his teachings?
SPEAKER_00: I like that, I don't like this.
SPEAKER_00: You are absolutely misguided if that's what you're doing.
SPEAKER_00: The question is not, do you like his teachings?
SPEAKER_00: To decide whether you will follow him.
SPEAKER_00: The question is, was Jesus Christ raised from the dead?
SPEAKER_00: If he is, why?
SPEAKER_00: Why would you not follow him just because there's things you don't like about what he said?
SPEAKER_00: That's the question.
SPEAKER_00: Is he alive?
SPEAKER_00: If he's alive, then it makes sense, complete sense, to lay down your burden, to lay down your doubt, your skepticism, and follow him.
SPEAKER_00: Oh, friends, do you hear the key issue is whether or not he is alive.
SPEAKER_00: Jesus would say to each of us, yes.
SPEAKER_00: I'm not asking if you've heard about my message.
SPEAKER_00: I'm asking, have you experienced this resurrection power?
SPEAKER_00: Have you received the resurrected Savior?
SPEAKER_00: He says, come.
SPEAKER_00: He says, come and I will receive you.
SPEAKER_00: Come and I will forgive you.
SPEAKER_00: Come and I will give you shalom.
SPEAKER_00: He can do that for each of us.
SPEAKER_00: Would you pray with me?
SPEAKER_00: Oh risen Savior, risen Lord, Son of God, you are alive.
SPEAKER_00: You are alive.
SPEAKER_00: Would you please bring us alive in Christ?
SPEAKER_00: Some for the very first time.
SPEAKER_00: Some for the very first time would respond to your shalom, your peace, your forgiveness.
SPEAKER_00: But Lord, all of us, all of us need the filling of your spirit.
SPEAKER_00: All of us need our faith to grow and rise up so that we will go with your commission.
SPEAKER_00: That we will be filled with your spirit.
SPEAKER_00: That we will profess that Jesus Christ, Lord and Savior, to your glory we pray.
SPEAKER_00: Amen.