Lost Cause | Too Good — Forrest Coleman

Lost Cause | Too Good — Forrest Coleman | John 20:1-18

Transcript

Forrest 0:06

Hey, I'm Pastor Forrest, and welcome to the Multiply Church Podcast. Each week we open God's word together to help you meet God and multiply good in your everyday life. We're so glad that you've taken time to join us for this week's sermon. And if you haven't already, be sure to subscribe and follow us on social media so you never miss a message. Now, let's dive into this week's sermon. As we jump into our last installment of our series Lost Cause today, anybody ready to have some fun this morning as we celebrate our risen Savior? I'm excited today. As we uh jump in, it's a little fun and celebrating uh you're in luck today as we celebrate Easter because there is $20 under every single chair here in the room. No, I'm just kidding. There's nothing under anybody's chair. No, I'm just kidding. Actually, there is one yellow envelope in a seatback somewhere in this room that has a hundred dollars in it. Somebody look for it. It's real, it's somewhere in here. Anybody find it? Anyone see it? You look around, look at the seats next to you. Your yellow envelope. It's in the seat back pocket. Somebody's got it. Hey, give it up to her. Is it the lady back there? Oh no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no. It's my boy, it's my boy. Hey, um hey, isn't he doubly blessed for coming to church this morning? Come on, somebody. Now, I know when I said that you didn't believe me. You you thought there was nothing under the chairs. Uh the reason why is because we've trained ourselves to be skeptical of good news, but to accept bad news. We've trained ourselves to believe that good news oftentimes is too good to be true. And as we are walking through this life, oftentimes we are so quick to believe what is broken and messed up and slow to believe what is beautiful. See, we know how to embrace disappointment. We know how to expect the worst. I know. I know how to expect the worst. And we've trained ourselves to believe that good news is oftentimes too good to be true. And there's some people who feel that exact same way about Easter, about the resurrection, about grace, about God. And maybe not that necessarily that those things couldn't be true for anybody, but there's people who think that just couldn't be true for me. Because I'm too far gone, I'm too messed up, I've gone too far. But let me tell you today, that's why Easter matters. That's why this message matters today, because if you know somebody who feels too hurt, too far gone, too late, too ashamed, too cynical, too written off, Easter is exactly for people like that. The title of my message today is Too Good. Everybody say too good. See, we know how to believe things like don't get your hopes up when nothing really changes, death is final. This kind of grace can't actually be real. And that that type of type of thinking is not just for modern people. That same type of thinking was happening at Easter morning. And so, what are we gonna do today? What I want us to do today together is we take a look at the story of Easter morning from the scripture. I want for us, and every person who's walked in the room today, for us to fully respond to the resurrection. I want you this morning to respond fully to the resurrection of Christ. Because again, it's so easy for us to believe the things that are broken, but slow to believe that which is beautiful. And if we fail to do that, if we fail to fully respond to the resurrection today, what's gonna end up happening is that we end up kind of giving half of ourselves to the Lord and end up giving half of our mind to Him and half of our presence and half of our voice to the Lord. See, there's people who just want to give Jesus a quick reaction. But Jesus, an Easter Sunday, expects a full response from us. Not halfway, not half baked, not half done, but fully, fully, fully believing what Easter is really all about and not thinking it's just too good to be true. Because you can think it's too good to be true, not just intellectually, but you can believe that personally as well. Well, you know, God and the gospel, all this, this this is it's it's for other people. It's for church people, it's for more cleaned up people, it's not for me. Guess what? That's a lie. Because Easter confronts that head on. And what we're gonna look at, we're gonna look at and center around the fact that Mary sees the open tomb and she does not think resurrection. Mary sees the open tomb and she immediately thinks they took him. Something has happened. There's some evil, there, there's some conspiracy. See, in John chapter 20, we see the resurrection through Mary Magdalene's eyes. This is the same Mary Magdalene as the woman that Jesus rescued, who was demonically oppressed and in bondage, spiritually bondaged and possessed. This is a woman that many people would have just written off. That many people would have considered a lost cause. And now, on resurrection morning, this is the woman who is standing at the center of the greatest news of history. Isn't that like God? She comes to the tomb, she sees that the stone is rolled away, she runs to tell Peter and John, they come to check it out and to inspect it. They leave, and Mary stays, and then everything shifts and changes. So we're going to read the Easter story from the Gospel of John, chapter 20. And if you would stand right now for the reading of God's word in reverence as we read the Easter story. Early on Sunday morning, while it was still dark, Mary Magdalene came to the tomb and found that the stone had been rolled away from the entrance. She ran and found Simon Peter and the other disciple of whom Jesus loved, and she said, They have taken the Lord's body out of the tomb, and we don't know where they have put him. Peter and the other disciple started out for the tomb, and they were both running, and the other disciple outran Peter and reached the tomb first. He stood, he stooped and looked in and saw the linen wrappings lying there, but he didn't go in. Then Simon Peter arrived and went inside. And he also noticed the linen wrappings lying there. While the cloth, uh while the cloth had covered Jesus' head, was folded up and lying apart from the other wrappings. Then the disciple who had reached the tomb first went in and saw and believed. For until they uh until then they still had not understood the scriptures that Jesus said that that Jesus must rise from the dead. Verse 10. Then they went home. Verse 11. Mary was standing outside the tomb crying, and as she wept, she stooped and looked in, and she saw two white-robed angels, one sitting at the head and the other at the foot of the place where the body of Jesus had been lying. Dear woman, why are you crying? The angels asked her, Because they have taken away my Lord, she replied, and I don't know where they put them, where they put him. She turned to leave and saw someone standing there. It was Jesus, but she didn't recognize him. Dear woman, why are you crying? Jesus asked her, Who are you looking for? She thought that he was the gardener. Sir, she said, if you have taken him away, tell me where you've put him and I will go get him. Mary, Jesus said. She turned to him and cried, Rabboni, which is Hebrew for teacher. Don't cling to me, Jesus said. For I haven't yet ascended to the Father, but go and find my brothers and tell them I am ascending to my Father and your Father, to my God and your God. Mary Magdalene found the disciples and told them, I have seen the Lord. And then she gave them his message. Bless the reading of God's word, you can be seated. Mary gets to the garden tomb. The stone is rolled away. And her first response is not to instantly believe or some kind of connection that she's made. Instead, she's confused, she's upset, she's crying, she's grieving. See, this story doesn't uh begin with people just saying, oh yeah, of course Jesus rose from the grave. It started with fear and with disbelief and with grief and with confusion. And despite thousands of years of evidence of the resurrection, some people still reject the resurrection. Just some of the common evidences that we now know for thousands of years, the fact that women were the last at the cross and the first in the tomb. And if you were inventing a story in that world at this time, you would not write it that way. Women didn't have the social standing, they didn't have the ability as witnesses. It wouldn't make sense for you to write this story, having women be the last at the cross and the first of the tomb. Or the fact that there are hundreds of prophecies that are fulfilled all throughout the scripture over 15 centuries, not by accident, but the fact that the scripture is not just this random pile of disconnected stories, but it is this library of books that is one long story, all pointing to the risen Jesus. Or how about the fact that the resurrection changed people, real people who were skeptics, who disbelieved? Like Mary, like Thomas, who said, I have to put my hands into the into his hands and into the wound on his side. Or like the Apostle Paul, who actually murdered and killed and persecuted Christians, who saw the risen Jesus on the road to Damascus, or the disciples. These were not just people who were naive and optimistic. These were people who were grieving, there were people who were doubting, there were people who were hostile to the gospel message. And somehow what happened on that Easter morning was powerful enough to transform them all the way to them dying for what they knew to be true. Not too good to be true. I know for me at times it's possible for me to be sure about something, that's so sure, so confident about something, and be completely dead wrong. I just, I'm just that kind of person where I like, if I believe something, I'm believing it. And maybe some of you are more skeptical than you're letting on. Some of you are smart enough to ask hard questions. Can I tell you that God is big enough for your questions? Can I tell you that God is big enough for your doubt? God is big enough. Asking hard questions isn't the problem. The problem is when we wave off, when we dismiss the resurrection without truly considering what happened. And so, if we're gonna fully respond to the resurrection today, what we need to do is we need to think deeply about the resurrection before you dismiss it. Think about what actually happened before you dismiss the resurrection as some religious fantasy. Think honestly about what actually happened that day. And the fact that Christianity hangs in the balance of Jesus walking out of the empty tomb and how people who truly believed that they saw the risen Jesus had transformed lives all the way to death that spread that right now in 2026 in Frankfurt, Kentucky, we are saying Jesus is alive. Jesus is alive, he's real, he's walked out of the grave, and it's so easy at times for people to just dismiss this story when we have literally hundreds and thousands and thousands of years of evidences about the resurrection. A resurrection, it's too serious to dismiss. And it's easy at times for us to just take things at face value or dismiss something too easily. To be so confident that religion is wrong. Can I tell you that confidence is not the same thing as correct? Feeling sure doesn't mean that you're actually seeing clearly. A few years ago, a couple from our church uh invited me and my wife over for dinner, and I thought I was being really caring and pastoral and intentional, and I looked at the wife and I asked, How's the pregnancy going? And immediately my wife Emily started digging her fingernails into my leg, which was the first warning sign that I ignored. And the woman looked back at me and she said, I'm not pregnant. And instead of apologizing like a normal person, I argued with her. I said, No, I'm pretty sure that you told me that you were. Well, it turns out it was not her who told me, it was a completely different woman at church who told me that she was pregnant. So here I was. I wasn't just wrong, I was confidently wrong. I was publicly wrong. I even doubled down on being wrong, now for a lifetime of embarrassment with that couple, and now with you. Hey, just because something sounds unlikely doesn't mean that it's untrue. And there's some in here that maybe some of you that are here today, and maybe you're here for the first time, and maybe the first time in a while, and you have rejected the resurrection without truly examining it. Let me ask you this Easter, don't accept your doubt. Be honest about the resurrection before you reject it. Peter and John came to the tomb, inspected it. And then they leave. She stays even though she's confused. She stays even though she's grieving and hurting. She stays in the place even when she can't make sense of what God is doing. And because she stayed, she got to hear Jesus say her name. He said, Mary. And she immediately recognized her Savior. It was a turning point. It wasn't one more clue, it wasn't some theory that she had, it wasn't some other argument, it was Jesus saying her name. Listen to me, the resurrection becomes personal when you allow Jesus to say your name. So oftentimes I just want the quick answers. I want quick comfort from God. I want everything from God, a quick breakthrough. You know, God doesn't abide by my timeline. And I just don't know why he doesn't. Just do what I want him to do when I want him to do it. Don't give up too early. Some of you are ready to walk away and you're walking away too soon. Because of one answer, unanswered prayer, or a hard season, or some painful experience that you've had at a church, or confusion, or thinking that God is being silent to you. Or thinking about Christ and thinking, well, you know, I tried that before. Listen to me. If we're gonna fully respond to the resurrection of Jesus, you've got to stay long enough to listen to Jesus say your name. Mary, she stayed at the tomb, she was searching for answers, and what she ended up having is she stayed long enough to actually have a true encounter with the risen Jesus. Can I tell you that you need to do the same thing? Imagine if Mary had left too soon and she had missed out on this resurrection moment. Listen to me. Some people don't miss Jesus because they never come near to him. They miss him because they leave too soon. Don't give Jesus a drive by chance. Don't just sample Jesus. Don't just glance at him. Don't just give him one Easter and say, well, that was enough. Stay. Stay in his presence, stay in his word, stay around his people, stay open to Jesus. And here's what I'm asking of you. I'm asking for you to give me one year of your life. One year of your life, prioritizing God's purposes in your life, prioritizing worshiping and gathering for worship of our Almighty God. I'm asking you to give one year. And I'm gonna make a promise to you. Your life will never be the same. Your family will never be the same. Your kids will never be the same. Our church is filled with people who gave me and gave the Lord one year of their life, and their family has never been the same. And some of you are ready to walk away after just one bad experience or one disappointment or one unanswered prayer or one hard stretch. And Mary encountered Jesus, and that happened because she stayed. Will you give Jesus a year of your life? Not just a weekend, not just an emotional response, not just a prayer in crisis, not just one Easter. Give him your life, follow him, stay near to him, walk with him, and watch what he does. Mary encountered the risen Jesus because she didn't just rush off. She didn't throw her hands up. She stayed. You're weary. Some of you are grieving. Some of you are feeling spiritually numb. And we see Jesus encounter Mary when she's confused, when she's grieving, she's weeping, and she encounters Jesus and she leaves a witness. A witness of the greatest miracle in history. And she goes to the disciples and she says, I have seen the Lord. And one of the greatest reversals in all of the scripture. Mary, this woman who came looking for a dead body, leaves seeing and having an encounter with her living Savior. Jesus loves to turn people who feel like lost causes into witnesses of his glory and his goodness. Mary Magdalene was a woman that many had written off. And then she becomes the first carrier of this resurrection news. It's so personal, but it's not private. In Revelation, we see the way that it's by Christ's authority given to us, and his blood given for us. On the cross, and an empty tomb, and the word of our testimony that has power to overcome evil and darkness. Look at Revelation 12, verse 10, and I've heard a loud voice in heaven say, Now the salv now the salvation and the power and the kingdom of our God and the authority of Christ has come, for the accuser of our brothers has been thrown down, who accuses them day and night before our God. And they have conquered him by the blood of the Lamb and the Word of their testimony. For they love not their lives even unto death. Listen to me. God has told us this by Christ's authority and by his mighty power, that it's by the blood of the Lamb and the Word of our witness that we overcome evil in darkness. We overcome the evil one that wants to steal, kill, and destroy, that wants to come against your house and against your kids and against your family. That it is powerful by the fact that we have the blood of the Lamb and the word of your testimony. Don't keep it to yourself. It's personal, it's not private. It's deeply personal, but not just meant to be kept to ourselves. You know, for me, there are some things I just don't have to be told to talk about. I love great barbecue. And I talk about it, I post about it, nobody has to tell me to do that. And some of you, you hear about being, you hear being a witness for Christ or for sharing your faith, and all of a sudden you feel all this pressure and all this duty and awkward and guilt. Listen, when when when you know that good news is real, you can't stop talking about it. You can't stop sharing about it. If we're gonna fully respond to the resurrection today, Christian, you need to speak the good news because it is too good not to share. It is too good not to share. Don't let something this good stay private. When we share what Jesus has done in our life, the word of our testimony, our witness of Christ. This isn't some religious duty that we're doing. This is us talking about the greatest news that we have ever received that so many people that we know they need to hear it. They need to hear that Jesus is alive. There's somebody at your work who needs to hear that Jesus is alive. There's somebody in your family who needs to hear Jesus is alive. There's a coworker of yours that needs to hear that Jesus is alive. There's a family member, there's a cousin, and you speak the good news. It is too good to keep to yourself. Many Easters ago, a friend of mine, Justin Riccio, received an invite for church. And Justin was far from God. The night before Easter, they had planned to go meet up with her family and go to church, and he and Britney were too hung over from alcohol and pills that they couldn't make it, but they had this invite to a church down the street in the neighborhood, and they showed up. And Justin hung over, didn't know halfway where he was, heard the gospel, the good news of Jesus, and it completely transformed his life. He went from dead to alive. And now there's not a person I know who has baptized more people than Justin Riccio. He has baptized so many of his friends. Years ago, over 20 of his friends he went to high school with had died early from overdoses, and he had baptized way more than that. He had an encounter with the risen Jesus on an Easter Sunday because somebody was a witness, because somebody invited him, because somebody was willing to say, Can I tell you the greatest news that I've heard? The power of the blood of the Lamb and the Word of our testimony, the word of our witness. A couple of weeks ago, I was at uh this church planting conference down in Florida. It's called Exponential, and at the end of the conference, there's always a prayer time. And I was there last year and I got prayed over this specific scripture, and I've been thinking about it all year long. And this scripture talks about how that a seed must go into the ground and die. And then a few weeks ago I was at this conference, and it was prayer time again, and and and this scripture came up, and I I went down to be prayed for by one of the pastors who was there. And uh after he prayed over me, he put reached into his pocket and he handed me these two acorns, these two seeds. And he said, This one is for multiply church. This one is for all the churches that will be planted out of multiply church. That the seed has to go down into the ground and be buried. But listen to me, buried doesn't mean failure. And and I just I just I just want like quick wins, some fast fruit. I want this all to just all work out. I I want the resurrection part, but skip the burial part. But but multiplication doesn't skip the burial part. Look at John 12, 24. Very truly I tell you, Jesus says this, very truly I tell you, unless a kernel of wheat falls into the ground and dies, it remains only a single seed. But if it dies, it produces many seeds. This uh this small little acorn was a witness to me. Yeah, it's ordinary, it's just what is just a little acorn. It doesn't really mean anything. But if it goes into the ground and it's buried, over time it can become far bigger than itself. Listen to me. The tomb is not the end of the story. Jesus' death is not the end. What Jesus did for us on the cross and out of the grave to be buried and to be raised again, to go down into the ground, is gonna lead to the greatest possible kingdom growth and mission that you have ever been a part of. Not because of anything that we've done, but everything that Jesus has done. When the tomb was full, it looked like failure. It looked like it was finished. But when the seed goes into the ground, what looks finished can turn to fruitful. What looks like no hope can turn into hope. What looks like a lost cause can be turned around because of our mighty King Jesus. Do not think that you're a lost cause. Jesus loves you so much that he was buried in the ground to be raised back to life so you can walk in life with him and live the multiplied life that God has called you, he's led you to, he's planned for you, that you would walk in his purposes today. Imagine if we had a whole room filled with people who fully responded to the risen Jesus. What would God do? What could God do? Imagine with me if the if the skeptics in the room actually got honest. What if the the ones that are wandering from God actually stayed? What if those who claim to be Christians and believers in Jesus open their mouth? What will we see? We would see more people come home to Jesus, we'd see more families change, we'd see more prodigals return. And we'd have one more person who would move from I thought it was over to I have seen the Lord. I have seen the Lord. I have seen the Lord today. If you are too hurt, if you're too far, if you feel like it's too late, can I tell you that Jesus is too good to miss? He is too good. The cross is where Christ paid the penalty and dealt with your sin. And the empty tomb is where death was crushed and would not win. With the risen Jesus, your story's not over. Think honestly about the resurrection before you reject it. Stay long enough to hear Jesus call your name. Speak the good news because it's too good to keep to yourself. We're all sinners that are needing a savior. And this morning, there may be some of you that have been buried in the ground. You're spiritually dead, but you need Jesus to make you alive. And the way that you do that is by receiving what he did for you on the cross by purchasing you with his blood, and then him walking out of the grave, so then you can also have new life in him and receive him as your savior. And today, maybe that very day, for some of you in this room right now. Would you bow your heads and pray with me now? Father, thank you, Jesus, for what you did for us on the cross and walking out of the grave. And right now, God, we just right now, everybody, right now, we just thank you, God. We thank you for what you have done for us, that's given us new life. And today, we pray over anybody in this room who's not received you as Savior that today will be the day of salvation, that today will be the day that they receive you, that they turn their life to you, that they ask for your forgiveness and are set free. And if that's you today, I want to ask you right now to pray with every head bowed, pray in your mind and heart, pray, Jesus, save me. Go ahead, pray it in your heart, and my Jesus, save me. I believe that you died on the cross for my sins and that you walked out of the grave. Cleanse me so I can be in heaven with you one day. I repent and give my life to you as you gave your life for mine. Thank you for saving me.

Sallie 34:07

We're so grateful you joined us for this week's message. At Multiply, we believe life was never meant to be lived alone. If today you made the decision to follow Jesus, we'd be honored to walk with you on this journey. Visit multiplyky.com to let us know. We love you and we'll see you again soon.