Relatable with Allie Beth Stuckey - BONUS： What the Resurrection Means for All of Us

00:00:00.000 Okay guys, happy Easter weekend. I wanted to just give you a little bonus episode to wish you happy

00:00:07.760 Easter and to do the only fitting thing before Easter Sunday and that is talk about the wonder

00:00:14.720 and the beauty and the great news of the gospel of Jesus Christ. And I thought the best way to do

00:00:20.600 that was to read you some scripture. So whether you are a seasoned believer or whether you're

00:00:25.740 still trying to figure out if this whole God thing is real or maybe you're a new believer

00:00:30.500 and you're still trying to understand, okay, how do I express what the gospel is? What exactly is

00:00:36.420 Easter celebrating? I hope that this encourages and edifies you. So let me read you a little bit

00:00:42.260 of Romans 5. We'll start with verse 1. This is really the gospel. Therefore, since we have been

00:00:49.100 justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ. Through him, we have also

00:00:54.820 obtained access by faith into this grace in which we stand, and we rejoice in hope of the glory of

00:01:01.440 God. And then I'll fast forward a little bit to verse 6. For while we were still weak, at the right

00:01:07.640 time Christ died for the ungodly. For one will scarcely die for a righteous person, though perhaps

00:01:13.000 for a good person one would dare even to die. But God shows his love for us in that while we were still

00:01:19.100 sinners, Christ died for us. Since therefore we have now been justified by his blood, much more

00:01:26.240 shall we be saved by him from the wrath of God. For if while we were enemies, we were reconciled to

00:01:33.600 God by the death of his son, much more now that we are reconciled, shall we be saved by his life.

00:01:40.720 More than that, we also rejoice in God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom we have now received

00:01:46.520 reconciliation. So we are reconciled as an unholy, sinful people to a holy, perfect God. We had to

00:01:56.680 be restored. We had to be renewed. We had to be redeemed in order to be granted access to this

00:02:04.700 perfect, holy God of the universe. We are sinful. We have all sinned and fallen short of the glory of

00:02:11.420 God. Whether you have the most egregious sins in your past or whether you think that your sins are

00:02:16.980 just small and petty. You've stolen a pen or you've told a lie or you've gossiped or you've judged

00:02:24.780 someone hypocritically. Whatever is in your past, no matter how bad you think that you are or how good

00:02:32.040 you think that you are, the fact of the matter is, is that as Ephesians 2 says, we are all equally

00:02:37.740 dead in our sins apart from Christ. If you think about a dead person, a dead person can't help

00:02:43.700 themselves. They can't do anything. They can't save themselves. They can't make themselves better or

00:02:50.100 fix themselves up so they look more presentable. They are completely and totally helpless. And that

00:02:55.180 is how Ephesians 2 paints us, that we are dead in our sins. This Romans 5 passage says that we are

00:03:00.540 enemies of God. So we were in a really bad place, all of us, no matter our background, doesn't matter our

00:03:05.740 race or our sex or our socioeconomic background, or like I said, our sin history. We were all equally

00:03:13.040 dead in sin apart from God. We were enemies of God. We were hostile to God. We were under the reign of

00:03:20.680 Satan and we had to be saved. And how were we saved? Again, going to Ephesians 2 specifically verses 8

00:03:28.280 through 10. We were saved by the grace of God through faith in Christ. He made us alive together.

00:03:35.400 In Christ. He made us new. He gave us new hearts. He made us new creations. He gave us his righteousness.

00:03:45.240 He gave us his holiness. He forgave us of our sins and he made us acceptable before God. Not because of

00:03:52.640 anything that we have done, but as a gift, he gave us this salvation and redemption and reconciliation.

00:03:59.260 So we have a hope of salvation. We get to now go from being enemies of God to friends with God.

00:04:06.580 We get to be fellow heirs with Christ of God's inheritance. We get to look forward to the hope

00:04:13.300 of heaven after death. But not only that, we are free from the chains and the shackles and the slavery to

00:04:21.920 sin. So not only do we have something to look forward to in the next life, but we also have

00:04:29.020 liberation from the burden of sin that holds us down today. We find joy and we find freedom. We

00:04:35.780 find a lightness. We find a satisfaction and fulfillment in the repentance from sin and in

00:04:42.220 obedience to God. Jesus' burden is light and his yoke is easy, whereas the burden of sin is really heavy.

00:04:49.820 The yoke of the devil is really difficult. And so Jesus gives us freedom, not just in the next life,

00:04:58.860 but also in this life. So that's what Jesus' death accomplishes, but that's also what Jesus'

00:05:04.460 resurrection accomplishes. That's what sets Jesus apart. A lot of people who claimed that they were

00:05:09.080 special or claimed that they were maybe some kind of Messiah or some kind of prophet died.

00:05:13.920 In fact, they all died. Only one of them rose again. According to the testimony,

00:05:19.820 of multiple eyewitnesses. And so I want to read you from Luke 24, what happened when Jesus was raised

00:05:29.140 from the dead three days after he died on a cross for our sins, becoming our sacrifice to reconcile us

00:05:36.820 to God, taking on our punishment, our sins that we might be forgiven and made acceptable before God.

00:05:44.340 So let me read you about, let me, let me read to you about the resurrection. Luke 24, verse one,

00:05:53.200 But on the first day of the week at early dawn, they went to the tomb, taking the spices they had

00:05:57.440 prepared, and they found the stone rolled away from the tomb. And when they went in, they did not find

00:06:02.800 the body of the Lord Jesus. While they were perplexed about this, behold, two men stood by

00:06:07.740 them in dazzling apparel. And as they were frightened and bowed their faces to the ground, the men said to

00:06:12.600 them, Why do you seek the living among the dead? Meaning Jesus. He is not here, but has risen.

00:06:19.120 Remember how he told you, while he was still in Galilee, that the Son of Man must be delivered 0.93

00:06:23.820 into the hands of sinful men and be crucified and on the third day rise. And they remembered

00:06:29.040 his words. And returning from the tomb, they told all these things to the eleven and to all the rest.

00:06:34.340 Now it was Mary Magdalene and Joanna and Mary, the mother of James, and the other women with them

00:06:39.500 who told these things to the apostles. But these words seemed to them an idle tale, and they did not

00:06:44.340 believe them. But Peter rose and ran to the tomb, stooping and looking in. He saw the linen

00:06:48.860 cloths by themselves, and he went home marveling at what had happened. And we could

00:06:53.660 keep going there, who Jesus spoke to after he rose from the dead, and the entire story of the

00:07:00.880 resurrection. But I highly encourage you, if you have or if you haven't read Luke 24, the account of

00:07:06.120 the resurrection, to go do that today and tomorrow. Maybe gather your family around. If you've never

00:07:11.860 done that before, maybe it feels a little bit awkward. That's okay. It's not you speaking.

00:07:15.980 It's the Word of God working. And it's the Holy Spirit working. And He cannot fail. It doesn't

00:07:22.440 matter if you're a bad reader. It doesn't matter if you've never read the Bible out loud. It doesn't

00:07:26.340 matter if you've never said a prayer with your family. You can pull this passage up on your phone,

00:07:31.220 and you can read it with those who are around you. I promise it will only be an encouraging and Holy

00:07:38.160 Spirit-filled experience. And it will glorify God. That is what the resurrection accomplishes for us,

00:07:47.120 that it is the defeat of death, is victory over sin and darkness. Just as our sinful selves have died,

00:07:58.700 as Christ has died, so our new selves, our renewed selves that we were given by grace through faith,

00:08:07.600 have also defeated spiritual death forever in Jesus's resurrection. And so that's our hope, is that yes,

00:08:17.940 death, physical death, unfortunately, sadly, still happens. But we have faith, and we have hope,

00:08:27.340 and the ultimate victory over death. That death doesn't have the same consequence, the same impact,

00:08:35.240 the same sting for the Christian, because our God defeated it. And He has given us that hope in the power 1.00

00:08:44.520 and the reality of His resurrection. That's a bold claim. It's a bold claim that the God that we serve

00:08:50.620 came as a man, fully man, fully God, that He died on a cross for our sins, and that He was

00:08:56.980 raised to life three days later. And in that, we get salvation that we never even earned, but it's just

00:09:04.980 given to us as a gift. It's a bold claim, and that is Christianity. Christianity has always been

00:09:10.640 controversial. It has always been countercultural. It has always been scandalous. It has always been 1.00

00:09:16.400 radical. It has always been the center of scorn for people who don't believe the gospel. So let us not

00:09:26.440 be surprised by the adversarial and even hostile culture when it comes to contending for our faith.

00:09:37.300 It's always been that way. Let us rejoice in our sufferings. Let us rejoice in any persecution

00:09:44.600 experienced here or abroad by Christians. Let us remember that it's worth it, that the gospel

00:09:51.060 is worth speaking up about, is worth defending, is worth rejoicing over with all the crazy stuff going on

00:09:58.920 in the world today. Let us take time to rest with our family, to truly celebrate the resurrection of

00:10:05.720 Jesus Christ, and to remember the eternal truth that God came to save us, and that He is in total

00:10:11.960 control, and that He has already claimed victory over darkness. And even as it seems like darkness is

00:10:18.460 winning, we know that God wins. So thank you so much for listening to this. We will be back here on Monday.

00:10:24.740 We will be back here on Monday.

Relatable with Allie Beth Stuckey - April 16, 2022

BONUS： What the Resurrection Means for All of Us

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