It’s Friday … But Sunday’s a-Comin’!

John 20:1-18

The Empty Tomb

Early on the first day of the week, while it was still dark, Mary Magdalenewent to the tomb and saw that the stone had been removed from the entrance.So she came running to Simon Peter and the other disciple, the one Jesus loved, and said, “They have taken the Lord out of the tomb, and we don’t know where they have put him!”

So Peter and the other disciple started for the tomb. Both were running, but the other disciple outran Peter and reached the tomb first. He bent over and looked in at the strips of linen lying there but did not go in. Then Simon Peter came along behind him and went straight into the tomb. He saw the strips of linen lying there, as well as the cloth that had been wrapped around Jesus’ head. The cloth was still lying in its place, separate from the linen. Finally the other disciple, who had reached the tomb first, also went inside. He saw and believed. (They still did not understand from Scripture that Jesus had to rise from the dead.) 10 Then the disciples went back to where they were staying.

Jesus Appears to Mary Magdalene

11 Now Mary stood outside the tomb crying. As she wept, she bent over to look into the tomb 12 and saw two angels in white, seated where Jesus’ body had been, one at the head and the other at the foot.

13 They asked her, “Woman, why are you crying?”

“They have taken my Lord away,” she said, “and I don’t know where they have put him.” 14 At this, she turned around and saw Jesus standing there, but she did not realize that it was Jesus.

15 He asked her, “Woman, why are you crying? Who is it you are looking for?”

Thinking he was the gardener, she said, “Sir, if you have carried him away, tell me where you have put him, and I will get him.”

16 Jesus said to her, “Mary.”

She turned toward him and cried out in Aramaic, “Rabboni!” (which means “Teacher”).

17 Jesus said, “Do not hold on to me, for I have not yet ascended to the Father. Go instead to my brothers and tell them, ‘I am ascending to my Father and your Father, to my God and your God.’”

18 Mary Magdalene went to the disciples with the news: “I have seen the Lord!” And she told them that he had said these things to her.

Dear Friends in Christ,

Many years ago at one of my former congregations I showed a video – actually it was a film if you can remember what those were – that featured a dynamic, well-known Christian speaker by the name of Tony Campolo. He ended his part of the video with a story that I’ve never forgotten entitled “It’s Friday, but Sunday’s a- comin’!” Now even though Mr. Campolo is white, he said in this film that he attends an African-American church in Philadelphia and sometimes he gets asked to preach.  Well, one Sunday he preached and he said he was really on that day. He said he was so good that he wanted to take notes on himself.  And as he preached, his predominantly black audience really got into it with their shouts of Amen and Hallelujah.   After he was finished he sat down next to the head pastor who paid him a nice compliment. He said, “You did all right, boy.” Tony then asked him if he could top what he’d just done, to which the seasoned preacher replied, “Son, you just sit back and watch because the old man is gonna do you in!” And Tony said that’s exactly what he did. And he did it with a single phrase which he built on throughout his hour and 15 minute sermon. The phrase was, “It’s Friday, but Sunday’s a-comin’!” Now that may not sound like much on the surface, but it was the way he did it that made the impact. He started out softly and slowly. He said, “It was Friday… Friday… And my Jesus was dead on a cross. But that’s Friday… Sunday’s a-comin’!”  Then somebody yelled from the congregation, “Preach, brother! Preach! Preach!” And that was all he needed. He really started to take off then. He said, “It was Friday and Mary was crying her eyes out and the disciples were runnin’ in every direction like sheep without a shepherd. But that was Friday; Sunday’s a-comin’!”  Soon more in the crowd joined in with their shouts of encouragement. So he continued: “It was Friday. My Jesus was dead and buried in the grave and all the forces of hell were whoopin’ it up, havin’ a party. But they didn’t know that it was only Friday and Sunday’s a-comin’!”  And he just continued on like that for a half hour, an hour, an hour and a quarter, until finally he shouted at the top of his lungs, “It’s Friiidddaaayy!!”  And I’m sure I don’t have to tell you what the crowd shouted back: “But Sunday’s a-comin’!”

Well, my friends, the good news for today is that Friday’s past and Sunday’s here, and we have come together to celebrate the greatest victory and the most significant event that this world has ever known. And that is the simultaneous defeat of sin, death, Satan, and hell by him who was dead and buried on Friday, yes, but who was raised to life again on Sunday by the glorious power of the Father, and who now offers and presents to us, his believing and blood-bought children, the benefits and blessings of his resurrection so that we might enjoy them both here in time and hereafter in eternity. And that’s what I really want to talk to you about this glorious Easter morning. What does the resurrection of Christ really prove and what meaning does it have for our lives today?

The first thing that it proves is that Jesus was who he claimed to be. He was the promised Messiah and he was the Son of God.  As most of you know, the Old Testament is filled with prophecies foretelling various things about the coming Messiah. Beginning already with Genesis 3:15 where God promised Adam and Eve that one day he would send a deliverer into the world who would come from the seed of the woman and crush the head of Satan, the serpent, and continuing throughout the entire Old Testament, somebody once counted them up and came up with more than 330 of these very specific and detailed prophecies about the coming Messiah. So when he came, there should have been no mistaking him.

Well, one of the most stunning and profound of those prophecies can be found in Isaiah 53:10-11 where it says, “Yet it was the LORD’s will to crush him and cause him to suffer, and though the LORD makes his life a guilt offering, he will see his offspring and prolong his days, and the will of the LORD will prosper in his hand. After the suffering of his soul, he will see the light [of life] and be satisfied.”  That is one of the clearest prophecies that we have in the Old Testament foretelling that the Messiah would rise from the dead.  Then in Psalm 16:10 we find the Messiah saying to his Heavenly Father, “You will not abandon me to the grave, nor will you let your Holy One see decay.”

Now why am I making such a big deal out of this? Well, I don’t know how many of you realize this, but there were many who came before Christ and many who came after him, claiming to be the Messiah. But they were all false messiahs because not one of them could fulfill these extremely important prophecies concerning the resurrection. Only Jesus did that which proved once and for all beyond the shadow of a doubt that he was the One whom God had promised for so many centuries.  He was our heaven-sent Savior and Deliverer.

But not only did his resurrection prove that, it also proved that Jesus was the Son of God. Listen to how the Apostle Paul puts it in Romans 1:4 where he says that Jesus “through the Spirit of holiness was declared with power to be the Son of God by his resurrection from the dead.” Now that should be very comforting to us to know that Jesus was not just an ordinary man for if he was, how could his death on the cross have been a full and sufficient payment for all of our sins? It couldn’t have! That would be like me trying to pay for all of your sins. Yet I’m just a puny human being myself, and as such I too am a sinner. So just like one person in debt cannot pay off another person’s debt, so also one sinner cannot pay off another sinner’s debt. It takes God himself to make that payment, and this he did in the person of his Son Jesus Christ whose resurrection from the dead proved to all people that he really was both true manand true God, just as he claimed to be.

Then a second point that we want to note about the resurrection is that it proves that what Jesus says is true. Throughout his ministry Jesus made numerous references to his resurrection.  Recall how on one occasion he told the Jewish religious leaders to tear down this temple (referring to the temple of his body) and he would raise it up again in three days. Another time he said that the sign of Jonah that would be given to that unbelieving generation. He said that just as Jonah was in the belly of that huge fish for three days and three nights, so he, the Son of Man, would be three days and three nights in the heart of the earth. And then I don’t know how many times Jesus told his disciples that eventually they were going to go to Jerusalem where he would be handed over to his enemies to be mocked, scourged, and crucified, but he always added every single time that on the third day he would rise.

Now those are some pretty bold and audacious claims, aren’t they? I don’t know of anyone else in the history of the world who has been able to predict their own resurrection from the dead and actually bring it to pass. Yet Jesus did just that. Which means that his Word is golden.  His Word is truth.  His Word can be trusted.  So when he says, “I am the Way, the Truth, and the Life; no one comes to the father except by me,” believe that and recognize him as the one and only way to heaven. When he says, “I am the bread of life. He who comes to me will never go hungry, and he who believes in me will never be thirsty,” believe that and take advantage of the spiritual nourishment and sustenance that he offers you. When he says, “I and the Resurrection and the Life. He who believes in me, though he die, yet shall he live, and whoever lives and believes in me shall never die,” believe that and find comfort in the victory that he offers us and our Christian loved ones over man’s greatest enemy in life, namely, death.

And my friends, believe all the other promises that he holds out to you in his Word.  You know, somebody once counted them and came up with more than 3000 of them. As incredible as that is, what’s even more amazing is that he is faithful to every one of them. So search the Scriptures diligently and regularly for those promises and then cling to them like an anchor in the midst of a storm. Let them become your source of strength, your lifeline, if you will, because like somebody once said, “You can never break the promises of God by leaning on them.”

Then a third thing that Christ’s resurrection proves is that our faith is not worthless. You know, there are times when even the strongest of Christians wavers in their faith or has doubts or maybe even wonders whether being a Christian is really worth it. I’m sure that the disciples must have felt that way many times, especially after Jesus had ascended into heaven. After all, just look at what they got for their faithfulness: imprisonment, persecution, torture, separation from families and friends, and some of the most horrible deaths you could ever imagine.  And indeed, all of that would have been in vain had the Savior whom they confessed and proclaimed been a dead Savior. At least that’s what Paul tells us in 1 Corinthians 15:17 when he says, “If Christ has not been raised, your faith is worthless; you are still in your sins.”

Now if what Paul says there is true, then the flip side of the coin must also be true, namely, that if Christ has been raised from the dead, then your faith is not worthless. It is rather the most valuable thing you can possess in life. For that faith, which means nothing less than a firm, unwavering belief and trust in Jesus Christ as your risen and living Lord and Savior, is really your ticket to heaven. We certainly can’t get there on our own. We can’t parade before God all of our good works and say, “Look at what a great person I’ve been, Lord. Surely you want people like me in your heaven.” And the reason we can’t do that is because no matter how hard we try and no matter how good we are or think we are, we are still sinful human beings in the sight of our holy and sinless God. So in and of ourselves we are completely incapable and unworthy of attaining our own salvation. For that we need a Savior – and not some dead Savior whose rotting and decaying corpse lies in a tomb somewhere in this world. No, we need a living Savior, a conquering Savior, a powerful Savior who can not only defeat sin and Satan for us but also death itself. And the only place we can find that kind of Savior and that kind of victory is in the person of Jesus Christ.

And that takes us to one more thing that the resurrection of Christ proves to us and that is thatwe to shall one day rise from the dead.  Like Jesus told his disciples the night before he died:“Because I live, you shall live also.” The Apostle Paul restated this same truth many times in his New Testament epistles.  In Philippians 3:20-21 he says: “Our citizenship is in heaven. And we eagerly await a Savior from there, the Lord Jesus Christ, who….will transform our lowly bodies so that they will be like his glorious body.”  And what’s really exciting about all this is that when he raises our lifeless bodies from the dead, they won’t be like the bodies we inhabit right now – imperfect, weak, and frail.  Instead, John tells us in his 1st epistle: “We know that when Christ appears, we shall be like him.”  So we will have wonderful, new, perfect bodies – bodies that will no longer be subject to pain and sickness, to suffering and death.  And those glorious and glorified bodies will be reunited with our souls that have already preceded us into heaven’s glory so that body and soul together we might taste of that blessed and perfect resurrected life that knows no end.

So my friends, thank God that Friday’s past and Sunday’s here!  And especially thank God that we, through no doing of our own, are now privileged by him to receive and enjoy the blessed fruits of Christ’s resurrection that we’ve looked at today. To him then who lived, died, and rose again for us: to him who now lives and reigns as King of kings and Lord of lords; to him who loves us more than we could ever know or comprehend – to this great and wonderful Savior, God, and Lord be all honor and glory, all praise and thanksgiving for this, his greatest day of triumph and all that it means to us!

Amen