WITNESSING THE RESURRECTION.

 

MATTHEW 28v1-20.

 

The word witness          – 1) eyewitness – observe – [to wirness something]

– 2) to testify – corroborate – [ to be a witness – to say

what you saw]

1. THE WITNESS OF THE ANGEL.

 

2 There was a violent earthquake, for an angel of the Lord came down from heaven and, going to the tomb, rolled back the stone and sat on it. 3 His appearance was like lightning, and his clothes were white as snow.

5 The angel said to the women, “Do not be afraid, for I know that you are looking for Jesus, who was crucified. 6 He is not here; he has risen, just as he said. Come and see the place where he lay. 7 Then go quickly and tell his disciples: ‘He has risen from the dead and is going ahead of you into Galilee. There you will see him.’ Now I have told you.”

The actions of the angel and the words of the angel.

The angel caused the quake!! So often in the Bible and earthquake is a sign -“The Lord is speaking!”  The earth shook / quaked when Jesus died – now it quaked as he rose again.

Hebrews 1:1-2

1 In the past God spoke to our forefathers through the prophets at many times and in various ways, 2 but in these last days he has spoken to us by his Son, …

Jesus is God’s final word to mankind – he is the supreme revelation of God – God is not going to speak in a better way – the resurrection shows that Jesus is the Messiah, the Son of God.

“Stone rolled away” – picked up and removed – sat upon like a hunter sitting on a prize kill!

WHY was the stone moved? So Jesus could get out of the tomb?? NO!! He could walk through walls!! It was as a witness to the women, the guards and the other disciples.

The angel then speaks to the women – “He is risen – go tell his disciples!!”

2. THE WITNESS OF THE WOMEN.

Matthew 28:1

1 After the Sabbath, at dawn on the first day of the week, Mary Magdalene and the other Mary went to look at the tomb. (NIV)

Matthew 28:5-7

5 The angel said to the women, “Do not be afraid, for I know that you are looking for Jesus, who was crucified. 6 He is not here; he has risen, just as he said. Come and see the place where he lay. 7 Then go quickly and tell his disciples: ‘He has risen from the dead and is going ahead of you into Galilee. There you will see him.’ Now I have told you.” (NIV)

The two Marys [plus other – see other gospels]

Their devotion to Jesus was evident – following his ministry – at the cross – at his burial [must have been there otherwise would not have know where to go] — Now at tomb.

The women did not see Jesus rise – just the results of his having risen.

We could expect a rebuke in view of their lack of faith – Jesus had said he would rise on the third day – why were they so afraid and surprised???  “He said he would rise again and again and again ……….

BUT no rebuke from the angel just a gentle reminder.  He is not here; he has risen, just as he said.

How gentle God is with his children!!

Just a “Come and see.” Come and witness for yourself the resurrection. NOW go and tell the disciples. And they ran to tell!

There is no suggestion that the women doubted the angel’s witness.

Now I have told you.  – You are now witnesses – it is your responsibility to carry the message to the disciples. – Once you have witnessed tha risen Christ you are responsible to be a witness for the risen Christ and to be a carrier of his message.

They believed and ran to obey.

When they met Jesus on the way  – their response is the only true response we can have to the risen Lord – worship at his feet

His message ‘ Go tell those cowards who ran off and left me alone I never want to see them again!!’  NO!! NO!!

‘Tell my brothers….’

What an encouragement – no matter how much we let him down he comes to us “My brother, my sister”

3. THE WITNESS OF THE GUARDS.

 

Matthew 28:4 4 The guards were so afraid of him that they shook and became like dead men. (NIV)

What quaked more – the earth or the guards.

The Jewish leaders had made the tomb secure – a stone – a seal – a Roman guard. What puny, futile efforts in the face God’s resurrection power. God laughs at man’s security!

Psalm 2:4

4 The One enthroned in heaven laughs;

the Lord scoffs at them. (NIV)

Psalm 46:6

6 Nations are in uproar, kingdoms fall;

he lifts his voice, the earth melts. (NIV)

Matthew 28:11-15

11 While the women were on their way, some of the guards went into the city and reported to the chief priests everything that had happened. 12 When the chief priests had met with the elders and devised a plan, they gave the soldiers a large sum of money, 13 telling them, “You are to say, ‘His disciples came during the night and stole him away while we were asleep.’ 14 If this report gets to the governor, we will satisfy him and keep you out of trouble.” 15 So the soldiers took the money and did as they were instructed. And this story has been widely circulated among the Jews to this very day. (NIV)

The women saw and spread the news – the guards allowed themselves to be used to hush up the news and to tell lies!!

Only some of the guard wen to the Jewish leaders – they were scattered.

The Sanhedrin – do not reject their story – not told if they believed the stroy BUT they didn’t want it linked to claims of the resurection.

The lengths to which people will go to surpress the truth.

ILLUS.: Deedat – He knows his arguments against the gospel are weak BUT he plays on the ignorance of the people.

They stole the body – think about that – John tells iu that the grave clothes were neatly placed in the tomb. [Jn.20v7]

The disciples stole the body but first took the time to unwrap it and neatly fold the grave clothes while a guard of Roman soldiers was outside!!! After having moved a 2 ton stone so quietly that they did not wake the sleeping guards.

ILLUS.: Imagine the conversation with one guard after hearing the explanation.

Enquirers #1 “O that explains it then”

”        #2 “ You mean to tell me that all 12 [?] of you were asleep when a few fishermen came and moved the stone and carried away the body and you never woke!! Some sllepers you must be?!!”

”             #3 – a believer –  ” If you were sleeping how do you know what happened? You didn’t see anyone carrying the body away! You are merely guessing!! I too have a solution and it is far more reasonable than yours – Jesus rose from the dead!!”

All man solution to the resurrestion are flawed! There is more evidence for the historical evidence of Jesus Christ than for any other historical event of the time!!

 

4. THE WITNESS OF THE DISCIPLES.       

Matthew 28:16-20

16 Then the eleven disciples went to Galilee, to the mountain where Jesus had told them to go. 17 When they saw him, they worshipped him; but some doubted. 18 Then Jesus came to them and said, “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. 19 Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptising them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, 20 and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you. And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age.” (NIV)

The response of the disciples was the same as the women – they worshipped!!

“.. some doubted.”  – only temporarily. We know that they all did believe [Acts 1 coming of Spirit on all]

They were witnesses to:-

His Claim – ALL authority.

His Commission – ALL nations

His Comfort  – ALL time

Women    – saw – believed – GO!}

} be witnesses

Disciples – saw – believed – GO!}

As you go MAKE DISCIPLES OF ALL NATIONS (ta eqnh)

MY WITNESS! —

Problem with being in Missionary / Church work we tend to get caught up in activities of keeping the machinery of OUR ministry going and can loose sight of the world and people.

How many non-Christian friends do you have??

Witnessing is not just linked to aggressive evangelism!

Acts 1v8 “….. BE my witnesses.”  “Witnessing is not something we DO, it is something we are.”  “It is not what I say, it is what I am”

Jesus did not get his authority because he rose from the dead – He had the authority and he demonstrated it by rising from the dead.

As HIS witnesses we have HIS authority because HE is with us ALWAYS!!

Matthew 14:22-33 When Faith Falters

INTRODUCTION

Many of you know Joni Erickson Tada. She was paralyzed in a swimming accident as a teen. This life-changing accident lead her on a journey of faith. And from her experiences with God, she has become a well known Christian speaker and artist. In a recent devotional she wrote about another moment of importance in her life. She says,

“When I was little and went horseback riding with my sisters, I had a hard time keeping up. My problem was that I was riding a little pony only half the size of their mounts. I had to gallop twice as fast just to keep up. I didn’t mind. I took it as a challenge until we came to the edge of a river. My sisters on their big horses thought it was fun and exciting to cross the river at the deepest part. They never seemed to notice that my little pony sank quite a bit deeper into the swirling waters. It was scary, but I wasn’t about to let them know.”

So, Joni rode her mount into the river; she continues,

“One crossing in particular sticks in my memory: the Gorsuch Switch Crossing on the Patapsco River. It had rained earlier that week and the river was brown and swollen
As our horses waded out toward midstream, I became transfixed staring at the swirling waters rushing around the legs of my pony. It made me scared and dizzy. I began to lose my balance in the saddle.”

Have you ever crossed a stream on a fallen log? I can tell you, you’re fine until you look down at the rushing water and then suddenly you’re off balance, struggling to keep from falling and you usually wind up scooting across the rest of the way on the seat of your pants. Or you climb up a ladder to get to that high pitch of the roof, to repair a loose shingle. And when you look down, you freeze. That is what it is like when doubt seeps in; we lose our focus, our sense of balance, and our confidence. You know what I mean, you are going along in life and everything is going your way until something happens that makes you doubt and then it seems that everything turns against you. You get a good job and they tell you you are doing great but the company gets bought off and you find yourself unemployed wondering if anyone will ever hire you again. You’re in a good relationship but you’re afraid to trust him and the doubt begins to drive a wedge of suspicion between you. You’ve always wanted to go to college, but you got more than one C in school, so you changed your mind, and took the first job offered to you after you graduated.

Doubt. It is that insidious, spreading fear that makes us take our eyes off the goal and question our abilities and worth. That’s what happened to Peter. For a moment, he was walking on water, literally, then doubt seeped in and he began to sink. I love this biblical story because Peter is so human, he is so like us. He is bold and willing to take risks on the one hand and fearful and full of doubt on the other. He shows us what it means to be a Christian caught midway between faith and doubt. We want to believe but doubt comes so naturally to us. In fact, this very story challenges the faith of many of us. We have a hard time conceiving of anyone walking on water. Our faith sinks as we doubt the validity of a story which violates natural law. But just for now try to put the science aside. This scripture isn’t concerned with science but faith. Focus on what the story says about who Jesus is and what it means to be one of his disciples.

The first thing we should notice is that while Jesus made the disciples get into the boat and sent them across the sea, he went up the mountain by himself to pray. The story gives us bifocal image – in one scene we see Jesus in prayer on the mountain, which traditionally symbolizes the place where the presence and power of God is found – while at the same time the disciples were being battered by wind and waves in a small boat on the sea. They were rowing for all they were worth but getting nowhere because the wind was against them. Have you ever felt like that? That no matter how hard you tried, you just couldn’t get ahead? You work and work but still can’t get the bills paid up. You’ve been in program after program but you still can’t break the addiction. You try a new diet every month but you still can’t lose the weight the doctor says has to come off. You’ve been to therapist after therapist, but still the pain won’t let you go. Sometimes it seems the wind is against us and our efforts are fruitless. By the time Jesus came walking toward them in the hours just before dawn, the disciples were soaked to the bone, dead-tired and near despair. They’d been rowing for hours but the shore didn’t seem much closer than when they’d started. The wind was against them and they were getting no where on their own. Then they saw Jesus and cried out in fear, “It’s a ghost.” But he immediately reassured them, “Take heart, it is I; do not be afraid.” Jesus had been on the way to his disciples for a long time before they noticed him. He was concerned with their needs even when he seemed to be absent from them. The time on the mountain was not time apart from them, but time preparing for the work of saving them.

When life is battering us around and the wind is against us, sometimes we don’t realize that Jesus is coming to us through the events of our lives. We may not immediately recognize the ways that he is present, interceding for us. But he is there, working for our good long before we are able to hear the words of assurance, “Take heart, it is I; do not be afraid.” But like Peter, sometimes we want proof. How do we know that Jesus is the one who comes to us? We catch a glimpse of something but it is fleeting and mysterious. How do we know that Jesus is there in the shadows, coming across the turmoil of our lives? How do we know that he is the one who can help us? Peter said, “Lord if it is you, command me to come to you on the water.” It was an odd question. He might have said, “Lord, if it is you, make this storm stop,” or “Lord, if it is you, give us the strength of ten men so we can make it to the other side of the sea.” But Peter wanted more than that. He said, “If it is you, bid me come to where you are. Let me join you on the water. Show me that I can do whatever you command me to do. Take away my doubt. Make me have faith.” And Jesus said “come.” Barbara Brown Taylor paints a vivid description of what this moment must have been like:

“Peter swung his legs over the side of the boat and, while all the other disciples watched with their hearts beating in their mouths, he placed his feet on the surface of the water – the waves crashing against the side of the boat, the wind whipping his hair into his eyes – he put his feet flat on top of the water, took a huge, trembling breath, and stood up. Then he took a few hesitant steps toward Jesus across the heaving surface, like the first steps he ever took in his life, and he was doing fine until a gust of wind almost toppled him, and he got scared and felt his feet sinking into the black waves below and he went down like a stone.”

We know that sinking feeling. When doubt creeps into our minds and fear grips our hearts we stop hoping for what is possible and start worrying about all that could go wrong. When our faith falters, we take our eyes off the goal and focus on the obstacles. And when we do, they grow larger and more powerful and we sink under their weight. If the fear of failure is foremost in your mind, then you will certainly fail. It is the nature of human behavior. It is also the nature of faith, but with a slight difference. For a moment, Peter forgot that he wasn’t dependent only upon his own ability. It wasn’t what he could accomplish, but what God could accomplish through him. He lost sight of the one who called him to venture forth from the safety of the boat and gave him the power to fulfill what had been commanded. He accepted the risk of faith by answering Jesus’ call and climbing over the rim of the boat but his doubt crept back when he felt the force of the wind and saw the size of the waves. He shifted his attention from the power of God in Jesus to his own limitations and fears and he started to sink like a rock.

CONCLUSION

But before he went down, he cried out, “Lord, save me.” Jesus immediately reached out a strong hand to catch him and haul him into the boat, wet and shivering. At least Peter had the good sense to call out for help when he needed it. Some of us would rather drown than admit we need help! We should notice that Matthew says Jesus immediately reached out to catch him. He didn’t have to beg for help or wait until he was floundering in the water – the help was there immediately, even as Jesus rebuked him, “you of little faith, why did you doubt?” Why do any of us doubt? “Because we are afraid, because the sea is so vast and we are so small. Because the storm is so powerful and we are so easily sunk. Because life is beyond our control and we are so helpless in its grip? Why do we doubt? Because we are afraid, even when we do have faith. Because we do have faith, you know. We do not have none; we have some. Like Peter, we have a little and a little is better than nothing.” In the Gospel of Matthew the word oligopistos (of little faith) was never used to speak of nonbelievers. Rather it was spoken as a rebuke to people of faith who didn’t use the resources of faith available to them. Jesus rebuked Peter not for being faithless, but for not exercising the faith that he had. Faith is like a muscle, it will waste away if it is not used. It must be exercised; it must be practiced. Jesus had taught the disciples that with the faith of a mustard seed they could move mountains. But faced with the immediate threat of a churning sea, Peter’s doubt seemed more real to him than his faith. Yet, in his
moment of crisis he reached out with the little bit of faith that he had and it was enough.

That is the good news in this story. Jesus can reach out to save us of little faith, even as we sink in doubt and fear. That is good news indeed, because like Peter, faith and doubt are all mixed up in us – giving us courage and feeding our fears, lifting us up and bearing us down, supporting our weight on the wild seas of our lives and sinking us like stones. Faith and doubt co-exist in us. We obey and fear, we walk and sink, we believe and doubt
It is not like we do only one or the other, we do both. “Which is why we need Jesus,” says, Taylor. “It’s why we wouldn’t be caught dead on the water without him. Our fears and doubts may paralyze us, but they are also what makes us cry out for his saving touch. If we never sank – if we could walk on the water just fine all by ourselves – we wouldn’t need a savior. . . Our doubts, fearsome as they are remind us who we are and whose we are and whom we need in our lives to save us. When we sink, as Peter does, as we all do, our Lord reaches out and catches us, responding first with grace and then with judgment – “Why did you doubt?” – but never, never with rejection. He returns us to the boat knowing full well that the only reason we are in the boat in the first place is because we believe, or want to believe, and because we mean to follow him through all our doubtful days.”

Maybe our desire to believe is enough for Jesus to work with. It is at least a beginning. It gives us a place in the boat with the others who are struggling to believe more and doubt less. It is in the boat that we find people who are listening for Jesus’ voice in the darkness. It is there that we find people willing to obey the call when it comes and take the risk of faith. And it is there that we find help when the seas of life threaten to overwhelm us. Maybe it is enough to offer up our little faith, praying with the epileptic in the gospel of Mark, “Lord, I believe, help Thou my unbelief (Mark 9:24).” When Peter was hauled out of the sea by the scruff of his neck, he fell grateful and exhausted onto the deck of the boat. Then Jesus climbed in behind him. Did you notice that? When Peter couldn’t come to Jesus, Jesus came to him and to all those waiting there in the boat. When we can’t walk to
Jesus, Jesus walks toward us and climbs into our life circumstances with us to bring the
help that we need. And like Peter Joni found the help she needed, in her moment of doubt and fear. She wrote,

“The voice of my sister Jay finally broke through my panic. “Look up, Joni! Keep looking up!” Sure enough, as soon as I focused on my sister on the other side, I was able to regain my balance and finish the crossing.”

And she concludes her story with reference to this event,

“That little story came to mind recently when I was reading about Peter in Matthew 14. It seems he had a similar problem as he walked on the water toward the Lord Jesus. He looked down at the raging waters, got dizzy, and lost his balance. Because he took his eyes off the Lord and put them on the swirling waves around him, he began to sink. How much we are like him! …we let our circumstances almost transfix us,… We become dizzy with fear and anxiety And before you know it, we’ve lost all balance. It’s easy to panic, isn’t it? And admittedly, it’s hard to look up especially when you feel like you’re sinking. But my pony and I made it across the Patapsco and Peter made it back to his boat. Thousands before you, enduring the gale force winds of circumstance, have made it through keeping their eyes on the Lord Jesus!”

And as Peter and the disciples learned the lesson of faith and doubt, they also discovered the care and compassion of Christ; and they learned of the faithfulness and presence of God. The moment Jesus stepped into the boat, the sea became calm and the wind was stilled and everyone knew they were in the presence of the Almighty God. And they fell
down and worshipped him. They recognized the God who has promised them, and each and everyone of us.

[But now] thus says the Lord,
He who created you, O Jacob,
He who formed you, O Israel:
Fear not for I have redeemed you;
I have called you by name, you are mine;
When you pass through the waters I will be with you;
and through the rivers, they shall not overwhelm you;
When you walk through fire you shall not be burned,
and the flame shall not consume you.
For I am the Lord your God,
the Holy One of Israel, your Savior.
Isa 43:1-3

When the winds which have been against us suddenly cease, when the fears that have gripped us lose their power, when the deliverance that we have hoped for is in sight, then we know without a doubt that we are in the presence of the Almighty. And like the disciples “in the awesome silence of that night becoming day, all of us who are in this boat together worship him, saying, ’Truly, you are the son of God.’”