“A-Where Did He Go, George?!”

Today’s the day!

While the guys were still sleeping, a few faithful ladies walked down before dawn to the Garden Tomb to properly – finally – attend to the body of Jesus, as they had been prevented from doing so on the preparation day and Passover.

Tears filled their eyes as they pondered how on earth would they ever be able to move the huge stone that had been placed over the entryway. Only instead of the regiment of guards that Caiaphas had posted there, there was a distinct absence of activity there.

They round the corner leading up to the tomb only to find the stone was already moved…and an angel was sitting on top of it!

Bewildered, they listened to the angel’s words — “Why do you seek the living among the dead? He is not here, for He is risen!” — and looked into the tomb to see it was just as the angel had said….an empty funeral wrapping still in the place they had originally laid Him, but no Jesus.

They immediately ran back to where the disciples were and told them what they saw and heard.

John and Peter ran to the tomb to check it out. John stopped at the door and peered in, amazed. Peter lumbered inside, equally amazed. They departed to share with everyone else what had happened, and the news of Jesus’ resurrection hasn’t stopped spreading ever since.

This changes everything.

What do you intend to do with this, the most impactful news ever reported?

“Evangelists, Take Note…” ((DTFD, April 6))

(from “Daily Thoughts for Disciples” by Oswald Chambers, April 6th entry)

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“We preach Christ crucified.” — 1st Corinthians 1:23

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Never confuse the cross of Christ with the benefits that flow from it.

For all of Paul’s doctrine, his one great passion was the cross of Christ, not salvation, not sanctification, but the great truth that God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son; consequently, you never find him artificial or making a feeble statement. Every doctrine Paul taught had the blood and the power of God in it.

There is an amazing force of spirit in all he said because the great passion behind was not that he wanted people to be holy, that was secondary, but that he had come to understand what God meant by the cross of Christ.

If we have the only idea of personal holiness of being put in God’s showroom, we shall never come anywhere near seeing what God wants; but when we have come where Paul is and God is enabling us to understand what the cross of Christ means, then nothing can ever turn us (see Romans 8:35-39)…

Most of our emphasis today is on what our Lord’s death means to us; the thing that is of importance is that we understand what God means in the cross. Paul did not understand the cross in order that he might receive the life of God; but by understanding the cross, he received the life. Study the cross for no other sake than God’s sake, and you will be holy without knowing it.

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Taken from Daily Thoughts for Disciples, © 1976, 1994 by Oswald Chambers Publications Association, Ltd., and used by permission of Discovery House Publishers, Grand Rapids MI 49501. All rights reserved.

[[Some words Chambers uses are not used often today — click [here] to look up difficult words.]]

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Brief commentary:
The cross is not salvation; the cross is a display of a pre-ordained plan of sacrifice, redemption, and reconciliation rooted in a love we can scarcely comprehend. Salvation is a result, an “effect”, but it’s not the cause.

The cross itself — or, more accurately, what Jesus did upon it — is “the reason”. It’s seriously to everyone’s detriment that we constantly “skip ahead” to the benefits that flow from “the reason” and miss the privilege of pondering the vastness of “the reason”. I’d even go a step farther and say that the reason we notice a lot of “professing Christians” rather than a lot of “humble disciples” is that we’ve skipped ahead too much, so quick to proclaim the benefits without spending any time at all on the heart of the reason.

The God who formed the worlds, who spoke the universe into existence with but a word, who knit you together in your mother’s womb, loves you. Forget the standard “cliché emotion-vacuum” that you might normally experience when seeing that. God really, genuinely, 100% loves YOU. It’s not a punchline; it’s a foundational building block of Creation. God loves you.

Because most of us don’t believe it when we hear that God loves us, He demonstrated His love for us in such a way that it takes a conscious, willful decision for a person to not accept it.

God is God; He doesn’t owe you anything. He created you. He created a world filled with amazing, awesome things within it for you. He gave you a body through which you are able to interact with the world He created for you. He even gives you breath so that your body can continue to interact with the world. Face it: He’s set you up pretty good. He’s provided more than enough for you.

“Nuh-uh,” you might say. “What if my family is poor?” Then consider yourself lucky; riches might bring stuff, but they also bring envies, jealousies, contempt, bitterness, and all sorts of other troubles. Find a disciple of Jesus and they’ll make sure you have enough to eat and a place to sleep, money to put in your gas tank to get to work. Jesus was considered poor, and He never let it stop Him or His disciples from accomplishing what He had for them to do. Are you unable to function or be happy because you are short on material wealth? Don’t use it as an excuse.

“What if I was born with a disability?” Lots of people have been born with some disability or another; strictly speaking, since there has yet to be born a truly “perfect human”, you could say that we’re all disabled somehow or another, we just prefer to turn it into a battle of degrees — “I have it worse than you.” Are you unable to function or be happy because you have a hardship? That’s like saying you can’t drive because your car isn’t as nice as your neighbor’s. The reality is that there are lots of people with the same kind of car you have who are enjoying their drive everyday; maybe it’s time to stop looking at it so negatively and just enjoy the drive.

“Well what if I have had bad things happen to me?” Lots of people have had bad things happen to them; again, everyone to some degree or another has had some bad things happen to them, but we like to think that we have it the worst. Are you unable to function or be happy because bad things have happened to you? That’s like saying you can’t play just because you think other people on your team are better than you are. Even if others around you haven’t had it as bad as you have (in reality, some of them have probably had it worse), having a pouty party and refusing to play ball is silly. If you get hit by a pitch, you take your base and keep playing.

“Well what if people have mistreated me or abused me really bad?” Lots of people have been abused, and to some degree everyone has experienced this from somewhere, be it other kids on the schoolyard or someone at home, etc. Are you unable to function or be happy because others have abused you? That’s like saying because you’ve had to use the bathroom you’re somehow not worthy of eating in the dining room. I’m certainly not going to downplay the “badness” of abuse; however I’m not going to say it’s a reason to lay down and die, either. So someone treated you like crap; if it stinks that bad, flush ’em from your life and walk into another room.

“What’s this all got to do with the cross?” you might say.

The cross is God saying “Not only did I care enough about you to create you, I also care enough about you to redeem you.“

Rebellion is one of those things that really shows how devoted a person is to a relationship. How much rebellion would you put up with from a person, say a co-worker or neighbor? If someone was always fighting with you about things, how long would you be their friend? For most people, the answer would be “Not very long.” What about family members? Likely, it would be more than you’d put up with from strangers, but after a point many people would simply stop showing up to events where the other person is likely to be so as to avoid the fighting. What about your kids, how much rebellion would you put up with from them? Your kids would likely have a longer leash than strangers, and even other family members, but most people still have some threshold that can be crossed.

You’re one of God’s kids, and if you’re anything like me, you’ve been quite a bit rebellious at times. There are likely times when you’ve yelled at Him. There are likely times when, in periods of disappointment after thinking He hasn’t come through for you, you’ve refused to talk to Him. There have maybe even been times when you’ve refused to claim Him as your Father, despising even the idea of being called by His name.

But He remains faithful to us, even when we’re rebellious towards Him. We can fight and kick and scream and call Him names, even deny we’ve ever had anything to do with Him or have any desire to have anything to do with Him in the future; yet He remains faithful, loving us and patiently waiting for us to return home to Him. The cross is the declaration of that love. Everything that flows out of it is secondary to that realization, and only that realization will melt a hardened heart. Evangelists, take note.