Latest revision as of 17:14, 17 April 2025

Theological Proposition/Focus: In light of Christ's resurrection, we are called to transition from passive observers to active participants in sharing the hope of the Gospel, knowing that death is defeated and life is renewed in Him.

Christ Focus: Christ's resurrection is the fulfillment of Old Testament prophecy and is central to the New Testament, embodying the promise of eternal life and victory over sin and death, affirming Him as the Savior of all humanity.

Homiletical Proposition/Application: Christians must move beyond their fears and doubts to act on the truth of Christ's resurrection. By embracing the victory over death, believers are motivated to share the good news and engage actively in their faith community.

Introduction

Image: After that I will never do it the same.

When I worked at the autoshop through college, July was rough. People would bring their cars in with it 90 degrees outside, their radiator nearly boiling, and ask if we could get the oil changed in the next fifteen minutes while they ran into the gas station to grab a hotdog for lunch.

We would say yes and get to work. The worst part would be pulling the drain plug and having piping hot oil hit your arm. Then one of the older guys saw what we were doing, came over, and taught us a trick I will never forget. He took a rag, put it over the shop vac nozzle, and placed it on the oil filler port. Then when I pulled the drain plug, voilà, no boiling oil running down my arm.

I looked at him and remarked, "You just changed my life!"

Then guess what? Over the years to come, I had great joy showing that same trick to new hires each year.

Okay, so maybe that didn't really change my life, but it strikes me how learning one thing can, in fact, change everything.

Need: We need to have our whole world turned upside down by the resurrection of Jesus Christ.

Preview: We need to understand the significant surprise of the resurrection so that we might run to God with abandon, simply believing all He has revealed to us.

Text: John 20:1-10 read all at the beginning.

Setting the Stage:

Death is a reality that we all deal with. One of the hardest things about the death of a loved one is the moments when you experience that split-second hope that they are not dead.

You probably know what I mean. You walk in the door and for just a second, you hope you would be greeted by that friendly smile or "hello." But we all know the reality: death, as far as life here and now, is a final thing. People don't come back from the dead. The one who earnestly waits to again hear the voice of the loved one instead is faced with silence.

I want us to go back 2000 years in the past. You have just spent three years nearly every day with this man Jesus and his group of twelve close followers. This Jesus spoke like no one has ever spoken. He loved like no one has ever loved, and for the first time in as long as you can remember, you felt like life had meaning.

In fact, before Jesus, you had faced deep affliction at the hands of seven demons (Luke 8:2, Mark 16:9), but Jesus had cast them out, forever changing your life. After all that time when things reached a climax, disaster struck. You were standing there at the cross when Jesus was crucified (Matthew 27:55-56, John 19:25), and now the time has come to say goodbye.

This passage recounts the momentous discovery of the empty tomb by Mary Magdalene and the subsequent revelation of Christ's resurrection, a pivotal event that shifts despair into hope and calls for decisive action.

Body

Significant Surprise — If death can be defeated, then nothing should surprise us (1-2).

Mary's initial response to finding the stone rolled away is a natural one. It reminds us that we should acknowledge our own initial moments of confusion or disbelief in our spiritual journeys. We should recognize our fears and uncertainties about faith and move forward from them.

If you live long enough, you learn to expect things to follow a normal path of behavior.

As a general rule, Occam's Razor works because things happen in predictable ways. But what we learn in John 20 is that nothing went as Mary, Peter, and John expected. But before we get too deep into that, I want us just to notice the flow of the text.

John's narrative moves from the death of Jesus immediately into the resurrection. Remember Jesus died on the day of preparation before the Passover, but if we read John's narrative, the Passover is completely passed over. We don't know what the disciples did or how they mourned. We don't know what damper was placed on the Passover celebration. It is as if Saturday never happened. But I think that is part of John's point. What happened Sunday was so profound that everything else fades.

What is clear from chapter 20 is that Mary was not expecting her Sunday to go as it did. We read that while it was still dark, early in the morning, Mary went to the tomb. Matthew 28 and Luke 24 tell us that Mary was not alone but that she, along with the other Mary, had brought spices that they had prepared for the body of Jesus. Why would they be doing this? Because this was the normal thing to do.

The surprise occurs when they arrive and find that the large stone that was intended to be hard to move has been rolled away. Things are not as they were expected to be. The text does not tell us if Mary went in to look for the body of Jesus or just made an assumption, but verse 2 makes it clear that Mary is quite worried. And her primary concern is, where has the body of Jesus been placed? I want us to understand that this is the normal concern in this situation.

The empty tomb was a surprise, and the initial assumption was a wrong assumption.

Mary did not expect the tomb to be empty.

Jesus has alluded to His resurrection, but the followers did not seem to get it.

• John 2:19-22 "Jesus answered them, 'Destroy this temple, and I will raise it again in three days.' They replied, 'It has taken forty-six years to build this temple, and you are going to raise it in three days?' But the temple he had spoken of was his body. After he was raised from the dead, his disciples recalled what he had said. Then they believed the scripture and the words that Jesus had spoken."

a. Jesus metaphorically refers to His body as the temple and predicts His resurrection.

• John 10:17-18 "The reason my Father loves me is that I lay down my life—only to take it up again. No one takes it from me, but I lay it down of my own accord. I have authority to lay it down and authority to take it up again. This command I received from my Father."

a. Jesus clearly states that He has the power to lay down His life and take it up again, referring to His resurrection.

• John 11:25-26 "Jesus said to her, 'I am the resurrection and the life. The one who believes in me will live, even though they die; and whoever lives by believing in me will never die. Do you believe this?'"

a. Jesus declares Himself as the source of resurrection and eternal life, foreshadowing His own victory over death.

So what assumption does Mary make? I think Mary assumed that someone, probably the Jews, had taken the body of Jesus. Mary was there to honor Jesus with spices and instead discovers what she believes to be a most dishonorable state; the body of Jesus has been stolen. The problem is that Mary's assumption was wrong.

We need to remember that when God is at work, nothing is impossible.

The empty tomb is a key piece of evidence in the argument for the historical reality of the resurrection of Jesus Christ. Here's how it connects to the case for the resurrection:

The tomb was known and guarded

a. Jesus was buried in the tomb of Joseph of Arimathea, a well-known figure (Matthew 27:57-60). This means the location of the tomb was public knowledge.

b. The tomb was sealed and guarded by Roman soldiers (Matthew 27:62-66). This makes the idea of the body being stolen highly unlikely.

The tomb was found empty by women

a. The first witnesses of the empty tomb were women (Matthew 28:1-10, Mark 16:1-8, Luke 24:1-12, John 20:1-18).

b. In first-century Jewish culture, women's testimony was not highly valued, so if the empty tomb story were fabricated, it is unlikely that women would have been chosen as the primary witnesses. This suggests authenticity.

The Jewish and Roman authorities could not produce the body

a. The simplest way to disprove the resurrection would have been to produce Jesus' body.

b. Neither the Jewish leaders nor the Roman authorities could do this. Instead, they spread the story that the disciples stole the body (Matthew 28:11-15), which ironically confirms that the tomb was empty.

What seemed impossible is what had actually happened. Jesus was back!

Image: My new old riding lawn mower.

When Emily and I were first married, we lived in a really old house next to a large open field. The grass was in terrible shape; some of you know how much that bothers me, and the weeds from the field came right up to the property. In the summer, the weeds would grow tall, so I would take my push mower and mow down a significant part of the field to try to make things look halfway decent. In the fall, the mice would come flowing in from the field.

So, I began to think, I really wish I had a riding lawn mower. The thing is, we could not afford one. Our rent at the time was $350 a month, and that was pushing it for our budget as college students. As I sought wisdom and prayed, I knew a riding mower was outside of my pay.

A few weeks later, as I was leaving church on Sunday, Earl, one of the emeritus deacons at the church, approached me and asked, "Say, I just bought me a new lawn tractor and was wondering if you would want to come by and pick up my old riding lawn mower and you could tinker with it?"

I was in shock; what had just happened? I had literally told no one, not even Emily, about my desire to have a riding lawn mower because I thought it was a stupid idea so far beyond my budget that I would sound foolish to even mention it. Moreover, this was far from a need; this was a want.

That day I learned something: God wants to provide for not just my needs but my wants. At this point in my life, I have lost track of the number of times God has given me a want. What I have found is that God surprises me by doing the unexpected.

MTR: Ask yourself, "What impossible situation am I facing right now?" And then pray for God to act in that situation.

With Abandon — Don't be afraid to run to God with abandon (3-7).

Consider the difference in responses between Peter and the other disciple. Like them, believers are called to actively investigate and seek understanding of the resurrection's implications. The resurrection invites us to explore and understand God's truth, moving us from passive knowledge to active understanding.

Step 1: If you see something happening, you probably want to expedite your response.

I love what we read here in the text. It tells us that once the disciples had heard from Mary, they ran to the tomb. If you look carefully through the book of John, you'll see that the "other disciple" is none other than John himself. So, we have Peter and John beginning to run toward the tomb.

The text tells us that while both were running, John outran Peter. Now, I don't think we're supposed to take this as simply a foot race to determine who was the faster runner—though it seems to have been the case that John is faster. Rather, I believe what we're meant to understand is that they ran with full speed and wholehearted determination toward the tomb.

Both Peter and John realized that something significant was happening, and they were not about to be left out. They knew they needed to get there—they needed to know what was happening.

The first step to following God with abandon is going all in. When you see something happening, that first step—perhaps one of the most significant steps—is to move toward it. There is a time to wait and watch, and there is a time to go all in, full speed, leaving nothing behind.

What I love about this narrative of Peter and John is that neither of them took it easy or approached it casually. Both Peter and John went all in—they ran to the tomb.

Image: Running track — Distance races

Back in school, I ran distance races, and there is an important balance in a distance race. You must run hard and leave nothing behind. If at the end of the race you don't feel like you are dying, then you regret not having given it your all.

I was never great, but my brother was on the state champion 4x400 team. I remember the day before they were to head to the state championship; I was working on my parents' sprinkler system, and my brother and his teammates came into the house with t-shirts and markers and very carefully wrote on the t-shirts, "Those who puke together win together," or something like that. The point they were wanting to make was that if you didn't give it everything you had, you were not a winning team.

Don't leave anything on the track.

Step 2: Don't miss the details.

Image: Don't miss the trail signs.

As a middle-aged adult, I am not sure my fastest 5K time is accurate. I am not a fast runner, but a few years ago, Emily's department at UNL had a race for hearing, and she asked me to enter it for fun for her students. So I entered it and decided I was going to run hard. Well, I ran hard and didn't realize that it wasn't actually a race but just a time for people to get together. Anyway, I outran the person riding a bike to put up signs, and I think I took a wrong turn at the end because when I crossed the finish line, my watch was reading something like 2.8 miles.

As we run with abandon, we must also remember not to miss the details.

John 20:3-7 tells us that after hearing the news, Peter and John ran to the tomb. John, arriving first, stoops down and looks in, observing what has happened. When Peter arrives shortly after, he goes straight inside. What they find is astounding—the grave is not as it should be.

The text tells us that both disciples see the linen strips lying there, but Peter notices something more: the face cloth that had been wrapped around Jesus' head is separate from the other linens. This detail is significant. The burial cloths are not in a disorderly heap, as if Jesus' body had simply been taken away. Instead, the face covering is neatly set aside.

The burial cloth, set aside with deliberate order, can be compared to the cloth that Moses used to cover his radiant face when he encountered God. Moses' veil concealed the overwhelming glory of God while preserving the sacred memory of that encounter. The cloth served to separate the people from the glory of God that Moses encountered when meeting with God. The carefully arranged burial cloth signifies a transition—Christ now brings the glory of God to the people and there is no need to hide that glory. Christ's veil is put away, no longer to be used.

This moment also invites us to compare it with the resurrection of Lazarus. When Lazarus comes out of the tomb, he is still bound in his grave clothes, needing others to free him (John 11:44). But here, Jesus is entirely free from the chains of death. He is so free that He even takes the time to set aside His burial cloths—an act of divine order rather than haste.

God is at work in this narrative, and the details reveal His power and purpose. As we run full speed in pursuit of Him, we must also be attentive to His direction and the details He places before us.

Step 3: Inside of God's plan, take action!

Finally, I want you to notice something. We often get after Peter because he is a hothead always plunging in without thinking. But here, Peter's attitude does not get him in trouble; rather, it earns him the honor of being the first one mentioned to have entered the empty tomb (remember earlier that nothing is said about Mary entering).

I have a tendency to jump into things, so I need to be careful here, but I want to encourage you. There are times when it is clear that we are in God's plan, and we need to jump in.

There are times for action.

If you are sitting on the sidelines, it is clear God is leading, and you are wondering if you should jump in, then the answer is yes!

MTR: Evaluate your behaviors; are you all in on God's work?

Simply Believe — Don't worry about understanding it all; worry about believing it all (8-10).

Belief and understanding transformed the disciples from bewildered witnesses to hopeful proclaimers. This encourages us to let the truth of the resurrection propel us into action—sharing hope and living out our renewed purpose in Christ daily.

You are not responsible for what you don't know.

The text tells us that after Peter enters the tomb, John decides to follow and sees the empty tomb and believes. Verse 9 tells us that John did not understand everything yet.

I think there is a lot going on here. The Greek word ἀπίστευσεν (apisteusen), which we translate as believe, is the aorist tense of the verb πιστεύω (pisteuō). In general, we translate aorist tenses as simple past tense in English, but there are times when the aorist should be taken as an ingressive aorist. The ingressive aorist tense "may be used to stress the beginning of an action or the entrance into a state" ^[1]

This is exactly what is happening here in John 20. We see that John saw the empty tomb and entered into a state of belief. That belief is hardly fully realized, but what we see here is the spark of belief. John entered the tomb, saw that Jesus was not there, and the spark was lit.

History tells us that John lived more than 60 years after these events, and he wrote the book of John well into that time. John had much more to learn, but what mattered here is that John believed.

You do not need to be a theological expert in order to simply believe. Salvation comes by simply believing that you are a sinner in need of a Savior and that Jesus Christ died on the cross, paying for sin and rising again as the first of the coming resurrection, showing that God had accepted the gift of Christ's sacrifice as complete payment for sin.

You are responsible for believing Jesus.

The parenthetical in verse 9 is especially significant. Earlier we saw that John believed, but here we see that he did not understand everything. But there is even more here. Notice what John lacked in his knowledge. John did not fully grasp Scripture. This makes me feel good because I also do not understand everything.

What I am saying is this: I think John in this moment believes in the resurrected Christ, but he does not yet understand all the connections throughout Scripture. You do not need to be the foremost theological expert. You don't need to have mastery of Scripture. You should be growing in these areas, but what you need most is to believe in Jesus.

Let me put this another way. If the thing that is hanging you up right now is all the details of Scripture, then I applaud your search for knowledge, but I ask you very simply: What will you do with Jesus? What I mean is simply this: put aside all the theological controversy and let's just take some very simple facts.

There was a historical man named Jesus.

This man taught revolutionary ideas, chief of which was that God loves you and wants a relationship with you.

This man taught that He was the way to that relationship.

He offered Himself on the cross for you and died on that cross.

Three days later, the tomb was empty, and His followers offered their lives on the basis of the empty tomb and resurrection.

What will you do with that reality?

Image: Paul's advice in 1 Timothy 1:4

In 1 Timothy 1:3–4 Paul advises Timothy, "As I urged you when I went into Macedonia, stay there in Ephesus so that you may command certain people not to teach false doctrines any longer 4 or to devote themselves to myths and endless genealogies. Such things promote controversial speculations rather than advancing God’s work—which is by faith." Within context, Paul is trying to help this young pastor to lead well. The larger context of the passage shows that Paul is urging Timothy to keep the church focused on what truly matters—the work of God that comes through faith in Jesus Christ. Not every believer is responsible for mastering every detail of theology or understanding every mystery, but every believer is responsible for trusting in Christ. Endless debates and speculative teachings can become a distraction from the simple, powerful truth of the gospel. Our calling is not to unravel every theological puzzle but to cling to the Savior who has made Himself known.

The question that we all face is: What will you do with the truth?

At this point, the disciples do not understand what is next. So what do they do? They returned to their homes. Guess what? You do not get off so easily. We have the complete word of God, and we can fast forward to Matthew 28:18-20, "Then Jesus came to them and said, 'All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you. And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age.'"

You have been assigned a mission; that mission is to take the truth, apply it to yourself, and then take it throughout the world. What will you do with it?

MTR: Take action on the truth you know.

1. ↑ Daniel B. Wallace, Greek Grammar Beyond the Basics: An Exegetical Syntax of the New Testament (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 1996), 558.