Expect a Resurrection | Short Sermon Series

How do you know Jesus is alive? Because he got up from the grave and lives in you - there is resurrection power in you! The tomb wasn’t empty when Jesus got up. Jesus just wasn’t there, but all your fear, shame, sin and death is all left behind in that tomb.

Before Jesus rose from the grave, was a day where people had lost hope and didn’t know what to do next. Little did they know it was a set-up for the next day. Resurrection is not just an idea, it’s a present reality!

Unmet expectations can turn into resentment. In John 11, Marry & Martha said to Jesus ‘If you had been here, our brother wouldn’t have died’. Though Martha knew that Lazarus would ‘rise again in the resurrection at the last day’, our faith isn’t for the future - it’s for the now. And Jesus replied, “I AM the resurrection” and brought Lazarus back to life.

“When Jesus rose early on the first day of the week, he appeared first to Mary Magdalene, out of whom he had driven seven demons.” (Mark 16:9) Isn’t it interesting that the first person Jesus appeared to after his resurrection was the person with the most dysfunction? On Friday, she saw the tomb and fully accepted Jesus’ death and said “it’s over”. But on Sunday, the stone was rolled and it yelled out, “HE IS RISEN”!!

The only way to fully accept resurrection is to fully accept death. Start to expect a resurrection today, because the very unmet expectations and ‘dead places’ in your life are the starting points of resurrection!

Ezekiel 37 / John 11 / Mark 16

Sermon by @stevenfurtick