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Easter Sunday Reflection PERFECT LOVE DRIVES OUT FEAR – AND BRINGS HOPE Matthew 28:1-23

Easter Sunday Reflection PERFECT LOVE DRIVES OUT FEAR – AND BRINGS HOPE Matthew 28:1-23. Penge Baptist Church 31st March 2013. The Resurrection Account….

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Easter Sunday Reflection PERFECT LOVE DRIVES OUT FEAR – AND BRINGS HOPE Matthew 28:1-23

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  1. Easter Sunday ReflectionPERFECT LOVE DRIVES OUT FEAR – AND BRINGS HOPEMatthew 28:1-23 Penge Baptist Church 31st March 2013

  2. The Resurrection Account…. • After the Sabbath, at dawn on the first day of the week, Mary Magdalene and the other Mary went to look at the tomb. 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. His appearance was like lightning, and his clothes were white as snow. The guards were so afraid of him that they shook and became like dead men. The angel said to the women, “Do not be afraid, for I know that you are looking for Jesus, who was crucified. He is not here; he has risen, just as he said. Come and see the place where he lay.

  3. 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 women hurried away from the tomb, afraid yet filled with joy, and ran to tell his disciples. Suddenly Jesus met them.“Greetings,” he said. They came to him, clasped his feet and worshiped him. Then Jesus said to them, “Do not be afraid. Go and tell my brothers to go to Galilee; there they will see me.”

  4. What’s to fear? • Top ten phobias! • Death • Thunder and lightning • Cancer • Vomiting • Heights • Closed spaces • Open spaces • Flying • Social situations • SPIDERS!

  5. What’s to fear? • Our fears and anxieties stem from the “curse of Eden” - due to our rejecting God • Pain • To the woman he said, “I will greatly increase your pains in childbearing; with pain you will give birth to children. • Human oppression and injustice • Your desire will be for your husband, and he will rule over you.” • The disorder of creation • To Adam he said, “Because you listened to your wife and ate from the tree about which I commanded you, ‘You must not eat of it,’ “Cursed is the ground because of you; through painful toil you will eat of it all the days of your life. It will produce thorns and thistles for you, and you will eat the plants of the field.

  6. Frustration in work • By the sweat of your brow you will eat your food • Sickness and death • until you return to the ground, since from it you were taken; for dust you are and to dust you will return.” • Separation from God • So the LORD God banished him from the Garden of Eden to work the ground from which he had been taken. After he drove the man out, he placed on the east side of the Garden of Eden cherubim and a flaming sword flashing back and forth to guard the way to the tree of life. • Spiritual evil • The woman said, “The serpent deceived me, and I ate.” • But also a promise • “He will crush your head, you will strike his heel” (Genesis 3:15)

  7. The joy of Easter • The curse is lifted – in the new creation • After the Sabbath, at dawn on the first day of the week, Mary Magdalene and the other Mary went to look at the tomb. (Matthew 28:1) • Due to Jesus’ perfect love – and the Father’s • For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life. (John 3:16) • Jesus said “Greater love has no one than this, that he lay down his life for his friends.” (John 15:13)

  8. The end of separation from God • we were in slavery under the basic principles of the world. But when the time had fully come, God sent his Son, born of a woman, born under law, to redeem those under law, that we might receive the full rights of sons. Because you are sons, God sent the Spirit of his Son into our hearts, the Spirit who calls out, “Abba, Father.” So you are no longer a slave, but a son; and since you are a son, God has made you also an heir. (Galatians 4:3-7) • Defeat of the forces of evil • Since the children have flesh and blood, he too shared in their humanity so that by his death he might destroy him who holds the power of death—that is, the devil— and free those who all their lives were held in slavery by their fear of death (Hebrews 2:13-15)

  9. The end of death • If only for this life we have hope in Christ, we are to be pitied more than all men. But Christ has indeed been raised from the dead, the first-fruits of those who have fallen asleep. For since death came through a man, the resurrection of the dead comes also through a man. For as in Adam all die, so in Christ all will be made alive. (1 Corinthians 15:19-22) • The end of sickness and pain foreshadowed • “they will place their hands on sick people and they will get well” (Mark 16:18)

  10. The end of decay foreshadowed • The creation waits in eager expectation for the sons of God to be revealed. For the creation was subjected to frustration, not by its own choice, but by the will of the one who subjected it, in hope that the creation itself will be liberated from its bondage to decay and brought into the glorious freedom of the children of God. We know that the whole creation has been groaning as in the pains of childbirth right up to the present time. (Romans 8:19-22) • his good pleasure, which he purposed in Christ…to bring all things in heaven and on earth together under one head, even Christ. (Ephesians 1:9-10) • The end of injustice and oppression foreshadowed • There is neither Jew nor Greek, slave nor free, male nor female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus. (Galatians 3:28)

  11. A job to do….under divine authority!…. • Then the eleven disciples went to Galilee, to the mountain where Jesus had told them to go. When they saw him, they worshiped him; but some doubted. 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.” (Matthew 28:16-20)

  12. …having been re-created and forgiven! • Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; the old has gone, the new has come! All this is from God, who reconciled us to himself through Christ and gave us the ministry of reconciliation: that God was reconciling the world to himself in Christ, not counting men’s sins against them. (2 Corinthians 5:17-19)

  13. Perfect love drives out fear – and brings Easter Hope! • Jesus’ resurrection at Easter means life before death as well as life after death • Jesus said “I have come that they may have life, and have it to the full.” (John 10:10) • Jesus said “your kingdom come, your will be done, on earth as it is in heaven” (Matthew 6:10) • God said “I am making everything new!” (Revelation 21:4)

  14. “The Lord God took the man and put him in the Garden of Eden to work it and take care of it.” (Genesis 2:15) • “The resurrection of Jesus is a reaffirmation of the goodness of creation and the Gift of the Spirit is there to make us the fully human beings we were supposed to be so we can fulfil that mandate at last” (N T Wright) • “We are God’s fellow workers” (1 Corinthians 3:9) • As Resurrection People, let’s work fearlessly for the new creation, under the authority of the King! • Therefore, my dear brothers, stand firm. Let nothing move you. Always give yourselves fully to the work of the Lord, because you know that your labor in the Lord is not in vain. (1 Corinthians 15:58)

  15. Bringing Easter hope, in love and gratitude • “every act of love, every deed done in Christ and by the Spirit, every work of true creativity, every time justice is done, peace is made, families are healed, temptation is resisted, true freedom is sought and won – then this earthly event takes place within a long history of things that implement Jesus’ own resurrection and anticipate the final new creation, acting as signposts of hope pointing back to the first and on to the second” (NT Wright)

  16. And never underestimate God’s Resurrection power

  17. If you have never been baptised… • We were therefore buried with him through baptism into death in order that, just as Christ was raised from the dead through the glory of the Father, we too may live a new life. (Romans 6:4)

  18. And if you are not a Christian today… • “As God’s fellow workers we urge you not to receive God’s grace in vain. For he says, “In the time of my favor I heard you, and in the day of salvation I helped you.” I tell you, now is the time of God’s favor, now is the day of salvation.” (2 Corinthians 6:1-2)

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