Job’s Easter Hope

What this episode covers

Old Testament Reading Our Old Testament reading and our sermon text this morning is Job chapter 19, verses 21 through 27. And this is God’s inspired, inerrant, infallible word. Let’s hear the word of God. Have mercy on me, have mercy on me, O you my friends, for the hand of God has touched me. Why do you, like God, pursue me? Why are you not satisfied with my flesh? Oh, that my words were written. Oh, that they were inscribed in a book. Oh, that with an iron pen and lead they were engraved in the rock forever. For I know that my Redeemer lives, and at the last he will stand upon the earth. And after my skin has been thus destroyed, yet in my flesh, I shall see God, whom I shall see for myself, and my eyes shall behold, and not another. My heart faints within me. New Testament Reading You can keep your place there and turn to 1 Corinthians chapter 15 for our New Testament reading. 1 Corinthians 15 verses 12 through 22. So 1 Corinthians 15, 12 through 22. Now, if Christ is proclaimed as raised from the dead, how can some of you say that there is no resurrection from the dead? But if there is no resurrection of the dead, then not even Christ has been raised. And if Christ has not been raised, then our preaching is in vain and your faith is in vain. We are even found to be misrepresenting God because we testified about God that he raised Christ, whom he did not raise, if it is true that the dead are not raised. For if the dead are not raised, not even Christ has been raised. And if Christ has not been raised, your faith is futile and you are still in your sins. Then those also who have fallen asleep in Christ have perished. If in Christ we have hope in this life only, we are of all people most to be pitied. But in fact, Christ has been raised from the dead, the first fruits of those who have fallen asleep. For as by a man came death, by a man has come also the resurrection of the dead. For as in Adam all die, so also in Christ shall all be made alive. The grass withers, the flower fades, but the word of our God endures forever. The Joy and Meaning of Easter When I was a kid, I loved Easter. Of course, for me at that time, Easter had absolutely nothing to do with Jesus or the resurrection, but I loved Easter baskets full of candy and chocolate bunnies and Easter egg hunts and all of that. But when I came to faith in Christ as a young adult, I came to love Easter for much better reasons. I loved hearing about the empty tomb, the resurrection of Christ, singing the great Easter hymns, greeting others with “He is risen.” I do love our Easter breakfast too before the congregation, before our worship. So that’s another reason to love Easter. There are countless reasons why as Christians we should rejoice and celebrate that glorious day when our Lord Jesus emerged from the tomb. One reason we should love Easter is because the resurrection of Christ is the guarantee that our faith and hope as Christians are not in vain, that all that we do as believers in Christ, all that we live for as Christians is not in vain. The empty tomb is the guarantee that what we believe is true, that we are truly serving the living Lord Jesus. As we heard in our New Testament reading from 1 Corinthians, the Apostle Paul says, if the dead are not raised, not even Christ has been raised. And if Christ has not been raised, your faith is futile and you are still on your sins. But praise the Lord, that is not the case. The tomb that contained Jesus for those three days, it was empty on that Easter morning, it is still empty today. Paul says, in fact, in fact, Christ has been raised from the dead, the first fruits of those who have fallen asleep. The tomb is empty, and one day the whole world will know what we now know by faith, and that is Jesus Christ. He is the true, the living Lord of lords, King of kings. He is the savior of all who come to him in faith. So praise God for the resurrection of Jesus. Another reason why we should love Ea

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