The Resurrection Changes Everything

00:02 Well, it is a beautiful morning to be alive. It's a wonderful day to know Christ and to be in the center of His will. To be gathered together in divine presence with the brothers and sisters that worship and serve God here at this place. And I was asked to make a particular announcement this morning. 00:22 And so I want to do that at this time. My message is about the change that the resurrection brings. And death brings changes. But we have a couple here that has experienced the changes that death brings in the departure and death of a spouse. 00:43 And in a sense, experiencing a resurrection of sorts. And so this is relating to Steve McCullough and Naomi Otto. Sister, Naomi would like for me this morning to announce their engagement. And so they are looking forward to a late summer wedding. And Lord willing, 01:03 they will be locating around here in Goshen. And so I told them yesterday, I'm grateful that He's not taken her away somewhere. But he said, well, He wouldn't do that. But we want to give our congratulations to Steve and Naomi this morning. 01:24 So death changes things and the resurrection changes things. In fact, the resurrection of Jesus Christ has changed everything. There's nothing that has not been affected by His resurrection. And if you would turn in your copies of the Scriptures this morning to the book of Romans, the 8th chapter, 01:45 be speaking this morning primarily from verse 11 of Romans 8. 01:52 "But if the Spirit of Him who raised Jesus from the dead dwells in you, He who raised Christ from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies through His Spirit who dwells in you." There was a Muslim man who became a Christian. 02:12 And after he became known that he was a Christian, his family or friends asked him, "Why did you leave the Muslim faith to join the Christian faith and to become a Christian?" And he said, "Imagine with me," he said, "if you were walking down a road and you came to a fork in the road. And there was a need to ask for directions. 02:34 And at the fork in the road, there was a dead man and a living man. Which one would you ask for directions?" Well, that makes sense. So he went with the living man. I'm happy to say this morning that Muhammad is not alive. 02:54 But Jesus is alive. And in fact, they say that those who have studied such things of apologetics would say that the resurrection is one of the most documented, provable events in world history. Now, I've not studied that. But I have read some who have studied that. 03:15 And from a legal perspective, those even who have attempted to dissuade people from believing in the resurrection, they have attempted to disprove that Jesus was resurrected from the dead. And it ended up because of looking at the proof, infallible proofs, they have come to be believers in the resurrection themselves. 03:36 And so if you're an atheist or you're an agnostic, you don't believe in the resurrection of Jesus Christ, just start studying it with an open heart and open mind and allow God to show you those proofs. And you can be and will be convinced as others have been. But death does a number of interesting things to people. And the concept of resurrection, 03:58 the promise of resurrection, either strikes hope in the heart of people or fear and terror in the heart of people. I remember reading different accounts in history, more recent history, where people who have tried to get away from the idea of a resurrection. 04:16 And so they have had their casket and their remains firmly encased in concrete. One even went so far as to have engraved in the concrete or at least written on it that this vault is to remain sealed in the case and event of a resurrection. 04:36 And they do not want to stand before God in judgment and in giving an answer. And I remember a woman who was of this persuasion. 04:47 She said, "If there is a resurrection, then out of my concrete encased tomb will grow a tree." And little did she know that there was an acorn that had been planted in that tomb and it began to grow. 05:03 And it actually grew to be a great oak and cracked that concrete encasement. And it's a historical fact. It does interesting things to people who try to deal with death, such as a mother of a 10-year-old daughter. You can have seen pictures of this grave. 05:21 She always comforted her 10-year-old daughter when a storm came through. She was scared of storms. 05:28 And so the mother, in tenderness and wanting to deal with her own grief and her child's loss, she had a stairway, stairs installed at the grave and a glass plate put in the side of the coffin so that she, 05:46 during a storm, could walk down there and sit beside her daughter and comfort her. Interesting things that people do in the face of death. But you know we don't need to do all those things because we have the hope of the resurrection. We know that when a man, a person, a boy or girl, someone dies, their body is just a shell. 06:07 It's to be respected and honored and revered because it was at one point the dwelling place of the image of God and bears the image of God. But it's just a shell. The person is no longer there. 06:19 But one day, as I remember standing at the grave of my grandmother when the pastor who had that funeral made this statement at the graveside, "That this grave, which is one day being occupied, 06:34 will one day be empty." And so I can take you to that spot there in the Fairview Mennonite Church Cemetery in Albany, Oregon, where my grandmother and grandfather are buried and my mother and father are buried. 06:48 And many of those who have gone on before that were heroes in my life have been buried and have taken up a plot of land about 6 by 8 or whatever it is, or 4 by 6 or whatever. But those graves will one day be empty. And so if you end up with your real estate just being a little plot of sod, 07:10 remember you only need it for the weekend. You only need it for the weekend like Jesus needed His grave. D.A. Carson wrote this in the book Scandalous. "There's a school of thought in Christian circles that almost views death so much as a blessing that you are not allowed to cry." Some people, they won't cry at a funeral. 07:29 They're just going to have a celebration. And there's nothing wrong with celebrating and remembering a person's life. But what we celebrate is the resurrection and the hope of the resurrection. But he said, "In the Bible, death is an enemy." Don't ever forget that death is an enemy. It is an enemy. I've seen it. I've seen it. I've been at the bedside of my mother when she passed. 07:49 I've been at the bedside of my father when he passed. I was at the bedside of my mother-in-law when she passed. And I'll tell you, death is an enemy. Now, you put makeup on it and you put it in a nice box and put on this regular clothes and you open the casket and say, 08:08 "Oh, I've seen some people that look better in the casket than they did in life." Really? But it's an enemy. It is an enemy. Don't ever forget that. And he says, "It is ugly. It destroys relationships. It is to be feared. It is repulsive. There is something odious about death. Never pretend otherwise. 08:27 But death does not have the last word. Thank God for a Savior who would claim, 'I am the resurrection and the life.'" We think about the order of events and how that the resurrection changed people's perspective. It changed their course of action. It changed their attitudes. 08:46 It changed the direction of their life. It changed the perspective that they had on life and on the past and on the present and on the future. Death and the resurrection changed the women who were to go and anoint the body of Jesus early in the morning on the resurrection morning, Mary Magdalene and Mary, the mother of James and Salome and other women. 09:08 It changed their direction. As they were going to the tomb, they said, "How are we going to get behind this stone that's been rolled?" And we know what happened was that the angel came and rolled that stone away. 09:20 And they were able to see the angel, see an angel sitting in the front at the head of the bed and at the foot of the bed with the grave clothes in between. And how that they immediately changed all their plans for the day, changed all their plans. And they began to run and tell the disciples about the things that they had seen, 09:41 not fully understanding, just bearing the message of the angel that said, "He is not here, for He has risen as He said." Mary Magdalene hurried to tell Peter and John who ran to the tomb. And it changed their day. It changed their perspective. It changed their eternity as they didn't fully understand what had taken place. 10:02 But as the events unfolded throughout the day and throughout the next 40 days, they began to understand that Jesus was alive, that Jesus was alive. Meanwhile, Mary Magdalene returned to the tomb and stood weeping at the tomb, supposing a man to be the gardener. 10:21 And she said, "Mr. Gardener, if you have any knowledge of where they've taken my Lord, please let me know because I've come to find my Lord." And then he just said one word to her. He just said her name, Mary. And there was such a recognition. And the lights came on. 10:37 It was the light bulb moment when she understood that this was Jesus who was speaking to her. And the glory that filled her heart, the thrill that came through her soul, as happened to the others as they went through that day and the next 40 days. Sometime that afternoon, Jesus appeared to Simon Peter. 10:58 And then the disciples on the road to Emmaus toward the evening, as they walked with Jesus and they heard Him teach the Scriptures to them. What a journey that must have been as Jesus spoke to them and gave them understanding of the Scriptures, the Old Testament Scriptures, 11:18 and how this thing needed to happen, that Christ would come and suffer and die as a criminal on a cross and be buried. And the third day, come back to life, be risen to life forevermore. And that death could not hold Him and the grave could not keep Him. And so when they discovered that this was Jesus, as the lights came on, 11:37 as it were, the sun was fading, but the lights came on. And they immediately, when they recognized Him and He vanished out of their sight, they changed. They changed their course of direction. The resurrection changed everything. I don't know what they were going to Emmaus for. But whatever it was, they hightailed it back to Jerusalem and said, "He's alive. He's risen. 11:57 And we have seen Him." He appeared that night to the 11 apostles, disciples who were enclosed in a room behind locked doors, behind closed doors for fear of the Jews. And He appeared before them, the doors being locked. And He introduced Himself as the risen Lord. 12:19 Later, a week later, He appeared to the 12 or no, to the 11. First, He appeared to the 10 because Thomas wasn't there and Judas was no longer living. And then He appeared to the 11 and allowed Thomas to touch His hands, touch His feet, stick His hand in His side to know that this was not just a spirit. This was a body, 12:39 a body, a resurrected body that shows us a bit what our resurrected body will be like as well. And then He appeared to 7 on the shores of Galilee and made breakfast for them. What a breakfast that would have been. Your breakfast this morning was wonderful, Food Committee. 12:58 And we thank you so much for it. You put a lot of effort and time. And you really hit it and knocked it out of the park as far as I'm concerned. But I'll tell you, a better breakfast was one they experienced on the shores of Galilee as Jesus cooked the fish and gave them and said, "Come and eat with Me. 13:14 Come and dine." And Jesus gave them a meal to share together and restored Peter into the kingdom of God and forgave him as he repented and confessed Christ three times. And of course, then He appeared to the disciples and to more than 500 brothers at one time. 500 people saw Him at one time. 13:36 And James, the half-brother of Jesus, saw Him, the resurrected Christ. And His last appearance was to a small group of followers. I'm not sure how many there were. 13:46 But on the Mount of Olives near Bethany, as He ascended into heaven, as He blessed them, as they remained behind and the clouds received Him out of their sight. And He hasn't been seen in a physical body. Well, I guess He has been with John the Revelator on the island of Patmos. 14:07 But He's not been seen since. Now, He maybe has revealed Himself through some dreams or some visions. But the physical presence of Christ today is in heaven at the right hand of the throne of God. But one day, He will return. 14:24 And we are convinced of that, just as convinced of His return as we are of His first coming and His death and His burial and His resurrection. The same book that promised that promises that He will return. And He will change everything even further. But the resurrection really changed the course of history. 14:45 Now, what does this mean for us? What does the resurrection mean for us? We know it to be a historical fact. But what is the significance of the resurrection? And we read about this in Romans 8:11. "But if the Spirit of Him who raised Jesus from the dead dwells in you..." Now, that's an if. 15:05 If it dwells in you. And the if is yes, if you belong to Christ. Because the Bible says here in the verse just up from that, that if anyone has not the Spirit of Christ, he does not belong to Christ. So if you belong to Christ, the Spirit of God dwells in you. 15:24 And if the Spirit of God dwells in you, the Spirit of Him who raised Jesus from the dead, if He dwells in you, He who raised Christ from the dead will also give life or quicken your mortal body by His Spirit who dwells in you. 15:42 We see three things in this verse this morning that I want to point out to you. First of all, the Spirit of God and the Father working together raised Christ from the dead. The Trinity, the Holy God, raised Jesus of Nazareth from the dead. 15:58 The second thing that we see in this passage is that the Spirit of God dwells in you and in me as believers. And then the third implication of that, and by extension, He raised Jesus from the dead. He dwells in you. 16:15 And the same One who raised Jesus from the dead and dwells in you will raise you from the dead. It's a progression. It's a logical progression that He puts forth here that illustrates the power of God not only to raise Christ but to raise us from the dead at the resurrection. 16:36 And so let us look at these three things this morning. First of all, God by His Spirit raised Jesus from the dead. Peter said that Psalm 16:10 was referring to the Messiah, Jesus Christ. When the psalmist wrote, "Thou wilt not leave my soul in hell or in Hades, the place of the departed dead. 16:57 Thou wilt not leave my soul in hell. Neither wilt thou suffer, Thine Holy One, to see corruption." Who is He speaking of? He was speaking of Christ, of the Messiah who would come a thousand years later. And Peter said this spoke concerning the resurrection of the Christ, that His soul was not left in Hades, 17:19 nor did His flesh see corruption. And so Peter looked at that scripture and said, "That is applying to Jesus, the Son of God." Acts 2:24, it has also said that whom God raised up having loosed the pains of death because it was not possible that He should be held by it. 17:38 Death was not... It wasn't even possible for for Jesus to stay in the grave. It was not possible. And that God raised Him from the dead. Acts 10 says, "Him God raised up on the third day and showed Him openly, not to all the people but to witnesses chosen before by God, 18:00 even to us who ate and drank with Him after He rose from the dead." He wasn't just an appearance. He was a companion. We ate with Him. We drank with Him. We had fellowship with Him. We touched Him. Peter said it in 2 Peter, 1 Peter, I think. No, 1 John. "That which was from the beginning, which we have seen with our eyes, 18:19 which we have touched with our hands, and our hands have handled of the Word of Life." Romans 1:4 says, "And declared to be the Son of God with power according to the Spirit of holiness by the resurrection of the dead." Who raised Christ from the dead? God did. God the Father, God the Spirit. 18:39 Ephesians 1 says, "And what is the exceeding greatness of His power toward us who believe according to the working of His mighty power which He wrought in Christ when He raised Him from the dead." And the point there in Ephesians 1 is that that power that raised Christ from the dead is working in you. 19:00 And so if the Spirit of Him who raised Jesus from the dead dwells in you, then there's some things that you can guarantee are going to happen. Ephesians 1:17. Excuse me. I'm getting ahead of myself. Not only that, did the God raised Him from the dead... Try this one out, that Jesus raised Himself from the dead. 19:22 He was involved in His own resurrection. For Jesus said, "Destroy this temple." He was speaking of the temple of His body. "And after three days, I will build it again." He said, "I will build it again." And He got very specific about this in John 10:17 and 18 when He said, 19:41 "Therefore, my Father loves me because I lay down my life that I might take it again. No one takes it from me, but I lay it down of myself. I have power to lay it down, and I have power to take it up again." And that's exactly what He did. So you have the Trinity, 20:00 the Spirit, the Father, Jesus Himself working together in harmony and in concert on that third day in the grave, in the tomb to bring forth the body of Jesus Christ like a plant being raised in a new kind of humanity, a new body, 20:21 a new physical molecular structure. I don't know how that is, but we know it is reality. This is the day that changed everything. There's a new kind of humanity emerged. And any doubt of who He was is now erased. 20:42 You know, was He the Son of God? Was He not the Son of God? Well, they've debated back and forth, the people who saw Him. Yes, He's a prophet. Yes, He's a priest. Yes, He's a king. Yes, He's the Messiah. But was He or was He not the Son of God? There's no doubt and no debate today because of the resurrection. That doubt has been erased. 21:03 There is no longer subject to weakness. 21:06 His body would never be subject to death and decay and persecution and pain again. He would rise above all pain and suffering, no longer subject to the aging process or to death or disease. Jesus, in His first body, 21:26 in His humanity, was subject to death, was subject to disease, was subject to aging. He aged to the degree of being 33 years old. But no longer is He subject to death and aging and disease. He would live a life forever. And all of the effects of the fall would be negated. 21:48 That's one of the things that the resurrection promises us is that all of the effects of the fall, not just some of them, but all of them will one day be negated. 21:59 This curse that we live under of aging and death and sickness and disease and oppression and physical weakness and emotional tiredness and the downward pull of our old nature will 22:17 one day be all eliminated. It's a day that changed everything, never to suffer again, made perfect, a new creation, one that was now untouchable by the devil, untouchable, unaffected. He was unaffected by temptation from this point on. 22:39 In fact, He now destroyed the works of the devil. 22:42 And through death, He destroyed Him that had the power of death, even the devil, and made them an open display of shame and of humiliation before the world as they watched the devil do his best to try to destroy and instead was destroyed. 23:04 You know, like Brother Aaron said this morning, I think about that a lot. Death is the biggest weapon that Satan has. And if he used his weapon and it didn't work, he's got nothing left. Amen? You take the biggest artillery and you shoot that, you shoot your atomic bomb or whatever, 23:25 your AK-57 or your B-51 or B-10 or whatever bomber, and it doesn't work. There's nothing left. And Jesus destroyed our enemy, the devil. One now who would give us living hope beyond the grave was this Jesus, 23:45 that no one can 23:49 usurp or rise above Him. He was the one who experienced the lowliness of rejection and humiliation, yet rose above it. We experienced the lowliness of rejection and humiliation. And one day, we also will rise above all those things. Because for the first time, 24:09 there were not only footprints going down to the grave, they were coming back out of the grave. I like that concept. I like that concept. The dead and their footprints, as it were, go down into the grave. Every one of us, if the Lord tarries, will end up in the same condition, 24:31 footsteps leading down to the grave. But Jesus' footsteps came out of the grave. And one day, ours will also. If the gospel means anything, it not only means that man can be saved by grace through faith from his sins and his soul experience eternal life, 24:52 but if it means anything at all, it also must include a resurrection of the body to erase the effects and the curse of sin. What really changed on the day of the resurrection and on the day of Pentecost is that the Spirit came to dwell within the believer. 25:15 And so the Spirit of Him who raised Jesus from the dead now dwells in you, in me, in us. A new kind of spiritual life opened up where God would dwell within the human heart to give joy instead of sorrow, 25:37 to give peace instead of turmoil, to give meaning instead of despair and purpose instead of emptiness, where He would change the affections of the heart, where He would give a new power and strength, a new dynamic presence, 25:58 where His Spirit would enable and equip and empower us to live above sin. Romans 8:10 refers to this before the verse before 11 there in our text. 26:11 "And if Christ is in you, the body is dead because of sin, but the Spirit is life because of righteousness." So when the Spirit comes in, there is a... a a a It changes everything. It changes everything. Christ now in us is the hope of glory. 26:33 We had it in Sunday school this morning. If you were in the men's class, Colossians 1:27, it's just Christ in you, the hope of glory. 26:41 Ephesians 3 says that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith, that you, being rooted and grounded in love, may be able to comprehend with all the saints what is the width and length and depth and height and to know the love of Christ which passeth knowledge, that you may be filled with all the fullness of God. And so Christian this morning, 27:03 if you're struggling, if you're struggling with your humanity, you're struggling with your old nature, you're struggling with temptation, you're struggling with sin, you're struggling with habits, you're struggling with rejection, you're struggling with emotional pain, you're struggling with the pain of abuse and mistreatment and rejection, 27:23 let it be known to you that you are filled with all the fullness of God. And if this Christ dwells in you, the body is dead. Yes, the body is subject to this decay because of sin. But the Spirit is life because of righteousness. Ephesians 1:17, 27:45 that the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of glory, may give you the spirit of wisdom and revelation in the knowledge of Him, the eyes of your understanding being enlightened, that you may know what is the hope of His calling, what are the riches of the glory of His inheritance, 28:04 and what is the exceeding greatness of His power toward us who believe according to the working of His mighty power. That same power that raised Christ from the dead is working in you. 28:16 Going on, which He worked in Christ when He raised Him from the dead and seated Him at the right hand in the heavenly places far above all principality and power and might and dominion and every name that is named, not only in this age, but also in that which is to come. 28:34 There is no place for the Christian to need to be defeated. It doesn't mean that we don't struggle. But what it does mean is that in that struggle, there is victory. There is joy. There is growth. 28:52 There is a life-giving dynamic presence that comes by the Spirit of God living within us, living the life of the Lord Jesus Christ in and through us. That changes everything, delivering us from the power of darkness and every evil work, 29:11 walking in newness of life that as Christ was raised up from the dead, even so we also should walk in newness of life, not in the coldness of the old life, not in the bondage of addictions and the broken relationships and shattered dreams and the pain of abuse and the anger of injustice and the sorrow of grief, 29:32 but in the power of God, living in the newness of the Spirit, not in the oldness and the coldness of the flesh. 29:41 Until we all become equipped and edified in the body of Christ, Ephesians 4 says, "Till we all come to the unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God to a perfect man unto the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ, where we put away lying and deception and speak the truth in love, 30:01 where we put off the former conduct, the old man which grows corrupt according to the deceitful lusts of sin. And then we put on the new man which is created by God according to true righteousness and holiness." I love the phrase in the song that says, "He breaks the power of canceled sin. 30:22 He sets the prisoner free. His blood can make the foulest clean. His blood avails for me." You see that when Christ comes into your life, everything changes. Amen! Everything changes. I love the song that's signature sound. 30:41 Ernie Haas's signature sound says it's, "Jesus changed everything." And He will. And He does. He changes the mind. He changes the will. He changes the direction. He changes the emotions. He changes the affections so that that which no which time passed didn't interest us at all, 31:03 all of a sudden becomes the passion and central function of our life. And Christ will conquer death. So we've seen in this verse this morning that the Spirit of God raised up Christ from the dead. We see in this verse that Christ, 31:24 by His Spirit, dwells in you. 31:27 And now for the culmination, that if the Spirit of God raised Christ from the dead, and if the Spirit of God dwells in you, then the Spirit of God that raised Christ from the dead will also give life to your mortal body through His Spirit who lives in you, 31:48 who dwells in you, that if Christ conquered death and Christ lives in you, then Christ will conquer death for you. Amen! For me. You see, the Bible is very clear that we all have an appointment with death. It doesn't matter if you're little, 32:08 big, old, young, rich, poor, fat, skinny, ugly, pretty, beautiful, homely. It doesn't matter. It doesn't matter if you're a king or you're a beggar. Death has an appointment with your name on its calendar. Isaac said, "Behold, now I am old. 32:30 I know not the day of my death." Hebrews says it is appointed unto man once to die. And after that, the judgment. Psalm 103 says, "As for man, his days are as grass, as the flower of the field, so he flourisheth. For the wind passeth over it and it is gone. 32:50 And the place thereof shall know it no more." Ecclesiastes says that all go unto one place. All are of dust and all turn to dust again, dust to dust, ashes to ashes, earth to earth. Ecclesiastes 8 says, "No one has power over the Spirit to retain the Spirit. 33:12 And no one has power in the day of death." If you could have power, if man could have power over the day of his death and retain his Spirit in his body, he would be able to live forever. But we can't do that. We cannot do that. When that appointment comes, 33:32 brothers and sisters, when that appointment with death comes, you can be the strongest man or woman in the world, and you cannot keep your Spirit in your body. Something you can't do. There's no power of us, from us, to be able to keep on living when the body says, "It's done. 33:54 It's over." Psalm 89, verse 48 says, "Who can live and not see death? 34:01 Who can escape the power of the grave?" And while that is true, the Christian's hope, the Christian's joy, the Christian's expectation is that he who raised up Christ from the dead will also quicken our mortal bodies by His Spirit. 34:25 While death has changed everything and changes everything, the Spirit and the resurrection will change everything forever. The redemption of our bodies, the body that God created will be redeemed back into pristine condition. Death will be destroyed. 34:48 Death will be swallowed up in victory. Our bodies will be made like unto His glorious body, imperishable, not to wear out, no longer to age, no longer to experience sickness and disease, eternally healthy and forever strong. 35:08 Not in some superhuman kind of way where we can, where we got big muscles and can leap tall buildings in a single bound, and not in a superhuman kind of way, but in a way that God made a body to function at its best. 35:26 I don't know what age we're going to be when we get to heaven. I don't know what kind of age, the condition the body is going to be in. But I have a suspicion. It will be your body as God intended it to be before the fall at its best condition possible: youthful, yet mature, 35:48 beautiful, handsome, not for the glory of man, but for the glory of God. 35:57 To say, "This is God at His best." See what the Lord has done: a beautiful, shining, brightness and radiance which will be free from indwelling sin, free from abiding sin, free from the fear of death, and free from the controlling power of sin. 36:19 I can't imagine. This is so foreign to what we have ever experienced that we don't even know how to get our heads around it. I don't. Thomas Brooks was an English Puritan preacher in the 1600s. He wrote several sermons in print that are in print, 36:40 and some of which are funeral sermons. And he said this: "Death actually becomes God's meek helper. Death is another Moses. It delivers believers out of bondage and from making bricks in Egypt." Think about that. We are all our lifetime subject to the bondage of death. 37:01 However, death does at in a moment which no graces, no duties, nor any ordinances can do for a man all his lifetime. Death frees a person from those diseases, corruptions, temptations that no duties, nor graces, nor ordinances could do. 37:21 Every prayer then that we when we die shall have its answer. All hungering and thirsting shall be filled and satisfied. Every sigh, groan, and tear that has fallen from the saints' eyes shall then be recompensed. We shall be glorified. The word glorified, 37:42 Wayne Grudem says in his theology books, is defined like this: glorified is the final step in the application of redemption. 37:52 It will happen when Christ returns and raises from the dead the bodies of all believers for all time who have died and reunites them with their souls and changes the bodies of all the believers who remain alive, 38:07 thereby giving all believers at the same time perfect resurrection bodies like His own. It is going to be the greatest game changer that you've ever seen. 38:22 And so this morning, brothers and sisters, death is but an inevitable interlude that has to be passed through on the way to glorification. You can't get around it. 38:39 You can't bypass it unless we are alive and remain when the Lord returns. So we'll either go by death or by rapture, one or the other. We don't know which. There will be a generation that will not die. 38:57 We understand that from Scripture because there will be the dead in Christ that are raised up and those who alive and remain that will be caught up with them in the air to meet the Lord in the air. But I like this, and I'll close with this this morning. George Herbert, an English poet, said it like this: "Death used to be an executioner, 39:19 but the gospel has made it just a gardener." Let's pray. 39:27 Father, thank You for the truth and the power and the hope and the joy and the Spirit of life of the resurrection that dwells in us. 39:43 And Lord, we thank You that that same Spirit which raised up Christ from the dead dwells in us and through us and will one day raise us up from the dead. 39:57 And Jesus said it is true that there comes a day when all that are in the grave shall hear His voice and come forth, some to the judgment of life and some to the judgment of condemnation. 40:15 Lord, we thank You this morning for the truth of the gospel that whosoever believes and receives Jesus Christ as Savior and Lord shall not perish but have everlasting life, that he who has the Son has life, 40:35 and he who does not have the Son does not have life. 40:40 And so this morning, if there's someone here today who has never received Christ and this thought of a day appointed unto die troubles you and brings fear to your consciousness and to your heart, 41:00 strikes fear to your very soul because you've never trusted Christ. You've never believed in Christ. You've never received Jesus Christ into your life for the forgiveness of your sins. I would invite you this morning to pray with me a prayer. It's not so important the words that you say, 41:21 but the heart that says them. 41:24 Something like this: "Dear Lord Jesus, I need You in my life. I need You to be my Savior, for I have sinned and broken God's law. 41:39 I need You to be my Lord and take control of my life. Come into my life. Make me a new person because You are the Son of God, my only hope, 41:59 my only Savior, my only righteousness. Thank You for forgiving my sins. Thank You for cleansing me from all unrighteousness. Thank You for making me Your child. 42:16 And thank You for giving me the hope of eternal life in Christ's name." And if you prayed that prayer this morning with me, I invite you to tell somebody as you leave the service this morning. Tell me, 42:36 tell one of the pastors, tell one of the elders, tell one of your parents, tell your Sunday school teacher, tell somebody, "I prayed with Pastor Todd this morning to receive Jesus Christ. And would you pray with me and help me?" That is the greatest Easter gift that one could ever have. 42:59 Thank You, Lord, for this service this morning, for each one who's been in divine presence. We pray that You will dismiss us with Your blessing in Christ's name. Amen.