Rev. David Holwick K Easter sermon
First Baptist Church
Ledgewood, New Jersey
March 27, 2005
1 Peter 1:3-9
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I. What do you have to look forward to?
A. Holwick family - Easter egg hunt and birthday party for Becca.
Discussion with Celeste this week on our future.
Beyond this year - empty nest, retirement, old age, then ???
B. Easter speaks to the question marks.
1) What will happen to me?
2) If I assume good will happen, how can I know it is true?
II. Easter is all about hope. 1:3
A. Resurrection of Jesus started something special.
1) It was a remarkable event, and not just for Jesus.
2) His resurrection can mean something for each of us.
B. New birth becomes a possibility.
1) This is what Jesus meant when he discussed being born again.
a) Something new is born in our soul.
b) It has an effect on everything in our lives.
2) The new birth is by God's mercy and gift, not our effort.
3) It is our decision whether we receive it or not.
C. A living hope.
1) Hoping, or just enduring?
Samuel Taylor Coleridge said, "Hope without an object
cannot live."
If you have ever lost the focus of your life, you understand
hopelessness.
Perhaps you have poured yourself into your job, marriage,
or the struggles of life; only to see it destroyed.
The object of your hope was gone, and you felt dead and
aimless.
Psychologist William Marston asked 3,000 people this
question: "What do you have to live for?"
94 percent responded that they were merely enduring their
lives, hoping someday that things would get better.
This seems so inadequate.
#3639
2) Hope can help you hang on.
A few years ago the psychology department of Duke University
carried out an interesting experiment.
They wanted to see how long rats could swim.
In one container they placed a rat for whom there was no
possibility of escape.
He swam a few moments and then ducked his head to drown.
(It is obvious this was not a New Jersey university - the
researchers would have been arrested.)
In the other container they made the hope of escape possible
for the rat.
The rat swam for several hours before finally drowning.
The conclusion of the experiment was just the opposite of
our common conclusion.
We usually say, "As long as there is life, there is hope."
The Duke experiment proved, "As long as there is hope,
there is life."
#14123
3) Where can hope come from?
Vaclav Havel, the first democratic president of Czechoslovakia[*],
and who was a prisoner of the communists for many years,
was asked if he saw any grounds for hope in this world.
He answered:
"I should probably say that the kind of hope I often think
about (especially in situations that are particularly
hopeless, such as prison) I understand above all as a
state of mind, not a state of the world.
Either we have hope within us or we don't;
It is a dimension of the soul, and it's not essentially
dependent on some particular observation of the world or
estimate of the situation...
I think the deepest and most important form of hope, the only
one that can keep us above water and urges us to good works,
and the only true source of the breathtaking dimension of
the human spirit and its efforts, is something we get,
as it were, from "elsewhere."
#18449
4) Christians don't just have hope, we have a living hope.
a) Our hope is not from "somewhere," but from God.
b) This hope is a continuous (living) experience.
c) God gives us a new perspective on life.
D. The best is yet to come. 1:4
1) Our hope will be fulfilled as an inheritance, in heaven.
2) Nothing in this world can touch it.
III. Easter is all about God's power. 1:5
A. God's power raised Jesus from the dead.
1) The world's attention this week has been on the power
of a human to hasten another's death. (Terri Schiavo)
2) In extreme situations like this, we often say, "let nature
take its course," or, "Let God's will be done."
3) God certainly allows death to occur. But his real business
is creating new life, even out of death.
a) The resurrection on Easter morning was a demonstration
of God's live-giving power.
B. God's power will shield us. 1:5
1) A divine protection is implied.
a) But as following verses will show, this doesn't mean
bad things never happen to us.
b) It does mean nothing in the world can harm our soul.
2) We are shielded until the Second Coming occurs.
a) This is not a day of catastrophe, but of salvation.
b) It is something to look forward to.
IV. The joy of Easter can overcome any grief. 1:6
A. We can have joy because of God's promises.
1) Jesus is coming back.
2) Salvation will encompass everything, not just our souls.
a) God's will, will truly be done on earth as it is in
heaven.
B. But we can suffer now - what Peter calls "a little while."
1) Eternity will put it in a different perspective.
2) Right now, maybe all we see is "all kinds of trials."
C. The trials have a purpose.
1) Trials prove our faith genuine.
2) Trials can bring glory to God.
V. We don't see yet... 1:8
A. Our perspective is limited and our faith incomplete.
1) Almost all of us would like more answers.
a) We have honest questions for God.
b) Questions not just about he suffering and pain,
but the miracles and promises.
2) Fortunately, faith does not require sight.
a) Indeed, the Bible says faith is being certain
of what we do NOT see. Hebrews 11:1
b) Faith is not totally blind either:
1> It takes the evidence we can see.
2> It then trusts God for what we cannot see.
B. Peter had the advantage of knowing and seeing Jesus.
1) We do not have this privilege.
2) But we do have a blessing. John 20:29
Right after his resurrection, Jesus encountered "Doubting
Thomas" and said to him:
"Because you have seen me, you have believed;
Blessed are those who have not seen and yet have
believed."
3) Despite our limited faith, we can do three things: 1:8
a) We can love Jesus.
b) We can believe in him.
c) We can be filled with joy.
1> Not just a warm feeling, but an inexpressible and
glorious excitement.
VI. Easter turns "can'ts" into "cans".
Eric Butterworth tells of a young soldier who lost his legs
after stepping on a land mine while serving in Bosnia.
When he awoke in the military hospital in Germany and found
that he would never walk again, something died within him.
He lay in his hospital bed, staring blankly at the ceiling.
He refused to talk with anyone.
He refused to cooperate with the doctors and nurses.
All he wanted to do was to die.
One day a young man strolled into his room and sat down in
the chair near his bed.
Quietly he drew from his pocket a harmonica and began to
play softly.
The patient looked at him for a moment, then back at the
ceiling.
That was all for that day.
The next day the harmonica player came again.
For several days he continued to come and play quietly for
the young soldier in the bed.
One day he said, "Does my playing bother you?"
The patient in the bed said, "No, I guess like it."
They talked for a while and each day their conversation
went a little longer.
One day the harmonica player was in a happy mood.
He played a lively tune and began to do a tap dance.
However the other soldier in the bed looked on, unimpressed.
"Hey, why don't you smile once and let the world know you're
alive?" the dancer said.
The legless soldier just replied, "I might as well be dead
as in the fix I'm in."
"Okay," answered his happy friend, "so you're dead.
But you're not as dead as the guy who was crucified 2,000 years
ago and he came out of it okay."
"Oh, that's easy for you to say," the patient replied, "but
if you were in my fix, you'd sing a different tune."
With that the dancer stood up and said, "I know a
2,000-year-old resurrection is pretty far in the dim past.
So maybe an up-to-date example will help you believe it can be
done."
And with that he pulled up the trouser legs of his pants and
the young man in the bed looked and saw two artificial limbs.
The tap-dancing fellow with the harmonica was not just some
starry-eyed Pollyanna.
He himself had once lay where the young soldier lay.
He, too, had faced the despair of a loss.
He too had thought, "I can't go on."
But the resurrection of Jesus had turned his "can't" into a
"can" and he was there to share it with the young soldier
in the bed.
#25670
________
[*] To be precise, Havel was the first (and last) elected president of
Czeckoslovakia and the first president of the Czech Republic. In both
situations he was elected by parliament.
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SOURCES FOR ILLUSTRATIONS USED IN THIS SERMON:
# 3639 "The God of Great Surprises, Dr. Bill Ankerberg, Homewood Church of
Homewood, Illinois; in the 50 Day Spiritual Adventure, Chapel of
the Air, April 7, 1996.
#14123 "Kept Alive By Hope," Bruster & Dale, in the Fredericksburg church
of Christ Illustration Collection.
#18449 "Is There Grounds For Hope In This World?" John Shea in STARLIGHT
(New York: Crossroad, 1992), pp. 10-11, quoted by Dr. Roger Davis,
First United Methodist Church of Pittsfield,
Massachusetts, December 29, 2002.
#25670 "Easter Hope For An Amputee," Eric Butterworth, from the sermon
"God's Yes To Life's No" by Rev. Lee Griess, Luther Memorial
Lutheran Church; Omaha, Nebraska (#16703 in Kerux Database).
These and 25,000 others are part of a database that can be downloaded,
absolutely free, at http://www.holwick.com/database.html
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Passage outline
I. New birth into living hope.
A. through the resurrection
B. into an imperishable inheritance
II. Shielded by God's power.
A. Through our faith.
B. Until the Second Coming.
III. Joy in the midst of grief.
A. All kinds of trials.
1) Refining fire for our faith.
2) Faith proved genuine.
3) Praise when Jesus is revealed.
B. Even though we don't see him...
1) We love him.
2) We believe in him.
3) We are filled with joy.
a) We are receiving goal of salvation.
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